Quantum tunnelling is a phenomenon which becomes relevant at the nanoscale and below. It is a paradox from the classical point of view as it enables elementary particles and atoms to permeate an energetic barrier without the need for sufficient energy to overcome it. Tunnelling might seem to be an exotic process only important for special physical effects and applications such as the Tunnel Diode, Scanning Tunnelling Microscopy (electron tunnelling) or Near-field Optical Microscopy operating in photon tunnelling mode. However, this review demonstrates that tunnelling can do far more, being of vital importance for life: physical and chemical processes which are crucial in theories about the origin and evolution of life can be traced directly back to the effects of quantum tunnelling. These processes include the chemical evolution in stellar interiors and within the cold interstellar medium, prebiotic chemistry in the atmosphere and subsurface of planetary bodies, planetary habitability via insolation and geothermal heat as well as the function of biomolecular nanomachines. This review shows that quantum tunnelling has many highly important implications to the field of molecular and biological evolution, prebiotic chemistry and astrobiology.

中文翻译：

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生命起源和进化的量子隧道

量子隧穿是一种在纳米级及以下变得相关的现象。从经典的观点来看，这是一个悖论，因为它使基本粒子和原子能够穿透能量屏障，而无需足够的能量来克服它。隧道可能似乎是一种奇异的过程，仅对特殊物理效应和应用很重要，例如隧道二极管、扫描隧道显微镜（电子隧道）或在光子隧道模式下运行的近场光学显微镜。然而，这篇综述表明隧道效应可以做的更多，对生命至关重要：在生命起源和进化理论中至关重要的物理和化学过程可以直接追溯到量子隧道效应。这些过程包括恒星内部和冷星际介质中的化学演化、大气和行星体表面下的益生元化学、通过日照和地热产生的行星宜居性以及生物分子纳米机器的功能。这篇综述表明，量子隧道效应对分子和生物进化、生命前化学和天体生物学领域具有许多非常重要的意义。