The emergence of life on Earth (and elsewhere) must have occurred in a milieu that is far from equilibrium, such as at alkaline hydrothermal vents that would have harboured built-in gradients in temperature, redox potential and pH along with precipitated iron-bearing minerals capable of separating these gradients, concentrating reactants and catalysing requisite protobiotic reactions. Iron-bearing minerals such as mackinawite, greenalite and fougèrite have been investigated as catalysts for protobiotic reactions, including amino acid synthesis. In the field of heterogeneous catalysis, it is well known that defect sites in the crystal structure are often the most active sites for catalysis, and mineral catalysts that have been exposed to ionizing radiation are known to exhibit increased reactivity due to radiation-induced defect sites. In this work, we (i) review the literature on the radioactive environment of the Hadean era, (ii) highlight the role of radionuclide ionizing radiation from 238U, 232Th and 40K in generating defect sites with high catalytic activity for the chemical evolution of organic molecules, and (iii) hypothesize that these processes accelerated the emergence of life.

中文翻译：

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含铁矿物中放射性核素引起的缺陷位点可能加速了生命的出现。

地球（和其他地方）上生命的出现必定发生在远离平衡的环境中，例如在碱性热液喷口处，那里会存在内置的温度梯度、氧化还原电位和 pH 值以及沉淀的含铁矿物能够分离这些梯度、浓缩反应物并催化必要的益生菌反应。含铁矿物（例如绿铁矿、绿铁矿和福特铁矿）已被研究作为益生菌反应（包括氨基酸合成）的催化剂。在多相催化领域，众所周知，晶体结构中的缺陷位点通常是催化最活跃的位点，并且已知暴露于电离辐射的矿物催化剂由于辐射诱导的缺陷位点而表现出更高的反应活性。在这项工作中，我们（i）回顾了有关冥古宙放射性环境的文献，（ii）强调了来自 238U、232Th 和 40K 的放射性核素电离辐射在生成具有高催化活性的缺陷位点方面的作用，这些缺陷位点对有机物的化学演化具有高催化活性。分子，以及（iii）假设这些过程加速了生命的出现。