Quotes About Autocatalytic

The hypothetical RNA replicase would be a self-replicating molecule, while the citric acid cycle is an autocatalytic network of chemical reactions. This isn't a shortcoming of the citric acid cycle, but another hint that a defining feature of life may not require RNA replicators and their genetic information: Life can exist before genes.

The conditions for developing organisms with many of the properties considered characteristic of living beings, by evolutionary processes, do not have to be similar to those prevailing on Earth," he concluded, based on his numerical evolution experiments at the IAS. "There is every reason to believe that any planet on which a large variety of molecules can reproduce by interconnected (or symbiotic) autocatalytic reactions, may see the formation of organisms with the same properties.