Investigate mechanisms of selection and the abiotic-to-biotic transition in Assembly

Investigate the mechanism(s) for selection and characterize the transition in the Assembly measure from the abiotic world to the biotic world.

Background

The paper emphasizes that Assembly Theory seeks to explain how selection generates complexity and to bridge the origin of selection before genetics to contemporary biology.

The authors explicitly state that there are many open questions about the underlying mechanisms of selection and about how Assembly changes from abiotic to biotic contexts, indicating key research directions for developing the theory.

References

AT as a theory is still in its infancy, with many open questions remaining about the mechanism for selection, and the transition in Assembly from the abiotic world to the biotic world.

— Assembly Theory and its Relationship with Computational Complexity  (2406.12176 - Kempes et al., 2024) in Generalizing Assembly Theory Beyond Covalent Chemistry

First, it is not clear that there is any real distinction between an abiotic world and a “prebiotic” world, because we do not know if it can be knowable that a planet is on the way from non-life to life prior to that life emerging.

— The Epistemic Risk of the 31st Spore: If Planets Aren't Fine Tuned, We're Doing Life Detection Wrong  (2609.10604 - Smith et al., 8 Sep 2026) in Section “Our near-complete ignorance on the fragility of nascent biospheres”