Mechanism for spontaneous protocell emergence before Darwinian evolution

Establish a concrete physical and chemical mechanism by which a protocell could spontaneously emerge prior to Darwinian evolution on early Earth, thereby resolving the origin of life as an open question in physics and chemistry.

Background

The paper develops an information-theoretic framework combining rate–distortion theory and algorithmic complexity to assess whether a protocell could plausibly assemble under prebiotic conditions within Earth’s early time window. Despite surveying progress in nonequilibrium physics, self-organization, and autocatalytic network theory, the authors emphasize that a definitive, mechanistic account of protocell emergence from disordered chemistry has not yet been achieved.

This open problem targets the core unresolved issue: identifying a physically grounded pathway from complex but unguided prebiotic chemistry to a minimal, functional protocell capable of initiating Darwinian evolution.