REVIEW article
Front. Astron. Space Sci.
Sec. Astrobiology
This article is part of the Research TopicOrganic Compounds in the Universe: Synthesis, Molecular Evolution and Relevance for Prebiotic ProcessesView all 4 articles
PREBIOTIC CHEMISTRY AND THE ORIGIN OF LIVING BEINGS: CURRENT STATE, SCIENTIFIC PERSPECTIVES AND (BIO)ETHICAL ISSUES
Provisionally accepted
Ricardo Alves Ferreira1*
Rodrigo Siqueira-Batista2,3*
Rafaela Lacerda Pedra Maroca-de-Avelar2Maria Isabel Cristina Batista Mayrink2Eugênio Silva4
Felipe Gómez5- 1Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- 2Faculdade Dinamica do Vale do Piranga, Ponte Nova, Brazil
- 3Universidade Federal de Vicosa, Viçosa, Brazil
- 4Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- 5Centro de Astrobiologia, Torrejón de Ardoz, Spain
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Throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, studies into prebiotic chemistry have made a decisive contribution to research into the origins of life. This is the theme of this article, conceived as an integrative bibliographic review, carried out by consulting descriptors in DeCS (https://decs.bvsalud.org/) and MeSH (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/mesh/), which enabled the design of the search strategies used to retrieve articles in PubMed (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) and SciELo (https://scielo.org/). After the article selection process, 45 texts were chosen and used to prepare this manuscript. The information collected was organized into six sections – (i) Primordial chemistry of the Earth; (ii) First organic compounds; (iii) Prebiotic chemical structures; (iv) Original living beings; (v) Scientific perspectives; and (vi) (bio)ethical implications – in which the main results and respective discussions were gathered. It is important to highlight the long road that has been traveled towards a better understanding of the events that culminated in the origins of life. The link 2 between science and ethics in this process is essential as a prerequisite for building responsible knowledge that considers the value of all forms of existence.
Keywords: Astrobiology, cosmochemistry, Earth, prebiotic chemistry, Search for extraterrestrial life
Received: 09 Aug 2025; Accepted: 08 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Ferreira, Siqueira-Batista, Maroca-de-Avelar, Mayrink, Silva and Gómez. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Ricardo Alves Ferreira
Rodrigo Siqueira-Batista
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