At the beginning of life, a community of early replicons (pieces of genetic information capable of self-replication) existed in proximity to a food source such as a hot spring or hydrothermal vent. This food source also produced lipid-like molecules self-assembling into vesicles that could enclose replicons. Close to the food source replicons thrived, but further away the only non-diluted resources would be inside vesicles. Therefore, evolutionary pressure could push replicons along two paths of development: merging with a vesicle, giving rise to cells; and entering the vesicle, using its resources, multiplying and leaving for another vesicle, giving rise to viruses.
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[ 27.6 ms ] story [ 141 ms ] threadSadly, upon reading it, I got this unsavory feeling this would end as "evidence" on an episode of Ancient Aliens.
here's an HN friendly paper discussing the origin of life via information theory:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtbi.2019.03.009.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S002251931...
this paper is the cite for this section of the wikipedia article:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viral_evolution
At the beginning of life, a community of early replicons (pieces of genetic information capable of self-replication) existed in proximity to a food source such as a hot spring or hydrothermal vent. This food source also produced lipid-like molecules self-assembling into vesicles that could enclose replicons. Close to the food source replicons thrived, but further away the only non-diluted resources would be inside vesicles. Therefore, evolutionary pressure could push replicons along two paths of development: merging with a vesicle, giving rise to cells; and entering the vesicle, using its resources, multiplying and leaving for another vesicle, giving rise to viruses.