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Stanley Miller Experiment
Conducted in the 1950’s
Produced a few amino acids (low-level building blocks of life)
Does not demonstrate how life might have begun naturally:
- Not all amino acids produced, nor sugars, purines, etc.
- Both left and right handed forms produced
- No macromolecules produced (e.g. proteins, DNA, RNA)
- Artificial trap
- Also produced molecules destructive to life
Notes:
Another famous area of evolutionary experimentation has been in trying to produce life (or at least the precursors of life) from chemicals. It is interesting that the most widely referenced chemical evolution experiment found in textbooks today is still the Stanley Miller experiment from the 1950’s. Evidently not much progress has been made in the last 50 years! However, this experiment produced only a few amino acids, and had many problems associated with it, some of which are given on the slide.