Conducting Miller-Urey ExperimentsEric T. Parker 1, James H. Cleaves 2,3, Aaron S. Burton 4, Daniel P. Glavin 5, Jason P. Dworkin 5, Manshui Zhou 1, Jeffrey L. Bada 6, Facundo M. Fernández 1
1School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2Earth-Life Science Institute, Tokyo Institute of Technology, 3Institute for Advanced Study, 4Astromaterials Research and Exploration Science Directorate, NASA Johnson Space Center, 5Goddard Center for Astrobiology, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, 6Geosciences Research Division, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California at San Diego
The Miller-Urey experiment was a pioneering study regarding the abiotic synthesis of organic compounds with possible relevance to the origins of life. Simple gases were introduced into a glass apparatus and subjected to an electric discharge, simulating the effects of lightning in the primordial Earth’s atmosphere-ocean system. The experiment was conducted for one week, after which, the samples collected from it were analyzed for the chemical building blocks of life.
