The Origin of Life
By: Translation with annotations by Sergius Morgulis
Edition: 2d ed., with a new introd. by the translator.
Publisher: Dover Publications
Published: 1953
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 270
Subjects: Evolution; Biochemistry; Molecular evolution; Origin of life
Genres: Non-fiction; Science (Biology)
First sentence: "The question of the origin of life, of its first appearance on Earth, still occupies the human mind, as it has done since the most remote antiquity."
Description: This book was written in 1937 by Professor A. I. Oparin, Associate Director of the Biochemical Institute of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Science and, although today's science is far advanced beyond that period, it offers insights into the early investigations of what would today be called molecular evolution.  A full sixteen years before Stanley Miller's famous discharge experiments of 1953, chemists and biologists were already investigating assorted prebiotic pathways and chemical reactions that could produce complex organic molecules like those associated with life.
Notes: Includes bibliography.
Table of contents: title: Theories of Spontaneous Generation of Life; title: Theories of the Continuity of Life; title: Theories of the Origin of Life at Some Distant Period of the Earth's Existence; title: Primary Forms of Carbon and Nitrogen Compounds; title: Origin of Organic Substances - Primary Proteins; title: The Origin of Primary Colloidal Systems; title: Origin of Primary Organisms; title: Further Evolution of Primary Organisms; title: Conclusion