Gels may have given early Earth chemistry a place to organize into life

by Robert Schreiber
Berlin, Germany (SPX) Dec 03, 2025

An international team from Japan, Malaysia, the UK, and Germany has proposed that life on Earth may have emerged within sticky, surface-bound gels that formed before the first cells. The researchers argue that these prebiotic gels, attached to mineral or other surfaces, could have provided both structure and chemical environments that helped early chemistry progress toward biology.

The team describes a prebiotic gel-first framework in which semi-solid gel matrices, resembling modern microbial biofilms, hosted key steps in the origin of life. These gels could have concentrated small molecules, retained useful components, and buffered environmental fluctuations, allowing complex reaction networks to develop over time.

According to co-lead author Tony Z. Jia of Hiroshima University, the work shifts attention from individual biomolecules to the physical role of gels in organizing and supporting early chemical systems. Drawing on soft-matter chemistry and observations from modern biological gels and biofilms, the study suggests that gel structures might have enabled proto-metabolic cycles and primitive self-replicating processes before enclosed cells evolved.

Co-lead author Kuhan Chandru of the Space Science Center at the National University of Malaysia noted that gels have received relatively limited attention in origins-of-life research compared with other hypotheses. The authors reviewed and synthesized disparate studies to build a coherent narrative in which primitive gels act as a cradle for life-like chemistry.

The study also extends the gel-first idea to astrobiology, proposing that similar surface-bound gels could form on other planetary bodies. The authors introduce the concept of potential Xeno-films - gel-like structures that might arise from non-terrestrial chemistries yet play a comparable structural role to biofilms, suggesting that future life-detection missions might target such organized structures rather than only specific molecules.

The team plans experimental work to test how simple chemicals under early Earth-like conditions could have assembled into gels and what properties these materials would offer to emerging reaction networks. They aim to determine whether such gels can indeed promote concentration, selective retention, and the kinds of dynamic behaviors required for the transition from chemistry to biology.

Co-first author Ramona Khanum said the researchers hope their framework prompts further investigation of gels and other underexplored ideas in origin-of-life studies. The work was supported by funding from the University of Leeds Research Mobility Funding, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, and the Mizuho Foundation for the Promotion of Science.

Research Report:Prebiotic Gels as the Cradle of Life