Is there a computer simulation of the origin of life?

Question

I haven't been able to find a description of one on the net. I haven't been able to find any articles about the achievement.

I mean, we've figured out what happened, all the way back to the big bang, and we've figured out that the cycle just repeats, right? And we've figured out how evolution works. So someone must have created a computer simulation, or at least a description of what it would be like. There must have been big news about it. It must be so cool.

Can anyone please direct me to the webpage? Thanks.

Answer 1

The big bang theory explains why ALL matter in the universe is expanding outwards from a central point in space (just like it would if there were, let’s say, an explosion) and that is all it explains. No, it doesn’t collapse and expand again.

We do not fully understand evolution. It is a theory…….The theory which all the evidence suggest, hence the reason it is the accepted theory. It doesn’t attempt to explain the origin of life, there is no evidence to formulate a theory on the origin yet but we are working on it.

Answer 2

Would you believe it that someone actually built one? Granted, it uses a novel form of computer code instead of molecules, but it gets the point across about randomness leading to complexity and order:

http://dllab.caltech.edu/avida/

If you are looking for an atom-by-atom computer simulation, wait a few centuries. Simulating interactions among biological molecules accurately sucks computing power, and people can't build something that could do it within a human lifetime.

If you liked that, you will also find the universe simulation interesting. A few astrophysicists took some educated guesses and a month on one of the fastest supercomputers ever built to simulate from the big bang onwards.

http://www.virgo.dur.ac.uk/new/index.php?subject=millennium

The resolution wouldn't even come close to showing, say, a planet, but it will show galactic superclusters just fine...

Its ironic that people understand the tiny and the incomprehensibly enormous, but not the in-between:)

Answer 3

You are talking about the origin of DNA. This is still only at a state of a few theories. Many believe that amino acids were the start of that chain of simple nucleotides. It's just hydrogen bonds when you really break it down. Do you believe that there is a primordial soup that created those acids, or do you believe that a god was instantly created at once?

Answer 4

Well of course there is only one computer powerful enough to simulate the universe itself and how life could come about in it somewhere. That computer is the universe itself.

In terms of a simpler approach -- perhaps that of a "Primordial Soup". I tried a "primordial computer simulation" Google search and found this:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=2442691&dopt=Abstract

Not sure if that's promising to you.

I recommend that as you continue to search, you use the phrases primordial and abiogenesis, which are the technical terms of what you're looking for, if I understand them correctly.

Answer 5

Thers a game from the late 80s 90s called earth sim or something like that that descs that your looking for.

Answer 6

Although evolution *does not* explain the origin of life there are software programs that use its algorithms. Here's a couple:

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/news/releases/2004/antenna/antenna.html

http://www.solver.com/gabasics.htm