The sizzling sun threw a wobbly ... and set off early life on Earth

By Peter Spinks
Updated May 25 2016 - 8:13pm, first published 7:38pm
The cradle of life? Microbial mats and stromatolites in Hamelin Pool in the Shark Bay area of Western Australia.  Some of these 3000-year-old colonies of micro-organisms resemble the oldest and simplest forms of life of about 3.5 billion years ago.  Photo: Sue Conwell
The cradle of life? Microbial mats and stromatolites in Hamelin Pool in the Shark Bay area of Western Australia. Some of these 3000-year-old colonies of micro-organisms resemble the oldest and simplest forms of life of about 3.5 billion years ago. Photo: Sue Conwell
Part of a huge chimney in a hydrothermal vent in the Atlantic Ocean.  Oceanographers and biologists believe that the earliest forms of life began in places like this. Photo: AP Photo/Scripps Institution of Oceanography
Part of a huge chimney in a hydrothermal vent in the Atlantic Ocean. Oceanographers and biologists believe that the earliest forms of life began in places like this. Photo: AP Photo/Scripps Institution of Oceanography
Solar flares are among the most powerful forces in the cosmos. Photo: NASA
Solar flares are among the most powerful forces in the cosmos. Photo: NASA
A remotely operated robotic arm breaks away part of a mineral rich "chimney" from a hydrothermal vent in prospecting in the Bismarck Sea, off PNG. Early life might have started somewhere like this.   Photo: Nautilus Minerals
A remotely operated robotic arm breaks away part of a mineral rich "chimney" from a hydrothermal vent in prospecting in the Bismarck Sea, off PNG. Early life might have started somewhere like this. Photo: Nautilus Minerals

The thorny question of how life arose on Earth has long troubled scientists. But now they have a major clue: material from ferocious, fire-spitting storms on the embryonic sun provided the spark that created the essential ingredients and climate needed for Earth's primitive life to get a toehold.

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