This book addresses the questions pertinent to how chemical processes became self-maintaining and self-replicating, i.e., produced life forms. Of all areas of organization in nature, such as the cosmos and animal societies, this is the least understood. The papers from the Eighth College Park Colloquium on Chemical Evolution fall within one of three groups conditions that allow for self-organization, self-organization of peptides and nucleotides, and the probability that life required organization within cell boundaries. These proceedings represent a substantial segment of the state of knowledge of the field.

Selected papers

• Molecular Coevolution of Phosphate Compounds and Polypeptides
• A Holistic Precellular Organization Model
• Photochemical Origins of Biomolecular Chirality
• Entropy and the Evolution of Complexity and Individuality
• Mechanisms of Entropy Disposal: Their Role in Shaping Prebioligical and Biological Organization
• Hydrophobicity as an Organizing Principle in the Origin of the Genetic Code
• Polymerization of Nucleotides in an Aqueous Solution
• Coevolution of Polypeptides and Nucleic Acids and Liposome Assembly
• Oparin, the First Cells, and Selection Processes
• A Study of Peptide Synthesis by Amino Acyl Nucleotide Anhydrides in Presence of Complementary Homopolynucleotides
• From Origins of Life to the Evolution of Microbial Communities: A Minimalistic Approach.

ISBN 0-937194-18-2, 1990, Hardcover, 305 pages