P V Sukumaran took his M Tech degree in applied geology from the University of Saugar and has been with the Geological Survey of India since 1974. His interests include petrology, geochemistry, palaeoceanography and organic evolution. He is presently posted as Director in the Department at Nagpur.

The prebiotic organic synthesis occurred in a reducing or mildly oxidising atmosphere. There was no dearth of energy sources to drive this reaction. The speculation that life originated in ocean floor vent habitats is supported by the recent discovery of fossil microbes in a mid-Archaean vent ecosystem. Evidence from nucleic acid sequencing that the last common ancestor of all extant life is a hyperthermophile also lends credence to this hypothesis. The first living molecule that held heritable genetic information was probably ribonucleic acid. The course of events that nature would have followed to reach the RNA-world is fairly clear, but simulating this course in the laboratory to reach RNA remains a formidable problem and has little relevance to an early Earth setting. A prolonged period of abiotic chemical evolution undoubtedly preceded the emergence of the first living molecule.

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Address for Correspondence
P V Sukumaran 
Director(Geol) 
Geological Survey of India 
Seminary Hills 
Nagpur 440006, India. 
Email: pvs34@yahoo.co.uk