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Research of the origins of life in connection with a marine environment started at the end of the seventies, when the `black smokers´ in the Pacific were discovered and the Red Sea deep hydrothermal brines were found to be a fruitful environment for abiotic synthesis of life precursors. For a while this research was categorised under the heading `chemistry´, but in less than a decade the topic became fully integrated into the science of ´oceanography´. The Scientific Committee on Oceanographic Research (SCOR) initiated Working Group 91: Chemical Evolution and Origin of Life in Marine Hydrothermal Systems´. This volume contains the final report of this working group.

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1 Why are Hydrothermal Systems Proposed as Plausible Environments for the Origin of Life?.- 2 Hydrothermal Systems: Their Varieties, Dynamics, and Suitability for Prebiotic Chemistry.- 3 Modem Life at High Temperatures.- 4 Aqueous Organic Geochemistry at High Temperature/High Pressure.- 5 Chemical Environments of Submarine Hydrothermal Systems.- 6 Chemical Markers of Prebiotic Chemistry in Hydrothermal Systems.- 7 Hydrothermal Organic Synthesis Experiments.- 8 An Experimental Approach to Chemical Evolution in Submarine Hydrothermal Systems.- 9 Mineral Theories of the Origin of Life and an Iron Sulfide Example.- 10 Future Research.- Literature Cited (Chapters 1-10).

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