Question

How did the miller-urey experiment test oparin’s hypothesis?

Answer 1

Hint: Oparin gave the hypothesis in 1924 that the Earth's atmosphere was extremely reducing in its early stages of development. This means that the atmosphere had an excess of negative charge and could cause reducing reactions by adding electrons to compounds. Miller and Urey tried to prove this hypothesis by conducting experiments.

Complete answer:
> It is estimated by geologists that the formation of Earth took place approximately five billion years ago. The earliest evidence of life on Earth comes from fossils discovered in Western Australia that date back to about 3.5 billion years ago owing to asteroid bombardment.
> Russian scientist, A. Oparin and English scientist, J. B. S. Haldane both separately proposed that life on Earth could have arisen step-by-step from non-living matter. The early Earth had a reducing atmosphere, meaning an oxygen-poor atmosphere in which molecules tend to donate electrons.
> In 1953, Stanley Miller and Harold Urey tried to test Oparin and Haldane’s hypothesis by conducting experiments. They found that organic molecules like amino acids and DNA could be spontaneously produced under reducing conditions. They built a closed system containing a heated pool of water and a mixture of gases like water vapor, ammonia, methane, and hydrogen. To simulate the lightning that might have provided energy for chemical reactions in Earth’s early atmosphere, Miller and Urey sent sparks of electricity through their experimental system.
> After experimenting for a week, Miller and Urey found that various types of amino acids, sugars, lipids, and other organic molecules had formed spontaneously from simple compounds.

Note: Scientists now believe that the atmosphere of early earth was not as predicted by Oparin and Haldane. So, Miller and Urey may not have done an accurate simulation of conditions on early Earth.