The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. 2002.
chemical evolution
The formation of complex organic molecules from simpler inorganic molecules through chemical reactions in the oceans during the early history of the Earth; the first step in the development of life on this planet. The period of chemical evolution lasted less than a billion years.
‡ Some scientists believe that all or most of the Earth’s original organic molecules were created in space and were brought to the Earth’s oceans by meteorites.
