article_snippet: First hydrogen cyanide is dissoved in water (a) and then reacts with metals to create salts (b).
article_snippet: These are left behind by evaporation and then undergo changes due to geothermal heating (c).
article_snippet: The resulting molecules are swept away by steams and accumulate in ponds where The resulting molecules react further (d).
article_snippet: Professor Sutherland and his colleagues argue that the early Earth would have been a favourable setting for these reactions.
article_snippet: Metal containing minerals that could have catalysed the reactions were also abundant while metal meteorites could also have caused the formation of other crucial elements like phosphate.
article_snippet: In their paper, the scientists set out a series of geochemical scenarios that would have led the reactions in different directions to produce each of the necessary building blocks.
article_snippet: Evaporation for example could have caused salts for form that could have then been washed into streams where solar radiation would have driven further chemical reactions.