From early Earth to Enceladus—mineral electrochemistry could drive organic synthesis
Abstract
Hydrothermal systems in the ocean can behave like fuel cells when minerals connect reduced vent fluids to oxidized seawater, sustaining electrical potentials that drive reactivity. A Nature Communications study experimentally demonstrates how that potential could reduce CO2 on minerals to form organic products under conditions relevant from the early Earth to Enceladus.
Copyright and License
© The Author(s) 2026. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Acknowledgement
My deepest gratitude to Dr. Laura M. Barge (NASA JPL/Caltech) and Dr. Jessica M. Weber (NASA JPL/Caltech) for meaningful suggestions, review of and support in writing this article. I would also like to thank Dr. John-Paul Jones (NASA JPL/Caltech) for discussions on electrochemical principles in geochemical analogues of fuel cells and his advice on CO2 electroreduction selectivity, including the parallels to single-atom alloy concepts in catalysis. My thanks to the boundless enthusiasm, geochemical education, and encouragement provided by my mentor and friend Professor George R. Rossman† (Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences, Caltech).
Files
s41467-026-71131-6.pdf
Additional details
Identifiers
- PMCID
- PMC13066395
- PMID
- 41957376
Related works
- Describes
- Journal Article: https://rdcu.be/fdEbp (URL)
Dates
- Submitted
-
2026-02-11
- Accepted
-
2026-03-04
- Available
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2026-04-09Version of record
Caltech Custom Metadata
- Caltech groups
- Kavli Nanoscience Institute , Keck Institute for Space Studies , Division of Engineering and Applied Science (EAS)
- Publication Status
- Published