Biopoiesis

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The process by which living organisms arise from non-living chemical matter through natural chemical and physical processes
2. The emergence of life from inanimate chemical substances through spontaneous organization and self-replication mechanisms
3. The natural generation of biological systems from non-living molecular components via chemical synthesis and organization

Etymology: "Biopoiesis" is built from two Greek elements: "bios," meaning life, and "poiesis," meaning making or production, the same root that gives English "poem" and "poetry." Together they describe the making of living things, and the term is used for the hypothetical process by which life could have arisen from non-living chemicals. The "-poiesis" ending is a productive suffix in modern scientific vocabulary, found in words such as "hematopoiesis," the formation of blood cells. Scientists coined "biopoiesis" by applying that pattern to the origin of life itself, so the word is a technical construction rather than an ancient one. Its meaning is the generation of life from chemistry, a process no one has directly observed.