Evolution Before Replicators: How Spatial Grooves Enable Heredity Without Copying

How did evolution begin before RNA or DNA existed? Traditional models assume heredity requires molecular copying, creating a paradox: complex replicators are needed to evolve, but evolution is needed to create them. This paper proposes a simple, testable alternative: heredity can emerge from persistent spatial grooves—microscopic patterns formed on mineral surfaces by self-amplifying chemical networks. These grooves carry information about a network’s assembly history and influence the formation of subsequent networks, creating parent-offspring resemblance without any copying of molecules. Combined with natural variation and selection, this allows genuine evolution in prebiotic chemistry, long before replicators appeared. Far from contradicting RNA-based models, this framework precedes and sets the stage for molecular evolution, showing how evolution could operate in simpler chemical systems first. The paper provides clear predictions for experimental validation, offering a pathway to test the origins of heredity and the earliest forms of life. Key points: Proposes a mechanism for heredity before molecular replicators existed. Explains how simple chemical networks could evolve through surface-mediated memory. Offers experimentally testable predictions in accessible chemical systems. Provides a conceptual bridge to later RNA- and DNA-based evolution.