Editing Autocatalysis (section)

=== Possible role in origin of life ===
{{main|Abiogenesis}}
[[File:FormoseRxn.svg|thumb|Autocatalytic cycle of formose reaction showing how glyceraldehyde can be both the catalyst and the product of one portion of this complex reaction type.|left|288px]]
An early example of autocatalysis is the [[formose reaction]], in which formaldehyde and base produce sugars and related polyols.  Characteristic of autocatalysis, this reaction rate is extremely slow initially but accelerates with time.  This kind of reaction has often been cited as being relevant to the origin of life.<ref name=ACIE/>

Autocatalysis is one explanation for [[abiogenesis]].<ref>{{cite book|author=Stuart Kauffman|title=At Home in the Universe: The Search for the Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity|isbn=978-0-19-509599-9|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=1995|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/athomeinuniverse00kauf_0}}</ref><ref>Ecology, the Ascendent Perspective", Robert Ulanowicz, Columbia Univ. Press 1997.</ref><ref>Investigations, Stuart Kauffman.</ref> Illustrative is the reaction amino adenosine and pentafluorophenyl ester in the presence of amino adenosine triacid ester (AATE).  This experiment demonstrated that autocatalysts could exhibit competition within a population of entities with heredity, which could be interpreted as a rudimentary form of [[natural selection]], and that certain environmental changes (such as irradiation) could alter the chemical structure of some of these self-replicating molecules (an analog for mutation) in such ways that could either boost or interfere with its ability to react, thus boosting or interfering with its ability to replicate and spread in the population.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Rebeck|first=Julius|title=Synthetic Self-Replicating Molecules|journal=Scientific American|date=July 1994|volume=271 |issue=1 |pages=48–55|doi=10.1038/scientificamerican0794-48 |bibcode=1994SciAm.271a..48R }}</ref>