Coacervates or protocells can also be defined as a set of colloidal molecules in which the water molecules are rigidly oriented in relation to them and surrounded by a film of water, which clearly delimits the coacervates of the liquid in which they float through the air.
The coacervate is a globule formed by a membrane that has chemical substances inside it; as its complexity increases, the coacervate separates from the water forming an independent unit, which nevertheless interacts with its environment.
It was the Soviet biochemist, Alexander Oparin, who discovered and baptized them, being an essential step for the explanation of the development of life on Earth.
Alexander Oparin, assured that lifeless lipid membranes could be produced, and after numerous experiments, he obtained drops of high composition in biological molecules, which were present but separated from the aqueous medium through a primary membrane. It was precisely these drops that he baptized with the name of coacervates. In addition, Oparin could also demonstrate that chemical reactions occur within a coacervate that produce the formation of different systems, which are increasingly complex.
In coacervates, chemical reactions develop that cause increasingly complex systems. As the complexity progresses, the coacervates separate from the aqueous medium and become independent units that interact with the environment.
It can be said that the coacervates are grains or drops that are delimited by a membrane. These are sets of molecules that have two phases: the water molecules surround the grains that have different chemicals. This forms a layer that separates the coacervates from the fluid in which they develop.
One theory indicates that, in Earth's early atmosphere, there were water, carbon dioxide, ammonia, and methane. Electric discharges and solar rays gave the conditions for the appearance of the coacervates, which would have appeared in the ocean, where different organic matter had already been found. The absorption of these organic materials allowed the nutrition of the coacervates, which began to develop and generate more complex molecules.
