📗 The Theory of Receptor-Origin of Life

Introduction
The problem of the origin of life on planets remains unresolved: Darwin’s theory explains the mechanisms of evolution but does not answer the question of where the first living system came from. Existing hypotheses (RNA world, lipid world, Oparin’s protocells, etc.) focus on chemistry but do not provide a universal criterion for drawing the line between the non-living and the living.
The proposed theory is based on topological analysis and introduces a new criterion: life does not begin with replication or heredity, but with the appearance of a receptor — the ability to perceive a signal from the external environment.

1. Initial Environment
On young planets with oceans (the so-called “primordial soup”), simple organic structures were formed: lipid spherules, toroidal bubbles, filaments, and tubules. These formations emerged and disintegrated continuously, generated by ongoing physicochemical processes.

2. Basic Topological Forms
In three-dimensional space (ℝ³), stable compact forms are limited to:
• The sphere (a closed shell with no holes),
• The torus (a closed shell with one hole).
Filaments and tubules can be viewed as derived deformations of these forms. Thus, the original “alphabet of life” consists of two topological classes: the sphere and the torus.

3. Transition to the Living
Traditional models associate the origin of life with self-replication. In this theory, the transition is defined differently:
• Non-living = a form without reception;
• Living = a form possessing at least one receptor (a molecule or structure sensitive to external stimuli — light, ions, chemical gradients).
The appearance of a receptor transforms a closed sphere or torus into a system capable of distinguishing between inside and outside. This is the minimal condition for life.

4. Process Dynamics
Over 1.5 to 2 billion years, trillions of organic formations appeared and vanished in the ocean.
Elementary receptors occasionally emerged within them (e.g., light-sensitive pigments or ion channels).
Most of these systems quickly disappeared: life flickered and faded.
Eventually, reception became linked to metabolism — an external signal stabilized the internal chemistry. This formed the first stable living organism.

5. Scientific Innovation
• A new criterion for life: life is defined by the presence of a receptor, not the ability to replicate or inherit.
• A topological framework: in 3D space, only two original living forms are possible — the sphere and the torus.
• A process-based model: life did not emerge “once,” but flickered into and out of existence countless times, until a successful version was stabilized.
• A shift in focus: from chemical to informational origin — the key transition is not reproduction but perception of the world.

6. Conclusions
The emergence of life is not a single event, but a long process of selection, which lasted longer than subsequent evolution.
The critical moment was the birth of the first receptor, enabling information exchange between form and environment.
Evolution only began once stable receptor forms became fixed — explaining the gap between a long pre-life era and the rapid development of life that followed.

📌 Thus, this theory answers a question left open by the Darwinian paradigm: where did the first living system (the first bacterium) come from? It did not arise as a “lucky chemical combination for replication,” but as a topological form with a receptor, fixed in oceanic selection after trillions of failed attempts.