Goldilocks time in the earlier universe; when could life have began?

[MSC]

Sort of a cross disciplinary question here that I've recently been wondering about; Was there a time in the earlier universe when the average temperature of space would have been between 0-100c? If so; for how long and could life have originated then and slowly evolved into extremophile seeding microbes, like tardigrades?

[sethoflagos]

1 hour ago, MSC said:

Sort of a cross disciplinary question here that I've recently been wondering about; Was there a time in the earlier universe when the average temperature of space would have been between 0-100c? If so; for how long and could life have originated then and slowly evolved into extremophile seeding microbes, like tardigrades?

The temperature range 4000K to 60K corresponds to a period called the 'dark ages': after recombination but before the birth of the first generation III stars.

The hydrogen + helium 'chemistry' of that era is not conducive to biology.

[MigL]

The thing to keep in mind is that the Big Bang process only produces 3 parts Hydrogen nuclei, 1 part Helium, and trivial amounts of Lithium.
These are the basic building blocks of our universe.
Heavier elements, up to A# 26, Fe or iron nucleii, are manufactured in the hearts of massive stars, as the fusion process which produces them has a net energy excess which is released.
All elements above A# 26 have an energy deficit, and energy must be added to fuse the heavier nucleii.
This energy is provided in various processes such as supeernova explosions of various types, neutron star mergers, etc, where gravity provides the added energy ( in a roundabout way ) to produce most of the known elements.

Notice that most of the elements essential for life  require stars to form from the initial Hydrogen/Helium mix ( known as population III stars ), live out their lives, and even die, before their last explosions spread trace amounts of heavier elements into the gas clouds of the early universe, to form 'dirty' population II, and I stars like our Sun and most other spiral arm stars.

Edited June 19 by MigL

[MSC]

Thanks guys! Now I know. So what was the earliest possible window when the conditions conducive to life as we know it clicked into place? 

[swansont]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2018/04/07/ask-ethan-how-fast-could-life-have-evolved-in-the-universe/

Turns out that it’s not too long, but unlikely for carbon-based life, since building up carbon takes time — carbon is from stellar cycles, not supernovae

“the very first stars of all should form somewhere around 50-100 million years after the Big Bang.”

“It's quite likely that only a few hundred million years after the first stars turned on — by time the Universe is 300 to 500 million years old — we had rocky planets forming around the most enriched stars at the time.”

—-

The next step would be to consider if life could continue, since you’d have a fair number of supernovae going off in the early universe, which isn’t conducive to life if they happen nearby. You certainly don’t want your planet to be orbiting a huge star that’s going to blow up just as the planet has cooled down and is ready for life.

[sethoflagos]

4 hours ago, swansont said:

“It's quite likely that only a few hundred million years after the first stars turned on — by time the Universe is 300 to 500 million years old — we had rocky planets forming around the most enriched stars at the time.”

As the OP specifically mentioned a tardigrade level of complexity, this would both push the timeline on by a couple of billion years and demand that those bio-friendly conditions persisted for this period without interruption by e.g. interaction with an active galactic centre (or indeed any galactic centre). The combined requirement for adequate metallicity and long duration stability may conceivably advance the timeline to a couple of billion years after the emergence of large, quiescent spiral galaxies: perhaps >50% of the current age of the universe.

Ward & Brownlee and others have pursued these avenues through the Rare Earth Hypothesis.

7 hours ago, MSC said:

... to life as we know it

Not sure what you mean here. Something more advanced than tardigrades?