Light into the darkness: Jena scientist researches the origin of life

Four billion years ago, the earth was an inhospitable place: hot, volcanically active and exposed to intense radiation at times. And yet the first building blocks of life emerged from this primordial soup. What role did light play in this? Corinna Kufner is investigating this question. The physicist has been Professor of Photonic Abiogenesis at Friedrich Schiller University Jena since April 2026. She had already moved from Harvard University to Jena at the end of 2024 to set up her own junior research group at the Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (Leibniz IPHT). Kufner uses ultra-fast spectroscopy to investigate how UV radiation could have triggered and influenced chemical reactions on the early Earth.

For a long time, chemical processes on the early Earth were mainly studied in the absence of light and with highly concentrated starting materials. In fact, molecules on the Earth’s surface were repeatedly exposed to intense solar radiation. Without a protective ozone layer, high-energy UV light hit them directly.

»In my doctoral thesis, I researched the fact that sunlight not only damages genetic material, but can also trigger processes that contribute to repair«, reports Corinna Kufner. »Sunlight can therefore actively repair damage in the genome.«

Current work suggests that UV radiation may have influenced the selection of early genetic building blocks. Some molecules decayed rapidly under the radiation, while others proved to be more stable and thus possibly had a better chance of becoming part of early chemical evolution.

From Harvard to Jena

Kufner’s scientific career began in Munich and led her to Harvard University after completing her doctorate. There, she broadened her perspective beyond the Earth: could processes similar to those in the primordial soup on Earth also take place on other planets? »I am driven by the question of why life has developed in the way we know it today«, says Corinna Kufner. »Are we alone in the universe? Could life have formed elsewhere under similar conditions?«

Corinna Kufner’s first encounter with Jena was at the international career workshop »Women in Photonics« at Leibniz IPHT. The event brings young female scientists from all over the world to Jena to promote professional exchange and open up career prospects in photonics.

A few years later, this first contact turned into a scientific perspective: Corinna Kufner decided|ruling|judgement in favour of a move from Harvard University to Jena. The decisive factor for her was the opportunity to set up her first own research group and combine photonic methods with questions about the origin of life.

»In Jena, photonics, Chemistry, Biology, Medicine and data science work closely together«, says Corinna Kufner. »I have found an interdisciplinary environment here for my research, which makes it possible to combine method development and basic research and which has been very supportive from the very beginning.«

Since 2025, Kufner has headed the »Photonic Abiogenesis« junior research group at Leibniz IPHT, which is funded as part of the Carl Zeiss Foundation’s Nexus programme and additionally supported by the Leibniz Association. She will also be involved in teaching at Friedrich Schiller University Jena in the future. She plans to teach course|classes on the Chemistry of Materials master’s degree programme and a seminar on Origins of Life.

Experiments on »original soup«

In the laboratory, Kufner’s team simulates the conditions of the early Earth. Using ultra-fast spectroscopic methods, the researchers visualise even extremely short-lived intermediate states: processes that only exist for billionths of a second and can hardly be observed using conventional methods.

»We will carry out experiments on primordial soup to understand which photochemical processes took place there«, explains Kufner. Her approach combines prebiotic photochemistry with ultrafast pump-probe spectroscopy. The aim is to identify new light-driven reaction pathways and better understand how light could have contributed to the development of biological functionality.

Prospects for Medicine and Space Travel

The findings extend beyond basic research. The researchers are investigating the same fundamental photochemical processes that also play a role in modern applications, for example when light specifically changes, activates or destroys molecules.

At the same time, the research provides important clues for the search for life in space. Understanding the UV conditions under which biomolecules remain stable or decay can help to estimate on which planets life could develop.