Metals play a very important role in the living world. It is therefore interesting to consider the origin of these metals, which autotrophic organisms find in the surface layers of the Earth's crust.
The Earth is a differentiated body, and metals such as iron are concentrated mainly in the planet's core. Nevertheless, iron and many other metals remain in the crust. Why ? The answer to this question begs another. Where do terrestrial metals or, more generally, the metals found in the planets, satellites and asteroids that make up the solar system come from? They must already have been present in the solar proton nebula in which all these bodies were formed. But why? The answer to this question is well known, but it leads to yet another question, and then to yet another, until we reach the limit of our ability to answer it. In the framework of the standard cosmological model, the only elements present in the primordial Universe were light elements (essentially H and He). Our Universe therefore necessarily experienced a " pre-metallic " state.
The presentation therefore focused on the origin of metals in the Universe, but also on the contribution of metals, organic matter and water to the primitive Earth, during the so-called post-accretionary phase.
