Benjamin Nettersheim, a geobiologist at the University of Bremen in Germany, Jochen Brocks, a palaeobiogeochemist at the Australian National University in Canberra, and their colleagues decided to focus on short-lived molecules that modern eukaryotes make while synthesizing sterols.

德国不莱梅大学的地球生物学家本杰明·内特谢姆、澳大利亚国立大学堪培拉分校的古生物地球化学家约翰·布洛克斯及其同事决定将重点放在现代真核生物合成类固醇时产生的短寿命分子上。