The Origins of Life PDF Download

Author: Leslie E. Orgel
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN:
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Author:
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780815332183
Category : Cells
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Author: Aleksandr Ivanovich Oparin
Publisher: Courier Dover Publications
ISBN: 9780486495224
Category : Evolution (Biology)
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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This classic of biochemistry offered the first detailed exposition of the theory that living tissue was preceded upon Earth by a long and gradual evolution of nitrogen and carbon compounds. "Easily the most scholarly authority on the question...it will be a landmark for discussion for a long time to come." — New York Times.

Author: Paul Davies
Publisher: Penguin UK
ISBN: 0141941839
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 366

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The origins of life remains one of the great unsolved mysteries of science. Growing evidence suggests that the first organisms lived deep underground, in environments previously thought to be uninhabitable, and that microbes carried inside rocks have travelled between Earth and Mars. But the question remains: how can life spring into being from non-living chemicals? THE FIFTH MIRACLE reveals the remarkable new theories and discoveries that seem set to transform our understanding of life's role in the unfolding drama of the cosmos.

Author: Manfred Eigen
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 9780198547525
Category : Evolution
Languages : en
Pages : 173

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Eigen shows that life on Earth is the inevitable result of certain chance events that took place in the unique history of our planet. He introduces how to interpret the molecular 'fossil record'. Part one are ideas that are justified scientifically. Part two shows important biological ideas and the final section summarizes developments in molecular biology.

Author: Sir Fred Hoyle
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Biochemistry
Languages : en
Pages : 28

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Author: Stuart A. Kauffman
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199826676
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 958

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Stuart Kauffman here presents a brilliant new paradigm for evolutionary biology, one that extends the basic concepts of Darwinian evolution to accommodate recent findings and perspectives from the fields of biology, physics, chemistry and mathematics. The book drives to the heart of the exciting debate on the origins of life and maintenance of order in complex biological systems. It focuses on the concept of self-organization: the spontaneous emergence of order that is widely observed throughout nature Kauffman argues that self-organization plays an important role in the Darwinian process of natural selection. Yet until now no systematic effort has been made to incorporate the concept of self-organization into evolutionary theory. The construction requirements which permit complex systems to adapt are poorly understood, as is the extent to which selection itself can yield systems able to adapt more successfully. This book explores these themes. It shows how complex systems, contrary to expectations, can spontaneously exhibit stunning degrees of order, and how this order, in turn, is essential for understanding the emergence and development of life on Earth. Topics include the new biotechnology of applied molecular evolution, with its important implications for developing new drugs and vaccines; the balance between order and chaos observed in many naturally occurring systems; new insights concerning the predictive power of statistical mechanics in biology; and other major issues. Indeed, the approaches investigated here may prove to be the new center around which biological science itself will evolve. The work is written for all those interested in the cutting edge of research in the life sciences.

Author: George Christopher Williams
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691185506
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 335

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Biological evolution is a fact—but the many conflicting theories of evolution remain controversial even today. When Adaptation and Natural Selection was first published in 1966, it struck a powerful blow against those who argued for the concept of group selection—the idea that evolution acts to select entire species rather than individuals. Williams’s famous work in favor of simple Darwinism over group selection has become a classic of science literature, valued for its thorough and convincing argument and its relevance to many fields outside of biology. Now with a new foreword by Richard Dawkins, Adaptation and Natural Selection is an essential text for understanding the nature of scientific debate.

Author: Christian De Duve
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 392

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A sweeping portrait--covering four billion years--of the possible origins and evolution of life on earth, written by a Nobel Prize-winning biochemist on the cutting edge of research into these issues.

Author: Pierre M. Durand
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022674793X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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The question of why an individual would actively kill itself has long been an evolutionary mystery. Pierre M. Durand’s ambitious book answers this question through close inspection of life and death in the earliest cellular life. As Durand shows us, cell death is a fascinating lens through which to examine the interconnectedness, in evolutionary terms, of life and death. It is a truism to note that one does not exist without the other, but just how does this play out in evolutionary history? These two processes have been studied from philosophical, theoretical, experimental, and genomic angles, but no one has yet integrated the information from these various disciplines. In this work, Durand synthesizes cellular studies of life and death looking at the origin of life and the evolutionary significance of programmed cellular death. The exciting and unexpected outcome of Durand’s analysis is the realization that life and death exhibit features of coevolution. The evolution of more complex cellular life depended on the coadaptation between traits that promote life and those that promote death. In an ironic twist, it becomes clear that, in many circumstances, programmed cell death is essential for sustaining life.