In the heart of the oceans, in total darkness, perhaps the key to one of the greatest chapters in our history occurred: the birth of life. Far from the surface and sunlight, improbable chemical ...

Few questions have captivated humankind more than the origin of life on Earth. How did the first living cells come to exist? How did these early protocells develop the structural membranes necessary ...

In a new book, astrophysicist Mario Livio describes how the existence of life on Earth can be traced back to an RNA-based “protocell.” The following is an excerpt from Is Earth Exceptional?: The Quest ...

When a bone grows, our bodies’ proteins help provide the structure. When a muscle tears, proteins help rebuild it. When we fight an infection, transport oxygen in our blood or send messages to a cell, ...

In many submerged regions, murky mud shelters strange life-forms that seem to be the key to one of the biggest mysteries of life on Earth. These creatures belong to a domain of life called the archaea ...

The emergence of the first biopolymers and their building blocks on the early Earth is considered a key moment in the origin of life (OoL), but how life began on the prebiotic Earth from a pile of ...