On Life's Beginnings with Nick Lane

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Our guest today is Nick Lane, who offers fresh insights on the theories of the origins of life. He is a Professor of Evolutionary Biochemistry in the Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment at University College London.

Nick’s research is on the way that energy flow has shaped evolution over 4 billion years, using a mixture of theoretical and experimental work to address the origin of life, the evolution of complex cells and downright peculiar behaviour such as sex.

He has received many awards for his work. Among them the 2015 Biochemical Society Award for his outstanding contribution to molecular life sciences and 2016 Royal Society Michael Faraday Prize and Lecture, the UK’s premier award for excellence in communicating science.

Nick is the author of five acclaimed books on evolutionary biochemistry, which have sold more than 150,000 copies worldwide, and been translated into 25 languages.

We talk about:

• How it all began deep in the ocean
• The similarity between a cell and the planet
• Is the earth only a giant battery
• How there are no clear definitions of what life is
• How cloning is boring and sex creates difference
• The innovation of multi- over single cell life
• How Genes shouldn’t be in the limelight, while chemistry is doing all the work
• The three domains of life

Let’s go back to the beginning!

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