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How Life and Luck Changed Earth’s Minerals
Is evolution predictable, or was it heavily shaped by random events? Biologists have argued over this question for decades. Some have suggested that if we replayed the history of life...
A Timely Fix for a Grand Theory of Nature
...up and spinning out to affect the evolution of the ecosystem. In the new study, the team focuses on two forests, one in Panama and one in Malaysia. Using census...
Droplets That ‘Come to Life’
...these active-droplet “protocells” divided and proliferated, evolution could have acted on them, gradually making them more complex and leading to the rise of living cells. The physics of active-droplet division...
How Could Life Evolve From Cyanide?
...evolutionary history as a recorded “tape of life” that might turn out differently if it were replayed again and again. In this episode, Steven Strogatz speaks with two researchers inspecting...
Vaccines Are Pushing Pathogens to Evolve
...Ph.D. in pathology, had always been fascinated by bacteria and evolutionary biology. And something evolutionarily profound was about to happen to bacteria in America. A new vaccine called Prevnar 7...
Quanta Writers and Editors Discuss Trends in Science and Math
...— there’s an overwhelming amount of evidence for evolution itself. There’s no question that evolution itself occurred, but there are questions about specific mechanisms by which it works. And thinking...
Billion-Year-Old Algae and Newer Genes Hint at Land Plants’ Origin
...big mysteries of evolution. Before then, terrestrial land was home only to microbial life. The first green plants to find their way out of the water were not the soaring...
Why Do We Get Old, and Can Aging Be Reversed?
...happens with age. Evolution didn’t try to make us old. Evolution tried to make us young and healthy. And sometimes that came at a cost. Strogatz (03:56): It’s a fascinating...
Moonlighting Genes Evolve for a Venomous Job
...it’s likely that this mode of evolution could have been underestimated because other studies have rarely compared evolutionary next of kin. “If you look at species that are very, very...