Seminar room SR 201, Geb 30.42, IOC KIT

Wednesdays, 14:00-15:30, weekly from 15.05.2019

Lecture dates: weekly from 15th May 2019 

Lecture time: Wednesdays, 14:00-15:30, Seminarraum 201, 2. OG, IOC KIT, Geb 30.42

Following topics will be discussed:

Definitions of life – e.g. self-replicating chemical systems that use external energy sources to stay out of the equilibrium;

The origin of atoms and simple molecules - how the Universe, stars, planets, and molecules building them were formed?

Minimal requirements for a habitable environment – under which conditions the known forms of life can exist? Hypothetical other chemistries that could form living systems elsewhere;

The primordial soup – what pool of biologically relevant molecules likely existed on the prebiotic Earth: the Miller-Urey experiment, the formose reaction, prebiotic syntheses of aminoacids, sugars, nucleic acids, nucleotides, and lipids, prebiotic polymerization;

The origin of life – self-replicating systems, metabolism-first vs. gene-first, the “RNA world”, the origins of homochirality;

Formation of protocells – enhancing RNA with polypeptides, establishment of the genetic code, DNA as the enhanced information storage, metabolic networks, membranes;

From molecules to cells – LUCA (Last Universal Common Ancestor), information storage and function – split on different molecules, origins of the genetic code, metabolic networks and lipid membranes;

The history of life on Earth – timeline for LUCA, beginning of photosynthesis and aerobic metabolism, Eukaryotes, multicellular life, extremophilic organisms, habitable worlds outside Earth – current status of knowledge, space exploration programs;