The Science of How Life Started

How did life get started on Earth? And how are we using what we know to look for it throughout the galaxy?

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Why is Carbon the Key to Life? (On Earth, Anyway)

Space Mirrors and Other Weird Ways to Fight Climate Change

What Meteors Reveal About Earth’s Hidden Past

What Does the Moon Smell Like?

Credits:
Executive Producers:
George Zaidan
Hilary Hudson

Producers:
Elaine Seward
Andrew Sobey

Writer/Host:
Sam Jones, PhD

Scientific consultants:
Michelle Boucher, PhD
Jason Dworkin, PhD
Lelia Duman, PhD
Nicholas Hud, PhD

Sources:
Phosphine gas in the cloud decks of Venus

Habitable zones of different stars

The Habitable Zone

Protein Synthesis and the Genetic Code

Early life on earth

Phosphate backbone

Phosphodiester Bond

Primordial soup

Life on Venus? The picture gets cloudier

A Biologist Explains: What is Life?

Alternative Definitions of Life: Perspective Matters

The Seven Pillars of Life

Darwinian Evolution

Water on Mars

Life on other planets?

Exoplanet atmospheres

Hubble versus James Webb Telescope

Ingredients for life in space

Habitability on Mars from a Microbial Point of View

Vocabulary of Definitions of Life Suggests a Definition

Goddard Media Studios--transit spectroscopy

Phosphine gas found in Venus’ atmosphere may be ‘a possible sign of life’

NASA definition of life

Meteoritic Amino Acids: Diversity in Compositions Reflects Parent Body Histories

A search for amino acids and nucleobases in the Martian meteorite Roberts Massif 04262 using liquid chromatography‐mass spectrometry

The 1953 Stanley L. Miller Experiment: Fifty Years of Prebiotic Organic Chemistry

Prebiotic Soup--Revisiting the Miller Experiment

[ACSReactions]

Did you know that “chemical” was added to NASA’s definition of “life” to exclude computer life? Sorry in silico fans!

[ParneetKaurChemistry]

I love to learn chemistry from you 😍
You make it really interesting 👍

[fizli]

great explainer, definitely deserves more views

[drewofearth]

🙌🏻 The meme interjections are really a nice touch. Great video. I’m not sure why the views are below 2k at this time. I loved it

[milanberk]

I love this subject and if you love it to, may I suggest a book: Life in the Universe - by Lewis Dartnell. it's really good

[vedantverma]

Very clean and precise video! Loved it...

[dhindaravrel]

As a Trekkie, I understand that Horta was storytelling symbol that was supposed to say that what we might perceive as monstrous and evil might have motives we don't understand, and that communicating with it and negotiating on the basis of mutual respect and common ground will lead to mutual benefit and peaceful coexistence, without one way of life totally dominating the other. The episode also meant to make us aware that our actions may have unintended consequences, and that we shouldn't mess with things we don't understand, like we shouldn't spray pesticides on crops only to find out years later that they're causing cancer or have led to the extinction of important insect species, or some such. Many examples could be given.

I sure hope no Trekkie will defend the aliens shown on Star Trek as realistic depictions of alien life. They were never meant to be. They were always meant to be representing aspects of the human condition or the world around us, and aid in the telling of stories that affect us today (or society back when Star Trek was made). Before Abrams ruined it, Star Trek episodes used to be morality plays, and that is how the alien creatures should be seen. Trying to analyse them with science, or expecting science to come up with explanations of how they could really exist, will only lead to disappointment.

[MrXdeDEdex]

But it probably won't look like this....

Hey you never know!

[fatsquirrel]

Is YouTube not sharing this? 300k subs, less than 2k views? Seems odd.

[baraskparas]

A new book published by Austin Macauley Publishers titled From Chemistry to Life on Earth outlines abiogenesis in great detail with a solution to the evolution of the genetic code and the ribosome as well as the cell in general using 290 references, 50 illustrations and several information tables with a proposed molecular natural selection formula with a worked example for ATP.
A new definition of life is proposed with a coconut viroid being the smallest living thing on Earth.

[plasma]

the green screen is causing webthingers

[BloodBlight]

I hope that webbing is from the green screen. :)

[frankkolmann]

Also you are wrong, were are primates, we did not evolve from primates. All different primates evolved from common ancestor, including humans. In fact gorillas and chimpanzees could have evolved from us.

[torbjorn.b.g.larsson]

The chemical origin hypothesis of life is a minority issue - the vast majority of geologists and biologists have no reason to reject evolution and life as a process among populations all the way from a split with hydrothermal vents "and the rest is detail". [C.f. "The physiology and habitat of the last universal common ancestor", Weiss et al., Nature Microbiology.]

[chickenlover]

As long as you limit the definition of life to being an organism, you will never find life on other planets. Heck, you won't even find all the life on this one.

[michaelhurlburt]

What if life only originated on earth?

[jimhunt]

Sorry, this is kind of a minor point, but if mules cannot reproduce how can mules undergo Darwinian evolution? Doesn't that exclude mules (or similar nonfertile hybrids) from the NASA definition of life?

[LeRoiJojo]

Perseverance should find those Protean ruins any day, now. Can't wait!

[ChemTalk]

Great video, we'll watch this with the kids tonight!

[jimtuv]

I wish that the term population had been used instead of an organism. Evolution works on populations, not individuals.