The life of super-Earths
Subtitle: how the hunt for alien worlds and artificial cells will revolutionize life on our planet
By: Dimitar Sasselov
Publisher: Basic Books
Published: 2012
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 202
ISBN-13: 9780465021932; 9780465023400
Subjects: Origin; Extrasolar planets; SCIENCE / Life Sciences / Biological Diversity; Life; Synthetic biology; Life on other planets; Exobiology; SCIENCE / Astrophysics & Space Science
Description: "In the past year, we have witnessed unprecedented breakthroughs in the seemingly unrelated fields of synthetic biology and exoplanetary astronomy. Just recently, arsenic-based bacteria was discovered in a California lake-both puzzling and electrifying the scientific world. In The Life of Super-Earths, expert astronomer Dimitar Sasselov aims to highlight these groundbreaking findings and explain how what we learn in the laboratory informs our investigation of the universe, and vice versa. The discovery of a New Earth, or other world, may be in our future. But a truly 'alien' life form is more likely to emerge from our planet's natural environment or in a petri dish at a research lab. We may cross a milestone into the era of synthetic biology under the microscope. These breakthroughs will shed new light on our place in the universe and answer the age-old question: Are we alone in the universe? The Life of Super-Earths offers nothing short of a revolution in our understanding of life and its place in the cosmos"--
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.