Jack Szostak (Harvard/HHMI) Part 1: The Origin of Cellular Life on Earth

I personally am a fan of the RNA world hypothesis: link RNA can act as both a store of information, and as an enzyme catalyzing reactions. In this theory, certain sequences of RNA would be the original self-replicating molecules. Over time, variations in their replication would give rise to other enzymes for specialized reactions, and DNA as a pure-data store. Jack Szostak has done an excellent series of short videos on the theory, and he and his students have done a surprising amount of experiments to support the theory. ▶ this video

There are some plausible theories, like RNA randomly crystallizing on a suitable surface. Sooner or later a self-copying one just happened to crystallize by chance, and there was no going back. Fun lecture series: ▶ this video

I found it cute and quite meaningful. If you spend a good deal of time on Cellular Automata, Dissipative Structures and genetics these things really start to jump out at you. Here's a starter pack: Cellular Automata and Computation: link Origin of Life: ▶ this video Dissipative Structures: link

Jack Szostak does a pretty good job of outlining how life might have arisen. It’s less mysterious than it intuitively might seem: ▶ this video link

There are also people trying to assemble life from simpler molecules that are commonly formed in non-organic processes. This series of presentation by Jack Szostak is rather interesting ▶ this video

Recently I got interested in the origin of life. I found this 3 part talk which discusses how the simplest possible life form might have looked like. My feeling after watching this is that we are slowly getting there (which will also mean jump starting in a dish a self replicating thing from inorganic matter). ▶ this video link link

Look into "dissipative structures", which are indeed closely linked to thermodynamics. In short, energy gradients (ie, on hydrothermal vents) can cause matter to organize itself into structures that more efficiently dissipate this energy. You can see how the creation of this structure would in turn enable the creation of a new kind of structure that lives on top of that. link ▶ this video