Living computers : replicators, information processing, and the evolution of life / Alvis Brazma.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Brazma, Alvis, author.

Series:

Oxford scholarship online.

Oxford scholarship online

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Evolution (Biology).

Proteins.

DNA.

RNA.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (0 pages)

Place of Publication:

Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2023.

Summary:

This accessible and entertaining book explores the fundamental connections between life and information and how they emerged inextricably linked, taking the reader on a journey through all the major evolutionary transitions.

Contents:

Cover

Living Computers

Copyright Page

Dedication

Preface

Acknowledgements

Contents

Introduction

I How to Clone Oneself?

A mechanical replicator

Self-reproduction without hand-waving

Cellular automata and Life

Self-reproducing structures

The world of information bits and bytes

Church-Turing thesis

The complexity of reproduction

Autonomous replicators and ecosystems

Chance and making a reliable device from unreliable parts

Microbes-molecular replicators

II Self-organizing Molecules

Measuring order

From order to disorder

From disorder to order

Molecular order of crystal lattices

Energy and its equal partitioning

Free energy

Creating order via the Second Law

Molecular templates and copying of information

The liquid order in water

III Informed Self-organization

Life's building blocks

Self-organizing sequences

The empiric laws of biology

Self-assembling molecular complexes

Self-organizing molecular processes

Energy and information

Life's information molecule

The central dogma

Copying the cell's 'tape'

Assembling by the manual

Controlling the production

Epigenetic information and inherited structures

Genome sequencing and bioinformatics

Crick's central dogma and von Neumann's replicator

IV The Simplest Life

Model bacteria

Inside a bacterium

A bacterium replicating

Autonomy and ecosystems

How similar are the clones?

The simplest possible living cell

Biochemical communism

The RNA world

A living cell and the Universal Constructor

V Evolving Replicators

Changing genomes

A death for every birth

From genotype to phenotype

Microbes in the wild

Pangenomes and exchange of information

Complexity evolving

Fitness landscape and evolvability

How much change is too much?.

Darwinian and Lamarckian evolution

VI Life on Earth

From pre-life to life

The chemistry of early life

From RNA to DNA and proteins

A complex cell

The key epimutation

From cells to organisms

Genomes vs individuals

Sex and information exchange

The elusive concept of a gene

Runaway genomes

New means of information processing

Is evolution learning?

Animal communications

VII Evolution as a Ratchet of Information

Information and prior knowledge

The analogue and the digital

Information in a genome and the prior knowledge of a cell

Epigenetic information

Niche construction

Animal cultures

Measuring biological complexity

Is there progress in evolution?

Genetic algorithms

The Brownian ratchet of information

All the information on Earth

VIII From DNA to Language

What is language?

Learning by example

From animal communications to language

When did our ancestors start to talk?

From genes to language

Genotypes and mnemotypes

From language to genes

From speaking to writing

From clay tablets to silicon chips

IX Epilogue: Beyond Language

Notes

Bibliography

Index.

Notes:

Also issued in print: 2023.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource and publisher information; title from PDF title page (viewed on September 27, 2023).

ISBN:

0-19-196810-2

0-19-287195-1

OCLC:

1409660328