What is life? How did it appear on Earth? Is there life on other planets? How to communicate with possible extraterrestrials? These questions, which have tormented men since they looked up to the sky, Véronique Bréchot and Michel Marcelin try to answer them. This duo was not born from the last meteorite shower: the first, a chemist by training, works at the Institute of Microbiology of the Mediterranean in Marseille, and is closely interested in life in extreme environments.
From the infinitely small to the infinitely large
The second, a specialist in the rotation of galaxies and the dispersion of dark matter, works at the Marseille Astrophysics Laboratory. But these two CNRS research directors are not content with looking into microscopes or telescopes. They share their knowledge with as many people as possible, via conferences, articles or books. And their latest, which comes in the form of a quality work, published this summer by Hachette, The Universe and Lifeis a fine example of scientific popularization on a theme that is both complex and essential.
From the infinitely small (domain of Véronique Bréchot) to the infinitely large (that of Michel Marcelin), the book offers a journey which evokes the birth of the universe, then focuses on life on Earth. Namely in what conditions it was born, what are the chemical and physical puzzles (cells, molecules) which compose it, how to define it… The authors list for example the characteristics which differentiate the living from the inert, citing a definition of NASA in 1992: “Life is a self-sustaining chemical system capable of Darwinian evolution.“
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