One Plus One Equals One
Symbiosis and the evolution of complex life
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- $29.99
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- $29.99
Publisher Description
We are in the midst of a revolution. It is a scientific revolution built upon the tools of molecular biology, with which we probe and prod the living world in ways unimaginable a few decades ago. Need to track a bacterium at the root of a hospital outbreak? No problem: the offending germ's complete genetic profile can be obtained in 24 hours. We insert human DNA into E. coli bacteria to produce our insulin.
It is natural to look at biotechnology in the 21st century with a mix of wonder and fear. But biotechnology is not as 'unnatural' as one might think. All living organisms use the same molecular processes to replicate their genetic material and the same basic code to 'read' their genes. The similarities can be seen in their DNA. Here, John Archibald shows how evolution has been 'plugging-and-playing' with the subcellular components of life from the very beginning and continues to do so today. For evidence, we need look no further than the inner workings of our own cells. Molecular biology has allowed us to gaze back more than three billion years, revealing the microbial mergers and acquisitions that underpin the development of complex life. One Plus One Equals One tells the story of how we have come to this realization and its implications.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Archibald, a biochemist and molecular biologist at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, focuses this short and accessible text on "two apparent singularities whose evolutionary significance cannot be overstated." These two events are responsible for the structure of much of the life on our planet today, and understanding them deepens our comprehension of the evolutionary pathways that have led to the present. The first epic event was the evolution of eukaryotes, complex cells with a distinct nucleus that comprise all multicellular animals and plants. Had this evolutionary step not occurred, Earth would still be populated solely by single-celled organisms. The second was the development of the chloroplast (the organelle responsible for photosynthesis) in early eukaryotes by way of endosymbiosis, in which one cell engulfs and then incorporates the function of another. Archibald recognizes just how momentous these actions were: "What followed was a chain of events that led to a transformation of ocean, land, and atmosphere." He presents both a clear history of the subject and a concise description of the underlying science. Perhaps most striking is his discussion of the evolutionary implications of endosymbiosis, a process that "acts to bring evolutionarily distinct lineages together in a manner than can lead to the generation of entirely new organisms."
