Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life

Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Number Of Pages: 368
Publication Date: 2005-11-03
Sales Rank: 487685
ISBN / ASIN: 0192804812
EAN: 9780192804815
Binding: Hardcover
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
Studio: Oxford University Press, USA
Average Rating: 5

Power, Sex, Suicide, Complexity, Individuality, Fertility, Prehistory, Ageing, Death. These universal themes are all linked by mitochondria - the tiny structures located inside our cells - miniature powerhouses that use oxygen to generate power. There are hundreds of them in each cell, some 10 million billion in a human being. Once considered menial slaves, mere workhorses for complex cells with nuclei, their significance is now undergoing a radical revision. Mitochondria are now seen as the key ingredient that made complex life possible at all. For two billion years, bacteria ruled the earth without ever generating true complexity - a stasis that may still grip life on other planets. Then the union of two bacterial cells led to an evolutionary big bang, from which algae, fungi, plants and animals emerged. For mitochondria were once free-living bacteria, and still retain unmistakable traits of their ancestry, including some of their original DNA. Ever since their fateful absorption, the tortuous and unpredictable relationship between the mitochondria and their host cells has forced one evolutionary innovation after another. Without mitochondria, nothing would exist of the world we know and love. Their story is the story of life itself. Today, mitochondria are central to research into human prehistory, genetic diseases, cell suicide, fertility, ageing, bioenergetics, sex and the eukaryotic cell. Piecing together puzzles from the forefront of research, this book paints a sweeping canvas that will thrill all who are interested in biology, while also contributing to evolutionary thinking and debate. This is a book full of startling insights into the nature and evolution of life, and should be read by anyone who wants to know why we're here.

Review:

Simply the most fascinating book I have read in years

I cannot over recommend this book. It ranks alongside "The Selfish Gene" by Richard Dawkins as one of the seminal books for understanding life on earth. Interestingly, the title doesn't oversell the book at all - it really does contain fascinating information about power, sex and suicide (albeit cell suicide). If you have any interest in evolution or the origins of life - just get this book.

Review:

The ATP Powerhouses

The power of "mighty"chondria enthralled me to my very cells. Science, power, intrique...like a great mystery novel that takes place within the cell...

Note: reading this book in public elicits stares. The title jumps out, but not the subtitle.

Review:

It *is* a life-changing book!!!

Well, all right... Enthusiasm might trump my common sense a little, here. Not everyone will change their outlook on life after reading this highly interesting and eye-opening book, but it certainly convinced me of the central role that mitochondria likely played in the evolution of eukaryotic cells and of multicellular organisms. I had to change my opinion on the relative importance of getting a nucleus or getting mitochondria during our evolutionary journey; mitochondria, which up to now I had unfairly considered as rather boring ATP factories and mere actors in the process of apoptosis, now do indeed seem to be the architects of life as we know it.

Nick Lane does a great job at integrating the relevant scientific literature and weaving it into an all-audience book filled with exciting facts and clever hypotheses. Among popular science writers, he is certainly among the best; the same appears to be true as a theory-builder.

This is a must-read book for all biologists, and a "really, really should be read" book for anyone else.

Review:

The mighty mitochondria

Nick Lane tops his previous effort ("Oxygen") in gathering the myriad threads of biological science around a unifiying topic. By writing about all complex life forms from the point of view of their embedded mitochondria he answers open questions (and poses some novel ones) about the rise of complex organisms, the underpinnings of sexual reproduction and programmed cell death, and even our odds of encountering extraterrestial intelligence.

My only quibble is that each chapter seems to have been written for serialized publication -- there is too much summary of past chapters at the start of each.

A great read, for an audience spanning a wide range of previous biology studies.

Review:

Fantastic

This is one of few (the only?)books that manage to treat molecular biology at a popular level and still be interesting. I'm reminded of the feeling I had when I first read "the selfish gene"; the "yes, that's it!" feeling. Lane does an incredible job of making a page-turning novel out of what would at first glance seem to be an uninteresting topic. My only caveat would be that the topic is still complex and difficult and the details may be too much for some.

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