scholarly journals Constraint Closure Drove Major Transitions in the Origins of Life

Entropy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 105
Author(s):  
Niles E. Lehman ◽  
Stuart. A. Kauffman
Keyword(s):  
Phase Space ◽  
Boundary Conditions ◽  
Small Molecules ◽  
Origins Of Life ◽  
Major Transitions ◽  
Autocatalytic Sets ◽  
Forms Of Life ◽  
The Universe

Life is an epiphenomenon for which origins are of tremendous interest to explain. We provide a framework for doing so based on the thermodynamic concept of work cycles. These cycles can create their own closure events, and thereby provide a mechanism for engendering novelty. We note that three significant such events led to life as we know it on Earth: (1) the advent of collective autocatalytic sets (CASs) of small molecules; (2) the advent of CASs of reproducing informational polymers; and (3) the advent of CASs of polymerase replicases. Each step could occur only when the boundary conditions of the system fostered constraints that fundamentally changed the phase space. With the realization that these successive events are required for innovative forms of life, we may now be able to focus more clearly on the question of life’s abundance in the universe.

scholarly journals ON CANONICAL QUANTIZATION OF THE GAUGED WZW MODEL WITH PERMUTATION BRANES

2011 ◽  
Vol 26 (26) ◽  
pp. 4647-4660
Author(s):  
GOR SARKISSIAN
Keyword(s):  
Riemann Surface ◽  
Phase Space ◽  
Boundary Conditions ◽  
Canonical Quantization ◽  
Simons Theory ◽  
Gauge Fields ◽  
Time Line ◽  
Chern Simons ◽  
Special Case ◽  
Chern Simons Theory

In this paper we perform canonical quantization of the product of the gauged WZW models on a strip with boundary conditions specified by permutation branes. We show that the phase space of the N-fold product of the gauged WZW model G/H on a strip with boundary conditions given by permutation branes is symplectomorphic to the phase space of the double Chern–Simons theory on a sphere with N holes times the time-line with G and H gauge fields both coupled to two Wilson lines. For the special case of the topological coset G/G we arrive at the conclusion that the phase space of the N-fold product of the topological coset G/G on a strip with boundary conditions given by permutation branes is symplectomorphic to the phase space of Chern–Simons theory on a Riemann surface of the genus N-1 times the time-line with four Wilson lines.

scholarly journals Energy, genes and evolution: introduction to an evolutionary synthesis

2013 ◽  
Vol 368 (1622) ◽  
pp. 20120253 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nick Lane ◽  
William F. Martin ◽  
John A. Raven ◽  
John F. Allen
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Evolutionary Synthesis ◽  
Past Century ◽  
Major Transitions ◽  
Life On Earth ◽  
Energy Harnessing ◽  
Emergence Of Life ◽  
The Universe ◽  
Planetary Habitability ◽  
Origin Of Eukaryotes

Life is the harnessing of chemical energy in such a way that the energy-harnessing device makes a copy of itself. No energy, no evolution. The ‘modern synthesis’ of the past century explained evolution in terms of genes, but this is only part of the story. While the mechanisms of natural selection are correct, and increasingly well understood, they do little to explain the actual trajectories taken by life on Earth. From a cosmic perspective—what is the probability of life elsewhere in the Universe, and what are its probable traits?—a gene-based view of evolution says almost nothing. Irresistible geological and environmental changes affected eukaryotes and prokaryotes in very different ways, ones that do not relate to specific genes or niches. Questions such as the early emergence of life, the morphological and genomic constraints on prokaryotes, the singular origin of eukaryotes, and the unique and perplexing traits shared by all eukaryotes but not found in any prokaryote, are instead illuminated by bioenergetics. If nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution, nothing in evolution makes sense except in the light of energetics. This Special Issue of Philosophical Transactions examines the interplay between energy transduction and genome function in the major transitions of evolution, with implications ranging from planetary habitability to human health. We hope that these papers will contribute to a new evolutionary synthesis of energetics and genetics.

Phase space analysis of the Umami Chaplygin model

2021 ◽  
pp. 2150052
Author(s):  
Qihong Huang ◽  
Ruanjing Zhang ◽  
Jun Chen ◽  
He Huang ◽  
Feiquan Tu
Keyword(s):  
Phase Space ◽  
Cosmic Acceleration ◽  
Accelerated Expansion ◽  
Late Time ◽  
Phase Space Analysis ◽  
Space Analysis ◽  
History Of ◽  
Evolutionary Trajectories ◽  
The Universe ◽  
Universe Evolution

In this paper, we analyze the universe evolution and phase space behavior of the Umami Chaplygin model, where the Umami Chaplygin fluid replaces both a dark energy and a dark and baryonic matter. We find the Umami Chaplygin model can be stable against perturbations under some conditions and can be used to explain the late-time cosmic acceleration. The results of phase space analysis show that there exists a late-time accelerated expansion attractor with [Formula: see text], which indicates the Umami Chaplygin fluid can behave as a cosmological constant. Moreover, the Umami Chaplygin model can describe the expansion history of the universe. The evolutionary trajectories of the statefinder diagnostic pairs and the finite time future singularities are also discussed.

Good God!

2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Luke Barnes
Keyword(s):  
Origins Of Life ◽  
Life Meaning ◽  
Big Picture ◽  
The Universe

Even an atheist has to believe something. Luke Barnes reviews Sean Carroll’s The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself, in which Carroll attempts to construct an atheistic worldview called poetic naturalism.

Life as It Could Be

2020 ◽  
pp. 101-114
Author(s):  
Luis Campos
Keyword(s):  
Synthetic Biology ◽  
Molecular Biology ◽  
The Future ◽  
Forms Of Life ◽  
Life On Earth ◽  
The Universe

This chapter explores the intersection between two related fields: synthetic biology and astrobiology. Pushing the engineering of life past traditional limits in molecular biology and expanding the envelope of life to forms never before extant, synthetic biologists are now beginning to design experimental ways of getting at what astrobiologists have long suspected: that the life known here on Earth is but a subset of vast combinatorial possibilities in the universe. The resonances between the future engineered possibilities of this world and speculations about possible biologies on habitable others are not merely happenstance. Indeed, there is a curious and compelling deeper history interlinking scientific speculation about new forms of life elsewhere in the universe with visions for the human-directed engineering of new forms of life on Earth. For decades, the astrobiological and the synthetic biological have mutually inspired each other and overlapped in powerful genealogical ways.

scholarly journals AN OPEN INFLATIONARY MODEL FOR DIMENSIONAL REDUCTION AND ITS EFFECTS ON THE OBSERVABLE PARAMETERS OF THE UNIVERSE

2005 ◽  
Vol 20 (11) ◽  
pp. 2449-2453
Author(s):  
KORAY KARACA ◽  
SELÇUK BAYIN
Keyword(s):  
Phase Transition ◽  
Cosmological Model ◽  
Boundary Conditions ◽  
Dimensional Reduction ◽  
Higher Dimensions ◽  
Inflationary Model ◽  
Early Stages ◽  
Isotropic Cosmological Model ◽  
Spatially Homogeneous ◽  
The Universe

Assuming that higher dimensions existed in the early stages of the universe where the evolution was inflationary, we construct an open, singularity-free, spatially homogeneous and isotropic cosmological model to study the effects of dimensional reduction that may have taken place during the early stages of the universe. We consider dimensional reduction to take place in a stepwise manner and interpret each step as a phase transition. By imposing suitable boundary conditions we trace their effects on the present day parameters of the universe.

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