Week 4

Our Evolution Over the Past 3 Billion Years

This week focuses on endosymbiosis, the origin of the eukaryotic cell, the origin of multicellularity and the tragic separation of somatic cells from the germline. Are sex and death so fundamentally linked that we should expect them to evolve on other planets?

Sex and the Origins of Death
by William R. Clark, 1998, Oxford University Press

What is Sex?
by Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan

Dazzle Gradually: Reflections on the Nature of Nature
by Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan, 2007, Chelsea Green Publishing

Life on a Young Planet: The First Three Billion Years of Evolution on Earth
by Andrew H. Knoll, 2003, Princeton University Press

With few exceptions eukaryotes...