 Highbridge, a division of recorded books, presents Assembling Life, How Can Life Begin on Earth and Other Habitable Planets, by David Deemer, read by Stephen R. Thorne. Preface In 1964, long before the Internet gave instant access to the accumulated knowledge of humankind, it was necessary to actually visit a library full of books, thumb through a thick volume of chemical abstracts to find the desired citation, and then trudge up several flights of stairs to crack open the bound volume in which the desired paper was embedded. The article I wanted was in archives of biochemistry and biophysics, and while leafing through the pages, I happened to see the title, Synthesis of Purines Under Possible Primitive Earth Conditions. As a novice biochemist, I knew that purines were components of nucleic acids, but I had never before heard the phrase Primitive Earth. What could that mean? I began to read and was fascinated. Someone named John Oro at the University of Houston had discovered that adenine was a pentamer of hydrogen cyanide, and that this simple reaction could have provided one of the essential nucleobases required for life to begin. My curiosity satisfied, I found the paper I needed, took notes by hand because photocopiers had not yet been invented, and then returned to the lab where I was studying how calcium ions interact with fatty acid monolayers. I would never have imagined that fifteen years later I would be visiting Oro in Houston and writing a paper with him on how lipid membranes could have been involved in life's beginning. The study of life's origins was, in the 1960s and 1970s, on the fringes of scientific research, and may still be yet, although inroads are being made. As I went through post-doctoral studies at University of California, Berkeley, and then began my academic career at UC Davis, I did not give it another thought. The topic was definitely not something a young assistant professor who wanted to impress senior colleagues and be awarded a tenured position should get interested in. Instead my research was focused on biological membranes of mitochondria, chloroplasts, and sarcoplasmic reticulum, using the new technique of freeze fracture electron microscopy to study their structure and function. By 1975 I was a tenured associate professor and decided to celebrate by taking a sabbatical to learn more about the membrane models called liposomes. These models Sample complete. Ready to continue?