What is life?

Abstract

Background Many traditional biological concepts continue to be debated by biologists, scientists and philosophers of science. The specific objective of this brief reflection is to offer an alternative vision to the definition of life taking as a starting point the traits common to all living beings. Results and Conclusions Thus, I define life as a process that takes place in highly organized organic structures and is characterized by being preprogrammed, interactive, adaptative and evolutionary. If life is the process, living beings are the system in which this process takes place. I also wonder whether viruses can be considered living things or not. Taking as a starting point my definition of life and, of course, on what others have thought about it, I am in favor of considering viruses as living beings. I base this conclusion on the fact that viruses satisfy all the vital characteristics common to all living things and on the role they have played in the evolution of species. Finally, I argue that if there were life elsewhere in the universe, it would be very similar to what we know on this planet because the laws of physics and the composition of matter are universal and because of the principle of the inexorability of life.

Theoretical perspective on synthetic man‐made life: Learning from the origin of life

“…Metabolism, in the contemporary sense, refers to the whole set of chemical reactions that sustain the living of a cell or an individual. Yet, upon the very beginning of natural life or man-made life, a welldefined individual may not yet exist [90,91], and thus, metabolism was simply the collective term for all chemical reactions within the system that facilitate various functions such as self-replication, one of the key characteristics of life [92][93][94]. So, the crucial question arises: What chemical reactions must be included in the system, and how should they be coupled in order to allow the entire system to perform functions such as self-replication found in living life?…”

A new definition and three categories for classifying ecosystems

“…Accordingly, many ecological studies have overlooked the importance of viruses as major players in the dynamic of ecosystems. However, it should be noted that viruses have played a key role in the evolution of species [12] and that there are strong biological arguments supporting their consideration as living things [13][14][15]. Consequently, viruses should not be ignored if we are to understand how an ecosystem works because they participate in food webs, in horizontal gene transmission, and in biogeochemical cycles [16][17][18][19].…”

Target‐based virtual screening, computational multiscoring docking and molecular dynamics simulation of small molecules as promising drug candidate affecting kinesin‐like protein KIFC1

“…Under normal circumstances, the production of the new cells maintains equilibrium but occasionally, cells arise that no longer respond to the tightly controlled cell cycle and checkpoints. These cells give rise to clones of cells that can expand to a considerable size, producing tumour or neoplasm characterized by various salient features namely, loss of cell cycle control, heritability, transplant ability, genetic mutability, loss of density‐dependent inhibition, angiogenesis, invasiveness and metastasis 1–7 . About 10 million people succumbed to cancer in 2020 worldwide, and these data have been grown by leaps and bounds in recent years, devastating socioeconomic impact, especially in low‐and middle‐income countries.…”

“…These cells give rise to clones of cells that can expand to a considerable size, producing tumour or neoplasm characterized by various salient features namely, loss of cell cycle control, heritability, transplant ability, genetic mutability, loss of density-dependent inhibition, angiogenesis, invasiveness and metastasis. [1][2][3][4][5][6][7] About 10 million people succumbed to cancer in 2020 worldwide, and these data have been grown by leaps and bounds in recent years, devastating socioeconomic impact, especially in low-and middle-income countries. Breast cancer ranks first in new cases, followed by lung, colon and rectum, prostate, skin and stomach in 2020 (Figure 1).…”