Summary of Carl Zimmer's Life's Edge EPUB

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.

Book Preview: #1 I felt my own life, as well as the lives of others, as I made my way down the hairpin road. I could feel the steep slope in my legs, and I was aware of the nerves in my skin sensing the humidity and temperature of the air around me.

#2 I visited a laboratory in La Jolla, California, that was studying the kelp neuron. The kelp had the kind of complexity that marks living things, but I couldn’t say whether it was still alive. I couldn’t ask it how its day was going.

#3 The lab where Trujillo worked was led by another scientist from Brazil named Alysson Muotri. He grew neurons from people with a hereditary form of autism called Rett syndrome. The neurons spread their kelp-like branches across petri dishes and made contact with each other.

#4 Scientists were able to grow brain organoids in 2013, and they have been growing them ever since. They are able to see how the organoids develop, and they believe that they are developing more like our own brains.