[B]acteria, the simplest of cells, are... so complex that we still have almost everything to learn about their invisible organization. - Nick Lane

Viruses are quite sophisticated in the sense that they're forming virion particles and they're infecting other cells... s and things... selfish genes, I suppose in the broadest sense.

In bacteria, the DNA forms into a long and twisted loop. The contorted tracks... close... to form a singular circular . In eukaryotic cells, there are usually a number of different chromosomes... each has two separate ends.

Thew problem here for me is that I'm in a biology department and is still somewhat frowned upon by a lot of biologists who would see it as a form of speculation. So the courses that I teach are about life on earth and they're not so much about life in the Universe... [I]t is something that I should develop, I think.