Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life

I hadn’t studied much biology since my college days 50 years ago, so this exciting book was a real eye opener. How did life actually get going on earth? Why did it take a couple of billion years before all higher forms of life got their start, and how are mitochondria the key? Why would most life in other parts of the universe likely not get beyond the level of bacteria? What do mitochondria have to do with aging, and how do we age more slowly than rats but faster than birds?Renowned British scientist and author Nick Lane explores all these questions and many more, explaining the latest research, controversies, and speculations. Lane does a very good job of explaining the basic findings and arguments to educated readers who are not trained in biology but are keen to understand what’s going on inside the life they see all around and experience in their own bodies.My interests had been more in the physical and mathematical sciences, but there’s nothing like encounters with aging that will say “Whoa – What’s Going On Here?”, especially when your doctor says, “Don’t worry, that’s just normal aging”. A heart attack, a detached retina, loss of balance – “just normal aging” - SURE! It’s like a SYNDROME, a name for something they don’t understand or can’t do much about. Or could they? - if they thought more like curious scientists exploring the universe and less like authorities stuck in the ruts of past dogmas.So Lane explains why all the anti-oxidant therapies in the world have failed to extend our life spans, despite the destruction wrecked by free radicals on mitochondrial DNA. Yet birds, with only a few changes to their DNA, avoid most of this damage and live disease-free to ripe old ages (relative to their body size). There is even a group of humans in Italy who live to 100 quite easily due to a simple genetic mutation. He identifies “uncoupling” as the possible mechanism as it causes the “respiration chain” in mitochondria to produce heat instead of free radicals when the mitochondria is at rest (not producing ATP to power the cell). The implication is that there may be better prospects for gene therapies than drug therapies in our future (at least if humanity somehow manages to survive the wrath of Gaia against the wanton destruction of a civilization drunk on fossil fuels).

The author explains a difficult topic in a straight forward way. Mitochondria generate the energy upon which the life of the eukaryotes depends. To put it another way: no mitochondria, no human beings. Fascinating organelles that reside within the majority of our cells, mitochondria posses their own DNA.How did the mitochondria make a home in the eukaryotic cells? Is this a true symbiotic relationship? When did eukaryotic cells acquire mitochondria and what evolutionary advantage did it provide them with? Were mitochondria once free living organisms? How did scientists discover mitochondria? These, and other fascinating questions are addressed in this well written book. I highly recommend it to other readers.Some general comments:I have noticed that many ebooks are offered for sale without the preview option. A prospective buyer cannot see the table of contents nor the writing style of the author without buying the book first. You could go through the trouble of downloading a sample.Yes, there is a description of the book written somewhere. However it is not the same thing as seeing for oneself what the contents are and whether the author writes in a manner that is engaging and understandable. To me, this is like being asked to buy a car without having the ability to go for a test drive or look under the hood. It is tantamount to buying a car based on someone’s description of the car and their satisfaction rating. I don’t like this trend, and I avoid buying a book that has no preview features.

Fascinating book about the evolution of cells and the role of mitochondria in allowing large eukaryote cells and multi-cellular organisms. Extremely clear descriptions of how things work, and an excellent framework for understanding issues in evolution, how sex in single-celled eukaryotes led to apoptosis in multi-cellular organisms, issues in tracking evolution using maternal mitochondrial DNA, why Aubrey de Gray's suggestion that we move mitochondrial DNA into our cell's nucleus as part of an anti-aging protocol won't work (when we can do the in-vivo gene manipulation), and how cells use reactive oxygen species as signals.The book explains a number of things I've wondered about:(1) Why does a mother's environment affect the children of her daughters? It's because the unit of growth is the cell, not just DNA, and the daughter's eggs are formed in-utero. So if the mother is stressed nutritionally early in the pregnancy, it affects her daughter's children by reducing the robustness of her daughter's eggs.(2) Why don't antioxidants increase longevity? It's because the cell uses ROS as a signal for proteins needed by the mitochondria and to grow more mitochondria, and needs a finely tuned level of internal anti-oxidant machinery in order to hear the signal, yet not be damaged by it. So taking extra Vitamin C or E reduce the internal signaling, and might cause premature apoptosis of the cell because it degrades the health of your mitochondria. This ties into studies showing that Vit C and/or E reduce the benefits of exercise, by shutting down the internal ROS signaling pathways.(3) How can we improve our own longevity? It looks like the major factor is the rate of leakage of ROS from mitochondria. So things that reduce this leakage make a big difference: (a) where possible, have your cells run on fat instead of glucose, because that reduces free electron leak from complex I, and (b) make sure you have balanced levels of omega-6 and omega-3 PUFA, as that appears to also make a significant difference (at least in mice...)There is much more, and I have a much better framework now for my research on how to optimize my health. Highly recommended!Two other books in the same class are  The Fourth Phase of Water: Beyond Solid, Liquid, and Vapor , and  Cells, Gels and the Engines of Life .

The title "Power, Sex, Suicide" is catching and the subtitle ambitious (Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life), but that's really what the book is about: mitochondria, tiny organelles dealing with energy inside the eukaryotic cells of all the plants, animals, fungi and algae. Starting from their probable origin, the authors explains what Mitochondria do, how they do it, what their presence in the eukaryotic cell has implied for the development of complex life forms with sexual reproduction, and that age and die.The language is clear, the occasional jargon explained, the style is as lively as this complex and rather technical subject allows.This is a wonderfully wide-ranging book. Unfortunately, that very quality might be what makes it a trifle too challenging for those who, like me, have little knowledge of general biology. In addition, I found it difficult to extract key ideas from the generous flow of information and from the succession of scientific theories that have proved wrong or incomplete, swept away by new discoveries. In other words, this is probably not the right book to start with.Even if I finally decided to give up (for now!) because I didn't have the prerequisites to fully enjoy this book, I recommend it to the interested reader who has a better knowledge of biology (and perhaps also chemistry). This book is also an enthusiastic testimony to scientific research being an ongoing process, with temporary certainties leading to further questioning.Just a note about this specific edition of "Power, Sex, Suicide" (OUP, 2009): the book is printed in very small, tight fonts, with reduced space line. I sometimes had to use my finger not to skip lines. The captions of the (rare) graphics and the occasional footnotes are even smaller. The original 2005 edition might be more reader-friendly.

I am interested in factual books but no scientist. This is a dense read but interesting. While this is a rapidly developing field, the book still seemed current enough.One gripe: it's repetitive. This is a criticism that can be laid at an awful lot of factual books, particularly science books.Repetition is useful when reminding the reader of a topic brought up in an earlier chapter. It's confusing when the same point is made several different ways in the same chapter, or even paragraph. This is because the writer does not make it clear it is a repetition beforehand.Still, worthwhile and for me, an original, profound topic.

Despite its understandably sensationalised title, this book provides a clear and in-depth overview of the biochemical processes involved in the beginnings of life, and the processes involved in cell multiplication and apoptosis. It's a dense read but one that is often engaging and covers interesting findings in a wide-ranging story centred around the mitochondria. I would recommend this book if you are a science undergrad or someone interested in the very first beginnings of the human race. And, if you are pressed for time, the epilogue provides a good and very succinct overview of the whole book.

Nick Lane's book is written as a series of lectures. I found myself becoming irritated by repetition, wishing the contents had been better edited. However, 'Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life' contains important information for anyone taking, or considering taking, antioxidant supplements. I recommend reading chapters 17 and 18, and the Epilogue, even if you're not particularly interested in the arguments surrounding the origin of the eukaryotic cell, proton power, or the power laws of biology. This section explains the vital role of free-radicals in cell signalling. You will discover how a cell responds to a leak of free-radicals when ATP levels are low, how it responds differently when the leak is accompanied by high levels of ATP, and what happens if neither response solves the problem, and a retrograde response involving transcription factors in the nucleus is initiated.

I initially bought this book so i could say that I read it for my personal Statement. However when i started reading it I couldn't help but get invested in it, seeing how ideas i was taught in science (i.e respiration,evolution etc.) being applied in the real world with living organisms was engaging. I especially enjoyed the way Lane wrote about a theory of how eukaryotic life evolved and some of the rejected theories. It is written in a way so as not to put off people who weren't taught the principles and still able to be interesting for those who are better read about biologyIt is an incredible book and is a must read.