The Last Universal Common Ancestor (LUCA), the theoretical single organism from which all life on Earth descends, is now believed to have emerged far earlier than previously estimated. This discovery ...

As such, our understanding of LUCA impacts our understanding of the early evolution of life on Earth. Was LUCA a simple or complex organism? What kind of environment did it inhabit and when?” ...

First, he had traced the evolution of cellular life directly ... These results provided strong evidence that the last universal common ancestor (LUCA) of all cellular life really existed, although ...

Now, we don't know what LUCA looked like. We don't know precisely ... It's these changes to DNA, are billions of years, that have led to the evolution of new life forms, and driven the magnificent ...

A: archaea; B: bacteria; E: eukaryote; LUCA: last universal common ancestor ... possibility of rampant gene transfer at early stages of evolution, so distinct lineages of descent might not have ...