Scientists have debated the definition of life for decades, but they still lack a consensus on the answer. Experts believe that "edge cases" make life difficult to define and blur boundaries across ...

A central question of astrobiology concerns the origin and distribution of life in the Universe. For this reason, astrobiology can be considered to fall within the science called transitional biology.

What is life? Like most great questions, this one is easy to ask but difficult to answer. Scientists have been trying for centuries, and philosophers have done so for millennia. Today our knowledge is ...

Biologists have been unable to agree on a definition of the complex phenomenon known as “life.” In a special collection of essays in Astrobiology, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., ...

This story is a collaboration between Science Friday and KHN. It was written by Sarah Varney. Credit: Eric Harkleroad, KHN illustration; Getty Images; Unsplash. As life-preserving medical technology ...

Salk scientists engineered a right-handed RNA enzyme (bottom left) that can combine left-handed RNA fragments (bottom right) to create a mirror image of itself. The new left-handed RNA enzyme (top ...

Challenge your mind right now. Come up with a brief, meaningful, and defensible definition of life. Try it. How hard can it be? You know life when you see it, right? You are life. So put that search ...