Harvard Club of Washington, DC

Professor Harold Morowitz

Life, the Fourth Geosphere

Ancient Origins of Life on Earth

Distinguished researcher Harold Morowitz will explore with us the geochemical origins of life on Earth, 3.5 billion years ago.  He will speak for about an hour and then conduct an open discussion with the audience.

Wednesday, November 2^nd, 2011

6:00- 9:00 pm

Langstaff Auditorium

The Potomac School

1301 Potomac School Road

McLean, VA 22101

Free parking is available on site.

There will be light refreshments served first, before the presentation.

RSVP:  Cort Morgan, AB 1980  cmorgan@potomacschool.org

Biophysicist Harold Morowitz became a Robinson Professor at George Mason University after a long career of teaching and research at Yale University as Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry and serving for five years as Master of Pierson College. The author of several books, Morowitz has written extensively on the thermodynamics of living systems, as well as on popular topics in science. Included in those publications are Mayonnaise and the Origins of Life, Cosmic Joy and Local Pain, The Thermodynamics of Pizza, Entropy and the Magic Flute, and The Kindly Dr. Guillotin. In his current research, Morowitz is investigating the interface of biology and information sciences and continues his exploration of the origins of life. Other books are The Origin of Cellular Life: Metabolism Recapitulates Biogenesis and The Facts of Life (co-authored with James Trefil). He is Staff Scientist and former Director of the Krasnow Institute for Advanced Study and former Editor-in-Chief of the journal Complexity. His book The Emergence of Everything: How the World Became Complex was published in 2002 by Oxford University Press.

Dr. Morowitz is principal investigator on the multi-institutional grant “From Geochemistry to the Origin of Life,” which is centered at the Santa Fe Institute and includes George Mason University and four other research centers.