About the Book
The underlying active mechanisms of change generation, which enable efficient adaptive evolution, have eluded biologists for decades. Until now...
The prevailing scientific view still holds that organismal and cancer evolution is largely a function of accumulated random genetic mutations and natural selection.
While inefficient random mutations were the primary mechanism of evolution during early life on Earth that still play a prominent role in pathobiology...
in the modern era of biology, genomic adaptive change generation prior to Darwinian selection is primarily the result of feedback-driven, active cell biology processes.
Introducing Active Biological Evolution, by Frank H. Laukien-a groundbreaking book that synthesizes a vast body of empirical observations and recent research, as well as his novel concepts of the evolution of evolutionary processes, and of short-term, fast epigenetic and epiproteomic evolution into the cogent and comprehensive framework of Active Evolution.
The takeaway is clear: the Active Evolution concept can explain not only the efficient evolution of advanced molecular, cell, and organismal biology processes, but also finally rationalize the origins of complex traits and new species. In short...
the processes of adaptive evolution are, themselves, evolving.
In Active Biological Evolution, you will learn that...
-The Modern Synthesis theory and the Central Dogma are insufficient to explain the rapid, active, and more efficient adaptive evolutionary processes of the last billion-plus years.
-While random mutations remain important in monogenic diseases, cancer driver mutations, and viral evolution, they play a negligible role in the modern adaptive evolution of organisms.
-The Active Evolution framework integrates vertically heritable and horizontally transferable genome changes, as well as short-term heritable epigenetic and epiproteomic changes.
-These active evolutionary processes also have a darker side-explaining accelerated evolution of metastatic, treatment-resistant cancers, the adaptability of viruses, and giving us pause on inherent risks of genetic engineering, DNA vaccines, and synthetic biology.
The new paradigm of Active Evolution underscores the fundamental interconnectedness of evolutionary processes-that, in short, "No genome is an island."
Active Evolution promises to do nothing less than redefine the fields of modern evolutionary biology and of late-stage cancer evolution.
About the Author :
Frank H. Laukien, born in Stuttgart in 1960, grew up in Germany, where he obtained his Abitur as valedictorian, before coming to MIT and the United States as a physics undergraduate student.Today, he is the Chairman, President, and CEO of Bruker Corporation, a company with 7000 employees worldwide that is dedicated to high-performance life-science tools, scientific instrumentation, and diagnostic solutions (Nasdaq: BRKR). He joined Bruker in 1988 and became CEO of Bruker Daltonics in 1997, a company he took public in 2000. Dr. Laukien was named an Entrepreneur of the Year 2008 in New England by E&Y.Frank Laukien holds a B.S. in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Ph.D. in chemical physics from Harvard University. In the 1990s, Dr. Laukien was a visiting lecturer in NMR and mass spectrometry at the University of Bremen and later an adjunct professor at the Institute of Mass Spectrometry of the University of Amsterdam. In 2021, he was appointed as a Visiting Scholar in the Department of Chemistry & Chemical Biology of Harvard University, where he also is a member of the Harvard Origins of Life Initiative and of the Galileo Project.Dr. Laukien has published numerous peer-reviewed papers and is a co-inventor on many scientific instrumentation patents. Previously, he served on the Dean's Advisory Committee of the School of Science of MIT, and he is currently on the Visiting Committee of the MIT Department of Chemistry. For many years, he served on the Board of the Analytical, Life Science & Diagnostics Association (ALDA), including one year as ALDA chairman.In 2017, Dr. Laukien was elected a senator of acatech, the German Academy of Natural and Technical Sciences.In 2020, he created the podcast series Origins & Evolution with Professor of Astronomy Dimitar Sasselov, the Director of the Harvard Origins of Life Initiative.Since 2020, Laukien has been the lead organizer of the Cancer Evolution Symposium and Cancer Evolution Seminar Series, which has been summarized in a special issue on cancer evolution of the journal Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology (PBMB), published in October 2021.In August 2021, he became co-chair of the new scientific working group on Cancer Evolution of the American Association for Cancer Research, and since June 2020, Dr. Laukien has also been a member of The Oncology Think Tank (TOTT).Together with lead founder and Harvard astronomy professor Avi Loeb, in July 2021, Dr. Laukien has become the co-founder of the Galileo Project "for the systematic scientific search for evidence of extraterrestrial technological artifacts."Frank lives in New England. He is passionate about basic scientific and medical research for the benefit and advancement of humanity. Frank is an enthusiastic life science innovator and entrepreneur and a devoted father and grandfather. He enjoys hiking, swimming, tennis, and skiing.
Review :
Charles Darwin's seminal book On the Origin of Species brought one of the greatest revolutions in science. ... Fisher, Haldane, Wright and Huxley wrote the Modern Synthesis with genetics. ... Waddington, Gould, Pigliucci and Müller brought us the Extended Synthesis. Frank Laukien and others have been extending the synthesis even further, emphasizing how evolution is not just random mutations, but actively accelerated and driven by feedback. ... We are in the Age of CRISPR, [with] relevance of evolution to our daily lives, with potent medical implications.
-George Church, Professor of Genetics, Harvard Medical School; Author of Regenesis
Active Biological Evolution is a persuasive argument showing that evolution has been about much more than gradual mutational evolution of genomes ... the evidence is incontrovertible.
-Denis Noble, Professor in the Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, Oxford University; Author of Dance to the Tune of Life
Frank Laukien revolutionizes the way we think about evolution by proposing that feedback on genomic and other molecular changes prior to selection accelerates natural evolution, leading to Active Evolution, which is not just the result of random DNA mutations.
-Avi Loeb, Professor of Science, Harvard University; Author of Extraterrestrial
Synthesizing three waves of evolutionary thinking spanning two centuries, Active Biological Evolution combines powerful writing, compelling arguments, and erudite references to make an electrifying case for feedback-driven, actively accelerated evolution. This book will change how we think about cancer, and it may revolutionize the translational medical applications of evolutionary principles.
-Azra Raza, M.D., Professor of Medicine, Columbia University; Author of The First Cell
Frank Laukien fundamentally challenges the consensus in the Modern Synthesis in evolution. His original and provocative insights are sure to start a wide-ranging discussion.
-Professor Matthias Mann, Director at the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry
Active Biological Evolution provocatively challenges the scientific community to develop an altered framework on how to interpret biological evolution. Simply put, the insights in this delightful book could impact how the scientific and biomedical world views, and...treats disease.
-Nevan Krogan, Ph.D., Professor of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology, UCSF
...through his EDITA (Externally Driven, Irreversible & Transferable Adaptation) hypothesis, [Laukien] proposes evolution can occur more rapidly in unicellular life and cancer evolution, and even in multicellular life and in humans.
-Kenneth J. Pienta, M.D., Professor, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
Active Biological Evolution is truly remarkable. By re-examining the traditional principles of evolutionary biology from the perspective of modern biology, Frank Laukien proposes wholly new ideas for how species, and even cancer cells, evolve in a non-random manner. This lucid and well-written book will prove to be provocative, controversial, and ultimately prescient...
-Steve Gullans, Ph.D., Co-author, Evolving Ourselves
