Jonathan Lambert

And I'm Jonathan Lambert. Thanks for listening to Shortwave, the science podcast from NPR.

And I'm Jonathan Lambert. Thanks for listening to Shortwave, the science podcast from NPR.

And I'm Jonathan Lambert. Thanks for listening to Shortwave, the science podcast from NPR.

No, we're talking about the ancestor of all life.

No, we're talking about the ancestor of all life.

No, we're talking about the ancestor of all life.

Yes. So they call it LUCA, which stands for the last universal common ancestor, which is no longer alive, but it would have existed billions of years ago as some kind of single-celled organism.

Yes. So they call it LUCA, which stands for the last universal common ancestor, which is no longer alive, but it would have existed billions of years ago as some kind of single-celled organism.

Yes. So they call it LUCA, which stands for the last universal common ancestor, which is no longer alive, but it would have existed billions of years ago as some kind of single-celled organism.

So imagine for a second the tree of life.

So imagine for a second the tree of life.

So imagine for a second the tree of life.

Yeah. So everything. Yeah. So let's start at the branches. Every living thing on Earth is represented as a tip on the branch of that tree.

Yeah. So everything. Yeah. So let's start at the branches. Every living thing on Earth is represented as a tip on the branch of that tree.

Yeah. So everything. Yeah. So let's start at the branches. Every living thing on Earth is represented as a tip on the branch of that tree.

And if you follow any two branches back in time, they converge on their most recent common ancestor. So like chimps and humans, for instance, converge on a common ancestor that lived like less than 10 million years ago.

And if you follow any two branches back in time, they converge on their most recent common ancestor. So like chimps and humans, for instance, converge on a common ancestor that lived like less than 10 million years ago.

And if you follow any two branches back in time, they converge on their most recent common ancestor. So like chimps and humans, for instance, converge on a common ancestor that lived like less than 10 million years ago.

If you keep tracing any path of ancestry back far enough, whether you start with gorillas or sharks or ginkgo trees or those neat bacteria that live in the bowels of the earth, you'll eventually reach the same single point. That's Luca. That's the ancestor of every living thing and every dead thing that we know about.

If you keep tracing any path of ancestry back far enough, whether you start with gorillas or sharks or ginkgo trees or those neat bacteria that live in the bowels of the earth, you'll eventually reach the same single point. That's Luca. That's the ancestor of every living thing and every dead thing that we know about.