RESEARCH TOPICS

For Term Papers or Seminar
Examples of suitable topics appear below. The list is by no means exclusive, and you are welcome to suggest alternatives. Your selected topics and method of delivery should be approved by the third week of the semester.

 
1

The Miller-Urey Experiment: Successes and Failures
2 Hydrothermal Systems and the Origin of Life
3 Detecting Extra-Solar Planets
4 Zones of Habitability Around Main-Sequence Stars
5 Photosynthesis and Its Role in Evolution
6 Replication and Heredity in Primitive Life
7 Prebiotic molecules in meteorites
8 Comets as Harbingers of Life
9 Panspermia
10 The Earliest Fossils
11 The Atmosphere of Titan and Its Relevance to Prebiotic Earth
12 Meteorites from Mars and Their Significance
13 Europa: Life below the ice?
14 Inorganic Catalysts and Enzymes: Their Role in Early Life
15 Organic molecules in Interstellar space
16 The Origin of Homo Sapiens
17 Education in Origins of Life
18 The Discovery of DNA
19 Charles Darwin and the Origin of Species
20 Molecular chirality and the orgins of life