What is Life? - with Paul Nurse

Living things are extraordinary and our quest to define life is one of the most fundamental questions in biology. Subscribe for regular science videos: Watch the Q&A: Sir Paul Nurse is a geneticist and cell biologist whose discoveries have helped to explain how the cell controls its cycle of growth and division. Working in fission yeast, he showed that the cdc2 gene encodes a protein kinase, which ensures the cell is ready to copy its DNA and divide. Paul’s findings have broader significance since errors in cell growth and division may lead to cancer and other serious diseases. He was awarded the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, alongside Tim Hunt and Leland H. Hartwell.