What Is Life?—2nd Edition
A special issue of Life (ISSN 2075-1729).
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 27 February 2026 | Viewed by 28
Special Issue Editors
Interests: virus-host interactions; lipid rafts; gangliosides; virus receptors; RNA viruses; SARS-CoV-2 variants; antivirals; vaccines
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: astrobiology; chirality; prebiotics; organic chemistry; evolution; synthetic organic chemistry; meteorites; organic synthesis; chromatography; mars
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
The first edition of our Special Issue, What is Life? (https://www.mdpi.com/journal/life/special_issues/S551RX0199), sparked the interest of many scientists from around the world. We have therefore decided to offer a second edition, which will revisit the same themes while enriching them with new ones, particularly those related to the rise of artificial intelligence and its applications in biology. In this second edition we would like to encourage new contributions that allow us to approach the problem of defining life with generally overlooked approaches, including the fundamental parameters (water, time, space, electrostatic potential, entropy, or quantum mechanisms) that were the subject of the first edition of this Special Issue. This second edition is still aimed at providing selected contributions on the basic but neglected parameters of biology that are critical for better understanding what life is, and how it handles order and chaos through a combination of genetic and epigenetic mechanisms. Potential topics include, but are not limited to, the definition of life; the role of water in biological mechanisms; how living organisms handle time constraints; electrostatic potential in biology; quantum mechanisms in biology; the impact of silent mutations on evolution; intrinsically disordered proteins, moonlighting proteins and their roles in biology; new insights in the origin of life—astrobiology; synthetic biology; are viruses alive?; artificial intelligence contributions to the definition of life and its emergence on Earth; AlphaFold; the epigenetic dimension of protein structure; chirality; biological membranes; and emergence.
Prof. Dr. Jacques Fantini
Dr. André Brack
Guest Editor
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Life is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- definition of life
- origins of life
- artificial intelligence
- alphafold
- synthetic biology
- theoretical biology
- quantum biology
- water, time, and space
- membrane systems
- electrostatic potential
- DNA
- RNA
- epigenetics
- mutations
- molecular interactions
- chirality
- artificial intelligence and life processes
- early evolution of life
- coevolution
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Related Special Issue
- What Is Life? in Life (10 articles)
