This oceanic mega-organism consisted of genes and individual organelles and some form of leaky membranes. It could break down and extract energy from nutrients and make some proteins, but it lacked enzymes for making and reading DNA - so it wasn't dividing and evolving at that point. The theory states that around 2.9 billion years ago, LUCA split into 3 domains of life, that we have today - bacteria, archea, and eukaryotes that gave rise to plants and animals. What I like about this finding and theory is that it really supports the spiritual belief, common in almost every spiritual tradition, that we are all connected and that there is an inter-dependence between all species of life on earth.
We come from a common ancestor, which spanned an area of this world that we cannot even imagine today! And its individual cells and organelles worked together to keep it living, and to help create the life we have now. Thank you LUCA, for creating us, and let us all remember , we are connected, in ways we can only begin to imagine.
