Physics of life

Summary

Life has emerged on our planet from physical principles such as molecular self-organization, thermodynamics, stochastics and iterative refinement. This course will introduce the physical methods to study life and will discuss the quantitative and physical concepts that make life possible.

Content

Learning Prerequisites

Recommended courses

• Biophysics: physics of the cell (P. De Los Rios, S. Manley, BA6)
• Biophysics: physics of biological systems (S. Rahi, MA1)

Important concepts to start the course

• Thermodynamics, Fourier transformation

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course, the student must be able to:

• Describe the molecules and structural arrangement of modern biological cells
• Describe and quantitatively understand the physical mechanisms that drive living organisms.
• Explain the biophysical tools used to study the molecules of life and interpret their data.

Teaching methods

• 2 hours of class + 2 hour of exercises
• Students are invited to give one 10-min presentation on one of several possible topics during the semester.

Expected student activities

Homework will be given every week. Solutions will be handed out. Homework will not be graded. It is strongly advised to make the effort to do the homework weekly.

Assessment methods

• The course grading is composed of a final written exam
• Students should give a 10-min presentation on one of a given list of topics. Failure to give the presentation will lower the final grade by 0.5.

Resources

Bibliography

• David Sheehan: Physical Biochemistry, Principles and Applications (Wiley, 2013)

Ressources en bibliothèque

• Physical Biochemistry / Sheehan

Moodle Link

• https://go.epfl.ch/PHYS-468