---
product_id: 539752239
title: "Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death"
price: "120.74 DT"
currency: TND
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 13
url: https://www.desertcart.tn/products/539752239-transformer-the-deep-chemistry-of-life-and-death
store_origin: TN
region: Tunisia
---

# Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death

**Price:** 120.74 DT
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

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- **What is this?** Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death
- **How much does it cost?** 120.74 DT with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.tn](https://www.desertcart.tn/products/539752239-transformer-the-deep-chemistry-of-life-and-death)

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## Description

From the renowned biochemist and author of The Vital Question , an illuminating inquiry into the Krebs cycle and the origins of life. “Nick Lane’s exploration of the building blocks that underlie life’s big fundamental questions―the origin of life itself, aging, and disease―have shaped my thinking since I first came across his work. He is one of my favorite science writers.”―Bill Gates What brings the Earth to life, and our own lives to an end? For decades, biology has been dominated by the study of genetic information. Information is important, but it is only part of what makes us alive. Our inheritance also includes our living metabolic network, a flame passed from generation to generation, right back to the origin of life. In Transformer , biochemist Nick Lane reveals a scientific renaissance that is hiding in plain sight ―how the same simple chemistry gives rise to life and causes our demise. Lane is among the vanguard of researchers asking why the Krebs cycle, the “perfect circle” at the heart of metabolism, remains so elusive more than eighty years after its discovery. Transformer is Lane’s voyage, as a biochemist, to find the inner meaning of the Krebs cycle―and its reverse―why it is still spinning at the heart of life and death today. Lane reveals the beautiful, violent world within our cells, where hydrogen atoms are stripped from the carbon skeletons of food and fed to the ravenous beast of oxygen. Yet this same cycle, spinning in reverse, also created the chemical building blocks that enabled the emergence of life on our planet. Now it does both. How can the same pathway create and destroy? What might our study of the Krebs cycle teach us about the mysteries of aging and the hardest problem of all, consciousness? Transformer unites the story of our planet with the story of our cells―what makes us the way we are, and how it connects us to the origin of life. Enlivened by Lane’s talent for distilling and humanizing complex research, Transformer offers an essential read for anyone fascinated by biology’s great mysteries. Life is at root a chemical phenomenon: this is its deep logic. 58 illustrations

Review: Nick Lane has made difficult science accessible - Absolutely fascinating subject! If you ever wondered HOW plants make energy out of sunlight and air, and build themselves carbon houses with it, this is the book for you. I picked up this book without ever having heard of the Krebs cycle or the reverse Krebs cycle or the scientists who worked out the chemistry. Well, now I have. Lane does more than just explain the chemistry. He puts a face on it. He doesn't only tell us what these scientists discovered, he tells us about the experiments, the successful ones and the ones that failed, the decades of slogging into blind alleys, the accidents of history, the personal lives of the scientists who worked out the intricate chemistry that has given us this world of life that we know today. I'm really enjoying this book.
Review: This is a great book. Everyone dreads studying the Krebs cycle. Lane makes it readable and engaging. - Lane makes every topic readable and information-packed. Most people who have taken the dreaded biochemistry course haven't learned half as much about the Krebs Cycle as is in this book, and most of them dreaded the course partly because they found it so hard to learn. But of course you wouldn't just look at a car and how some of the parts (wheels, belts) go around that it uses fuel. you would look at how the parts relate to each other and what each one does. That is what Lane does for the Krebs Cycle. Lane takes the cycle in small steps shows what each one does and how it is essential to the life that runs on oxygen, and by running in reverse, makes oxygen by breaking off from other chemicals. He shows how it can be adapted by its chemical environment to produce other necessary chemicals along the way. His stories of discovery are partly from his own research of deep-sea life. The Krebs cycle is independent of life (I hadn't known this) but can just chug along producing components that can be used by living things as they emerge and become capable of reproducing. Every book I have read by Lane has been fascinating. I started with Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life and they were all great.

## Technical Specifications

| Specification | Value |
|---------------|-------|
| Best Sellers Rank | #75,843 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #7 in Biochemistry (Books) #8 in Organic Chemistry (Books) #9 in Cell Biology (Books) |
| Customer Reviews | 4.5 out of 5 stars 396 Reviews |

## Images

![Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61LoD+5jSqL.jpg)

## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Nick Lane has made difficult science accessible
*by L***S on July 5, 2026*

Absolutely fascinating subject! If you ever wondered HOW plants make energy out of sunlight and air, and build themselves carbon houses with it, this is the book for you. I picked up this book without ever having heard of the Krebs cycle or the reverse Krebs cycle or the scientists who worked out the chemistry. Well, now I have. Lane does more than just explain the chemistry. He puts a face on it. He doesn't only tell us what these scientists discovered, he tells us about the experiments, the successful ones and the ones that failed, the decades of slogging into blind alleys, the accidents of history, the personal lives of the scientists who worked out the intricate chemistry that has given us this world of life that we know today. I'm really enjoying this book.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ This is a great book. Everyone dreads studying the Krebs cycle. Lane makes it readable and engaging.
*by J***S on January 25, 2024*

Lane makes every topic readable and information-packed. Most people who have taken the dreaded biochemistry course haven't learned half as much about the Krebs Cycle as is in this book, and most of them dreaded the course partly because they found it so hard to learn. But of course you wouldn't just look at a car and how some of the parts (wheels, belts) go around that it uses fuel. you would look at how the parts relate to each other and what each one does. That is what Lane does for the Krebs Cycle. Lane takes the cycle in small steps shows what each one does and how it is essential to the life that runs on oxygen, and by running in reverse, makes oxygen by breaking off from other chemicals. He shows how it can be adapted by its chemical environment to produce other necessary chemicals along the way. His stories of discovery are partly from his own research of deep-sea life. The Krebs cycle is independent of life (I hadn't known this) but can just chug along producing components that can be used by living things as they emerge and become capable of reproducing. Every book I have read by Lane has been fascinating. I started with Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life and they were all great.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ valuable book but a lot of detail
*by J***A on May 17, 2024*

Not knowing much about biochemistry, "Transformer" was a informative book, although the detailed explanations were more than I could follow, and not necessary to grasp the main points. Lane's thesis that making the stuff of life (biosynthesis) and using energy is fundamental to information (genetics) makes intuitive good sense. His application of this basic theme to how life goes about its business, how life originated, ageing, and cancer enlarged my appreciation for what it means to be alive. Well worth reading, and rereading for the major ideas.

## Frequently Bought Together

- Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death
- Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the meaning of life (Oxford Landmark Science)

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*Product available on Desertcart Tunisia*
*Store origin: TN*
*Last updated: 2026-09-25*