LUCA The Origin Of All Life Stock Image

The last universal common ancestor (LUCA) is the hypothesized common ancestral cell from which the three domains of life, the Bacteria, the Archaea, and the Eukarya originated. The cell had a lipid bilayer it possessed the genetic code and ribosomes which translated from DNA or RNA to proteins. The LUCA probably existed at latest 3.6 billion years ago, and possibly as early as 4.3 billion years ago[2] or earlier. The nature of this point or stage of divergence remains a topic of research.