---
product_id: 31840094
title: "Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology"
brand: "johnjoe mcfadden, jim al-khalili"
price: "¥6606"
currency: JPY
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 13
url: https://www.desertcart.jp/products/31840094-life-on-the-edge-the-coming-of-age-of-quantum
store_origin: JP
region: Japan
---

# Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology

**Brand:** johnjoe mcfadden, jim al-khalili
**Price:** ¥6606
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

## Quick Answers

- **What is this?** Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology by johnjoe mcfadden, jim al-khalili
- **How much does it cost?** ¥6606 with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.jp](https://www.desertcart.jp/products/31840094-life-on-the-edge-the-coming-of-age-of-quantum)

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## Description

New York Times bestseller • Life on the Edge alters our understanding of our world's fundamental dynamics through the use of quantum mechanics.
Life is the most extraordinary phenomenon in the known universe; but how did it come to be? Even in an age of cloning and artificial biology, the remarkable truth remains: nobody has ever made anything living entirely out of dead material. Life remains the only way to make life. Are we still missing a vital ingredient in its creation? Using first-hand experience at the cutting edge of science, Jim Al-Khalili and Johnjoe Macfadden reveal that missing ingredient to be quantum mechanics. Drawing on recent ground-breaking experiments around the world, each chapter in Life on the Edge illustrates one of life's puzzles: How do migrating birds know where to go? How do we really smell the scent of a rose? How do our genes copy themselves with such precision? Life on the Edge accessibly reveals how quantum mechanics can answer these probing questions of the universe.
Guiding the reader through the rapidly unfolding discoveries of the last few years, Al-Khalili and McFadden describe the explosive new field of quantum biology and its potentially revolutionary applications, while offering insights into the biggest puzzle of all: what is life? As they brilliantly demonstrate in these groundbreaking pages, life exists on the quantum edge.
Winner, Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication

## Technical Specifications

| Specification | Value |
|---------------|-------|
| Dimensions | 5.12 x 0.79 x 7.93 inches |
| Edition | Reprint |
| Isbn 10 | 0307986829 |
| Isbn 13 | 978-0307986825 |
| Item Weight | 9.6 ounces |
| Language | English |
| Print Length | 368 pages |
| Publication Date | July 26, 2016 |
| Publisher | Crown |

## Images

![Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71AB7xDp65L.jpg)

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## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ A book full of wonder
*by  on Reviewed in the United States August 30, 2026*

This may be the best book I’ve ever read in my life. Unfortunately, it’s a difficult read without some familiarity with chemistry and physics. So many good things in this book: dealing with the big questions of life, excellent explanations of complicated things, cutting edge information, showing how well sharing and debating ideas/research in the scientific community works, all wrapped up with interesting examples and good stories. Thank you Jim and JohnJoe.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Very interesting introduction to quantum mechanics in biology
*by  on Reviewed in the United States September 30, 2015*

Life on the Edge is an account of the growing field of quantum biology. The subject is to a certain extent in its academic infancy and no doubt will be an increasing focus for academics in the coming decades. In the book the authors outline certain mechanisms that seem to be a consequence of quantum mechanical phenomenon that various species take advantage of but also discuss broadly how quantum mechanics could intertwine with biology.The authors mix their time with familiarizing the reader with the unintuitive aspects of quantum mechanics and using those analogies to discuss how biology might use them. In the process of reading the book the reader will learn about the wave particle duality of nature as well as coherence and the collapse of the wave function. The authors spend time discussing how the messy and dense environment in the cell is an unintuitive arena for wave functions to propagate as most quantum phenomenon that we know of only retain their wave behavior when they are in isolated environments. At the core of the discussion of the likelihood of quantum biology is a high level perspective on how that might happen and the authors discuss how their might be a quantum resonance at the biological level which enhances wave propagation rather than opposes it. The details of this are much beyond the scope of this book and I am quite sure not worked out in any detail by the authors either as they are fairly radical. The authors discuss the criticisms of quantum biology and the reductionist response that inevitably some aspects of biology will be a function of quantum mechanics as Newtonian mechanics is quantum mechanics in the law of large numbers. Some of their response is convincing and some of it is not. In particular the authors discuss how the magnetic compass in birds that are used for navigation have quantum mechanical origin but then in the full discussion it becomes less and less clear that the mechanism is a fact at all. Other aspects of their discoveries seem quite remarkable; in particular the authors discuss how photosynthesis is catalyzed by a quantum walk by the incoming photon and that the speed by which the catalyst works can only be explained by the photon taking multiple paths. The idea of biology using quantum computation is the most interesting idea in the book and it is used in several places. The authors spend some time on DNA replication and how quantum mechanics might have a roll their in frequency resonance but this is a bit vague as it becomes clear there are many different phenomenon at work. The book effectively is a collection of examples of which all of them are at best partially worked out but in reading the chapters the reader gets a sense of what people are working on and the directions they are taking to attempt to provide solutions to biological mysteries.Life on the Edge gives a new perspective to the interested reader on quantum mechanics in biology. It is a new field that will take time to develop and evolve but in reading the book one gets a sense that there is promise in this research and some of the proposed solutions could offer fascinating solutions to how life allows us to speed up combinatorial dynamics that drive evolution. Very interesting book.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Fascinating topic, terrific explanations and science writing
*by  on Reviewed in the United States October 28, 2015*

"Life on the Edge" is not a reference to "Survivor," but to the authors' argument that an understanding of what life is and how it works may be found at the "edge" between classical/thermodynamic systems and quantum mechanics. In making their case (to borrow from the dust jacket), they bring together "first-hand experience at the cutting edge of science with unparalleled gifts of explanation." In short: A fascinating topic, a lively writing style, and exceptional explanatory skill makes for very good science writing.Prospective readers are presumably as curious as I am about the possible application of quantum ideas to understanding of biological/living systems. The authors' make a clear argument for the significance of quantum biology as the next and essential step in understanding biologic life. They draw on both underlying theory and contemporary research (some of it their own) to show how the quantum world is critical to our understanding of our larger, classical world, and specifically to critical biological processes. Some arguments pertain to increasingly recognized relevance of quantum mechanics to such critical functions as enzymes and photosynthesis; other chapters (e.g., "Mind" and consciousness) are more preliminary and speculative. But even while advocating for the significance of quantum theory, the authors' treatment is balanced, and allows the reader to appreciate what is more solid or more speculative. Overall, an illuminating account of work being done in this area. But what makes the book not just worthwhile but terrific is its outstanding explanation of the underlying quantum "weirdness" that is key to understanding their argument.The authors' skillful use of imaginative and lucid analogies is delightful and effective. As I suspect will be true of many readers, I have read dozens of explanations and considered even more examples of quantum theory and phenomena. This book provides the best (non-mathematical) explanations of quantum theory and its relation to classical and thermodynamic systems that I have read. This is not trivial. Most scientific concepts (even as those in literature and art) are founded on metaphor and analogy: It is simply the way most humans (including the most clever) think most of the time. Before we quantify or translate into provable theorems, mathematical or otherwise, we typically conceive of and fundamentally grasp ideas through imaginative comparison with other phenomena or ideas. The analogies and metaphors employed by the authors are exceptionally cogent and effective, which not only strengthens their arguments in the present case, but are likely to stick with many readers whenever they wrestle with quantum "weirdness." A great service by itself.

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*Last updated: 2026-10-12*