Introduction: Elixir of Life
In the beginning: The origins and importance of oxygen
Silence of the aeons: Three billion years of microbial evolution
Fuse to the Cambrian Explosion: Snowball earth, environmental change and the first animals
The Bolsover Dragonfly: Oxygen and the rise of the giants
Treachery in the air: oxygen poisoning and x-irradiation: A mechanism in common
Green planet: Radiation and the evolution of photosynthesis
Looking for LUCA: Last ancestor in an age before oxygen
Portrait of a paradox: Vitamin C and the many faces of an antioxidant
The antioxidant machine: a hundred and one ways of living with oxygen
Sex and the art of bodily maintenance: Trade-offs in the evolution of aging
Eat! or you'll live forever: The triangle of food, sex and longevity
Gender bender: The rate of living and the need for sexes
Beyond genes and destiny: The double-agent theory of ageing and disease
Life, deth and oxygen: Lessons from evolution on the future of ageing.
