funding origin of life research. in fact we're celebrating our 50th anniversary this year. the research that's going to be presented here today shows the goals of our program and our interest in the origin of life and life in the universe. i would like to introduce dr. simon, the lead author on the paper to fill us in on what she did and what she found. >> thanks, mary. as mary probably knows and as many of my colleagues would agree w-i'm always interested in exceptions to the rule. what i'm going to talk about here today is not that much different than another exception to the rule. and so i've discovered -- i've led a team that has discovered, something that i've been thinking about for many years. i've been thinking about an idea of substitution. what does it mean to be substitution. what does it mean to are toxics. i led a team that discovered a micobe.