Stars, Cells, and God

Human Language and God’s Image | Space Solar Power

Join biochemist Fazale “Fuz” Rana and astrophysicist Hugh Ross as they discuss discoveries with theological and philosophical implications that point to the reality of God’s existence.
Is it possible to mount a scientific defense showing that humans uniquely bear God’s image as Scripture teaches? In this episode, biochemist Fuz Rana discusses recent research from MIT that estimates the timing of the origin of human language and demonstrates that these results support the biblical account of humanity’s beginning.
Astrophysicist Hugh Ross discusses the feasibility of obtaining solar power from space. Researchers have devised a system where large satellites collect and convert solar power to electricity and transmit the electricity to Earth wirelessly. Previously, the system costs were prohibitive. Technological advances—lightweight collectors that can be folded and unraveled robotically and dynamically controlled for high precision and stability—now make space solar power an economically viable, fossil-fuel-free, continuously available solution for humanity’s energy needs.
Links and Resources:
Linguistic Capacity Was Present in the Homo sapiens Population 135 Thousand Years Ago
Rigid-Flexible Coupling Dynamics Modeling and Fractional-Order Sliding Mode Control for Large Space Solar Power Stations
Wireless Power Transfer in Space Using Flexible, Lightweight, Coherent Arrays
A Comprehensive Review on Space Solar Power Satellite: An Idiosyncratic Approach
Weathering Climate Change: A Fresh Approach

Oxygen in Distant Galaxy | Earth’s Magnetic Field and Life

Join astrophysicists Hugh Ross and Jeff Zweerink as they discuss new discoveries with theological and philosophical implications pointing to the reality of God’s existence.
Astrophysicist Hugh Ross discusses the James Webb Space Telescope’s confirmation that a galaxy called JADES-GS-z14-0 is the farthest one ever found. We’re seeing it as it looked just 291 million years after the big bang—13.48 billion light-years from us. By analyzing light from the galaxy, scientists found signs of a specific type of oxygen (called OIII), and hints of dust. The presence of heavy elements in the galaxy means that many massive stars must have formed just 200 to 290 million years after the universe began. Does the presence of these metals challenge the big bang?
Without Earth’s magnetic field, cosmic rays would sputter our atmosphere into space. Yet, scientists recently found that the magnetic field virtually collapsed for more than 20 million years as life transitioned from single-celled to complex, multicellular creatures. Astrophysicist Jeff Zweerink explains how detailed studies of Earth’s magnetic field direction and strength, coupled with measurements of the Earth’s core and the history of life, provide compelling evidence that Earth’s capacity to support life requires critical events occurring at precisely the right time. Such evidence points to a God who fashioned and developed our planet so life can thrive—particularly human life.
Links and Resources:
Photometric Detection at 7.7 µm of a Galaxy Beyond Redshift 14 with JWST/MIRI
Spectroscopic Confirmation of Two Luminous Galaxies at a Redshift of 14
Earth’s Magnetic Dipole Collapses, and Life Explodes
Is the Big Bang Theory in Trouble?

Comets: Evidence for Old or Young Earth?

Join astrophysicists Hugh Ross and Jeff Zweerink as they discuss new discoveries with theological and philosophical implications pointing to the reality of God’s existence.
For decades, young-earth creationists have used the existence of comets to argue that the earth can’t be a few billion years old. At first glance, this argument appears to have merit because comets are relatively short-lived phenomena. However, a closer examination of how comets formed and acquired orbits that bring them close to the Sun supports an old Earth. Even more importantly, cometary research provides strong evidence of God’s design in preparing Earth to support human life.
Links and Resources:
What 2024’s Bright Comet May Reveal About the Age of the Solar System
Size and Albedo of the Largest Detected Oort-Cloud Object: Comet C/2014 UN271 (Bernardinelli-Bernstein)

Creation of Woolly Mice | Nature Exceeds Human Designs

Join biochemist Fazale “Fuz” Rana and astrophysicist Jeff Zweerink as they discuss new discoveries with theological and philosophical implications pointing to the reality of God’s existence.
Can biotechnologists resurrect animals from extinction? Researchers from Colossal Bioscience have moved one step closer to making the woolly mammoth’s de-extinction a reality by gene-editing mice to exhibit woolly mammoth features. In this episode, biochemist Fuz Rana discusses this work and offers a Christian perspective on de-extinctions.
In the late 1960s, scientists theoretically worked out how to build a new class of materials that use the structure of the material (rather than the substance) to manipulate sound waves. It took another three decades to develop the technology to design and build them. Yet we find numerous examples of animals utilizing these novel-to-human materials. In this episode, we’ll discuss the science behind the durability of the mantis shrimp’s dactyl club (punching fist), which it uses to deliver blows without harming itself, and highlight the apologetic significance of these well-designed features found in nature.
LINKS & RESOURCES:
Rui Chen et al., “Multiplex-Edited Mice Recapitulate Woolly Mammoth Hair Phenotypes,” https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.03.03.641227v1
Pablo D. Zavattieri, “Naturally Twisted to Sieve Stress,” https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adv3100
A. Alderete et al., “Does the Mantis Shrimp Pack a Phononic Shield?,” https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adq7100

Human Uniqueness Confirmed | No Hard Steps to ETI?

Join biochemist Fazale “Fuz” Rana and astrophysicist Hugh Ross as they discuss discoveries with theological and philosophical implications pointing to the reality of God’s existence.
In this episode, biochemist Fuz Rana describes recent work from researchers at Rockefeller University. The researchers edited specific mouse genes to express the human version of the protein NOVA1, and they believe their research explains human language capability. Their findings add evidence for the exceptional nature of human beings and, consequently, the image of God.
Hugh discusses how four astrobiologists assert that intelligent life is the natural outcome of a hospitable environment. They note that the origin of life and every advance in Earth’s life occurred when physical and chemical conditions first permitted their appearance. Hence, they conclude that these appearances of life must be naturalistically straightforward and rapid. The team proposed a test of their hypothesis: exoplanets with the necessary physical and chemical conditions for each “hard step” in the origin and history of life will prove to be common and, in each case, chemical signatures for that life step will be found. Do the findings support their hypothesis?  
Links & Resources: 
A Humanized NOVA1 Splicing Factor Alters Mouse Vocal Communications
A Reassessment of the “Hard-Steps” Model for the Evolution of Intelligent Life
Who Was Adam? A Creation Model Approach to the Origin of Humanity
 

Do “Anti-Trans Laws” Increase Suicide Risk?

Join biochemist Fazale “Fuz” Rana and physician Steve Willing as they discuss discoveries with theological and philosophical implications pointing to the reality of God’s existence. 
In this episode, Fuz and Steve critique a recent Nature Human Behaviour article published by researchers at The Trevor Project claiming that anti-transgender laws increase suicides in young people with gender dysphoria. Is this claim valid? What is the relationship between suicide and gender dysphoria, and how does this discussion relate to the gospel?
Links and Resources:
State-Level Anti-Transgender Laws Increase Past-Year Suicide Attempts Among Transgender and Non-Binary Young People in the USA
Gender Identity White Papers

Oldest, Biggest Organism | Odd Cosmological Constant

Join astrophysicists Hugh Ross and Jeff Zweerink as they discuss discoveries with theological and philosophical implications pointing to the reality of God’s existence.
A team of biologists and geneticists collected over 500 samples from the leaves, roots, and bark of a single quaking aspen tree in Utah called Pando. This tree consists of 47,000 stems that cover 106 acres and it’s the world’s largest known organism. The team identified 4,000 genetic variations. They found that Pando’s triploid nature enhanced somatic mutations (noninherited DNA changes) gave Pando the just-right genetic diversity and resilience to thrive in a changing environment while maintaining genetic integrity. The team estimated that Pando is at least 16,000 years old and could be as old as 81,000 years old. The tree’s genetic designs enabled aspens and animals dependent on them to survive the radical climate changes that occurred during the last ice age.    For almost three decades, astronomers have recognized that the amount of dark energy in our universe falls exceedingly short of the amount expected in our best models of the universe (for example, the big bang). One possible explanation for this enormous discrepancy is that human existence demands that we see the observed level because any larger amount would preclude human life. Although initial research showed promise for this explanation, a recent paper using more realistic models of star formation reveals some significant challenges.
Links and Resources:
Mosaic of Somatic Mutations in Earth’s Oldest Living Organism, Pando Many Physicists Argue the Universe Is Fine-Tuned for Life. Our Findings Question This Idea. The Impact of the Cosmological Constant on Past and Future Star Formation

Solution to the Origin of Life?

Join biochemists Fazale “Fuz” Rana and Robert DiSilvestro as they discuss discoveries with theological and philosophical implications pointing to the reality of God’s existence.
Did life originate through evolutionary processes on the primordial Earth or through the handiwork of a Creator? In this episode Fuz and Robert critique one of the latest proposals from origin-of-life researchers for how proteins originated in the prebiotic world. In their analysis, Fuz and Robert show that a creation model best explains life’s origin.
Links and Resources:
Origins of Life: The Protein Folding Problem All Over Again?
Origins of Life: Biblical and Evolutionary Models Face Off by Fazale Rana and Hugh Ross

Mutations and Earth’s Age | Little Red Dots vs. Big Bang?

Join biochemist Fazale “Fuz” Rana and astrophysicist Hugh Ross as they discuss new discoveries with theological and philosophical implications pointing to the reality of God’s existence.
Young-earth creationists argue that the buildup of mutations quickly causes genomes to deteriorate, driving organisms to extinction. This process of genetic entropy occurs on a timescale of 6,000–10,000 years, indicating that Earth and life on Earth cannot be billions of years old. Drawing from recent work in genetics, biochemist Fuz Rana explains why this young-earth argument fails.
Little Red Dots (LRDs) are compact objects that are the emerging cores of large galaxies seen during the cosmic dawn (early stages of the universe). They were thought to challenge several big bang creation models because they were too bright. This challenge was based on the assumption that all their light came from stars. Spectra of LRDs show much of the light comes from gas spiraling into growing supermassive black holes at LRDs’ centers. This conclusion well fits big bang models where many first-to-form stars are hundreds of times the Sun’s mass.
Links and Resources:
Estimating the Proportion of Beneficial Mutations That Are Not Adaptive in Mammals
The Rise of Faint, Red AGN at z > 4: A Sample of Little Red Dots in the JWST Extragalactic Legacy Fields
Is the Big Bang Theory in Trouble?
A Matter of Days
Dinosaur Blood and the Age of the Earth

Chemical Signatures of ET? | Timescape Cosmology

Join astrophysicists Hugh Ross and Jeff Zweerink as they discuss new discoveries with theological and philosophical implications pointing to the reality of God’s existence.
Dimethyl sulfide in a planet’s atmosphere has been widely cited as an unambiguous signature of life on the planet. However, the discovery of dimethyl sulfide in a comet, in the interstellar medium, and in laboratory photochemical experiments shows nonbiological pathways for the manufacture of dimethyl sulfide and other organosulfurs. Thus, the James Webb Space Telescope’s discovery of such organic compounds on exoplanets can’t prove life exists on another planet.
The seeds of big bang cosmology were planted nearly 100 years ago, and it stands as the reigning cosmology model for the last 60–70 years. What many people may not realize is that the mathematical foundation for the big bang rests on an approximation needed to solve Einstein’s equations of general relativity. Over the last 20 years, a growing group of scientists have argued that more accurate solutions that don’t utilize the approximation provide a better model of the universe while simultaneously removing the need for dark energy. We describe the basics of this new model and discuss the apologetics implications.
Links and Resources:
Carbon-Bearing Molecules in a Possible Hycean Atmosphere
Abiotic Production of Dimethyl Sulfide, Carbonyl Sulfide, and Other Organosulfur Gases Via Photochemistry: Implications for Biosignatures and Metabolic Potential
Evidence for Abiotic Dimethyl Sulfide in Cometary Matter
On the Abiotic Origin of Dimethyl Sulfide: Discovery of DMS in the Interstellar Medium
Dark Energy May Not Exist: Something Stranger Might Explain the Universe
Supernovae Evidence for Foundational Change to Cosmological Models