James A. Lake | |
|---|---|
| Born | August 10, 1941 |
| Alma mater | University of Wisconsin University of Colorado Boulder |
| Known for | Symbiogenesis |
| Awards | Darwin–Wallace Medal |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Evolutionary biology |
| Institutions | University of California, Los Angeles |
| Doctoral students | Janet Sinsheimer |
James A. Lake (born August 10, 1941) is an American evolutionary biologist and a Distinguished Professor of Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology and of Human Genetics at UCLA. Lake is best known for the New Animal Phylogeny and for the first three-dimensional structure of the ribosome. He has also made significant contributions to understanding genome evolution across all kingdoms of life, including discovering informational and operational genes, elucidating the complexity hypothesis for gene transfer, rooting the tree of life, and understanding the early transition from prokaryotic to eukaryotic life.