A theoretical chemist, Orgel was fascinated with the origins of life on Earth. Born and educated in England, Orgel spent most of his professional life in the U.S., at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, where he directed the Chemical Evolution Laboratory.
“He would go for the fundamental questions of biology — why is biology the way it is and how did it get there?” said Scripps biochemist Gerald Joyce. “He’s tackled every problem on the origins of life.”
Orgel was dissatisfied with the theory that DNA was the first repository of genetic information, as it was too complicated to have not evolved from some precursor. He thus came up with the RNA world theory of the origin of life — that RNA (ribonucleic acid) came first. Later, after deciding that RNA was also too complex, he theorized that RNA wasn’t first either, but rather just one step in a long process. He is popularly known for Orgel’s Second Rule: “Evolution is cleverer than you are.”
Dr. Orgel died in a hospice on October 27 from pancreatic cancer. He was 80.