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Stuart Hameroff MD is Professor at the Arizona Astrobiology Center; Prof. Emeritus Anesthesiology & Psychology; Director of the Science of Consciousness Conference at the University of Arizona in Tucson, Arizona. Retired from Anesthesiology where he researched how general anesthetic gases act on quantum vibrations in microtubules to prevent consciousness.
Hameroff is known for his collaboration with British physicist and Nobel Laureate Sir Roger Penrose on the ‘Orch OR’ quantum theory of consciousness, and for managing “The Science of Consciousness” conferences for the past 30 years. Hameroff is also collaborating with Planetary Scientist Professor Dante Lauretta at Arizona Astrobiology Center (AABC) to study putative “signs of life” and “roots of consciousness” in extraterrestrial organic molecules from the early solar system retrieved by Dante’s NASA OSIRIS REx mission to asteroid Bennu. We will probe these molecules to answer the question: Which came first, life or consciousness?