Viral quasispecies: Life, evolution and catastrophe This paper, based on some discussions concerning the concepts of life and virus, analyzes the dynamics of viral populations and the pre-biotic molecular evolution from the point of view of the quasispecies and the hypercycle theoretical models. It explores the quasispecies behavior inside the sequence space and its competitive processes. At the end of the paper, the aforementioned theoretical models are complemented with some thermodynamics concepts and the function of the quasispecies as an Information Gathering and Using System (IGUS) is discussed. Key words: Quasispecies, hypercycle, virus, molecular-evolution, catastrophe, thermodynamics, IGUS.