Shelf 2:
Non-fictionBooks
for Biologists
Shelf 2:
Non-fiction
| Author and Title | Reviews and Reader's comments taken
from |
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Sankar Chatterjee: The Rise of Birds |
In The Rise of Birds, Chatterjee writes that Protoavis predates Archaeopteryx, previously known as the "first bird" by some 75 million years, and that it is more closely related to the modern bird than its Johnny-come-lately rival. But Protoavis is only the starting point for this sweeping, detailed, and beautifully illustrated history of bird evolution. Chatterjee examines the many recent discoveries of bird fossils all over the world and comes to some fascinating and often surprising conclusions: the evolutionary link between birds and dinosaurs.... Read an excerpt from the book. | |
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Hal Hellman: Great Feuds in Science |
"The facts, even the theories, are history. It is the process that is the living science; that's what makes the activity exciting to those who practice it," science writer Hal Hellman observes. "Often, however, the process of scientific discovery is charged with emotion.... Holders of an earlier idea may not give it up gladly." Hellman describes some of the most emotional, dramatic, and personal debates in scientific history. | |
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John Casti: The Cambridge Quintet |
It was a dark and stormy night. Four great minds, at the behest of a fifth, convened at Cambridge in 1949 to discuss artificial intelligence over a five-course dinner. Had geneticist J.B.S. Haldane, physicist Erwin Schrödinger, mathematician Alan Turing, and philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein actually met that night in the rooms of Britain's science adviser C.P. Snow, they may have enacted the drama revealed in The Cambridge Quintet. | |
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Evelyn Fox Keller: A Feeling for the Organism |
Barbara McClintock was one of the premier investigators in cytology and classical genetics, but her work was pushed out of the mainstream by the revolution in molecular biology in the middle of this century. Thirty years later, the simple truths sought by research scientists whose training was closer to physics than biology continued to prove elusive, and the discovery of transposons in bacteria marked the beginning of a revival of interest in her work. | |
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James Watson: The Double Helix |
Watson's account of his and Crick's race to determine the structure of DNA is very exciting. Very little technical information makes it accessible for the non-scientist. The Double Helix is very quick reading, and is one of the most captivating books I've ever read. Read an excerpt from the book. | |
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Paul de Kruif: Microbe Hunters |
From the top of today's news, where reoprts of Ebola and HIV loom large, comes the story of microbes, bacteria, and how disease shaoes our everyday lives and society thrives. The superheroes in this scheme are the scientists, bacteriologists, doctors, and medical technicians who wage active war against bacteria. The new Introduction to this book places this history in a thoroughly modern context. | |
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Lynn Margulis, Dorian Sagan, Lewis Thomas: Microcosmos: Microbial Ancestors |
A reader from Austin: This is an outstanding and
very readable book on the world of microbes. Beautifully written and filled
with insights, it should be required reading for biology students. I couldn't
put it down and I hated biology in high school! I takes you from the beginnings
of our planet to the present time, showing the reader the crucial role of
microbes in the creation and maintenance of all life. This book will also be of
interest to any serious student of the Gaia hypothesis. Read it and you will
never think of cells, bacteria and viruses the same way again. You will come
away with a humbling and enlightened view on man's place in a world created,
dominated, and maintained by microbes. |
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Henry Harris: The Birth of The Cell |
Not quite an emperor's-new-clothes retelling, but Harris (Regius Professor of Medicine Emeritus, Oxford) aims to set the record straight on who should really get the credit for discoveries and insights into the nature of cells. | |
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Laura Gould: Cats are not Peas |
Cats Are Not Peas tells the story of an unrecognized chapter in the history of science--the mystery behind the rarity of the male calico cat. The book takes readers through the great discoveries in genetics, from Mendel's studies of inheritance in peas through the discovery of the chromosome and the role of DNA--all from the little-known viewpoint of the pivotal and unheralded role played by cats as experimental subjects in this epic drama. | |
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Richard Conniff: Spineless Wonders |
Conniff, a journalist, knows all too well that most people do not share his admiration for the invertebrates of the world, and so he sets out to demonstrate just what marvels of engineering they really are. From discussions of just how these creatures are made and how they survive, he goes on to tell stories about the people who study them. From the scientist who ate the only known specimen of a new species to the leech-farmer in Wales, Conniff paints a vivid picture of invertebrates and the people who love them, making even that slime eel seem almost appealing. | |
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Sue Hubbell: Waiting for Aphrodite |
In Waiting for Aphrodite, Hubbell first trains her microscopic gaze on camel crickets--"They grew a bright orange bump on the back of what we would like to call their necks but mustn't, because bugs don't have necks"--and sea cucumbers--"cool and leathery and limp, a little like a damp, deflated football." From there, she continues her tour with millipedes, sponges, periwinkles, corals, earthworms, horseshoe crabs, and other underappreciated earth-dwellers, describing each species in lushly metaphoric prose and a perfectly appropriate sense of wonder. These are strange beasts, and their ways are mysterious. Yet Hubbell seeks, and finds, common ground between invertebrates and humans. | |
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Recommended by Students |
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