Showing titles in Biology

For Irwin Shapiro, science starts with questions. This book provides a broad and entertaining survey of major scientific discoveries that have changed our views of nature and, in turn, spawned further questions. Shapiro, an award-winning scientist and beloved teacher, separates his inquiry into three parts: looking up at the universe; looking down at the earth and its fossils; and looking in at the story of life. His framework encourages listeners to view science as a detective story—to observe and question nature and natural phenomena, and to base all conclusions on scientific evidence.

How do you revise hard topics without staying up all night to cram? Who said preparing for tests isn’t fun? You will be excited to take your exams after revising with this audiobook. This audiobook is the "ultimate exam and test prep Q&A" for you as a grade six student looking to pass your biology exam. It has 200 questions and answers covering different testable areas including: Living things, classification of organisms, plants, animals, and respiration and digestion, among others.

The zombie has had a bit of a renaissance over the last decade. Hollywood churns out films like World War Z and TV shows like The Walking Dead, and communities throughout the country hold zombie runs and races. So what’s driving the zombie obsession? Where did the fear of this creature originate? In this audiobook, The Real Zombies of Nature, we look at the myth of the zombie versus real instances of zombification in the natural world and engage in some scientific speculation about what would happen if myth ever became reality.

The human reaction to insects is neither purely biological nor simply cultural. And no one reacts to insects with indifference. Insects frighten, disgust, and fascinate us. Jeff Lockwood explores this phenomenon through evolutionary science, human history, and contemporary psychology, as well as a debilitating bout with entomophobia in his work as an entomologist. Exploring the nature of anxiety and phobia, Lockwood explores the lively debate about how much of our fear of insects can be attributed to ancestral predisposition for our own survival and how much is learned through individual experiences.

The chilling screams of the Red Fox, the rutting calls of the Fallow Deer and the rumbling growls of the Badger are just a few of the sounds featured in this publication. This identification guide from the British Library presents a comprehensive collection of recordings that will help listeners learn how to identify the sounds of British mammals. It includes the calls of species such as the Red Deer, Red Squirrel, and Grey Seal that are celebrated hallmarks of the British landscape.

Again and again, microbes have shaped our health, our genetics, our history, our culture, our politics, even our religion and ethics. This book reveals much that scientists and cultural historians have learned about the pervasive interconnections between infectious microbes and humans. It also considers what our ongoing fundamental relationship with infectious microbes might mean for the future of the human species.

Several years ago, ecologist Lauren E. Oakes set out from California for Alaska's old-growth forests to hunt for a dying tree: the yellow-cedar. With climate change as the culprit, the death of this species meant loss for many Alaskans. Oakes and her research team wanted to chronicle how plants and people could cope with their rapidly changing world. Amidst the standing dead, she discovered the resiliency of forgotten forests, flourishing again in the wake of destruction, and a diverse community of people who persevered to create new relationships with the emerging environment.

In The Other Big Bang, the evolutionary and developmental biologist Eric S. Haag explores the two-billion-year history of sex, from the first organisms on Earth to contemporary humans.

Wenn Biologen bei Freunden zum Essen eingeladen sind, müssen sie immer wieder die ganz existentiellen Fragen beantworten - manchmal auch die intimen und die ekligen. Was bezweckt eine Nachtigall, wenn sie singt? Haben Goldfische einen Penis? Wird man krank, wenn man am Biofilm im Kühlschrank leckt? In diesem Original Podcast leisten eine in allen Lebenslagen erfahrene marine Mikrobiologin und ein Experte für Amphibien und Reptilien erste Info-Hilfe, zusammen mit einem Journalisten, der eine unschlagbare Begeisterung für alles Lebendige hat.

Si la historia de la Tierra se redujera a un año, nuestra especie surgiría en los últimos treinta minutos. Pero la vida ha existido durante 3.700 millones de años, la mayor parte de la historia de nuestro planeta y más de una cuarta parte de la edad del universo. ¿Qué hicieron esos organismos durante todo este tiempo?

It happens everywhere: offices, schools, even your own backyard. And, seemingly, anything can trigger it: cell phones, sirens, bad music, constant distractions, your boss, or even your spouse. We all know certain things get under our skin. Can science explain why? NPR's Joe Palca and Flora Lichtman take you on a scientific quest through psychology, evolutionary biology, anthropology, and other disciplines to uncover the truth about being annoyed.

Unravel the enigmatic depths of Albert Einstein's mind in "Ideas and Opinions." This captivating collection, compiled by the master himself, unveils his diverse perspectives on science, philosophy, social issues, and even religion. Delve into the workings of relativity, ponder his nuanced views on faith, and journey with him as he advocates for peace, justice, and societal transformation.

An artist turned naturalist known for her botanical illustrations, Merian was born just 16 years after Galileo proclaimed that the Earth orbited the sun. But at the age of 50, she sailed from Europe to the New World on a solo scientific expedition to study insect metamorphosis—an unheard-of journey for any naturalist at that time, much less a woman.

As biologist Jeremy Griffith explains in THE Interview (which psychiatrist Professor Harry Prosen described as “the most important interview of all time”), while we humans lacked the explanation for our two-million-year corrupted human condition, we had no choice but to deny that our distant ape ancestors lived in a state of cooperative and loving innocence. But with the good reason for our corrupted condition now finally found, our species’ original state of innocence can at last be admitted.

For billions of years, microbes have produced and consumed greenhouse gases that regulate global temperature and in turn other aspects of our climate. The balance of these gases maintains Earth's habitability. Methane, a greenhouse gas produced only by microbes, may have kept Earth out of a deep freeze billions of years ago. Likewise, variations in carbon dioxide, another greenhouse gas released by microbes and other organisms, help to explain the comings and goings of ice ages over the last million years. Now we face a human-made climate crisis with drastic consequences.

How could a relatively simple chemical code give rise to the complexity of a human being? How could our human genome have evolved? And how does it actually work? Your genome defines you at the most profound level. That same genome is present in every one of the approximately 100,000 billion cells that make you who you are as an individual member of the human species. An important ingredient of the genome, and its essential nature, is memory .

Carlos López-Otín, prominente figura en el ámbito de la bioquímica y la biología molecular y autor de la exitosa Trilogía de la vida, nos propone un nuevo enfoque científico centrado en la medicina de la salud, y nos desvela los secretos para fomentarla y lograr el necesario equilibrio físico y mental.

Siroccos, Santa Anas, chinooks, monsoons...the wind has as many names as moods. Few other forces have so universally shaped the lands and waters of the earth, the plants and animals, the patterns of exploration, settlement, and civilization. Few other phenomena have exerted such a profound influence on the history and psyche of humankind. Wind touches all of us every day of our lives, yet remarkably little has been written about it except as a component of the weather.

In The Genial Gene, Joan Roughgarden forcefully rejects ideas that have come to dominate the study of animal evolution. Building on her brilliant and innovative book Evolution's Rainbow, in which she challenged accepted wisdom about gender identity and sexual orientation, Roughgarden upends the notion of the selfish gene and the theory of sexual selection and develops a compelling and controversial alternative theory called social selection.

As human beings, we are fascinated by what makes us tick. We know that nature gave us certain biological appetites to ensure our survival, among those the need for water, food, sex, and love, but meeting these alone is not enough to ensure happiness. Scientists, and now managers, are realizing that people have a biological need to experience social rewards like praise, the thrill of innovation, and the satisfaction of acquiring new skills.