A New Century Of Biology

Download or read book A New Biology for the 21st Century written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2009-11-20 with total page 113 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now more than ever, biology has the potential to contribute practical solutions to many of the major challenges confronting the United States and the world. A New Biology for the 21st Century recommends that a "New Biology" approach-one that depends on greater integration within biology, and closer collaboration with physical, computational, and earth scientists, mathematicians and engineers-be used to find solutions to four key societal needs: sustainable food production, ecosystem restoration, optimized biofuel production, and improvement in human health. The approach calls for a coordinated effort to leverage resources across the federal, private, and academic sectors to help meet challenges and improve the return on life science research in general.

Download or read book A New Century of Biology written by W. John Kress and published by Smithsonian Institution. This book was released on 2016-02-02 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the twentieth century, scientists in the relatively new field of biology played an important role in exposing the threats of environmental degradation, loss of species diversity, habitat fragmentation, scarce energy resources, and human population growth. In the essays found in A New Century of Biology, some of the world's most notable biologists consider how their discipline must evolve to address these problems in the twenty-first century. The next one hundred years, the contributors argue, will likely be dominated by breakthroughs in evolutionary biology and systems ecology; by an increased need for scientists to integrate research, teaching, and service missions; and by problem-solving ventures on greater spatial and temporal scales. Because human activity and increased population will continue to have a profound impact on the environment, biologists must define an effective strategy for integrating the biological sciences with global economics and human social structure. The eleven contributors are leaders in the fields of ecology, and evolution, morphology, and development, behavior, microbiology, ecosystem energetics and biogeochemistry, biodiversity and conservation biology, and human sciences. While acknowledging the real problems their discipline must address, they offer an optimistic agenda for the future.

Download or read book The Century of the Gene written by Evelyn Fox KELLER and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2009-06-30 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In a book that promises to change the way we think and talk about genes and genetic determinism, Evelyn Fox Keller, one of our most gifted historians and philosophers of science, provides a powerful, profound analysis of the achievements of genetics and molecular biology in the twentieth century, the century of the gene. Not just a chronicle of biology’s progress from gene to genome in one hundred years, The Century of the Gene also calls our attention to the surprising ways these advances challenge the familiar picture of the gene most of us still entertain. Keller shows us that the very successes that have stirred our imagination have also radically undermined the primacy of the gene—word and object—as the core explanatory concept of heredity and development. She argues that we need a new vocabulary that includes concepts such as robustness, fidelity, and evolvability. But more than a new vocabulary, a new awareness is absolutely crucial: that understanding the components of a system (be they individual genes, proteins, or even molecules) may tell us little about the interactions among these components. With the Human Genome Project nearing its first and most publicized goal, biologists are coming to realize that they have reached not the end of biology but the beginning of a new era. Indeed, Keller predicts that in the new century we will witness another Cambrian era, this time in new forms of biological thought rather than in new forms of biological life.

Download or read book Biology in the Nineteenth Century written by William Coleman and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1977 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Essential themes in the development of the life sciences during the nineteenth century.

Download or read book The Role of Theory in Advancing 21st-Century Biology written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2008-02-22 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although its importance is not always recognized, theory is an integral part of all biological research. Biologists' theoretical and conceptual frameworks inform every step of their research, affecting what experiments they do, what techniques and technologies they develop and use, and how they interpret their data. By examining how theory can help biologists answer questions like "What are the engineering principles of life?" or "How do cells really work?" the report shows how theory synthesizes biological knowledge from the molecular level to the level of whole ecosystems. The book concludes that theory is already an inextricable thread running throughout the practice of biology; but that explicitly giving theory equal status with other components of biological research could help catalyze transformative research that will lead to creative, dynamic, and innovative advances in our understanding of life.

Download or read book Mathematics and 21st Century Biology written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2005-06-16 with total page 162 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The exponentially increasing amounts of biological data along with comparable advances in computing power are making possible the construction of quantitative, predictive biological systems models. This development could revolutionize those biology-based fields of science. To assist this transformation, the U.S. Department of Energy asked the National Research Council to recommend mathematical research activities to enable more effective use of the large amounts of existing genomic information and the structural and functional genomic information being created. The resulting study is a broad, scientifically based view of the opportunities lying at the mathematical science and biology interface. The book provides a review of past successes, an examination of opportunities at the various levels of biological systemsâ€" from molecules to ecosystemsâ€"an analysis of cross-cutting themes, and a set of recommendations to advance the mathematics-biology connection that are applicable to all agencies funding research in this area.

Download or read book Black Walnut in a New Century written by and published by . This book was released on 2004 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents papers and abstracts relating to genetic improvement, nursery production, plantation establishment, natural stand management, pest management, agroforestry and economics of black walnut and related Juglans species.