An elegant tour of the wild and fraught sideshow of animal biotechnology.
Scientists have been monkeying with animal genes for decades. Mice are good examples: We can now manipulate them to spend all their time burying marbles or turning to the left. “We are editing their genetic codes, rebuilding their broken bodies, and supplementing their natural senses,” writes Anthes (Instant Egghead Guide: The Mind, 2008). The author generates a sense of awe when appropriate and, when called for, skepticism and an openness to other qualms, particularly issues of ethics, exploitation and commodification. “[S]tudying these creatures yields valuable insights into human disease. That’s good news for us, but little consolation for a tumor-riddled rodent,” writes the author. “But if there is peril here, there is also great promise.” In a bell-clear voice, the author examines the science behind genes, as well as cloning, cyborg insect armies, rescue rat-bots, “mass production of mutant mice” in China, bomb-sniffing beetle drones, prosthetic tails for dolphins, the possibility of enhancing animal sensory skills, and “ ‘pharming,’ in which simple genetic tweaks turn animals into living pharmaceutical factories.” Anthes lays out the facts, but it is still up to readers to decide which side of the ethical divide they will fall on.
Learned, entertaining and illuminating.Pub Date: March 12, 2013
ISBN: 978-0374158590
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Scientific American/Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Dec. 27, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2013
Categories: SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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BOOK REVIEW
A neurobiologist reveals the interconnectedness of the natural world through stories of plant migration.
In this slim but well-packed book, Mancuso (Plant Science/Univ. of Florence; The Revolutionary Genius of Plants: A New Understanding of Plant Intelligence and Behavior, 2018, etc.) presents an illuminating and surprisingly lively study of plant life. He smoothly balances expansive historical exploration with recent scientific research through stories of how various plant species are capable of migrating to locations throughout the world by means of air, water, and even via animals. They often continue to thrive in spite of dire obstacles and environments. One example is the response of plants following the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. Three decades later, the abandoned “Exclusion Zone” is now entirely covered by an enormous assortment of thriving plants. Mancuso also tracks the journeys of several species that might be regarded as invasive. “Why…do we insist on labeling as ‘invasive’ all those plants that, with great success, have managed to occupy new territories?” asks the author. “On a closer look, the invasive plants of today are the native flora of the future, just as the invasive species of the past are a fundamental part of our ecosystem today.” Throughout, Mancuso persuasively articulates why an understanding and appreciation of how nature is interconnected is vital to the future of our planet. “In nature everything is connected,” he writes. “This simple law that humans don’t seem to understand has a corollary: the extinction of a species, besides being a calamity in and of itself, has unforeseeable consequences for the system to which the species belongs.” The book is not without flaws. The loosely imagined watercolor renderings are vague and fail to effectively complement Mancuso’s richly descriptive prose or satisfy readers’ curiosity. Even without actual photos and maps, it would have been beneficial to readers to include more finely detailed plant and map renderings.
An authoritative, engaging study of plant life, accessible to younger readers as well as adults.Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-63542-991-6
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Other Press
Review Posted Online: Dec. 8, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2020
Categories: NATURE | SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
Bryson (I'm a Stranger Here Myself, 1999, etc.), a man who knows how to track down an explanation and make it confess, asks the hard questions of science—e.g., how did things get to be the way they are?—and, when possible, provides answers.
As he once went about making English intelligible, Bryson now attempts the same with the great moments of science, both the ideas themselves and their genesis, to resounding success. Piqued by his own ignorance on these matters, he’s egged on even more so by the people who’ve figured out—or think they’ve figured out—such things as what is in the center of the Earth. So he goes exploring, in the library and in company with scientists at work today, to get a grip on a range of topics from subatomic particles to cosmology. The aim is to deliver reports on these subjects in terms anyone can understand, and for the most part, it works. The most difficult is the nonintuitive material—time as part of space, say, or proteins inventing themselves spontaneously, without direction—and the quantum leaps unusual minds have made: as J.B.S. Haldane once put it, “The universe is not only queerer than we suppose; it is queerer than we can suppose.” Mostly, though, Bryson renders clear the evolution of continental drift, atomic structure, singularity, the extinction of the dinosaur, and a mighty host of other subjects in self-contained chapters that can be taken at a bite, rather than read wholesale. He delivers the human-interest angle on the scientists, and he keeps the reader laughing and willing to forge ahead, even over their heads: the human body, for instance, harboring enough energy “to explode with the force of thirty very large hydrogen bombs, assuming you knew how to liberate it and really wished to make a point.”
Loads of good explaining, with reminders, time and again, of how much remains unknown, neatly putting the death of science into perspective.Pub Date: May 6, 2003
ISBN: 0-7679-0817-1
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Broadway
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Categories: SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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