In an impressive narrative, the author renders esoteric DNA concepts accessible to lay readers.
Science writer Kean (The Disappearing Spoon: and Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements, 2010) returns with another wide-ranging, entertaining look at science history, this time focusing on the many mysteries of DNA.
The author examines numerous discoveries in more than a century of DNA and genetics research, including such familiar touchstones as Gregor Mendel’s pea-plant experiments and the double-helix model of Watson and Crick. Kean also explores less-well-known territory, deftly using his stories as jumping-off points to unpack specific scientific concepts. He discusses how DNA discoveries led not only to medical breakthroughs, but also to new ways of looking at the past; they “remade the very study of human beings.” Kean delves into theories regarding possible genetic diseases of Charles Darwin, French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and ancient Egyptian king Tut, among others, and how their ailments may have subtly affected developments in scientific, artistic and even royal history. Some stories edge into more bizarre areas, such as one Soviet scientist’s dream to create a human-chimpanzee hybrid, but Kean also tells the moving story of Tsutomu Yamaguchi, “perhaps the most unlucky man of the twentieth century,” who was near both Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 when the nuclear bombs were dropped—and who, despite almost certainly suffering DNA damage from radiation, lived into his 90s. At his best, Kean brings relatively obscure historical figures to life—particularly Niccolò Paganini, the titular violinist who wowed early-19th-century audiences with his virtuosity, aided by finger flexibility that may have been due to the genetic disease Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. Kean’s talent also shines in the sections on scientific rivalries, such as that between biologist Craig Venter’s private company Celera and the government-funded Human Genome Project, both of which are racing to sequence all human DNA.
In an impressive narrative, the author renders esoteric DNA concepts accessible to lay readers.Pub Date: July 17, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-316-18231-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: May 14, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2012
PROFILES
A top-notch survey of the covert aviation programs conducted by the US military and intelligence agencies since WW II. Drawing on previously classified archives and other sources, aviation historian Peebles pieces together a fascinating story that begins with the XP-59A. This fixed-wing fighter with British- designed engines was America's first jet. Airframe flaws kept it out of production and combat, but the armed forces gained valuable experience in running secret projects with small teams at isolated test sites. Probably the best known of the so-called dark eagles were the U-2 and SR-71 spy planes developed by Lockheed's fabled Skunk Works. Less familiar craft also performed important if less glamorous services'': Model 147 drones (a.k.a. Lightning Bugs) did bomb-damage assessments and other reconnaissance missions in the unfriendly skies over Communist China and North Vietnam. Equally unheralded is the GNAT-750 UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle), which the CIA has used to overfly Bosnia at relatively small cost. Not all clandestine aeronautical enterprises are developmental, as the author makes clear in his judicious review of the still unacknowledged pilot-training programs that have been conducted with the aid of captured MiGs. Nor, press reports and purported sightings by believers in UFOs to the contrary, is every rumored project a reality. Indeed, Peebles goes out of his way to put paid to any lingering notion that the Air Force has funded or even contemplated a hypersonic flying wing code-named Aurora. He then segues gracefully into an assessment of the socioeconomic credits and debits that accrue from putting strategic weapons systems under security wraps for prolonged periods. An informed and informative overviewcomplete with anecdotal detail on the venturesome souls who participatedof the undercover activities that have given America air superiority over friends and foes alike. (35 b&w photos, not seen)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-89141-535-1
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Presidio/Random
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1995
A disappointingly flat collection of musings on engineering history. Petroski's concern, as in previous works such as The Pencil (1990), is the interdependence of engineering and society—the role of engineers in shaping the world we live in, but also the fact that engineering's achievements are driven not purely by technology but by economics, politics, and culture. But in demonstrating these truths through chronicles of great engineered projects and portraits of interesting engineers like Isambard Kingdom Brunel, he largely leaves out the ingredient that would really enlighten the reader—the engineering itself. ``The tapering at the top of the building demanded some especially tricky structural engineering,'' Petroski hints, with regard to Malaysia's Petronas Twin Towers, the world's tallest. But he leaves it at that, satisfied to provide a sketchy account of the building's materials and facilities, and a slight chronology of the project. Similarly, ``improvements in tunneling, such as the chore of getting rid of the soil,'' would seem to be a main topic in the history of the Channel Tunnel, but that phrase appears merely as a transition in Petroski's lifeless parade of 19th-century tunnel plans. Without using his tantalizing examples—pioneering soil mechanicist Karl Terzaghi and the rise and decline of the transatlantic steamship—to explain any engineering principles, they remain little more than aimless encyclopedia entries. Perhaps this is because they were written for a scientifically oriented audience (most appeared in American Scientist), with the intention of highlighting the historical and social context. Still, only occasionally, as in a chapter using the various uses of wireless communication to illustrate the unpredictable evolution of technology, do they seem to ascend above the assembled facts to a salient idea. Petroski is a little petulant about the respect engineering gets (as from the executors of Alfred Nobel's bequest), but he's squandered an opportunity to propagate a real sense of the science and labor of builders and inventors. (22 illustrations, not seen)
Pub Date: Dec. 17, 1997
ISBN: 0-375-40041-9
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1997
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