Dance to the Tune of Life: Biological RelativityCover -- Half title -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Preface -- Acknowledgements -- 1 The Universe and the Principle of Relativity -- The Sky at Night -- Early Cosmologies -- The Copernican Revolution -- Galileo: Father of Modern Science -- The Earth from a Billion Miles -- Newton's Laws of Motion -- Nineteenth-Century Certainties -- Quantum Mechanics -- Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity -- Einstein's General Theory of Relativity -- Can We 'Feel' the Consequences of Relativity? -- Hubble's Deep Field Views -- Conclusions -- 2 Biological Scales and Levels -- The Sense of Scale -- Scales and Levels -- Atoms and Ions -- Molecules -- Molecules as Systems -- Networks -- Organelles -- Cells -- Tissues -- Organs -- Whole-Body Systems -- The Organism as a Whole -- Beyond Organisms -- Conclusions -- 3 Biological Networks -- Networks are not Diagrams! -- How Do Complex Structures Form? -- Biological Oscillators and Attractors -- Circadian Rhythm -- Cardiac Rhythm -- Gene Expression Patterns -- Synchronisation of Oscillators: Brainwaves -- Chance at the Heart of the Cell -- Conclusions -- 4 Nature and Origin of Cells -- The Medical Histology Class -- Cells as Carriages -- The Simplest Cells: Bacteria and Archaea -- Bacteria -- Archaea -- Eukaryotes: The Largest Organisms but the Smallest Domain -- The Cell Cycle -- Meiosis -- RNA and Other Early Worlds? -- How Cells Form Tissues -- The Nearly Cells: Viruses -- Tree, Networks or Rings of Life? -- The Death of Cells -- Conclusions -- 5 Blind Chance and Natural Selection -- Charles Darwin and his Predecessors -- Darwin on Lamarckism -- The Rise of Neo-Darwinism Leading to the Modern Synthesis -- Evolution and Genetics -- The Modern Synthesis -- Schrödinger and What is Life? -- Neo-Darwinism and the Central Dogma -- The Language of Neo-Darwinism -- The Language of Neo-Darwinism as a Whole |
Contents
Biological Scales and Levels | 30 |
Biological Networks | 69 |
Biological Oscillators and Attractors | 77 |
Nature and Origin of Cells | 97 |
RNA and Other Early Worlds? | 113 |
5 | 121 |
Evolution and Genetics | 129 |
NeoDarwinism and the Central Dogma | 136 |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
acquired characteristics active amino acids archaea atoms bacteria behaviour Biological Relativity biologists body called causation cells Central Dogma centre Chapter chromosomes circadian rhythm colour version complete components concept context Darwin diagram discovery DNA sequences domains Earth environment enzymes epigenetic equations eukaryotes evolution example experimental experiments fact Figure function galaxy genetic genome germ line heart human idea important inheritance of acquired interactions kind Lamarck Lamarckian living organisms living systems mathematical membrane metaphor microtubules Modern Synthesis molecular biology molecules move multicellular organisms muscle mutations natural selection Neo-Darwinism Neo-Darwinist networks Noble nucleus occur organelles original oscillator particles phenotype physics Physiology plants plate section principle of relativity prokaryotes properties protein channels purpose quantum mechanics question random reductionist relevant scales scientists Selfish Gene sense species stochasticity structure symbiogenesis systems biology template theory tion tissues variation Waddington Weismann Barrier whole