From astronomy to psychology, this beautifully illustrated chronology presents the most important and groundbreaking milestones in science. Award-winning author Cliff Pickover (The Math Book, The Physics Book, and The Medical Book) gathers into one fully illustrated volume the most important thinkers and ideas in the history of science. This unique omnibus edition includes 250 thoughtfully selected entries from many of the science-based books in the Sterling Milestones series, including math, physics, medicine, biology, chemistry, engineering, psychology, and space. With a new introduction by Pickover explaining how this impressive collection was curated, The Science Book showcases humanity's greatest achievements and provides readers with a sense of wonder at the diversity of scientific discovery.
Sterling
|
9781454930068
|
Hardcover
Hidden Valley Road
By Kolker, Robert
The heartrending story of a midcentury American family with twelve children, six of them diagnosed with schizophrenia, that became science's great hope in the quest to understand the disease.Don and Mimi Galvin seemed to be living the American dream. After World War II, Don's work with the Air Force brought them to Colorado, where their twelve children perfectly spanned the baby boom: the oldest born in 1945, the youngest in 1965. In those years, there was an established script for a family like the Galvins--aspiration, hard work, upward mobility, domestic harmony--and they worked hard to play their parts. But behind the scenes was a different story: psychological breakdown, sudden shocking violence, hidden abuse. By the mid-1970s, six of the ten Galvin boys, one after another, were diagnosed as schizophrenic. How could all this happen to one family? What took place inside the house on Hidden Valley Road was so extraordinary that the Galvins became one of the first families to be studied by the National Institute of Mental Health. Their story offers a shadow history of the science of schizophrenia, from the era of institutionalization, lobotomy, and the schizophrenogenic mother to the search for genetic markers for the disease, always amid profound disagreements about the nature of the illness itself. And unbeknownst to the Galvins, samples of their DNA informed decades of genetic research that continues today, offering paths to treatment, prediction, and even eradication of the disease for future generations. With clarity and compassion, bestselling and award-winning author Robert Kolker uncovers one family's unforgettable legacy of suffering, love, and hope.
Doubleday
|
9780385543767
|
Hardcover
Why We Sleep
By Phd, Matthew Walker
The first sleep book by a leading scientific expert - Professor Matthew Walker, Director of UC Berkeley's Sleep and Neuroimaging Lab - reveals his groundbreaking exploration of sleep, explaining how we can harness its transformative power to change our lives for the better.Sleep is one of the most important but least understood aspects of our life, wellness, and longevity. Until very recently, science had no answer to the question of why we sleep, or what good it served, or why we suffer such devastating health consequences when we don't sleep. Compared to the other basic drives in life - eating, drinking, and reproducing - the purpose of sleep remained elusive. An explosion of scientific discoveries in the last twenty years has shed new light on this fundamental aspect of our lives. Now, preeminent neuroscientist and sleep expert Matthew Walker gives us a new understanding of the vital importance of sleep and dreaming. Within the brain, sleep enriches our ability to learn, memorize, and make logical decisions. It recalibrates our emotions, restocks our immune system, fine-tunes our metabolism, and regulates our appetite. Dreaming mollifies painful memories and creates a virtual reality space in which the brain melds past and present knowledge to inspire creativity. Walker answers important questions about sleep: how do caffeine and alcohol affect sleep? What really happens during REM sleep? Why do our sleep patterns change across a lifetime? How do common sleep aids affect us and can they do long-term damage? Charting cutting-edge scientific breakthroughs, and synthesizing decades of research and clinical practice, Walker explains how we can harness sleep to improve learning, mood, and energy levels; regulate hormones; prevent cancer, Alzheimer's, and diabetes; slow the effects of aging; increase longevity; enhance the education and lifespan of our children, and boost the efficiency, success, and productivity of our businesses. Clear-eyed, fascinating, and accessible, Why We Sleep is a crucial and illuminating book.
Scribner
|
9781501144318
|
Hardcover
Being You
By Seth, Anil
An unprecedented tour of consciousness thanks to new experimental evidence, much of which comes from Anil Seth's own lab. His radical argument is that we do not perceive the world as it objectively is, but rather that we are prediction machines, constantly inventing our world and correcting our mistakes by the microsecond, and that we can now observe the biological mechanisms in the brain that accomplish this process of consciousness. Seth's work has yielded new ways to communicate with patients previously deemed unconscious, as well as promising methods of coping with brain damage and disease. Being You sheds light on the future of AI and virtual/augmented reality, adds empirical evidence to cutting-edge ideas of how the brain works, and ushers in a new age in the study of the mystery of human consciousness.
Dutton
|
9781524742874
|
Hardcover
The Butchering Art
By Fitzharris, Lindsey
A Top 10 Science Book of Fall 2017, Publishers WeeklyThe gripping story of how Joseph Lister's antiseptic method changed medicine foreverIn The Butchering Art, the historian Lindsey Fitzharris reveals the shocking world of nineteenth-century surgery and shows how it was transformed by advances made in germ theory and antiseptics between 1860 and 1875. She conjures up early operating theaters -- no place for the squeamish -- and surgeons, working before anesthesia, who were lauded for their speed and brute strength. These pioneers knew that the aftermath of surgery was often more dangerous than patients' afflictions, and they were baffled by the persistent infections that kept mortality rates stubbornly high. At a time when surgery couldn't have been more hazardous, an unlikely figure stepped forward: a young, melancholy Quaker surgeon named Joseph Lister, who would solve the riddle and change the course of history.Fitzharris dramatically reconstructs Lister's career path to his audacious claim that germs were the source of all infection and could be countered by a sterilizing agent applied to wounds. She introduces us to Lister's contemporaries -- some of them brilliant, some outright criminal -- and leads us through the grimy schools and squalid hospitals where they learned their art, the dead houses where they studied, and the cemeteries they ransacked for cadavers.Eerie and illuminating, The Butchering Art celebrates the triumph of a visionary surgeon whose quest to unite science and medicine delivered us into the modern world.
Scientific American / Farrar, Straus and Giroux
|
9780374117290
|
Hardcover
The Physics of Star Wars
By Johnson, Patrick
Explore the physics behind the world of Star Wars, with engaging topics and accessible information that shows how we're closer than ever before to creating technology from the galaxy far, far away - perfect for every Star Wars fan!Ever wish you could have your very own lightsaber like Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi? Or that you could fly through space at the speed of light like Han Solo and Poe Dameron? Well, those ideas aren't as outlandish as you think. In The Physics of Star Wars, you'll explore the mystical power of the Force using quantum mechanics, find out how much energy it would take for the Death Star or Starkiller Base to destroy a planet, and discover how we can potentially create our very own lightsabers. The fantastical world of Star Wars may become a reality!.
Adams Media
|
9781507203309
|
Paperback
The Ancient Mounds of Poverty Point
By Gibson, Jon L.
"Gibson, the grand old man of Poverty Point archaeology, has presented his personal reflections on his and others' extensive work at this mysterious and awe-inspiring site. He recounts (in his equally mysterious Louisiana voice) the setting, meaning, and history of archaeological thought that surround the site."--Mike Russo, National Park ServiceJon Gibson confronts the intriguing mystery of Poverty Point, the ruins of a large prehistoric Indian settlement that was home to one of the most fascinating ancient cultures in eastern North America. The 3,500-year-old site in northeastern Louisiana is known for its large, elaborate earthworks - a series of concentric, crescent-shaped dirt rings and bird-shaped mounds. With its imposing 25-mile core, it is one of the largest archaic constructions on American soil.
University Press of Florida
|
9780813025513
|
Paperback
We Are Electric
By Adee, Sally
Science journalist Sally Adee breaks open the field of bioelectricity - the electric currents that run through our bodies - its misunderstood history of quackery, charlatanism, and yes, shortages of frogs, and why new discoveries will lead to improved antibiotics, cleared arteries, and new ways to combat cancer.Bioelectricity is the electricity that runs through every living thing. It is the reason our brain can send signals to the rest of our body, but also how we develop in the womb, and why our body knows to heal itself. It might also be the next scientific frontier: if we can crack the bioelectric code, much like we did with the genetic code, the implications for our intelligence and health are significant.Yet the field is still emerging from two centuries of skepticism and entanglement with medical quackery - all stemming from an 18th-century scientific war about the nature of electricity between Luigi Galvani (father of bioelectricity, famous for shocking frogs) and Alessandro Volta (inventor of the battery) .
Hachette Books
|
9780306826627
|
Hardcover
The Violence Project
By Ph.d, Jillian Peterson
Using data from the writers' groundbreaking research on mass shooters, including first-person accounts from the perpetrators themselves, The Violence Project charts new pathways to prevention and innovative ways to stop the social contagion of violence. Frustrated by reactionary policy conversations that never seemed to convert into meaningful action, special investigator and psychologist Jill Peterson and sociologist James Densley built The Violence Project, the first comprehensive database of mass shooters. Their goal was to establish the root causes of mass shootings and figure out how to stop them by examining hundreds of data points in the life histories of more than 170 mass shooters - from their childhood and adolescence to their mental health and motives.
Abrams Press
|
9781419752957
|
Hardcover
What If Gray Wolves Disappeared?
By Ardely, Anthony
Gray wolves are a keystone species. Without them, many other animals and plants would be in danger of dying out. Readers of this fascinating book will learn exactly why these fierce hunters are such an important part of ecosystems. Eye-catching photographs bring readers face-to-face with these great predators and hold the attention of even the most reluctant readers. Meanwhile, informative and engaging text helps reinforce essential lessons from the elementary science curriculum. Young wolf enthusiasts will appreciate this captivating volume as much as they appreciate the creatures it is about.
The Science Book
By Pickover, Clifford A.
From astronomy to psychology, this beautifully illustrated chronology presents the most important and groundbreaking milestones in science. Award-winning author Cliff Pickover (The Math Book, The Physics Book, and The Medical Book) gathers into one fully illustrated volume the most important thinkers and ideas in the history of science. This unique omnibus edition includes 250 thoughtfully selected entries from many of the science-based books in the Sterling Milestones series, including math, physics, medicine, biology, chemistry, engineering, psychology, and space. With a new introduction by Pickover explaining how this impressive collection was curated, The Science Book showcases humanity's greatest achievements and provides readers with a sense of wonder at the diversity of scientific discovery.
Hidden Valley Road
By Kolker, Robert
The heartrending story of a midcentury American family with twelve children, six of them diagnosed with schizophrenia, that became science's great hope in the quest to understand the disease.Don and Mimi Galvin seemed to be living the American dream. After World War II, Don's work with the Air Force brought them to Colorado, where their twelve children perfectly spanned the baby boom: the oldest born in 1945, the youngest in 1965. In those years, there was an established script for a family like the Galvins--aspiration, hard work, upward mobility, domestic harmony--and they worked hard to play their parts. But behind the scenes was a different story: psychological breakdown, sudden shocking violence, hidden abuse. By the mid-1970s, six of the ten Galvin boys, one after another, were diagnosed as schizophrenic. How could all this happen to one family? What took place inside the house on Hidden Valley Road was so extraordinary that the Galvins became one of the first families to be studied by the National Institute of Mental Health. Their story offers a shadow history of the science of schizophrenia, from the era of institutionalization, lobotomy, and the schizophrenogenic mother to the search for genetic markers for the disease, always amid profound disagreements about the nature of the illness itself. And unbeknownst to the Galvins, samples of their DNA informed decades of genetic research that continues today, offering paths to treatment, prediction, and even eradication of the disease for future generations. With clarity and compassion, bestselling and award-winning author Robert Kolker uncovers one family's unforgettable legacy of suffering, love, and hope.
Why We Sleep
By Phd, Matthew Walker
The first sleep book by a leading scientific expert - Professor Matthew Walker, Director of UC Berkeley's Sleep and Neuroimaging Lab - reveals his groundbreaking exploration of sleep, explaining how we can harness its transformative power to change our lives for the better.Sleep is one of the most important but least understood aspects of our life, wellness, and longevity. Until very recently, science had no answer to the question of why we sleep, or what good it served, or why we suffer such devastating health consequences when we don't sleep. Compared to the other basic drives in life - eating, drinking, and reproducing - the purpose of sleep remained elusive. An explosion of scientific discoveries in the last twenty years has shed new light on this fundamental aspect of our lives. Now, preeminent neuroscientist and sleep expert Matthew Walker gives us a new understanding of the vital importance of sleep and dreaming. Within the brain, sleep enriches our ability to learn, memorize, and make logical decisions. It recalibrates our emotions, restocks our immune system, fine-tunes our metabolism, and regulates our appetite. Dreaming mollifies painful memories and creates a virtual reality space in which the brain melds past and present knowledge to inspire creativity. Walker answers important questions about sleep: how do caffeine and alcohol affect sleep? What really happens during REM sleep? Why do our sleep patterns change across a lifetime? How do common sleep aids affect us and can they do long-term damage? Charting cutting-edge scientific breakthroughs, and synthesizing decades of research and clinical practice, Walker explains how we can harness sleep to improve learning, mood, and energy levels; regulate hormones; prevent cancer, Alzheimer's, and diabetes; slow the effects of aging; increase longevity; enhance the education and lifespan of our children, and boost the efficiency, success, and productivity of our businesses. Clear-eyed, fascinating, and accessible, Why We Sleep is a crucial and illuminating book.
Being You
By Seth, Anil
An unprecedented tour of consciousness thanks to new experimental evidence, much of which comes from Anil Seth's own lab. His radical argument is that we do not perceive the world as it objectively is, but rather that we are prediction machines, constantly inventing our world and correcting our mistakes by the microsecond, and that we can now observe the biological mechanisms in the brain that accomplish this process of consciousness. Seth's work has yielded new ways to communicate with patients previously deemed unconscious, as well as promising methods of coping with brain damage and disease. Being You sheds light on the future of AI and virtual/augmented reality, adds empirical evidence to cutting-edge ideas of how the brain works, and ushers in a new age in the study of the mystery of human consciousness.
The Butchering Art
By Fitzharris, Lindsey
A Top 10 Science Book of Fall 2017, Publishers WeeklyThe gripping story of how Joseph Lister's antiseptic method changed medicine foreverIn The Butchering Art, the historian Lindsey Fitzharris reveals the shocking world of nineteenth-century surgery and shows how it was transformed by advances made in germ theory and antiseptics between 1860 and 1875. She conjures up early operating theaters -- no place for the squeamish -- and surgeons, working before anesthesia, who were lauded for their speed and brute strength. These pioneers knew that the aftermath of surgery was often more dangerous than patients' afflictions, and they were baffled by the persistent infections that kept mortality rates stubbornly high. At a time when surgery couldn't have been more hazardous, an unlikely figure stepped forward: a young, melancholy Quaker surgeon named Joseph Lister, who would solve the riddle and change the course of history.Fitzharris dramatically reconstructs Lister's career path to his audacious claim that germs were the source of all infection and could be countered by a sterilizing agent applied to wounds. She introduces us to Lister's contemporaries -- some of them brilliant, some outright criminal -- and leads us through the grimy schools and squalid hospitals where they learned their art, the dead houses where they studied, and the cemeteries they ransacked for cadavers.Eerie and illuminating, The Butchering Art celebrates the triumph of a visionary surgeon whose quest to unite science and medicine delivered us into the modern world.
The Physics of Star Wars
By Johnson, Patrick
Explore the physics behind the world of Star Wars, with engaging topics and accessible information that shows how we're closer than ever before to creating technology from the galaxy far, far away - perfect for every Star Wars fan!Ever wish you could have your very own lightsaber like Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi? Or that you could fly through space at the speed of light like Han Solo and Poe Dameron? Well, those ideas aren't as outlandish as you think. In The Physics of Star Wars, you'll explore the mystical power of the Force using quantum mechanics, find out how much energy it would take for the Death Star or Starkiller Base to destroy a planet, and discover how we can potentially create our very own lightsabers. The fantastical world of Star Wars may become a reality!.
The Ancient Mounds of Poverty Point
By Gibson, Jon L.
"Gibson, the grand old man of Poverty Point archaeology, has presented his personal reflections on his and others' extensive work at this mysterious and awe-inspiring site. He recounts (in his equally mysterious Louisiana voice) the setting, meaning, and history of archaeological thought that surround the site."--Mike Russo, National Park ServiceJon Gibson confronts the intriguing mystery of Poverty Point, the ruins of a large prehistoric Indian settlement that was home to one of the most fascinating ancient cultures in eastern North America. The 3,500-year-old site in northeastern Louisiana is known for its large, elaborate earthworks - a series of concentric, crescent-shaped dirt rings and bird-shaped mounds. With its imposing 25-mile core, it is one of the largest archaic constructions on American soil.
We Are Electric
By Adee, Sally
Science journalist Sally Adee breaks open the field of bioelectricity - the electric currents that run through our bodies - its misunderstood history of quackery, charlatanism, and yes, shortages of frogs, and why new discoveries will lead to improved antibiotics, cleared arteries, and new ways to combat cancer.Bioelectricity is the electricity that runs through every living thing. It is the reason our brain can send signals to the rest of our body, but also how we develop in the womb, and why our body knows to heal itself. It might also be the next scientific frontier: if we can crack the bioelectric code, much like we did with the genetic code, the implications for our intelligence and health are significant.Yet the field is still emerging from two centuries of skepticism and entanglement with medical quackery - all stemming from an 18th-century scientific war about the nature of electricity between Luigi Galvani (father of bioelectricity, famous for shocking frogs) and Alessandro Volta (inventor of the battery) .
The Violence Project
By Ph.d, Jillian Peterson
Using data from the writers' groundbreaking research on mass shooters, including first-person accounts from the perpetrators themselves, The Violence Project charts new pathways to prevention and innovative ways to stop the social contagion of violence. Frustrated by reactionary policy conversations that never seemed to convert into meaningful action, special investigator and psychologist Jill Peterson and sociologist James Densley built The Violence Project, the first comprehensive database of mass shooters. Their goal was to establish the root causes of mass shootings and figure out how to stop them by examining hundreds of data points in the life histories of more than 170 mass shooters - from their childhood and adolescence to their mental health and motives.
What If Gray Wolves Disappeared?
By Ardely, Anthony
Gray wolves are a keystone species. Without them, many other animals and plants would be in danger of dying out. Readers of this fascinating book will learn exactly why these fierce hunters are such an important part of ecosystems. Eye-catching photographs bring readers face-to-face with these great predators and hold the attention of even the most reluctant readers. Meanwhile, informative and engaging text helps reinforce essential lessons from the elementary science curriculum. Young wolf enthusiasts will appreciate this captivating volume as much as they appreciate the creatures it is about.