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101 Quantum Questions
Kenneth William Ford
Harvard University Press, 2011
Library of Congress QC174.13.F67 2011 | Dewey Decimal 530.12

This reader-friendly, richly illustrated book provides an engaging overview of quantum physics, from “big ideas” like probability and uncertainty and conservation laws to the behavior of quarks and photons and neutrinos, and on to explanations of how a laser works and why black holes evaporate.
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99% Ape: How Evolution Adds Up
Edited by Jonathan Silvertown
University of Chicago Press, 2009
Library of Congress QH367.A13 2009 | Dewey Decimal 576.8

In his lifetime, Charles Darwin was roundly mocked for suggesting that humans were descended from apes, and even in our own day, the teaching of evolution remains controversial. But in the century and a half since the publication of On the Origin of Species, our increasingly sophisticated understanding of genetics has borne out Darwin’s theory: humans share 99% of their genes with chimps (and many even with grapes!).

            99% Ape offers an accessible, straightforward introduction to evolution, beginning with Darwin’s discoveries and continuing through the latest genetic discoveries. Edited by Jonathan Silvertown, the volume brings together experts in a variety of fields pertinent to evolution, from paleobiology to planetary science, comparative anatomy to zoology, and even—for a discussion of legal battles surrounding the teaching of evolution—law. Interwoven with these varied accounts of evolution and its impact are vignettes from Darwin’s life that illustrate the continuity of thought that links Darwin’s work to today’s cutting-edge research.

            Beautifully illustrated, 99% Ape is a perfect companion to the upcoming celebration of Darwin’s bicentennial and a bracing reminder of the important role evolution still has to play in our understanding of our origins—and our possible futures.

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The Accidental Mind: How Brain Evolution Has Given Us Love, Memory, Dreams, and God
David J. Linden
Harvard University Press, 2007
Library of Congress QP376.L577 2007

Linden sets the record straight about the construction of the human brain; rather than the “beautifully-engineered optimized device, the absolute pinnacle of design” portrayed in many dumbed-down text books, pop-science tomes, and education televisions programs, Linden’s organ is a complicated assembly of cobbled-together functionality that created the mind as a by-product of ad-hoc solutions to questions of survival. His guided tour of the glorious amalgam of “crummy parts” includes pit-stops in the histories and fundamentals of neurology, neural-psychology, physiology, molecular and cellular biology, and genetics.
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The AMS Weather Book: The Ultimate Guide to America's Weather
Jack Williams
University of Chicago Press, 2009
Library of Congress QC981.2.W55 2009 | Dewey Decimal 551.5

America has some of the most varied and dynamic weather in the world. Every year, the Gulf Coast is battered by hurricanes, the Great Plains are ravaged by tornados, the Midwest is pummeled by blizzards, and the temperature in the Southwest reaches a sweltering 120 degrees. Extreme weather can be a matter of life and death, but even when it is pleasant—72 degrees and sunny—weather is still central to the lives of all Americans. Indeed, it’s hard to imagine a topic of greater collective interest. Whether we want to know if we should close the storm shutters or just carry an umbrella to work, we turn to forecasts. But few of us really understand the science behind them.

All that changes with The AMS Weather Book. The most comprehensive and up-to-date guide to our weather and our atmosphere, it is the ultimate resource for anyone who wants to understand how hurricanes form, why tornados twirl, or even why the sky is cerulean blue. Written by esteemed science journalist and former USA Today weather editor Jack Williams, The AMS Weather Book, copublished with the American Meteorological Society, covers everything from daily weather patterns, air pollution, and global warming to the stories of people coping with severe weather and those who devote their lives to understanding the atmosphere, oceans, and climate. Words alone, of course, are not adequate to explain many meteorological concepts, so The AMS Weather Book is filled with engaging full-color graphics that explain such concepts as why winds blow in a particular direction, how Doppler weather radar works, what happens inside hurricanes, how clouds create wind and snow, and what’s really affecting the earth’s climate.

For Weather Channel junkies, amateur meteorologists, and storm chasers alike, The AMS Weather Book is an invaluable tool for anyone who wants to better understand how weather works and how it affects our lives.

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Beasts of the Earth: Animals, Humans, and Disease
Torrey, E. Fuller
Rutgers University Press, 2014
Library of Congress RA639.T676 2005 | Dewey Decimal 616.959

Humans have lived in close proximity to other animals for thousands of years. Recent scientific studies have even shown that the presence of animals has a positive effect on our physical and mental health. People with pets typically have lower blood pressure, show fewer symptoms of depression, and tend to get more exercise.

But there is a darker side to the relationship between animals and humans. Animals are carriers of harmful infectious agents and the source of a myriad of human diseases. In recent years, the emergence of high-profile illnesses such as AIDS, SARS, West Nile virus, and bird flu has drawn much public attention, but as E. Fuller Torrey and Robert H. Yolken reveal, the transfer of deadly microbes from animals to humans is neither a new nor an easily avoided problem.

Beginning with the domestication of farm animals nearly 10,000 years ago, Beasts of the Earth traces the ways that human-animal contact has evolved over time. Today, shared living quarters, overlapping ecosystems, and experimental surgical practices where organs or tissues are transplanted from non-humans into humans continue to open new avenues for the transmission of infectious agents. Other changes in human behavior like increased air travel, automated food processing, and threats of bioterrorism are increasing the contagion factor by transporting microbes further distances and to larger populations in virtually no time at all.

While the authors urge that a better understanding of past diseases may help us lessen the severity of some illnesses, they also warn that, given our increasingly crowded planet, it is not a question of if but when and how often animal-transmitted diseases will pose serious challenges to human health in the future.

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The Best of Technology Writing 2008
Clive Thompson, Editor
University of Michigan Press, 2008
Library of Congress T47.B53 2008 | Dewey Decimal 600

"No one covers technology with more insight or panache than Clive Thompson. I can't imagine anyone better qualified to curate this fascinating series."
---Chris Anderson, editor in chief of Wired magazine and author of The Long Tail

"Editor Clive Thompson suggests we are in a ‘golden age of technology journalism.' Reading this collection, one suspects he is right---it sparkles with beautifully written narratives not only about what technology can do for us but what it does to us as people, to our ways of thinking about ourselves, our relationships, and how we envisage our world."
---Sherry Turkle, Director, MIT Initiative on Technology and Self, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Best of Technology Writing 2008 proves that technology writing is a bona fide literary genre with some of the most stylish, compelling, and just plain readable work in journalism today.

The third volume in this annual series, The Best of Technology Writing 2008 covers a fascinating mix of topics---from a molecular gastronomist's recipe for the perfect gin and tonic; to "the Mechanism," an ancient Greek artifact that might be the world's first laptop computer; to social media, privacy, and what is possibly the biggest generation gap since rock 'n' roll.

Featuring contributions from

  • Ted Allen
  • Michael Behar
  • Caleb Crain
  • Julian Dibbell
  • Cory Doctorow
  • David Glenn
  • Thomas Goetz
  • Charles Graeber
  • Alex Hutchinson
  • Walter Kirn
  • Robin Mejia
  • Emily Nussbaum
  • Ben Paynter
  • Jeffrey Rosen
  • John Seabrook
  • Cass R. Sunstein

digitalculturebooks is an imprint of the University of Michigan Press and the Scholarly Publishing Office of the University of Michigan Library dedicated to publishing innovative and accessible work exploring new media and their impact on society, culture, and scholarly communication. Visit the website at www.digitalculture.org.

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Beyond the Zonules of Zinn
David Bainbridge
Harvard University Press, 2008
Library of Congress QM451.B35 2008 | Dewey Decimal 611.8

In his latest book, Bainbridge combines an otherworldly journey through the central nervous system with an accessible and entertaining account of how the brain's anatomy has often misled anatomists about its function. Bainbridge uses the structure of the brain to set his book apart from the many volumes that focus on brain function.
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Beyond Weird: Why Everything You Thought You Knew about Quantum Physics Is Different
Philip Ball
University of Chicago Press, 2018
Library of Congress QC174.123.B36 2018 | Dewey Decimal 530.12

“Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it.”

Since Niels Bohr said this many years ago, quantum mechanics has only been getting more shocking. We now realize that it’s not really telling us that “weird” things happen out of sight, on the tiniest level, in the atomic world: rather, everything is quantum. But if quantum mechanics is correct, what seems obvious and right in our everyday world is built on foundations that don’t seem obvious or right at all—or even possible.

An exhilarating tour of the contemporary quantum landscape, Beyond Weird is a book about what quantum physics really means—and what it doesn’t. Science writer Philip Ball offers an up-to-date, accessible account of the quest to come to grips with the most fundamental theory of physical reality, and to explain how its counterintuitive principles underpin the world we experience. Over the past decade it has become clear that quantum physics is less a theory about particles and waves, uncertainty and fuzziness, than a theory about information and knowledge—about what can be known, and how we can know it.  Discoveries and experiments over the past few decades have called into question the meanings and limits of space and time, cause and effect, and, ultimately, of knowledge itself. The quantum world Ball shows us isn’t a different world. It is our world, and if anything deserves to be called “weird,” it’s us.
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Birthing a Better Way: 12 Secrets for Natural Childbirth
Kalena Cook
University of North Texas Press, 2010
Library of Congress RG525.C697 2010 | Dewey Decimal 618.45

Breast Cancer Recurrence and Advanced Disease: Comprehensive Expert Guidance
Barbara L. Gordon, Heather S. Shaw, David J. Kroll, and Brooke R. Daniel
Duke University Press, 2010
Library of Congress RC280.B8B67229 2010 | Dewey Decimal 616.99449

At age 42, Barbara L. Gordon was diagnosed with Stage II breast cancer. Two years later, it appeared that the cancer had metastasized. Along with her oncologist and other experts, Gordon has written the book that she wished she had as she faced late-stage breast cancer and the prospect of dying from the disease. Filled with information and advice, and designed to enable informed decisions and improved quality of life, this comprehensive guide gathers in one place authoritative medical information about recurrence and late-stage breast cancer, and it addresses the practical, emotional, spiritual, and interpersonal aspects of dying and death.

This indispensable book aids those diagnosed with recurrent or late-stage breast cancer, those wanting to reduce the chance of a recurrence, and those with other types of late-stage cancer. It is also a valuable resource for healthcare professionals, friends, and family members.

Topics covered include

• Types of recurrence, their symptoms, and ways of minimizing the chance of a recurrence
• Diagnostic tests, potential surgeries, and treatments to manage late-stage cancer
• Getting the best care, evaluating complementary therapies, and alleviating pain and depression
• Cessation of treatment and what one may experience as the disease progresses
• End-of-life issues including dealing with financial and legal matters, communicating with loved ones and hospice workers, and planning memorial services

Breast Cancer Recurrence and Advanced Disease includes a glossary of medical terms, appendices on nutrition and integrative health centers, and links to current Web sites addressing matters such as clinical trials, patients’ rights, and medical expenses.

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Brilliant Green: The Surprising History and Science of Plant Intelligence
Stefano Mancuso and Alessandra Viola
Island Press, 2018
Library of Congress QK711.2.M35713 2015 | Dewey Decimal 581.4

Are plants intelligent? Can they solve problems, communicate, and navigate their surroundings? Or are they passive, incapable of independent action or social behavior? Philosophers and scientists have pondered these questions since ancient Greece, most often concluding that plants are unthinking and inert: they are too silent, too sedentary -- just too different from us. Yet discoveries over the past fifty years have challenged these ideas, shedding new light on the extraordinary capabilities and complex interior lives of plants.

In Brilliant Green, Stefano Mancuso, a leading scientist and founder of the field of plant neurobiology, presents a new paradigm in our understanding of the vegetal world. Combining a historical perspective with the latest in plant science, Mancuso argues that, due to cultural prejudices and human arrogance, we continue to underestimate plants. In fact, they process information, sleep, remember, and signal to one another -- showing that, far from passive machines, plants are intelligent and aware. Through a survey of plant capabilities from sight and touch to communication, Mancuso challenges our notion of intelligence, presenting a vision of plant life that is more sophisticated than most imagine.

Plants have much to teach us, from network building to innovations in robotics and man-made materials -- but only if we understand more about how they live. Part botany lesson, part manifesto, Brilliant Green is an engaging and passionate examination of the inner workings of the plant kingdom.

Financial support for the translation of this book has been provided by SEPS: Segretariato Europeo Per Le Pubblicazioni Scientifiche.
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Building a Better Nest: Living Lightly at Home and in the World
Evelyn Searle Hess
Oregon State University Press, 2015
Library of Congress TH4815.H47 2015 | Dewey Decimal 690.837097953

For fifteen years, Evelyn Hess and her husband David lived in a tent and trailer, without electricity or running water, on twenty acres of wild land in the foothills of the Oregon Coast Range. When they decided to build a house – a real house at last – they knew it would have to respect the lessons of simple living that they learned in their camping life. They knew they could not do it alone. Building a Better Nest chronicles their adventures as they begin to construct a house of their own, seeking a model for sustainable living not just in their home, but beyond its walls.

What does it mean to build a better nest? Better for whom? Is it better for the individual or family? The planet? Green building and sustainable design are popular buzzwords, but to Hess, sustainable building is not a simple matter of buying and installing the latest recycled flooring products. It is also about cooperative work: working together in employment, in research, in activism, and in life. Hess is concerned with her local watershed, but also with the widening income gap, disappearing species, and peak resources. She actively works to reduce overconsumption and waste. For Hess, these problems are both philosophical and practical.

As Hess and her husband age, the questions of how to live responsibly arise with greater frequency and urgency. With unfailing wit and humor, she looks for answers in such places as neuroscience, Buddhism, and her ancestral legacy. Building a Better Nest will appeal to anyone with an interest in sustainable building, off-grid living, or alternative communities. The questions it asks about the way we live are earnest and important, from an author whose voice is steeped in wisdom and gratitude.
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Chasing Molecules: Poisonous Products, Human Health, and the Promise of Green Chemistry
Elizabeth Grossman
Island Press, 2011
Library of Congress RA1226.G76 2009 | Dewey Decimal 615.902

Each day, headlines warn that baby bottles are leaching dangerous chemicals, nonstick pans are causing infertility, and plastic containers are making us fat. What if green chemistry could change all that? What if rather than toxics, our economy ran on harmless, environmentally-friendly materials?
 
Elizabeth Grossman, an acclaimed journalist who brought national attention to the contaminants hidden in computers and other high tech electronics, now tackles the hazards of ordinary consumer products. She shows that for the sake of convenience, efficiency, and short-term safety, we have created synthetic chemicals that fundamentally change, at a molecular level, the way our bodies work. The consequences range from diabetes to cancer, reproductive and neurological disorders.
 
Yet it’s hard to imagine life without the creature comforts current materials provide—and Grossman argues we do not have to. A scientific revolution is introducing products that are “benign by design,” developing manufacturing processes that consider health impacts at every stage, and is creating new compounds that mimic rather than disrupt natural systems. Through interviews with leading researchers, Grossman gives us a first look at this radical transformation.
 
Green chemistry is just getting underway, but it offers hope that we can indeed create products that benefit health, the environment, and industry.
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Child Support: The Next Frontier
J. Thomas Oldham and Marygold S. Melli, Editors
University of Michigan Press, 2000
Library of Congress KF549.Z9C46 2000 | Dewey Decimal 346.730172

There has been a revolution in child support law in the last half-century, fueled by escalating numbers of divorces and children born to unmarried parents. This collection of essays examines the state of child support policy at the close of the twentieth century and the end of an era of far-reaching reform of the child support system.
Reforms have moved the child support system from one of minimal effort, based on the assumption that children in single parent households would be supported by their custodial parents or by government welfare, to a formula-based system for calculating child support and an aggressive enforcement program to collect that support from the noncustodial parent.
The essays range from a review of child support history, with a focus on the changing mores of parental responsibility, to empirical studies of whether increased establishment of paternity and child support enforcement results in more father-child contacts, to how child support affects fathers and whether the support obligation impoverishes noncustodial fathers. The essays explore the failure of the current child support reforms to reduce child poverty, consider the need to study how to determine what is a "fair amount" of child support, and debate proposals to follow the example of a number of other industrialized nations and provide more generous public benefits for poor children.
This book will be of interest to public policy makers and professionals--lawyers, legal scholars, social workers, and administrators--who work in and study the child support system.
Contributors are June R. Carbone, John Eekelaar, Martha A. Fineman, Irwin Garfinkel, Marsha Garrison, Paul K. Legler, Mavis Maclean, Marygold S. Melli, Daniel R. Meyer, J. Thomas Oldham, Allen M. Parkman, Judith A. Seltzer, and Andrea Warman.
J. Thomas Oldham is John H. Freeman Professor Law, University of Houston Law School. Marygold S. Melli is Voss-Bascom Professor of Law Emerita, University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School.
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Chronic Pain and the Family
Julie K. Silver
Harvard University Press, 2004
Library of Congress RB127.S499 2004 | Dewey Decimal 616.0472

Chronic pain is the leading cause of disability in the United States, affecting as many as 48 million people in this country alone. It can demoralize and depress both patient and family, especially when there is no effective pain control and no hope for relief. Improperly managed, chronic pain can lead to substance abuse (usually painkillers) and to acute psychological and emotional distress. Pain begets stress and stress begets pain in a wretched downward spiral. Silver reviews the causes and characteristics of chronic pain and explores its impact on individual family relationships and on the extended family, covering such issues as employment, parenting, childbearing and inheritance, and emotional health. Silver treats aspects of chronic pain not covered in a typical office visit: how men and women differ in their experience of chronic pain, the effect of chronic pain on a toddler's behavior or an older child's performance in school, the risks of dependence on and addiction to pain medications, and practical ways for relatives beyond the immediate family circle to offer help and support to the person in pain.
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Clean Water, 2nd ed: An Introduction to Water Quality and Water Pollution Control
Kenneth M. Vigil
Oregon State University Press, 2003
Library of Congress TD370.V55 2003 | Dewey Decimal 363.7364

Clean Water is a book for anyone concerned about this precious resource who wants to become better informed. In straightforward language, Kenneth Vigil provides a comprehensive introduction to the many scientific, regulatory, cultural, and geographic issues associated with water quality and water pollution control.

Most other books on water quality and pollution control are highly technical and very specific, and are aimed at engineers, scientists, or attorneys. Clean Water, on the other hand, is a comprehensive discussion of the subject intended for a wider audience of science students, educators, and the general public.

Vigil avoids the use of technical jargon and uses many photos and diagrams to illustrate and explain concepts. He provides sufficient detail to educate readers about many broad topics and includes additional references at the end of each chapter for exploring specific topics in more detail.

Clean Water summarizes the basic fundamentals of water chemistry and microbiology and outlines important water quality rules and regulations, all in concise, understandable prose. It describes the basic scientific principles behind water pollution control and the broader approach of addressing water pollution problems through watershed management. There are sections on drinking water and on citizen involvement in water pollution control efforts at home and in the community.
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The Complete Vegetarian: The Essential Guide to Good Health
Edited by Peggy Carlson M.D.
University of Illinois Press, 2007
Library of Congress TX392.C69 2009 | Dewey Decimal 641.5636

Citing health concerns as the number one reason why people adopt a vegetarian diet, this collection makes important scientific connections between good health and vegetarianism. The Complete Vegetarian examines the diet’s impact on chronic diseases and serves as a nutritional guide and meal-planning resource. Leading vegetarian nutritionists and medical doctors devote entire chapters to nutritional aspects that include fats, protein, and fiber; to diseases such as diabetes, cancer, heart disease, and high blood pressure; and to vegetarian meal planning, including specialized diets for children, pregnant women, and athletes.

The contributors' cutting-edge research finds that it is not only an absence of meat that accounts for the health effects of a vegetarian diet; other contributing factors include less saturated fat and more fiber, antioxidants, and unsaturated fats than other diets. The Complete Vegetarian promises to be an essential resource for health professionals and the growing number of people who have adopted or are thinking about adopting a vegetarian lifestyle.

Contributors include John J. B. Anderson, Dina Aronson, Peggy Carlson, James Craner, Brenda Davis, Simon K. Emms, Jeanene Fogli, Suzanne Havala Hobbs, Michael A. Klaper, Erin L. Kraker, Valerie Kurtzhalts, D. Enette Larson-Meyer, Reed Mangels, Carol M. Meerschaert, Virginia Messina, Mary Helen Niemeyer, Carl V. Phillips, Sudha Raj, and Cheryl Sullivan.

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Confounded Expectations: The Law's Struggle with Personal Responsibility
George W. Jarecke and Nancy K. Plant
Southern Illinois University Press, 2000
Library of Congress KF1250.Z9J37 2000 | Dewey Decimal 346.7303

George W. Jarecke and Nancy K. Plant present a selection of cases across a broad spectrum of American law to demonstrate that our society relies inappropriately on the legal system to cure ills the system was not designed to address.

Jarecke and Plant note that while we in the United States worry considerably about the problem of individual assumption of responsibility—whether for personal mistakes, financial setbacks, or pure bad luck—we appear uneasy about the concept and unclear about what it means on a daily basis. Not only are we incapable of accepting personal responsibility; we barely know what it means to do so.

Mistakenly, we turn to the legal system to solve this dilemma. Yet our laws as our legislators write them, as judges interpret them, as lawyers argue them, and as juries apply them send mixed messages about whether and how we should exercise personal responsibility.

Each chapter of Confounded Expectations features one main case to explain one legal theory, with other cases noted as examples of facets of each theory. To demonstrate the law that requires merchants to guarantee the quality of their products, for example, Jarecke and Plant discuss the case of the band mothers whose fund-raising luncheon menu included turkey salad contaminated by salmonella.  Peripheral cases include a horse falsely sold as a gelding, a riding mower that tipped over when used as instructed, makeup that was guaranteed to be safe but caused a rash, and pigs sick with hog cholera.

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Controversies in Science and Technology: From Maize to Menopause
Edited by Daniel Lee Kleinman, Abby J. Kinchy, and Jo Handelsman
University of Wisconsin Press, 2005
Library of Congress QH442.C645 2005 | Dewey Decimal 303.483

Written for general readers, teachers, journalists, and policymakers, this volume explores four controversial topics in science and technology, with commentaries from experts in such fields as sociology, religion, law, ethics, and politics:

* Antibiotics and Resistance: the science, the policy debates, and perspectives from a microbiologist, a veterinarian, and an M.D.

* Genetically Modified Maize and Gene Flow: the science of genetic modification, protecting genetic diversity, agricultural biotech vesus the environment, corporate patents versus farmers' rights

* Hormone Replacement Theory and Menopause: overview of the Women's Health Initiative, history of hormone replacement therapy, the medicalization of menopause, hormone replacement therapy and clinical trials

* Smallpox: historical and medical overview of smallpox, government policies for public health, the Emergency Health Powers Act, public resistance vs. cooperation.
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Courting Justice: Ten New Jersey Cases That Shook the Nation
Tractenberg, Paul L
Rutgers University Press, 2013
Library of Congress KF220.C67 2013 | Dewey Decimal 347.74907

Since 1947 a modernized New Jersey Supreme Court has played an important and controversial role in the state, nation, and world.  Its decisions in cutting-edge cases have confronted society’s toughest issues, reflecting changing social attitudes, modern life’s complexities, and new technologies.

Paul Tractenberg has selected ten of the court’s landmark decisions between 1960 and 2011 to illustrate its extensive involvement in major public issues, and to assess its impact. Each case chapter is authored by a distinguished academic or professional expert, several of whom were deeply involved in the cases’ litigation, enabling them to provide special insights. An overview chapter provides context for the court’s distinctive activity.

Many of the cases are so widely known that they have become part of the national conversation about law and policy. In the Karen Ann Quinlan decision, the court determined the right of privacy extends to refusing life-sustaining treatment. The Baby M case reined in surrogate parenting and focused on the child’s best interests. In the Mount Laurel decision, the court sought to increase affordable housing for low- and moderate-income residents throughout the state. The Megan’s Law case upheld legal regulation of sex offender community notification. A series of decisions known as Abbott/Robinson required the state to fund poor urban school districts at least on par with suburban districts.

Other less well known cases still have great public importance. Henningsen v. Bloomfield Motors reshaped product liability and tort law to protect consumers injured by defective cars; State v. Hunt shielded privacy rights from unwarranted searches beyond federal standards; Lehmann v. Toys ‘R’ Us protected employees from sexual harassment and a hostile work environment; Right to Choose v. Byrne expanded state constitutional abortion rights beyond the federal constitution; and Marini v. Ireland protected low-income tenants against removal from their homes.   

For some observers, the New Jersey Supreme Court represents the worst of judicial activism; others laud it for being, in its words, “the designated last-resort guarantor of the Constitution's command.” For Tractenberg, the court’s activism means it tends to find for the less powerful over the more powerful and for the public good against private interests, an approach he applauds.
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Curiosity: How Science Became Interested in Everything
Philip Ball
University of Chicago Press, 2013
Library of Congress Q125.B297 2013 | Dewey Decimal 509

With the recent landing of the Mars rover Curiosity, it seems safe to assume that the idea of being curious is alive and well in modern science—that it’s not merely encouraged but is seen as an essential component of the scientific mission. Yet there was a time when curiosity was condemned. Neither Pandora nor Eve could resist the dangerous allure of unanswered questions, and all knowledge wasn’t equal—for millennia it was believed that there were some things we should not try to know. In the late sixteenth century this attitude began to change dramatically, and in Curiosity: How Science Became Interested in Everything, Philip Ball investigates how curiosity first became sanctioned—when it changed from a vice to a virtue and how it became permissible to ask any and every question about the world.
 
Looking closely at the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, Ball vividly brings to life the age when modern science began, a time that spans the lives of Galileo and Isaac Newton. In this entertaining and illuminating account of the rise of science as we know it, Ball tells of scientists both legendary and lesser known, from Copernicus and Kepler to Robert Boyle, as well as the inventions and technologies that were inspired by curiosity itself, such as the telescope and the microscope. The so-called Scientific Revolution is often told as a story of great geniuses illuminating the world with flashes of inspiration. But Curiosity reveals a more complex story, in which the liberation—and subsequent taming—of curiosity was linked to magic, religion, literature, travel, trade, and empire. Ball also asks what has become of curiosity today: how it functions in science, how it is spun and packaged for consumption, how well it is being sustained, and how the changing shape of science influences the kinds of questions it may continue to ask.
 
Though proverbial wisdom tell us that it was through curiosity that our innocence was lost, that has not deterred us. Instead, it has been completely the contrary: today we spend vast sums trying to reconstruct the first instants of creation in particle accelerators, out of a pure desire to know. Ball refuses to let us take this desire for granted, and this book is a perfect homage to such an inquisitive attitude.

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The Dana Guide to Brain Health: A Practical Family Reference from Medical Experts
Edited by Floyd E. Bloom, M.D.; M. Flint Beal, M.D.; and, David J. Kupfer, M.D.
Dana Press, 2006
Library of Congress RC341.D173 2006 | Dewey Decimal 616.8

A child crashes to the ground from the monkey bars head-first. A high school student prepares for months to take the SAT. A grandmother slowly slips away from her family through the deadly progression of Alzheimer’s Disease. Whether we realize it or not, the importance of brain health to our daily lives goes far beyond just being able to walk and talk. The Dana Guide to Brain Health offers the first comprehensive home medical reference book on the brain, providing an unparalleled, authoritative guide to improving the fitness of our brains and, ultimately, enriching our lives.


With contributions from over one hundred of the most prominent scientists and clinicians in the United States, The Dana Guide to Brain Health is an extensive and wholly accessible manual on the workings of the human brain. This richly illustrated volume contains a wealth of facts and advice, on simple yet effective ways to take care of our brains; the intimate connection between brain health and body health; brain development from the prenatal period through adulthood; and how we learn, remember, and imagine.

The brain is far too important to be excluded any longer from our daily health concerns. The Dana Guide to Brain Health remedies this oversight with a clearly written, definitive map to our brains that reveals how we can take care of them in order to sustain a long and rich life.

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The Deepening Shade: Psychological Aspects of Life-Threatening Illness
Barbara M. Sourkes
University of Pittsburgh Press, 1982
Library of Congress R726.8.S62 1982 | Dewey Decimal 616

The Deepening Shade is an elegant synthesis of the psychology of life-threatening illness.  The book’s evocative power derives from the interweaving of clinical conceptualization with the words of patients and family members.  Rather than focusing on death, Sourkes explores <I>living</I> with a life-threatening illness.
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The Demon in the Machine: How Hidden Webs of Information Are Solving the Mystery of Life
Paul Davies
University of Chicago Press, 1991
Library of Congress QH501.D38 2019 | Dewey Decimal 576.83

Physics World Book of the Year

A Financial Times, Sunday Times, and Telegraph Best Science Book of the Year


What is life? For generations, scientists have struggled to make sense of this fundamental question, for life really does look like magic: even a humble bacterium accomplishes things so dazzling that no human engineer can match it. Huge advances in molecular biology over the past few decades have served only to deepen the mystery.

In this penetrating and wide-ranging book, world-renowned physicist and science communicator Paul Davies searches for answers in a field so new and fast-moving that it lacks a name; it is a domain where biology, computing, logic, chemistry, quantum physics, and nanotechnology intersect. At the heart of these diverse fields, Davies explains, is the concept of information: a quantity which has the power to unify biology with physics, transform technology and medicine, and force us to fundamentally reconsider what it means to be alive—even illuminating the age-old question of whether we are alone in the universe.

From life’s murky origins to the microscopic engines that run the cells of our bodies, The Demon in the Machine journeys across an astounding landscape of cutting-edge science. Weaving together cancer and consciousness, two-headed worms and bird navigation, Davies reveals how biological organisms garner and process information to conjure order out of chaos, opening a window onto the secret of life itself.
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Do You Really Need Surgery?: A Sensible Guide to Hysterectomy and Other Procedures for Women
Moore, M.D., Michele C
Rutgers University Press, 2004
Library of Congress RG101.M83 2004 | Dewey Decimal 618.1059

At last, here is a user-friendly guide to gynecologic surgery. The authors' guiding principle is that each woman for whom any kind of surgery is recommended should be well informed about the indications, the risks, and the expected results.

Using anecdotes drawn from a combined fifty years of experience, doctors Moore and de Costa provide clear and accurate information about women's anatomy, physiology, common gynecological ailments, diagnosis, alternative treatments, and, finally, full details about surgery itself. Among the surgeries discussed are removal of the uterus (hysterectomy), removal of the ovaries (oophorectomy), and removal of fibroids. The various ways of performing these procedures are examined, including minimally invasive surgery done through the laparoscope.

The authors also help the patient through the post-operative phase, revealing what to expect, how to make the recovery easier, and how to take care of yourself after the surgery. The result is a book that empowers women as they weigh their options with regard to gynecologic surgery.

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A Doctor's Dozen: Twelve Strategies for Personal Health and a Culture of Wellness
Catherine Florio Pipas
Dartmouth College Press, 2018
Library of Congress RA773.P57 2018 | Dewey Decimal 613.2

Burnout affects a third of our population and over half of our health professionals. For the second group, the impact is magnified, as consequences play out not only on a personal level, but also on a societal level and lead to medical errors, suboptimal care, low levels of patient satisfaction, and poor clinical outcomes. Achieving wellbeing requires strategies for change. In this book, Dr. Pipas shares twelve lessons and strategies for improved health that she has learned from patients, students, and colleagues over her twenty years working as a family physician. Each lesson is based on observation and research, and begins with a story of an exemplary patient whose challenges and successes reflect the theme of the lesson. Along with the lessons, the author offers plans for action, which taken together create the framework for a healthy life. Each lesson concludes with resources and a “health challenge.”
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Does It Run in the Family?: A Consumer's Guide to DNA Testing for Genetic Disorders
Zallen, Dorris Teichler
Rutgers University Press, 1997
Library of Congress RB155.6.T45 1997 | Dewey Decimal 616.042

What if your father had Alzheimer's disease? And what if there was a test to tell you if, as you grew older, you might develop it, too? Would you have the test? And if you did, how would the results affect the way you live your life? How would they affect your family? Your job? Your medical insurance?

Breast cancer, sickle-cell anemia, Huntington disease, muscular dystrophy--every day, people have to face the fact that a hereditary disorder runs in their family. The painful knowledge that they or their children might be at risk for a genetic disorder influences all their decisions about the future. They ask, "Is there a genetic test to let us know if we are really at risk? If there is such a test, do we really want to have it done?"

For an ever-growing number of disorders, testing is possible--but the existence of a test can raise new and troubling questions. In this book, geneticist and science policy expert Doris Teichler Zallen explains clearly and sympathetically how genetic disorders are passed along in families; which hereditary disorders can be tested for using genetic technology; how the new DNA tests for genetic disorders work; what genetic tests can and can't reveal, and why the tests often do not give clear-cut answers; what questions one should ask doctors and genetic counselors; how the health care system, government policies, and insurance companies influence our options; and what the resources are for obtaining more information and counseling.

Through the stories of real families and the choices they made about genetic testing, Zallen helps readers think through their own alternatives and discuss them with relatives. Does it Run in the Family? is essential reading for every family coping with inherited medical conditions and for the medical and genetics professionals involved in their decisions. It will also interest all readers who seek a clear explanation of the new DNA tests and the issues surrounding them.

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Down to Earth: Satellite Technologies, Industries, and Cultures
Parks, Lisa
Rutgers University Press, 2012
Library of Congress TK5104.D686 2012 | Dewey Decimal 354.51

Down to Earth presents the first comprehensive overview of the geopolitical maneuvers, financial investments, technological innovations, and ideological struggles that take place behind the scenes of the satellite industry. Satellite projects that have not received extensive coverage—microsatellites in China, WorldSpace in South Africa, SiriusXM, the failures of USA 193 and Cosmos 954, and Iridium—are explored. This collection takes readers on a voyage through a truly global industry, from the sites where satellites are launched to the corporate clean rooms where they are designed, and along the orbits and paths that satellites traverse. Combining a practical introduction to the mechanics of the satellite industry, a history of how its practices and technologies have evolved, and a sophisticated theoretical analysis of satellite cultures, Down to Earth opens up a new space for global media studies.

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The Earwig's Tail: A Modern Bestiary of Multi-legged Legends
May R. Berenbaum
Harvard University Press, 2009
Library of Congress QL467.B46 2009 | Dewey Decimal 595.7

Throughout the Middle Ages, enormously popular bestiaries presented people with descriptions of rare and unusual animals, typically paired with a moral or religious lesson. In The Earwig's Tail, entomologist May Berenbaum and illustrator Jay Hosler draw on the powerful cultural symbols of these antiquated books to create a beautiful and witty bestiary of the insect world.
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Embryos under the Microscope
Jane Maienschein
Harvard University Press, 2014
Library of Congress QM603.M35 2014 | Dewey Decimal 612.64

Jane Maienschein examines how understanding of embryos evolved from the speculations of natural philosophers to bioengineering, with its life-enhancing therapies. She shows that research on embryos has always seemed promising to some but frightening to others, and makes the case that public understanding must be informed by scientific findings.
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An Equation That Changed the World: Newton, Einstein, and the Theory of Relativity
Harald Fritzsch
University of Chicago Press, 1994
Library of Congress QC173.57.F7513 1994 | Dewey Decimal 530.11

Fritzsch offers readers the opportunity to listen in on a meeting of Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, and a present-day physicist. While he introduces the theory of relativity, Fritzsch teaches its sources, its workings, and the ways it has revolutionized our view of the physical world. An Equation That Changed the World dramatizes the importance of relativity, for the human race, and the survival of our planet.

"Fritzsch could not give the modern reader a more memorable introduction to the personalities and science of Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein unless somehow he could find the keys to H. G. Wells' time machine. . . . Many readers will applaud Fritzsch for this lively but profoundly insightful book." —Booklist, starred review

"[Fritzsch] has dreamed up a dialogue between the two great physicists, helped along by a fictional modern physicist. . . . The conversation builds up to an explanation of E=mc2, and on the way illuminates the important points where Newtonian and Einsteinian theory diverge." —David Lindley, New York Times Book Review
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From Stone to Star
Claude J. Allègre
Harvard University Press, 1992
Library of Congress QE31.A4413 1992 | Dewey Decimal 550

The Genetic Gods: Evolution and Belief in Human Affairs
John C. Avise
Harvard University Press, 1998
Library of Congress QH437.A95 1998 | Dewey Decimal 576

They mastermind our lives, shaping our features, our health, and our behavior, even in the sacrosanct realms of love and sex, religion, aging, and death. Yet we are the ones who house, perpetuate, and give the promise of immortality to these biological agents, our genetic gods. The link between genes and gods is hardly arbitrary, as the distinguished evolutionary geneticist John Avise reveals in this compelling book. In clear, straightforward terms, Avise reviews recent discoveries in molecular biology, evolutionary genetics, and human genetic engineering, and discusses the relevance of these findings to issues of ultimate concern traditionally reserved for mythology, theology, and religious faith.

The book explains how the genetic gods figure in our development--not just our metabolism and physiology, but even our emotional disposition, personality, ethical leanings, and, indeed, religiosity. Yet genes are physical rather than metaphysical entities. Having arisen via an amoral evolutionary process--natural selection--genes have no consciousness, no sentient code of conduct, no reflective concern about the consequences of their actions. It is Avise's contention that current genetic knowledge can inform our attempts to answer typically religious questions--about origins, fate, and meaning. The Genetic Gods challenges us to make the necessary connection between what we know, what we believe, and what we embody.



Table of Contents:

Preface
Prologue

1. The Doctrines of Biological Science
2. Geneses
3. Genetic Maladies
4. Genetic Beneficence
5. Strategies of the Genes
6. Genetic Sovereignty
7. New Lords of Our Genes?
8. Meaning
Epilogue

Notes
Glossary
Index



Reviews of this book:
Our genes, [Avise] says, are responsible not only for how we got here and exist day to day, but also for the core of our being--our personalities and morals. It is our genetic make-up that allows for and formulates our religious belief systems, he argues. Avise does not eschew spirituality but seeks a more informed, less confrontational approach between science and the pulpit.
--Science News

Reviews of this book:
For the general scientific reader, the book is an excellent distillation of a broad and increasingly important field, a course of causation that cannot be ignored. From advising expectant parents to getting innocent people off death row, genetics increasingly dominates our lives. The sections on genetics are expertly written, particularly for those readers without in-depth knowledge. The author explains slowly and carefully just how genetics operates, using multiple metaphors. His genetic discourse proceeds in a neighborly fashion, as one might tell stories while sitting in a rocking chair at a country store. He seems to be invigorated by genes and just can't wait to tell about them.
--David W. Hodo, Journal of the American Medical Association

Reviews of this book:
As a whole, this book is quite informative and stimulating, and sections of it are beautifully written. Indeed, Professor Avise has a real gift for prose and scientific expositions, and I would suspect that he must be a formidable lecturer...At its core, [The Genetic Gods] is a survey, and a very nice one at that, of evolutionary genetics, the field of the author's major research interests. There is a strong sociobiological cast to the arguments, and the work and ideas of E. O. Wilson figure prominently. The presentation of evolutionary genetics is imbedded in a more general discussion of modern human and molecular genetics...However, this book is, most of all, a philosophical treatise that attempts, admittedly with the bias of a biologist, to examine the intersection of the fundamental premises of evolution and religion. Professor Avise has given us plenty to think about in this book [and]...it was a real pleasure to wrestle with the ideas he was presenting. I would suggest that other readers give it a try.
--Charles J. Epstein, Trends in Genetics

Reviews of this book:
[Avise's] account of the role genes play in shaping the human condition is wholly involving, paying particular attention to issues of reproduction, aging and death. In addition to presenting ample biological information in a form accessible to the nonspecialist, Avise does a superb job of discussing many of the ethical implications that have arisen from our growing knowledge of human genetics. Just a few of the topics covered are genetic engineering, the patenting of life, genetic screening, abortion, human cloning, gene therapy and insurance-related controversies.
--Publishers Weekly

Reviews of this book:
Avise explains thoroughly how evolution operates on a genetic level. His goal is to show that humans can look to this information as a way to answer fundamental questions of life instead of looking to traditional religious beliefs...Avise includes some very interesting discussions of ethical concerns related to genetic issues.
--Eric D. Albright, Library Journal

This is a splendid account of a subject that affects us all: the breathtaking increase in understanding of human genetics and the insight it provides into human evolution. John Avise speaks with authority of molecular evolutionary genetics and with affecting compassion of what it might mean.
--Douglas J. Futuyma, State University of New York at Stony Brook

The Genetic Gods is many things. It is a wonderful introduction to modern molecular biology, by a man who knows his subject backwards. It is a stimulating account of the ways in which genetics impinges on human nature--our thinking and our behavior. It is a remarkably level-headed and sympathetic account of the implications of our new findings for traditional and not-so-traditional issues in philosophy and religion. In an age of genetic counseling, cloning, construction of new life forms, the book is worth its weight in gold for this alone. But most of all, it is a huge amount of fun to read--you want to applaud or argue with the author on nigh every page. Highly recommended!
--Michael Ruse, University of Guelph

The Genetic Gods makes a valuable contribution to the on-going task of sorting out the implications of evolutionary biology and genetics for human self-understanding. Avise addresses, with authority and grace, the most consequential intellectual issues of our time. A challenging and insightful book.
--Loyal Rue, Harvard University

A wonderfully informative and engaging book. Avise offers a lucid, accessible primer on our genes, angelic and demonic, and examines religious and ethical issues, all too human, now confronted by genetic science. He makes a compelling case that anyone seeking to 'Know Thyself' should study the DNA molecular scriptures, our most ancient and universal legacy.
--Dudley Herschbach, Harvard University, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry
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Great Expectation: A Father's Diary
Dan Roche
University of Iowa Press, 2008
Library of Congress HQ756.R637 2008 | Dewey Decimal 306.8742092

In Great Expectation, Dan Roche gives a man's perspective on what it means to start and expand a family relatively later in life. Through a series of diary entries in turns humorous, angst ridden, and full of hope and joy, Roche describes his own thoughts and concerns during the nine months of his wife's pregnancy.

With five years of parenting his irrepressible daughter Maeve under his belt, Roche, already forty-five years old, and his wife, Maura, face the prospect of another arrival and the myriad of emotions that come with a second child. From revelling in the joys of pregnancy such as Maura's delight at "having cleavage" and being able to eat whatever she desires; to assuaging the parental anxieties of choosing the right obstetrician, correcting the mistakes one made with the first child, and sending children to college in the future; to navigating the unforeseen, experiencing the unexpected death of a parent, and feeling trepidation toward the thought of having a son, Roche records his emotions with unusual candidness and intimacy.

Reflecting on day-to-day events and their significance in his family’s life together, Roche wonders what he is getting himself into and how much deeper he can immerse himself into parenting. Together, he and his wife face the bittersweet intersections of death and new life, menace and hopefulness. With sincerity and a mature wit, Great Expectation stands as a wise recounting of nine months’ time, with all of its chaos and charms, and offers a fresh perspective for first-time and veteran parents alike.

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Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler: Visiting Astronomy and Space Exploration Sites across America
Nickell, Duane S
Rutgers University Press, 2008
Library of Congress QB44.3.N53 2008 | Dewey Decimal 520.973

Finding all the fascinating scientific sites to visit throughout America can be a daunting task. This guidebook does all the work for you. The first in a series of travel books that will celebrate science and technology in America, Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler describes astronomy and space-related museums and attractions that conventional travel guides tend to ignore. So, gas up the car, grab some snacks for the road, and get started on the voyage.
Written in clear, easy-to-read language, Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler lists more than 50 of the most important and intriguing astronomical and space-related sites in the United States. The book encompasses both popular and obscure places of interest, all of which are open to the public. Grouping the attractions by theme—such as Native American astronomy, optical and radio telescopes, NASA and space exploration, and space rocks—Duane S. Nickell provides a scientific and historical overview of each theme followed by detailed descriptions of the related sites within that theme. With over 40 illustrations, the book gives readers a visual understanding of what they will experience at most of the sites. For those readers who want to use the book as a trip planner, Nickell also includes a state-by-state listing of the attractions and identifies “must-see” exhibits at many of the space museums featured.
Travelers and armchair tourists alike will be entertained by the illustrations and scientific descriptions of these “out of this world” attractions.
-Perfect for science and astronomy enthusiasts
-Contains detailed visitorinformation on each site
-Includes over 50 of the top astronomy and space-related sites
-Filled with interesting descriptions of all sites
-Over 40 photographs
-State-by-state appendix
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Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler: Visiting Physics and Chemistry Sites Across America
Nickell, Duane S
Rutgers University Press, 2010
Library of Congress QC24.5.N53 2010 | Dewey Decimal 530.0973

Imagine visiting a top-secret government lab, one that was a key site for the development of nuclear weapons and nuclear fusion technology in the twentieth century. Well, even in today's world of color-coded security levels, the doors of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California are open to you. And it's just one of the many surprising stops along the way in Duane S. Nickell's captivating new edition of the Scientific Traveler series, Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler: Visiting Physics and Chemistry Sites across America.

Are you in the mood for a trip to the Titan Missile Museum in Tucson? Want to spend some time at the Fermi National Accelerator Center near Chicago? Perhaps quench your thirst for knowledge and discovery at the Anheuser-Busch Brewery in St. Louis, where brewers are chemists at heart? Set your own pace. As an active participant or living room traveler, you'll be mesmerized as Nickell leads you on a tour of physics and chemistry sites.

Written in an easy-to-read and accessible style, this comprehensive guide is a practical and fun way to promote scientific literacy. You'll meet some of the world's great physicists, engineers, and chemists as you turn pages filled with more than fifty photographs. Organized into chapters on individuals, places, and sites--from universities of science to national laboratories, particle accelerators to energy labs and beyond--Nickell illuminates the history of each topic and paints a panorama of stunning achievements in physics and chemistry.

Whether you're traveling in California or Maine, or taking to the road in Texas or Illinois, Nickell helps complete your trip with a state-by-state list of monumental sites and resources. From the east coast to the west, north by northwest, or south in search of the Florida Solar Power Energy Center, you'll enjoy all your scientific travels with Visiting Physics and Chemistry Sites across America.
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Heal Your Heart: How You Can Prevent or Reverse Heart Disease
Gould, K. Lance
Rutgers University Press, 2000
Library of Congress RC685.C6G686 1998 | Dewey Decimal 616.123

In Heal Your Heart, Dr. K. Lance Gould’s goals are better survival and improved health through the prevention and reversal of heart and vascular disease. His program provides practical, do-it-yourself steps and explores options beyond traditional invasive medical procedures for more definitive solutions. Designed for the general reader, Heal Your Heart can be used by anyone. Scientific information and practical guidelines are presented in simple, full-color illustrations, summary graphs or tables with brief, nontechnical text that incorporate the most recent medical knowledge. Dr. Gould introduces readers to new non-invasive medical imaging technologies such as cardiac PET that may potentially provide early diagnoses for people who may be at risk. Dr. Gould demonstrates how patients and physicians can work together to conquer one of the relentless causes of disability and death. He outlines what questions to ask medical staff and how to manage your own reversal program including your doctors, whether specialists or general practitioners. The principles of reversing cardiovascular disease in this program may be adapted to various lifestyles, habits, tastes, time constraints, and personalities. Dr. Gould’s program avoids multiple medical consultations and special facilities or equipment. The essentials are healthy living habits combined with medical management at home and work. This reversal program may replace surgical or catheter procedures for treating cardiovascular disease in most patients. In some specific cases, some people may also need balloon dilation or bypass surgery. Dr. Gould furnishes the criteria used to identify the minority of patients who need them. For this minority, Dr. Gould’s reversal program in addition to surgical treatment will provide optimal outcome by dramatically lowering further risk. For most people, this program produces a sense of well-being and reduces or eliminates symptoms. 
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The Hoarders: Material Deviance in Modern American Culture
Scott Herring
University of Chicago Press, 2014
Library of Congress RC569.5.H63H47 2014 | Dewey Decimal 616.8584

The verb “declutter” has not yet made it into the Oxford English Dictionary, but its ever-increasing usage suggests that it’s only a matter of time. Articles containing tips and tricks on how to get organized cover magazine pages and pop up in TV programs and commercials, while clutter professionals and specialists referred to as “clutterologists” are just a phone call away. Everywhere the sentiment is the same: clutter is bad.

In The Hoarders, Scott Herring provides an in-depth examination of how modern hoarders came into being, from their onset in the late 1930s to the present day. He finds that both the idea of organization and the role of the clutterologist are deeply ingrained in our culture, and that there is a fine line between clutter and deviance in America. Herring introduces us to Jill, whose countertops are piled high with decaying food and whose cabinets are overrun with purchases, while the fly strips hanging from her ceiling are arguably more fly than strip. When Jill spots a decomposing pumpkin about to be jettisoned, she stops, seeing in the rotting, squalid vegetable a special treasure. “I’ve never seen one quite like this before,” she says, and looks to see if any seeds remain. It is from moments like these that Herring builds his questions: What counts as an acceptable material life—and who decides? Is hoarding some sort of inherent deviation of the mind, or a recent historical phenomenon grounded in changing material cultures? Herring opts for the latter, explaining that hoarders attract attention not because they are mentally ill but because they challenge normal modes of material relations. Piled high with detailed and, at times, disturbing descriptions of uncleanliness, The Hoarders delivers a sweeping and fascinating history of hoarding that will cause us all to reconsider how we view these accumulators of clutter.
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How to Grow a Human: Adventures in How We Are Made and Who We Are
Philip Ball
University of Chicago Press, 2019
Library of Congress R857.T55 | Dewey Decimal 612.028

Two summers ago, scientists removed a tiny piece of flesh from Philip Ball’s arm and turned it into a rudimentary “mini-brain.” The skin cells, removed from his body, did not die but were instead transformed into nerve cells that independently arranged themselves into a dense network and communicated with each other, exchanging the raw signals of thought. This was life—but whose? 

In his most mind-bending book yet, Ball makes that disconcerting question the focus of a tour through what scientists can now do in cell biology and tissue culture. He shows how these technologies could lead to tailor-made replacement organs for when ours fail, to new medical advances for repairing damage and assisting conception, and to new ways of “growing a human.” For example, it might prove possible to turn skin cells not into neurons but into eggs and sperm, or even to turn oneself into the constituent cells of embryos. Such methods would also create new options for gene editing, with all the attendant moral dilemmas. Ball argues that such advances can therefore never be about “just the science,” because they come already surrounded by a host of social narratives, preconceptions, and prejudices. But beyond even that, these developments raise questions about identity and self, birth and death, and force us to ask how mutable the human body really is—and what forms it might take in years to come. 
 
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How We See the Sky: A Naked-Eye Tour of Day and Night
Thomas Hockey
University of Chicago Press, 2002
Library of Congress QB44.3.H635 2011 | Dewey Decimal 520

Gazing up at the heavens from our backyards or a nearby field, most of us see an undifferentiated mess of stars—if, that is, we can see anything at all through the glow of light pollution. Today’s casual observer knows far less about the sky than did our ancestors, who depended on the sun and the moon to tell them the time and on the stars to guide them through the seas. Nowadays, we don’t need the sky, which is good, because we’ve made it far less accessible, hiding it behind the skyscrapers and the excessive artificial light of our cities. 

How We See the Sky gives us back our knowledge of the sky, offering a fascinating overview of what can be seen there without the aid of a telescope. Thomas Hockey begins by scanning the horizon, explaining how the visible universe rotates through this horizon as night turns to day and season to season. Subsequent chapters explore the sun’s and moon’s respective motions through the celestial globe, as well as the appearance of solstices, eclipses, and planets, and how these are accounted for in different kinds of calendars. In every chapter, Hockey introduces the common vocabulary of today’s astronomers, uses examples past and present to explain them, and provides conceptual tools to help newcomers understand the topics he discusses.


Packed with illustrations and enlivened by historical anecdotes and literary references, How We See the Sky reacquaints us with the wonders to be found in our own backyards.

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Ice: The Nature, the History, and the Uses of an Astonishing Substance
Mariana Gosnell
University of Chicago Press, 2007
Library of Congress QC926.32.G67 2007 | Dewey Decimal 551.31

More brittle than glass, at times stronger than steel, at other times flowing like molasses, ice covers 10 percent of the earth’s land and 7 percent of its oceans.

Mariana Gosnell here explores the history and uses of ice in all its complexity, grandeur, and significance. From the freezing of Pleasant Lake in New Hampshire to the breakup of a Vermont river at the onset of spring, from the frozen Antarctic landscape that emperor penguins inhabit to the cold, watery route bowhead whales take between Arctic ice floes, Gosnell examines icebergs, icicles, and frostbite; sea ice and permafrost; ice on Mars and in the rings of Saturn; and several new forms of ice developed in labs. Arecord of the scientific surprises, cultural magnitude, and everyday uses of frozen water, Ice is a sparkling illumination of a substance whose ebbs and flows over time have helped form the world we live in.

“Gosnell travels to the ends of the earth, into the clouds and under the frozen sea to conduct her investigations . . . By the time you finish this remarkable book, you’ll never think about freezing and melting in quite the same way.”—New York Times Book Review

“To read Ice is to discover just how astonishing it is and how necessary.”—San Francisco Chronicle

“A bright, curious, omnidirectional tour that will entrance nature readers.”—Booklist

“An encyclopedic work with surprises on every page . . . . Illustrated with images of ice castles, skaters, and bubble-filled frozen sculpture, Gosnell’s book breathes life into the crystals dubbed ‘glorious spangles’ by Henry David Thoreau.”—Discover

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In Search of Cell History: The Evolution of Life's Building Blocks
Franklin M. Harold
University of Chicago Press, 2014
Library of Congress QH582.4.H37 2014 | Dewey Decimal 571.6

The origin of cells remains one of the most fundamental problems in biology, one that over the past two decades has spawned a large body of research and debate. With In Search of Cell History, Franklin M. Harold offers a comprehensive, impartial take on that research and the controversies that keep the field in turmoil.

Written in accessible language and complemented by a glossary for easy reference, this book investigates the full scope of cellular history. Assuming only a basic knowledge of cell biology, Harold examines such pivotal subjects as the relationship between cells and genes; the central role of bioenergetics in the origin of life; the status of the universal tree of life with its three stems and viral outliers; and the controversies surrounding the last universal common ancestor. He also delves deeply into the evolution of cellular organization, the origin of complex cells, and the incorporation of symbiotic organelles, and considers the fossil evidence for the earliest life on earth. In Search of Cell History shows us just how far we have come in understanding cell evolution—and the evolution of life in general—and how far we still have to go.
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Law in Everyday Life
Austin Sarat and Thomas R. Kearns, Editors
University of Michigan Press, 1995
Library of Congress KF387.L374 1993 | Dewey Decimal 340.1

"Sarat and Kearns . . . have edited a truly marvelous work on the impact of the law on daily life and vice versa. . . . the essays are all exemplary, thought- provoking works worthy of a long, contemplative read by scholars, lawyers, and judges alike." --Choice
"The subject of law in everyday life is timely in theory and in practice. The essays collected here are stimulating for the very different ways in which they reconfigure the meanings of 'the law' as cultural practice, and 'the everyday' as a cultural domain in which the state expresses a range of interests and engagements. Readers looking for an introduction to this topic will come away from the book with a clear sense of the varied voices and modes of inquiry now involved in sociolegal studies, and what distinguishes them. More experienced readers will appreciate the book's meticulous reconsideration of the instrumentalities, agencies, and constructedness of law." --Carol Greenhouse, Indiana University
Contributors include David Engel, Hendrik Hartog, Thomas R. Kearns, David Kennedy, Catharine MacKinnon, George Marcus, Austin Sarat, and Patricia Williams.
Austin Sarat is William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science, and Chair of the Department of Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought, Amherst College. Thomas R. Kearns is William H. Hastie Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought, Amherst College.
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The Light of Christ: An Introduction to Catholicism
Thomas Joseph White
Catholic University of America Press, 2017
Library of Congress BX1754.W45 2017 | Dewey Decimal 230.2

The Light of Christ provides an accessible presentation of Catholicism that is grounded in traditional theology, but engaged with a host of contemporary questions or objections. Inspired by the theologies of Iranaeus, Thomas Aquinas and John Henry Newman, and rooted in a post-Vatican II context, Fr. Thomas Joseph White presents major doctrines of the Christian religion in a way that is comprehensible for non-specialists: knowledge of God, the mystery of the Trinity, the Incarnation and the atonement, the sacraments and the moral life, eschatology and prayer.

At the same time, The Light of Christ also addresses topics such as evolution, the modern historical study of Jesus and the Bible, and objections to Catholic moral teaching. Touching on the concerns of contemporary readers, Fr. White examines questions such as whether Christianity is compatible with the findings of the modern sciences, do historical Jesus studies disrupt or confirm the teaching of the faith, and does history confirm the antiquity of Catholic claims.

This book serves as an excellent introduction for young professionals with no specialized background in theology who are interested in learning more about Catholicism, or as an introduction to Catholic theology. It will also serve as a helpful text for theology courses in a university context.

As Fr. White states in the book’s introduction: “This is a book that offers itself as a companion. I do not presume to argue the reader into the truths of the Catholic faith, though I will make arguments. My goal is to make explicit in a few broad strokes the shape of Catholicism. I hope to outline its inherent intelligibility or form as a mystery that is at once visible and invisible, ancient and contemporary, mystical and reasonable.”
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Living With Cancer: A Practical Guide
Visel, Dave
Rutgers University Press, 2006
Library of Congress RC263.V57 2006 | Dewey Decimal 616.994

In this essential guide, Dave Visel draws on expertise hard-won during his wife’s battle with lymphoma. He provides an overview of the varieties of cancer and all the basic types of treatments available. Chapters dispel common myths associated with these treatments and provide tips on nutrition and physical fitness. Visel also moves beyond the hospital to provide information and strategies to help with the emotional, practical, and financial effects of a diagnosis. Cancer patients will find the tools they need to make well-informed decisions on questions ranging from the right time to tell coworkers to whether to travel for treatment.  Because medical bankruptcies affect nearly two million Americans each year, Visel devotes several chapters to financial issues.  He also addresses the effects of cancer on relationships, such as how to deal with a difficult parent or whether to reconcile with an estranged spouse. In addition, Living with Cancer provides a comprehensive overview of the most useful corporate, government, and non-profit resources available. Anyone looking for help in understanding the full range of personal, professional, and legal issues associated with cancer will welcome this book. As inspiring as it is informative, it is a survival guide in the truest sense.

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Living with Polio: The Epidemic and Its Survivors
Daniel J. Wilson
University of Chicago Press, 2005
Library of Congress RC180.2.W47 2005 | Dewey Decimal 616.835

Polio was the most dreaded childhood disease of twentieth-century America. Every summer during the 1940s and 1950s, parents were terrorized by the thought that polio might cripple their children. They warned their children not to drink from public fountains, to avoid swimming pools, and to stay away from movie theaters and other crowded places. Whenever and wherever polio struck, hospitals filled with victims of the virus. Many experienced only temporary paralysis, but others faced a lifetime of disability.

Living with Polio is the first book to focus primarily on the personal stories of the men and women who had acute polio and lived with its crippling consequences. Writing from personal experience, polio survivor Daniel J. Wilson shapes this impassioned book with the testimonials of more than one hundred polio victims, focusing on the years between 1930 and 1960. He traces the entire life experience of the survivors—from the alarming diagnosis all the way to the recent development of post-polio syndrome, a condition in which the symptoms of the disease may return two or three decades after they originally surfaced.

Living with Polio follows every physical and emotional stage of the disease: the loneliness of long separations from family and friends suffered by hospitalized victims; the rehabilitation facilitieswhere survivors spent a full year or more painfully trying to regain the use of their paralyzed muscles; and then the return home, where they were faced with readjusting to school or work with the aid of braces, crutches, or wheelchairs while their families faced the difficult responsibilities of caring for and supporting a child or spouse with a disability.

Poignant and gripping, Living with Polio is a compelling history of the enduring physical and psychological experience of polio straight from the rarely heard voices of its survivors.
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The Lost Species: Great Expeditions in the Collections of Natural History Museums
Christopher Kemp
University of Chicago Press, 2017
Library of Congress QH45.5.K46 2018 | Dewey Decimal 508.075

The tiny, lungless Thorius salamander from southern Mexico, thinner than a match and smaller than a quarter. The lushly white-coated Saki, an arboreal monkey from the Brazilian rainforests. The olinguito, a native of the Andes, which looks part mongoose, part teddy bear. These fantastic species are all new to science—at least newly named and identified; but they weren’t discovered in the wild, instead, they were unearthed in the drawers and cavernous basements of natural history museums. As Christopher Kemp reveals in The Lost Species, hiding in the cabinets and storage units of natural history museums is a treasure trove of discovery waiting to happen.

With Kemp as our guide, we go spelunking into museum basements, dig through specimen trays, and inspect the drawers and jars of collections, scientific detectives on the hunt for new species. We discover king crabs from 1906, unidentified tarantulas, mislabeled Himalayan landsnails, an unknown rove beetle originally collected by Darwin, and an overlooked squeaker frog, among other curiosities. In each case, these specimens sat quietly for decades—sometimes longer than a century—within the collections of museums, before sharp-eyed scientists understood they were new. Each year, scientists continue to encounter new species in museum collections—a stark reminder that we have named only a fraction of the world’s biodiversity. Sadly, some specimens have waited so long to be named that they are gone from the wild before they were identified, victims of climate change and habitat loss. As Kemp shows, these stories showcase the enduring importance of these very collections.

The Lost Species vividly tells these stories of discovery—from the latest information on each creature to the people who collected them and the scientists who finally realized what they had unearthed—and will inspire many a museumgoer to want to peek behind the closed doors and rummage through the archives.
 
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Lung Cancer Chronicles
Meyer, M.D., John
Rutgers University Press, 1990
Library of Congress RC280.L8M49 1990 | Dewey Decimal 616.99424

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The Lying Stones of Marrakech
Stephen Jay Gould
Harvard University Press, 2011
Library of Congress QH45.5.G74 2011 | Dewey Decimal 508

Gould covers topics as diverse as episodes in the birth of paleontology to lessons from Britain’s four greatest Victorian naturalists. This collection presents the richness and fascination of the various lives that have fueled the enterprise of science and opened our eyes to a world of unexpected wonders.
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March of the Microbes: Sighting the Unseen
John L. Ingraham
Harvard University Press, 2010
Library of Congress QR56.I54 2010 | Dewey Decimal 616.9041

A Choice Outstanding Academic Title Renowned microbiologist John Ingraham rescues the supremely important and ubiquitous microorganisms from their unwonted obscurity by showing us how we can, in fact, see and appreciate them.
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Marriage and Divorce in the Jewish State: Israel's Civil War
Susan M. Weiss and Netty C. Gross-Horowitz
Brandeis University Press, 2012
Library of Congress KMK577.W45 2013 | Dewey Decimal 346.56940166

Israel currently has two recognized systems of law operating side by side: civil and religious. Israeli religious courts possess the exclusive right to conduct and terminate marriages. There is no civil marriage or divorce in Israel, irrespective of one’s religious inclinations. All Muslims must marry and divorce in accordance with shariya laws, all Catholics in accordance with canon law, and all Jews in accordance with Torah law (halakha). The interpretation and implementation of Torah law is in the hands of the Orthodox religious establishment, the only stream of Judaism that enjoys legal recognition in Israel. The rabbinic courts strenuously oppose any changes to this so-called status quo arrangement between religious and secular authorities. In fact, religious courts in Israel are currently pressing for expanded jurisdiction beyond personal status, stressing their importance to Israel’s growing religious community. This book shows how religious courts, based on centuries-old patriarchal law, undermine the full civil and human rights of Jewish women in Israel. Making a broad argument for civil marriage and divorce in Israel, the authors also emphasize that religious marriages and divorces, when they do occur, must benefit from legislation that makes divorce easier to obtain. Making this issue their focal point, they speak to a larger question: Is Israel a democracy or a theocracy?
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Missing Words
Kay Thomsett
Gallaudet University Press, 1993
Library of Congress RF291.35.T48 1993 | Dewey Decimal 617.8

The Misunderstood Gene
Michel Morange
Harvard University Press, 2001
Library of Congress QH447.M6713 2001 | Dewey Decimal 572.86

News from Mars: Mass Media and the Forging of a New Astronomy, 1860-1910
Joshua Nall
University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019
Library of Congress QB641.N275 2019 | Dewey Decimal 523.43

Mass media in the late nineteenth century was full of news from Mars. In the wake of Giovanni Schiaparelli’s 1877 discovery of enigmatic dark, straight lines on the red planet, astronomers and the public at large vigorously debated the possibility that it might be inhabited. As rivalling scientific practitioners looked to marshal allies and sway public opinion—through newspapers, periodicals, popular books, exhibitions, and encyclopaedias—they exposed disagreements over how the discipline of astronomy should be organized and how it should establish acceptable conventions of discourse.

News from Mars provides a new account of this extraordinary episode in the history of astronomy, revealing how major transformations in astronomical practice across Britain and America were inextricably tied up with popular scientific culture and a transatlantic news economy that enabled knowledge to travel. As Joshua Nall argues, astronomers were journalists, too, eliding practice with communication in consequential ways. As writers and editors, they played a pivotal role in the emergence of a “new astronomy” dedicated to the study of the physical constitution and life history of celestial objects, blurring harsh distinctions between those who produced esoteric knowledge and those who disseminated it. 

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Newton's Apple and Other Myths about Science
Ronald L. Numbers
Harvard University Press, 2015
Library of Congress Q172.5.E77N49 2015 | Dewey Decimal 001.96

A falling apple inspired the law of gravity—or so the story goes. Is it true? Perhaps not. But why do such stories endure as explanations of how science happens? Newton’s Apple and Other Myths about Science brushes away popular misconceptions to provide a clearer picture of scientific breakthroughs from ancient times to the present.
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Ninety-nine More Maggots, Mites, and Munchers
May R. Berenbaum
University of Illinois Press, 1993
Library of Congress QL467.B474 1993 | Dewey Decimal 595.7

What lives in a reindeer’s nose? Glad you asked. In this sequel to Ninety-nine Gnats, Nits, and Nibblers, National Medal of Science winner May Berenbaum offers another classic compendium of creepy-crawly cameos. Read up on our myriad arthropodan indignities and allies as Berenbaum reveals:
Why the rove beetle gives mind-altering drugs to ants
How the snail-killing fly enjoys its escargot
Why Piophila casei doesn’t care when you eat its larvae
What strange fate awaits a honey ant worker engorged with nectar
 
As lively as a fly in the buttermilk, Ninety-nine More Maggots, Mites, and Munchers is a who’s who and what’s THAT? guide to Lilliputian life-forms both familiar and obscure.
 
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No Easy Answers: Science and the Pursuit of Knowledge
Allan Franklin
University of Pittsburgh Press, 2007
Library of Congress Q162.F694 2005 | Dewey Decimal 507.2

In No Easy Answers, Allan Franklin offers an accurate picture of science to both a general reader and to scholars in the humanities and social sciences who may not have any background in physics. Through the examination of nontechnical case studies, he illustrates the various roles that experiment plays in science. He uses examples of unquestioned success, such as the discoveries of the electron and of three types of neutrino, as well as studies that were dead ends, wrong turns, or just plain mistakes, such as the “fifth force,” a proposed modification of Newton's law of gravity. Franklin argues that science is a reasonable enterprise that provides us with knowledge of the natural world based on valid experimental evidence and reasoned and critical discussion, and he makes clear that it behooves all of us to understand how it works.
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An Orchard Invisible: A Natural History of Seeds
Jonathan Silvertown
University of Chicago Press, 2009
Library of Congress QK661.S558 2009 | Dewey Decimal 581.467

The story of seeds, in a nutshell, is a tale of evolution. From the tiny sesame that we sprinkle on our bagels to the forty-five-pound double coconut borne by the coco de mer tree, seeds are a perpetual reminder of the complexity and diversity of life on earth. With An Orchard Invisible, Jonathan Silvertown presents the oft-ignored seed with the natural history it deserves, one nearly as varied and surprising as the earth’s flora itself.

Beginning with the evolution of the first seed plant from fernlike ancestors more than 360 million years ago, Silvertown carries his tale through epochs and around the globe. In a clear and engaging style, he delves into the science of seeds: How and why do some lie dormant for years on end? How did seeds evolve? The wide variety of uses that humans have developed for seeds of all sorts also receives a fascinating look, studded with examples, including foods, oils, perfumes, and pharmaceuticals. An able guide with an eye for the unusual, Silvertown is happy to take readers on unexpected—but always interesting—tangents, from Lyme disease to human color vision to the Salem witch trials. But he never lets us forget that the driving force behind the story of seeds—its theme, even—is evolution, with its irrepressible habit of stumbling upon new solutions to the challenges of life.

"I have great faith in a seed," Thoreau wrote. "Convince me that you have a seed there, and I am prepared to expect wonders." Written with a scientist’s knowledge and a gardener’s delight, An Orchard Invisible offers those wonders in a package that will be irresistible to science buffs and green thumbs alike.

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Orchid of the Bayou: A Deaf Woman Faces Blindess
Cathryn Carroll
Gallaudet University Press, 2001
Library of Congress RF292.8.C37 2002 | Dewey Decimal 362.41092

In graduating from Gallaudet University, finding a job in Washington, D.C., and starting a family with her college sweetheart, Kitty Fischer tacitly abandoned the Louisiana Cajun culture that had exposed her to little more than prejudice and misery as a child. Upon discovering that she suffered from Usher syndrome (a genetic condition that causes both deafness and blindness), however, Fischer began an unlikely journey toward reclaiming her heritage. She and Cathryn Carroll tell the story of her heroic struggle and cultural odyssey in Orchid of the Bayou: A Deaf Woman Faces Blindness.

“By this time Mama knew I was ‘not right,’” Fischer says of her early childhood. “She knew the real words for ‘not right,’ too, though she never said those words. I was deaf and dumb.” Initially Fischer’s parents turned to folk healers to try and “cure” their daughter’s deafness, but an aunt’s fortunate discovery of the Louisiana School for the Deaf would rescue Fischer from misunderstanding and introduce her to sign language and Deaf culture. She weathered the school’'s experiments with oralism and soon rose to the top of her class, ultimately leaving Louisiana for the academic promise of Gallaudet.

While in college, Fischer met and married her future husband, Lance, a Jewish Deaf man from Brooklyn, New York, and each landed jobs close to their alma mater. After the birth of their first child, however, Fischer could no longer ignore her increasing tunnel vision. Doctors quickly confirmed that Fischer had Usher syndrome.

While Fischer struggled to come to terms with her condition, the high incidence of Usher syndrome among Cajun people led her to re-examine her cultural roots. “Could I still be me, Catherine Hoffpauir Fischer, had I not been born of a mix that codes for Usher syndrome?” she asks. “To some extent, the history of my people explains the constitution of my genes and the way my life has unfolded.” Today Fischer prospers, enjoying her time with family and friends and celebrating the Deaf, Cajun, Blind, and Jewish cultures that populate her life. Her lively story will resonate with anyone who recognizes the arduous journey toward claiming an identity.

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Overcoming Hearing Aid Fears: The Road to Better Hearing
Burkey, John M.
Rutgers University Press, 2003
Library of Congress RF300.B87 2003 | Dewey Decimal 617.89

Named one of the Best Consumer Health Books by the Library Journal 2003

There are dozens of misconceptions about hearing aids:

  • “They make you look old.”
  •  “They cause ear infections.”
  • “They increase hearing loss.”
  • “I can’t afford one.” 
This misinformation impairs a person’s quality of life by discouraging them from pursuing help. Technological advances have enabled hearing aids to address a greater range of hearing losses, while making them smaller, better designed, and easier to use than those of the past. More people than ever can benefit from a hearing aid, yet of the nearly thirty million people with a hearing impairment, only about 20 percent choose to use one.

In Overcoming Hearing Aid Fears, audiologist John M. Burkey addresses common fears, concerns, and misconceptions about hearing aids to help readers decide whether these devices will prove useful. Using an informal, anecdotal style informed by years of clinical practice, Burkey provides practical information about hearing aid styles, options, and costs. His expertise and experience in caring for more than 50,000 patients will help people with hearing loss address their personal concerns. The book also helps friends and family understand why a loved one might resist getting a hearing aid, and offers tips on counseling. Audiologists will find this text an important educational tool in advising their own patients.

Approximately 10 percent of Americans (and nearly one-third of people age seventy and older) have some degree of hearing loss that, if left untreated, causes frustration, isolation, and depression. A hearing aid is a simple tool to improve careers, relationships, and self-esteem, and to provide independence and security. Overcoming Hearing Aid Fears can help readers take that first step to a better life.
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Owning and Managing Forests: A Guide to Legal, Financial, and Practical Matters
Thom J. McEvoy; Foreword by Carl Reidel
Island Press, 2006
Library of Congress KF1750.Z9M39 2005 | Dewey Decimal 343.7307649

Owning and Managing Forests is both an accessible overview of the privileges, rights, and obligations that accompany forest ownership and a guidebook to help active forest owners and managers use laws to their advantage and avoid the pitfalls of expensive and exhausting litigation. The book is a revised, expanded, and updated edition of Legal Aspects of Owning and Managing Woodlands, published in 1998 by Island Press and named Best Forestry Book of the Year by the National Woodland Owners Association.
This edition provides current information on recent changes in property, environmental, and tax laws, while also discussing new directions in forest management. It offers expanded treatment of topics including private property, searching property records, easements, estate planning, timber sale contracts, working with forestry professionals, and how to pass woodlands intact to future generations. The book also describes the many different facets of trusts, changes in forestland taxation methods, and new licensing and certification options. Included, too, is a section on avoiding disputes and how to use alternative dispute resolution methods to avoid costly, troubling, and time-consuming court battles.
Owning and Managing Forests provides clear and concise descriptions of often confusing concepts and difficult subjects, and addresses issues in a competent yet conversational tone. Anyone involved with owning or managing forestland will find the book an essential guide and reference.
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A Palette of Particles
Jeremy Bernstein
Harvard University Press, 2013
Library of Congress QC793.26.B47 2013 | Dewey Decimal 539.72

Jeremy Bernstein guides readers through high-energy physics from early twentieth-century atomic models to leptons, mesons, quarks, and the newly discovered Higgs boson, drawing them into the excitement of a universe where 80 percent of all matter has never been identified. From molecules to galaxies, the more we discover, the less we seem to know.
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Parkinson's Disease and the Family
Nutan Sharma
Harvard University Press, 2005
Library of Congress RC382.S48 2005 | Dewey Decimal 616.833

Too often, with Parkinson's disease, a loved one serves as medical interpreter, patient advocate, and caregiver. Sharma and Richman draw on the latest research and clinical practice techniques to offer valuable suggestions for managing patient care and, perhaps more important, for healing the family unit.
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Planet of Microbes: The Perils and Potential of Earth's Essential Life Forms
Ted Anton
University of Chicago Press, 2017
Library of Congress QR56.A58 2018 | Dewey Decimal 579

We live in a time of unprecedented scientific knowledge about the origins of life on Earth. But if we want to grasp the big picture, we have to start small—very small. That’s because the real heroes of the story of life on Earth are microbes, the tiny living organisms we cannot see with the naked eye. Microbes were Earth’s first lifeforms, early anaerobic inhabitants that created the air we breathe. Today they live, invisible and seemingly invincible, in every corner of the planet, from Yellowstone’s scalding hot springs to Antarctic mountaintops to inside our very bodies—more than a hundred trillion of them. Don’t be alarmed though: many microbes are allies in achieving our—to say nothing of our planet’s—health.
           
In Planet of Microbes, Ted Anton takes readers through the most recent discoveries about microbes, revealing their unexpected potential to reshape the future of the planet. For years, we knew little about these invisible invaders, considering them as little more than our enemies in our fight against infectious disease. But the more we learn about microbes, the more it’s become clear that our very lives depend on them. They may also hold the answers to some of science’s most pressing problems, including how to combat a warming planet, clean up the environment, and help the body fight off a wide variety of diseases. Anton has spent years interviewing and working with the determined scientists who hope to harness the work of microbes, and he breaks down the science while also sharing incredible behind-the-scenes stories of the research taking place everywhere from microbreweries to Mars.
           
The world’s tiniest organisms were here more than three billion years before us. We live in their world, and Planet of Microbes at last gives these unsung heroes the recognition they deserve.
 
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Practical Botany for Gardeners: Over 3,000 Botanical Terms Explained and Explored
Geoff Hodge
University of Chicago Press, 2013
Library of Congress QK50.H63 2013 | Dewey Decimal 580

Gardening can be frustratingly shrouded in secrecy. Fickle plants make seemingly spontaneous decisions to bloom or bust, seeds sprout magically in the blink of an eye, and deep-rooted mysteries unfold underground and out of sight. Understanding basic botany is like unlocking a horticultural code; fortunately learning a little science can reveal the secrets of the botanical universe and shed some light on what’s really going on in your garden.

Practical Botany for Gardeners provides an elegant and accessible introduction to the world of botany. It presents the essentials that every gardener needs to know, connecting explanations of scientific facts with useful gardening tips. Flip to the roots section and you’ll not only learn how different types of roots support a plant but also find that adding fungi to soil aids growth. The pruning section both defines “lateral buds” and explains how far back on a shoot to cut in order to propagate them.

The book breaks down key areas and terminology with easy-to-navigate chapters arranged by theme, such as plant types, plant parts, inner workings, and external factors. “Great Botanists” and “Botany in Action” boxes delve deeper into the fascinating byways of plant science. This multifaceted book also includes two hundred botanical illustrations and basic diagrams that hearken to the classic roots of botany.

Part handbook, part reference, Practical Botany for Gardeners is a beautifully captivating read. It’s a must for garden lovers and backyard botanists who want to grow and nurture their own plant knowledge.
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The Practical Guide to Michigan Law
Fred S. Steingold
University of Michigan Press, 1983
Library of Congress KFM4281.S73 1983 | Dewey Decimal 349.774

Prostate Cancer: Making Survival Decisions
Sylvan Meyer and Seymour C. Nash, M.D., F.A.C.S.
University of Chicago Press, 1994
Library of Congress RC280.P7M49 1994 | Dewey Decimal 616.99463

Written by a surviving prostate cancer patient and his urologist, Prostate Cancer: Making Survival Decisions provides not just a physician's overview of the disease, but the compassion, understanding, and frankness of a man who's lived through the experience. From the first symptoms to early diagnosis to life after treatment, journalist Sylvan Meyer details every facet of the disease from the patient's point of view. Along with a clear, complete guide to the latest treatments, techniques, and findings, Meyer outlines the tough decisions the patient will face; describes what it's like to go through all the tests, the treatment, and the recovery; and provides an understanding of how the patient himself can affect the outcome.

Thoroughly researched and imbued with great sensitivity, Prostate Cancer: Making Survival Decisions is the most informative and illuminating book about prostate cancer available. Not just an indispensable tool for those who have been diagnosed or are at risk, this is an important guide for anyone who seeks a better understanding of this enigmatic disease and the controversies surrounding it.
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Randomness
Deborah J. Bennett
Harvard University Press, 1998
Library of Congress QA273.15.B46 1998 | Dewey Decimal 519.2

From the ancients’ first readings of the innards of birds to your neighbor’s last bout with the state lottery, humankind has put itself into the hands of chance. Today life itself may be at stake when probability comes into play—in the chance of a false negative in a medical test, in the reliability of DNA findings as legal evidence, or in the likelihood of passing on a deadly congenital disease—yet as few people as ever understand the odds. This book is aimed at the trouble with trying to learn about probability. A story of the misconceptions and difficulties civilization overcame in progressing toward probabilistic thinking, Randomness is also a skillful account of what makes the science of probability so daunting in our own day. To acquire a (correct) intuition of chance is not easy to begin with, and moving from an intuitive sense to a formal notion of probability presents further problems. Author Deborah Bennett traces the path this process takes in an individual trying to come to grips with concepts of uncertainty and fairness, and also charts the parallel path by which societies have developed ideas about chance. Why, from ancient to modern times, have people resorted to chance in making decisions? Is a decision made by random choice “fair”? What role has gambling played in our understanding of chance? Why do some individuals and societies refuse to accept randomness at all? If understanding randomness is so important to probabilistic thinking, why do the experts disagree about what it really is? And why are our intuitions about chance almost always dead wrong? Anyone who has puzzled over a probability conundrum is struck by the paradoxes and counterintuitive results that occur at a relatively simple level. Why this should be, and how it has been the case through the ages, for bumblers and brilliant mathematicians alike, is the entertaining and enlightening lesson of Randomness.
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RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTAR: In Search of the Soul of the Sea
Philip Hoare
University of Chicago Press, 2018
Library of Congress GC21.H5829 2018 | Dewey Decimal 304.209162

“Every day is an anxiety in my ways of getting to the water. . . . I’ve become so attuned to it, so scared of it, so in love with it that sometimes I can only think by the sea. It is the only place I feel at home.”
 
Many of us visit the sea. Admire it. Even profess to love it. But very few of us live it. Philip Hoare does. He swims in the sea every day, either off the coast of his native Southampton or his adopted Cape Cod. He watches its daily and seasonal changes. He collects and communes with the wrack—both dead and never living—that it throws up on the shingle. He thinks with, at, through the sea.
 
All of which should prepare readers: RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTAR is no ordinary book. It mounts no straight-ahead argument. It hews to no single genre. Instead, like the sea itself, it moves, flows, absorbs, transforms. In its pages we find passages of beautiful nature and travel writing, lyrical memoir, seams of American and English history and much more. We find Thoreau and Melville, Bowie and Byron, John Waters and Virginia Woolf, all linked through a certain refusal to be contained, to be strictly defined—an openness to discovery and change. Running throughout is an air of elegy, a reminder that the sea is an ending, a repository of lost ships, lost people, lost ways of being. It is where we came from; for Hoare, it is where he is going.
 
“Every swim is a little death,” Hoare writes, “but it is also a reminder that you are alive.” Few books have ever made that knife’s edge so palpable. Read RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTAR. Let it settle into the seabed of your soul. You’ll never forget it.
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Scorpion
Louise M. Pryke
Reaktion Books, 2016
Library of Congress QL458.7.P79 2016 | Dewey Decimal 595.46

No creature has quite the sting in our mythology and folklore as the scorpion. From the dawn of human civilization they have been a dangerous figure in our imaginations—poisonous, precise, and deadly quiet—but as Louise M. Pryke shows in this book, their bad reputation has overshadowed many exceptional qualities. Scurrying across hundreds of millions of years and across every continent except Antarctica, this book gives the scorpion its due as one of nature’s longest lasting survivors.
           
Indeed scorpions are older than dinosaurs. An ancient arthropod, their form—notable for its pair of pincers and an elegant tail that holds a menacing stinger high in the air in a permanent striking position—hasn’t changed since prehistoric times, though today there are some 1700 different species. Throughout our existence scorpions have served as a powerful cultural and religious symbol—sometimes dangerous, sometimes protecting—from the Egyptian goddess Serket to Zodiac astrology to folk medicine. A fascinating tour that takes us from the art of North Africa to the American Civil War to the markets of Beijing, Scorpion is an homage to one of earth’s oldest residents. 
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Seeds: A Natural History
Carolyn Fry
University of Chicago Press, 2016
Library of Congress QK661.F79 2016 | Dewey Decimal 581.467

From the magnificence of a towering redwood to the simple elegance of a tiny dandelion, seed-bearing plants abound on planet Earth. The sheer diversity of plants thriving today is largely thanks to the evolution of the seed, as this made plants resilient to environmental changes by enabling them to await optimum conditions for growth before springing to life. In a time of declining biodiversity, studying seeds is now helping scientists preserve this plant diversity for future generations.

With Seeds, Carolyn Fry offers a celebration of these vital but unassuming packages of life. She begins with a sweeping tour through human history, designed to help us understand why we should appreciate and respect these floral parcels. Wheat, corn, and rice, she reminds us, supply the foundations of meals eaten by people around the world. Countless medicines, oils, clothing materials, and building supplies are available only because of the versatility and variety of seed-bearing plants. Fry then provides a comprehensive history of the evolution of seeds, explaining the myriad ways that they have adapted, survived, and thrived across the globe. Delving deeper into the science of seeds, she reveals the fascinating processes of dormancy, reproduction, germination, and dispersal, and showcases the estimable work conservationists are doing today to gather and bank seeds in order to prevent species from going extinct.

Enriched by a stunning array of full-color images, Seeds offers a comprehensive exploration of some of the most enduring and essential players in the natural world.
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Six Modern Plagues and How We Are Causing Them
Mark Jerome Walters
Island Press, 2003
Library of Congress RA653.W34 2003 | Dewey Decimal 614.4

West Nile Virus -- Mad Cow Disease -- HIV/AIDS -- Hantavirus -- Lyme Disease ... and a new strain of Salmonella. Such modern epidemics have emerged over the past few decades as mysterious, yet significant risks to human health. These "plagues" are forcing us to modify our lifestyles in ways that minimize our chances of becoming a statistic in the latest tally of the afflicted. In Six Modern Plagues, Mark Jerome Walters offers us the first book for the general reader that connects these emerging health risks and their ecological origins. Drawing on new research, interviews, and his own investigations, Mark Jerome Walters weaves together a compelling argument: that changes humans have made to the environment, from warming the climate to clearing the forests, have contributed to, if not caused a rising tide of diseases that are afflicting humans and many other species. According to Mark Jerome Walters, humans are not always innocent bystanders to infectious disease. To the contrary, in the case of many modern epidemics, we are the instigators. Six Modern Plagues, a ground-breaking introduction to the connection between disease and environmental degradation should be read by all those interested in their health and the health of others.
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Spinal Cord Injury and the Family: A New Guide
Michelle J. ALPERT
Harvard University Press, 2008
Library of Congress RD594.3.A47 2008 | Dewey Decimal 617.482044

Combining clinical experience with patients’ own stories, the authors cover the causes of and prognosis for SCI through case studies, review common courses of rehabilitation, and answer the “what now?” questions—from daily routines to larger issues concerning sex, education and employment, childbearing, and parenting with SCI.
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Sublime Dreams of Living Machines
Minsoo Kang
Harvard University Press, 2010
Library of Congress TJ211.15.K36 2010 | Dewey Decimal 629.892094

Kang’s central contention is that the automaton, a machine that can move by itself (better known today as the robot), is one of the essential ideas with which people in the West have pondered the very nature of humanity itself. In Kang’s telling, automata are mirrors of the ideas, fears, and anxieties of a given era, in that attitudes towards the machines have always been indicative of a moment’s zeitgeist. The book is historically sweeping, but not comprehensive; the focus is on what Kang takes to be key changes in the representations of and responses to automata. His main interest is on how Europeans in different periods of the past thought about the very notion of a self-moving machine that acted as if it were alive and how they used it for various symbolic and intellectual purposes.
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The Thinking Person's Guide to Climate Change: Second Edition
Robert Henson
American Meteorological Society, 2019
Library of Congress QC903.H4835 2019 | Dewey Decimal 363.73874

Everybody can be a thinking person when it comes to climate change, and this book is a perfect roadmap.  Start a web search for “climate change” and the first three suggestions are “facts,” “news,” and “hoax.” The Thinking Person's Guide to Climate Change is rooted in the first, up to date on the second, and anything but the last. Produced by one of the most venerable atmospheric science organizations, it is a must-read for anyone looking for the full story on climate change.

Using global research and written with nonscientists in mind, the Guide breaks down the issues into straightforward categories: “Symptoms” covers signs such as melting ice and extreme weather, while “Science” lays out what we know and how we figured it out. “Debates” tackles the controversy and politics, while “Solutions” and “Actions” discuss what we can do as individuals and communities to create the best possible future. Full-color illustrations offer explanations of everything from how the greenhouse effect traps heat to which activities in everyday life emit the most carbon. Special-feature boxes zoom in on locations across the globe already experiencing the effects of a shifting climate.

The new edition of The Thinking Person's Guide to Climate Change has been thoroughly updated, including content on new global record highs, new research across the spectrum, and the Paris Agreement to cut greenhouse gases. This reference provides the most comprehensive, yet accessible, overview of where climate science stands today, acknowledging controversies but standing strong in its stance that the climate is changing—and something needs to be done.
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Treating the Brain: What the Best Doctors Know
Walter G. Bradley DM FRCP
Dana Press, 2009
Library of Congress RC346.B65 2009 | Dewey Decimal 616.8

Even in this information age, it is a daunting task to find clear, concise, and credible sources for essential medical facts. And for those dealing with the symptoms of often serious neurological disorders, finding trustworthy and straightforward information is gravely important.

Treating the Brain is precisely what has been missing for non-specialists. Focusing on the most common neurological conditions, it provides accurate, reliable information to patients, caregivers, and health practitioners from the neurologist whose professional text informs neurologists worldwide.. Walter G. Bradley, one of the nation’s foremost neurologists and the editor of the leading neurology textbook Neurology in Clinical Practice, navigates the complexities of the brain in highly accessible language. Treating the Brain is the definitive resource for patients, offering a coherent and up-to-date understanding of what physicians know about the brain. In the United States alone, one-quarter of all new consultations between patients and their family physician is a result of a neurological problem. Using case histories as examples, Treating the Brain explains the neurological examinations and tests and clinical features, causes, and treatments available for Alzheimer’s disease, migraines, stroke, epilepsy, Parkinson’s and other frequently diagnosed neurological disorders.

For anyone who has ever had a neurological symptom, from a headache to tingling hands, and for anyone with a personal interest in how the brain works in health and disease, Treating the Brain will prove to be a valuable, easy-to-read source of a wide-range of information.

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Under the Mask: A Guide to Feeling Secure and Comfortable During Anesthesia and Surgery
Cottrell, James M.D.
Rutgers University Press, 2001
Library of Congress RD81.C72 2001 | Dewey Decimal 617.96

Every year, about forty million Americans require surgery. Few truly understand what happens to them during the procedure-especially what the anesthesiologist does to ensure their survival and well being. An anesthesiologist disarms your entire nervous system with the most effective drugs for your body chemistry; keeps you alive while you're subjected to manipulations that would otherwise kill you; and ensures your safe return to consciousness. Yet despite their crucial role, anesthesiologists are often the unseen doctors. Under the Mask, written by a compassionate practitioner, demystifies the surgical process with detailed information that will make you a better-informed consumer.

Part One describes the development and current scope of anesthesiology, the medications and techniques used, and what the anesthesiologist does both in and outside the operating room. It explains your-the patient's- rights and advises you how to use the preoperative consultation with the anesthesiologist to your best advantage, specifying what information you need provide and what questions you should ask.

Part Two details the most common surgical and diagnostic procedures requiring anesthesia or conscious sedation. Using clear language, it explains each procedure, the possible risks, and the choices to make if there is more than one option. It also covers the anesthesiologist's crucial role in controlling pain caused by chronic conditions. The last chapter describes the newest anesthetic and pain control techniques available.

The author also helps you understand anesthesiology within the managed care system and explains what you can expect and what to do if you aren't getting what you need. This book enables you to make informed decisions regarding surgical anesthesia and subsequent pain control within the managed care system to protect your well-being and hasten your recovery.
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A User’s Guide to Bypass Surgery
Ted Klein
Ohio University Press, 1996
Library of Congress RD598.35.C67K54 1996 | Dewey Decimal 617.412

What Every Senior Needs To..
J Nora
University Press of Colorado, 2004
Library of Congress RA564.8.N67 2004 | Dewey Decimal 362.1989700973

At a time when astonishing medical advances appear in the media almost daily, access to even the most routine health care and satisfactory doctor-patient relationships is becoming increasingly difficult to find. Moreover, the rapidly growing population of
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Why Don't Jumbo Jets Flap Their Wings?: Flying Animals, Flying Machines, and How They Are Different
Alexander, David
Rutgers University Press, 2009
Library of Congress TL546.7.A44 2009 | Dewey Decimal 629.13

What do a bumble bee and a 747 jet have in common? It’s not a trick question. The fact is they have quite a lot in common. They both have wings. They both fly. And they’re both ideally suited to it. They just do it differently.

Why Don’t Jumbo Jets Flap Their Wings? offers a fascinating explanation of how nature and human engineers each arrived at powered flight. What emerges is a highly readable account of two very different approaches to solving the same fundamental problems of moving through the air, including lift, thrust, turning, and landing. The book traces the slow and deliberate evolutionary process of animal flight—in birds, bats, and insects—over millions of years and compares it to the directed efforts of human beings to create the aircraft over the course of a single century.

Among the many questions the book answers:
  • Why are wings necessary for flight?
  • How do different wings fly differently?
  • When did flight evolve in animals?
  • What vision, knowledge, and technology was needed before humans could learn to fly?
  • Why are animals and aircrafts perfectly suited to the kind of flying they do?

David E. Alexander first describes the basic properties of wings before launching into the diverse challenges of flight and the concepts of flight aerodynamics and control to present an integrated view that shows both why birds have historically had little influence on aeronautical engineering and exciting new areas of technology where engineers are successfully borrowing ideas from animals.
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A Woman's Concise Guide to Common Medical Tests
Moore, M.D., Michele C
Rutgers University Press, 2005
Library of Congress RC71.3.M665 2005 | Dewey Decimal 618.1075

Every year, millions of healthy women undergo a variety of screening tests without understanding why or the meaning of the outcome. If you are among those women, overwhelmed by information and baffled by results, this is the book you've been waiting for. In straightforward, personable prose, A Woman's Concise Guide to Common Medical Tests surveys a wide variety of standard tests commonly suggested by doctors.

Using the recommendations of the U.S. Preventative Health Services Task Force as a starting point, physicians Michele C. Moore and Caroline M. de Costa describe and explain screening tests for STDs and other communicable diseases, diabetes, thyroid disease, bone loss, various genetic tests, pregnancy, and cancer (including breast, colon, and skin). A section on common blood tests demystifies the numerical results that can be virtually impossible to interpret for women outside the medical profession. The authors detail what is considered "normal" as well as what's not-to help women make sense of their results.

As practicing physicians, both authors have fielded patients' questions about standard screening tests and understand what women should know but often feel afraid to ask about. For each test, there is an explanation of why it may be ordered, how it is done, what sort of preparation may be involved, and what risks may be incurred.

As the health-care industry continues to evolve, the amount of medical information available to women about their health can be overwhelming and confusing. Without being encyclopedic or intimidating, A Woman's Concise Guide to Common Medical Tests offers all the facts you need about screening tests, all in one place.

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You and the Law in New Jersey: A Resource Guide
Holness, Leighton A.
Rutgers University Press, 1998
Library of Congress KFN1881.M55 1998 | Dewey Decimal 349.749

What are your rights if you are fired from your job? What should you do if you are a crime victim or witness? How can you fight a child custody battle? What can you do if your landlord refuses to provide you with heat in the winter?

You and the Law in New Jersey, newly updated, is the ideal guidebook to assist readers in understanding the law, their rights, and how to get legal help. In clear, straightforward language, the book describes how law is made, how to do legal research, how the state and federal court systems work, how to get help if you can't afford a lawyer, how to hire a lawyer, and what to do if you are sued. The second edition contains much new information, including a chapter on credit, debt, and banking, and others on the rights of senior citizens, veterans, and people with disabilities. The authors have also expanded their information on the rights of renters, homeowners, and consumers of public utilities, as well as their treatment of employment law. They have rewritten chapters on health and public benefits to address the recent sweeping reforms of federal and state law. Other topics include family matters such as marriage, divorce, adoption, and domestic violence; the landlord-tenant relationship and buying a home; consumer rights; the criminal justice system; and citizen involvement in environmental law.

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You've Got Some Explaining To Do: Advice for Neuroscientists Writing for Lay Readers
Jane Nevins
Dana Press, 2014
Library of Congress MLCS 2018/49745 (R)

What are people who read opinion-page articles looking for? How can you reach people who read general-interest magazines? Hint: It's not the same as your colleagues or science journals.

This compact book offers the reasons and information that can help scientific writers adopt new habits to be successful and happy writing for a non-science audience. Go ahead and write journal-style for science journals and colleagues, says longtime science editor Jane Nevins, but you'll need to try different styles to reach a different audience.

The book is divided into three parts: The Meet-up, Simple Fixes, and Science and Style. In The Meet-up, Nevins describes the different venues for lay writing, from opinion pages to popular magazines, and what readers of each expect and respond to best.  In Simple Fixes, she shows how jargon, "cross-over words," and hackneyed expressions can be remedied, clearing away confusion for your readers. In Science and Style, she discusses what to put first, how to quote and paraphrase in lay copy, and what to leave out.

Throughout You've Got Some Explaining to Do, Nevins gives concrete, specific examples tied to neuroscience.  The author, who served as the first editor in chief of the Dana Press, brings more than 20 years of experience in translating neuroscience to lay readers. 

"No one is better at helping one learn to write for the non-professional public, as I can personally testify, than Jane Nevins."-Nobel laureate Eric R. Kandel, M.D., Director, Kavli Institute for Brain Science, Columbia University College of Physicians and Scientists.

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83 books about Popular works
101 Quantum Questions
Kenneth William Ford
Harvard University Press, 2011
This reader-friendly, richly illustrated book provides an engaging overview of quantum physics, from “big ideas” like probability and uncertainty and conservation laws to the behavior of quarks and photons and neutrinos, and on to explanations of how a laser works and why black holes evaporate.
[more]

99% Ape
How Evolution Adds Up
Edited by Jonathan Silvertown
University of Chicago Press, 2009

In his lifetime, Charles Darwin was roundly mocked for suggesting that humans were descended from apes, and even in our own day, the teaching of evolution remains controversial. But in the century and a half since the publication of On the Origin of Species, our increasingly sophisticated understanding of genetics has borne out Darwin’s theory: humans share 99% of their genes with chimps (and many even with grapes!).

            99% Ape offers an accessible, straightforward introduction to evolution, beginning with Darwin’s discoveries and continuing through the latest genetic discoveries. Edited by Jonathan Silvertown, the volume brings together experts in a variety of fields pertinent to evolution, from paleobiology to planetary science, comparative anatomy to zoology, and even—for a discussion of legal battles surrounding the teaching of evolution—law. Interwoven with these varied accounts of evolution and its impact are vignettes from Darwin’s life that illustrate the continuity of thought that links Darwin’s work to today’s cutting-edge research.

            Beautifully illustrated, 99% Ape is a perfect companion to the upcoming celebration of Darwin’s bicentennial and a bracing reminder of the important role evolution still has to play in our understanding of our origins—and our possible futures.

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The Accidental Mind
How Brain Evolution Has Given Us Love, Memory, Dreams, and God
David J. Linden
Harvard University Press, 2007
Linden sets the record straight about the construction of the human brain; rather than the “beautifully-engineered optimized device, the absolute pinnacle of design” portrayed in many dumbed-down text books, pop-science tomes, and education televisions programs, Linden’s organ is a complicated assembly of cobbled-together functionality that created the mind as a by-product of ad-hoc solutions to questions of survival. His guided tour of the glorious amalgam of “crummy parts” includes pit-stops in the histories and fundamentals of neurology, neural-psychology, physiology, molecular and cellular biology, and genetics.
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The AMS Weather Book
The Ultimate Guide to America's Weather
Jack Williams
University of Chicago Press, 2009

America has some of the most varied and dynamic weather in the world. Every year, the Gulf Coast is battered by hurricanes, the Great Plains are ravaged by tornados, the Midwest is pummeled by blizzards, and the temperature in the Southwest reaches a sweltering 120 degrees. Extreme weather can be a matter of life and death, but even when it is pleasant—72 degrees and sunny—weather is still central to the lives of all Americans. Indeed, it’s hard to imagine a topic of greater collective interest. Whether we want to know if we should close the storm shutters or just carry an umbrella to work, we turn to forecasts. But few of us really understand the science behind them.

All that changes with The AMS Weather Book. The most comprehensive and up-to-date guide to our weather and our atmosphere, it is the ultimate resource for anyone who wants to understand how hurricanes form, why tornados twirl, or even why the sky is cerulean blue. Written by esteemed science journalist and former USA Today weather editor Jack Williams, The AMS Weather Book, copublished with the American Meteorological Society, covers everything from daily weather patterns, air pollution, and global warming to the stories of people coping with severe weather and those who devote their lives to understanding the atmosphere, oceans, and climate. Words alone, of course, are not adequate to explain many meteorological concepts, so The AMS Weather Book is filled with engaging full-color graphics that explain such concepts as why winds blow in a particular direction, how Doppler weather radar works, what happens inside hurricanes, how clouds create wind and snow, and what’s really affecting the earth’s climate.

For Weather Channel junkies, amateur meteorologists, and storm chasers alike, The AMS Weather Book is an invaluable tool for anyone who wants to better understand how weather works and how it affects our lives.

[more]

Beasts of the Earth
Animals, Humans, and Disease
Torrey, E. Fuller
Rutgers University Press, 2014

Humans have lived in close proximity to other animals for thousands of years. Recent scientific studies have even shown that the presence of animals has a positive effect on our physical and mental health. People with pets typically have lower blood pressure, show fewer symptoms of depression, and tend to get more exercise.

But there is a darker side to the relationship between animals and humans. Animals are carriers of harmful infectious agents and the source of a myriad of human diseases. In recent years, the emergence of high-profile illnesses such as AIDS, SARS, West Nile virus, and bird flu has drawn much public attention, but as E. Fuller Torrey and Robert H. Yolken reveal, the transfer of deadly microbes from animals to humans is neither a new nor an easily avoided problem.

Beginning with the domestication of farm animals nearly 10,000 years ago, Beasts of the Earth traces the ways that human-animal contact has evolved over time. Today, shared living quarters, overlapping ecosystems, and experimental surgical practices where organs or tissues are transplanted from non-humans into humans continue to open new avenues for the transmission of infectious agents. Other changes in human behavior like increased air travel, automated food processing, and threats of bioterrorism are increasing the contagion factor by transporting microbes further distances and to larger populations in virtually no time at all.

While the authors urge that a better understanding of past diseases may help us lessen the severity of some illnesses, they also warn that, given our increasingly crowded planet, it is not a question of if but when and how often animal-transmitted diseases will pose serious challenges to human health in the future.

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The Best of Technology Writing 2008
Clive Thompson, Editor
University of Michigan Press, 2008

"No one covers technology with more insight or panache than Clive Thompson. I can't imagine anyone better qualified to curate this fascinating series."
---Chris Anderson, editor in chief of Wired magazine and author of The Long Tail

"Editor Clive Thompson suggests we are in a ‘golden age of technology journalism.' Reading this collection, one suspects he is right---it sparkles with beautifully written narratives not only about what technology can do for us but what it does to us as people, to our ways of thinking about ourselves, our relationships, and how we envisage our world."
---Sherry Turkle, Director, MIT Initiative on Technology and Self, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Best of Technology Writing 2008 proves that technology writing is a bona fide literary genre with some of the most stylish, compelling, and just plain readable work in journalism today.

The third volume in this annual series, The Best of Technology Writing 2008 covers a fascinating mix of topics---from a molecular gastronomist's recipe for the perfect gin and tonic; to "the Mechanism," an ancient Greek artifact that might be the world's first laptop computer; to social media, privacy, and what is possibly the biggest generation gap since rock 'n' roll.

Featuring contributions from

  • Ted Allen
  • Michael Behar
  • Caleb Crain
  • Julian Dibbell
  • Cory Doctorow
  • David Glenn
  • Thomas Goetz
  • Charles Graeber
  • Alex Hutchinson
  • Walter Kirn
  • Robin Mejia
  • Emily Nussbaum
  • Ben Paynter
  • Jeffrey Rosen
  • John Seabrook
  • Cass R. Sunstein

digitalculturebooks is an imprint of the University of Michigan Press and the Scholarly Publishing Office of the University of Michigan Library dedicated to publishing innovative and accessible work exploring new media and their impact on society, culture, and scholarly communication. Visit the website at www.digitalculture.org.

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Beyond the Zonules of Zinn
David Bainbridge
Harvard University Press, 2008
In his latest book, Bainbridge combines an otherworldly journey through the central nervous system with an accessible and entertaining account of how the brain's anatomy has often misled anatomists about its function. Bainbridge uses the structure of the brain to set his book apart from the many volumes that focus on brain function.
[more]

Beyond Weird
Why Everything You Thought You Knew about Quantum Physics Is Different
Philip Ball
University of Chicago Press, 2018
“Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it.”

Since Niels Bohr said this many years ago, quantum mechanics has only been getting more shocking. We now realize that it’s not really telling us that “weird” things happen out of sight, on the tiniest level, in the atomic world: rather, everything is quantum. But if quantum mechanics is correct, what seems obvious and right in our everyday world is built on foundations that don’t seem obvious or right at all—or even possible.

An exhilarating tour of the contemporary quantum landscape, Beyond Weird is a book about what quantum physics really means—and what it doesn’t. Science writer Philip Ball offers an up-to-date, accessible account of the quest to come to grips with the most fundamental theory of physical reality, and to explain how its counterintuitive principles underpin the world we experience. Over the past decade it has become clear that quantum physics is less a theory about particles and waves, uncertainty and fuzziness, than a theory about information and knowledge—about what can be known, and how we can know it.  Discoveries and experiments over the past few decades have called into question the meanings and limits of space and time, cause and effect, and, ultimately, of knowledge itself. The quantum world Ball shows us isn’t a different world. It is our world, and if anything deserves to be called “weird,” it’s us.
[more]

Birthing a Better Way
12 Secrets for Natural Childbirth
Kalena Cook
University of North Texas Press, 2010

Breast Cancer Recurrence and Advanced Disease
Comprehensive Expert Guidance
Barbara L. Gordon, Heather S. Shaw, David J. Kroll, and Brooke R. Daniel
Duke University Press, 2010
At age 42, Barbara L. Gordon was diagnosed with Stage II breast cancer. Two years later, it appeared that the cancer had metastasized. Along with her oncologist and other experts, Gordon has written the book that she wished she had as she faced late-stage breast cancer and the prospect of dying from the disease. Filled with information and advice, and designed to enable informed decisions and improved quality of life, this comprehensive guide gathers in one place authoritative medical information about recurrence and late-stage breast cancer, and it addresses the practical, emotional, spiritual, and interpersonal aspects of dying and death.

This indispensable book aids those diagnosed with recurrent or late-stage breast cancer, those wanting to reduce the chance of a recurrence, and those with other types of late-stage cancer. It is also a valuable resource for healthcare professionals, friends, and family members.

Topics covered include

• Types of recurrence, their symptoms, and ways of minimizing the chance of a recurrence
• Diagnostic tests, potential surgeries, and treatments to manage late-stage cancer
• Getting the best care, evaluating complementary therapies, and alleviating pain and depression
• Cessation of treatment and what one may experience as the disease progresses
• End-of-life issues including dealing with financial and legal matters, communicating with loved ones and hospice workers, and planning memorial services

Breast Cancer Recurrence and Advanced Disease includes a glossary of medical terms, appendices on nutrition and integrative health centers, and links to current Web sites addressing matters such as clinical trials, patients’ rights, and medical expenses.

[more]

Brilliant Green
The Surprising History and Science of Plant Intelligence
Stefano Mancuso and Alessandra Viola
Island Press, 2018
Are plants intelligent? Can they solve problems, communicate, and navigate their surroundings? Or are they passive, incapable of independent action or social behavior? Philosophers and scientists have pondered these questions since ancient Greece, most often concluding that plants are unthinking and inert: they are too silent, too sedentary -- just too different from us. Yet discoveries over the past fifty years have challenged these ideas, shedding new light on the extraordinary capabilities and complex interior lives of plants.

In Brilliant Green, Stefano Mancuso, a leading scientist and founder of the field of plant neurobiology, presents a new paradigm in our understanding of the vegetal world. Combining a historical perspective with the latest in plant science, Mancuso argues that, due to cultural prejudices and human arrogance, we continue to underestimate plants. In fact, they process information, sleep, remember, and signal to one another -- showing that, far from passive machines, plants are intelligent and aware. Through a survey of plant capabilities from sight and touch to communication, Mancuso challenges our notion of intelligence, presenting a vision of plant life that is more sophisticated than most imagine.

Plants have much to teach us, from network building to innovations in robotics and man-made materials -- but only if we understand more about how they live. Part botany lesson, part manifesto, Brilliant Green is an engaging and passionate examination of the inner workings of the plant kingdom.

Financial support for the translation of this book has been provided by SEPS: Segretariato Europeo Per Le Pubblicazioni Scientifiche.
[more]

Building a Better Nest
Living Lightly at Home and in the World
Evelyn Searle Hess
Oregon State University Press, 2015
For fifteen years, Evelyn Hess and her husband David lived in a tent and trailer, without electricity or running water, on twenty acres of wild land in the foothills of the Oregon Coast Range. When they decided to build a house – a real house at last – they knew it would have to respect the lessons of simple living that they learned in their camping life. They knew they could not do it alone. Building a Better Nest chronicles their adventures as they begin to construct a house of their own, seeking a model for sustainable living not just in their home, but beyond its walls.

What does it mean to build a better nest? Better for whom? Is it better for the individual or family? The planet? Green building and sustainable design are popular buzzwords, but to Hess, sustainable building is not a simple matter of buying and installing the latest recycled flooring products. It is also about cooperative work: working together in employment, in research, in activism, and in life. Hess is concerned with her local watershed, but also with the widening income gap, disappearing species, and peak resources. She actively works to reduce overconsumption and waste. For Hess, these problems are both philosophical and practical.

As Hess and her husband age, the questions of how to live responsibly arise with greater frequency and urgency. With unfailing wit and humor, she looks for answers in such places as neuroscience, Buddhism, and her ancestral legacy. Building a Better Nest will appeal to anyone with an interest in sustainable building, off-grid living, or alternative communities. The questions it asks about the way we live are earnest and important, from an author whose voice is steeped in wisdom and gratitude.
[more]

Chasing Molecules
Poisonous Products, Human Health, and the Promise of Green Chemistry
Elizabeth Grossman
Island Press, 2011
Each day, headlines warn that baby bottles are leaching dangerous chemicals, nonstick pans are causing infertility, and plastic containers are making us fat. What if green chemistry could change all that? What if rather than toxics, our economy ran on harmless, environmentally-friendly materials?
 
Elizabeth Grossman, an acclaimed journalist who brought national attention to the contaminants hidden in computers and other high tech electronics, now tackles the hazards of ordinary consumer products. She shows that for the sake of convenience, efficiency, and short-term safety, we have created synthetic chemicals that fundamentally change, at a molecular level, the way our bodies work. The consequences range from diabetes to cancer, reproductive and neurological disorders.
 
Yet it’s hard to imagine life without the creature comforts current materials provide—and Grossman argues we do not have to. A scientific revolution is introducing products that are “benign by design,” developing manufacturing processes that consider health impacts at every stage, and is creating new compounds that mimic rather than disrupt natural systems. Through interviews with leading researchers, Grossman gives us a first look at this radical transformation.
 
Green chemistry is just getting underway, but it offers hope that we can indeed create products that benefit health, the environment, and industry.
[more]

Child Support
The Next Frontier
J. Thomas Oldham and Marygold S. Melli, Editors
University of Michigan Press, 2000
There has been a revolution in child support law in the last half-century, fueled by escalating numbers of divorces and children born to unmarried parents. This collection of essays examines the state of child support policy at the close of the twentieth century and the end of an era of far-reaching reform of the child support system.
Reforms have moved the child support system from one of minimal effort, based on the assumption that children in single parent households would be supported by their custodial parents or by government welfare, to a formula-based system for calculating child support and an aggressive enforcement program to collect that support from the noncustodial parent.
The essays range from a review of child support history, with a focus on the changing mores of parental responsibility, to empirical studies of whether increased establishment of paternity and child support enforcement results in more father-child contacts, to how child support affects fathers and whether the support obligation impoverishes noncustodial fathers. The essays explore the failure of the current child support reforms to reduce child poverty, consider the need to study how to determine what is a "fair amount" of child support, and debate proposals to follow the example of a number of other industrialized nations and provide more generous public benefits for poor children.
This book will be of interest to public policy makers and professionals--lawyers, legal scholars, social workers, and administrators--who work in and study the child support system.
Contributors are June R. Carbone, John Eekelaar, Martha A. Fineman, Irwin Garfinkel, Marsha Garrison, Paul K. Legler, Mavis Maclean, Marygold S. Melli, Daniel R. Meyer, J. Thomas Oldham, Allen M. Parkman, Judith A. Seltzer, and Andrea Warman.
J. Thomas Oldham is John H. Freeman Professor Law, University of Houston Law School. Marygold S. Melli is Voss-Bascom Professor of Law Emerita, University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School.
[more]

Chronic Pain and the Family
Julie K. Silver
Harvard University Press, 2004
Chronic pain is the leading cause of disability in the United States, affecting as many as 48 million people in this country alone. It can demoralize and depress both patient and family, especially when there is no effective pain control and no hope for relief. Improperly managed, chronic pain can lead to substance abuse (usually painkillers) and to acute psychological and emotional distress. Pain begets stress and stress begets pain in a wretched downward spiral. Silver reviews the causes and characteristics of chronic pain and explores its impact on individual family relationships and on the extended family, covering such issues as employment, parenting, childbearing and inheritance, and emotional health. Silver treats aspects of chronic pain not covered in a typical office visit: how men and women differ in their experience of chronic pain, the effect of chronic pain on a toddler's behavior or an older child's performance in school, the risks of dependence on and addiction to pain medications, and practical ways for relatives beyond the immediate family circle to offer help and support to the person in pain.
[more]

Clean Water, 2nd ed
An Introduction to Water Quality and Water Pollution Control
Kenneth M. Vigil
Oregon State University Press, 2003
Clean Water is a book for anyone concerned about this precious resource who wants to become better informed. In straightforward language, Kenneth Vigil provides a comprehensive introduction to the many scientific, regulatory, cultural, and geographic issues associated with water quality and water pollution control.

Most other books on water quality and pollution control are highly technical and very specific, and are aimed at engineers, scientists, or attorneys. Clean Water, on the other hand, is a comprehensive discussion of the subject intended for a wider audience of science students, educators, and the general public.

Vigil avoids the use of technical jargon and uses many photos and diagrams to illustrate and explain concepts. He provides sufficient detail to educate readers about many broad topics and includes additional references at the end of each chapter for exploring specific topics in more detail.

Clean Water summarizes the basic fundamentals of water chemistry and microbiology and outlines important water quality rules and regulations, all in concise, understandable prose. It describes the basic scientific principles behind water pollution control and the broader approach of addressing water pollution problems through watershed management. There are sections on drinking water and on citizen involvement in water pollution control efforts at home and in the community.
[more]

The Complete Vegetarian
The Essential Guide to Good Health
Edited by Peggy Carlson M.D.
University of Illinois Press, 2007

Citing health concerns as the number one reason why people adopt a vegetarian diet, this collection makes important scientific connections between good health and vegetarianism. The Complete Vegetarian examines the diet’s impact on chronic diseases and serves as a nutritional guide and meal-planning resource. Leading vegetarian nutritionists and medical doctors devote entire chapters to nutritional aspects that include fats, protein, and fiber; to diseases such as diabetes, cancer, heart disease, and high blood pressure; and to vegetarian meal planning, including specialized diets for children, pregnant women, and athletes.

The contributors' cutting-edge research finds that it is not only an absence of meat that accounts for the health effects of a vegetarian diet; other contributing factors include less saturated fat and more fiber, antioxidants, and unsaturated fats than other diets. The Complete Vegetarian promises to be an essential resource for health professionals and the growing number of people who have adopted or are thinking about adopting a vegetarian lifestyle.

Contributors include John J. B. Anderson, Dina Aronson, Peggy Carlson, James Craner, Brenda Davis, Simon K. Emms, Jeanene Fogli, Suzanne Havala Hobbs, Michael A. Klaper, Erin L. Kraker, Valerie Kurtzhalts, D. Enette Larson-Meyer, Reed Mangels, Carol M. Meerschaert, Virginia Messina, Mary Helen Niemeyer, Carl V. Phillips, Sudha Raj, and Cheryl Sullivan.

[more]

Confounded Expectations
The Law's Struggle with Personal Responsibility
George W. Jarecke and Nancy K. Plant
Southern Illinois University Press, 2000

George W. Jarecke and Nancy K. Plant present a selection of cases across a broad spectrum of American law to demonstrate that our society relies inappropriately on the legal system to cure ills the system was not designed to address.

Jarecke and Plant note that while we in the United States worry considerably about the problem of individual assumption of responsibility—whether for personal mistakes, financial setbacks, or pure bad luck—we appear uneasy about the concept and unclear about what it means on a daily basis. Not only are we incapable of accepting personal responsibility; we barely know what it means to do so.

Mistakenly, we turn to the legal system to solve this dilemma. Yet our laws as our legislators write them, as judges interpret them, as lawyers argue them, and as juries apply them send mixed messages about whether and how we should exercise personal responsibility.

Each chapter of Confounded Expectations features one main case to explain one legal theory, with other cases noted as examples of facets of each theory. To demonstrate the law that requires merchants to guarantee the quality of their products, for example, Jarecke and Plant discuss the case of the band mothers whose fund-raising luncheon menu included turkey salad contaminated by salmonella.  Peripheral cases include a horse falsely sold as a gelding, a riding mower that tipped over when used as instructed, makeup that was guaranteed to be safe but caused a rash, and pigs sick with hog cholera.

[more]

Controversies in Science and Technology
From Maize to Menopause
Edited by Daniel Lee Kleinman, Abby J. Kinchy, and Jo Handelsman
University of Wisconsin Press, 2005
Written for general readers, teachers, journalists, and policymakers, this volume explores four controversial topics in science and technology, with commentaries from experts in such fields as sociology, religion, law, ethics, and politics:

* Antibiotics and Resistance: the science, the policy debates, and perspectives from a microbiologist, a veterinarian, and an M.D.

* Genetically Modified Maize and Gene Flow: the science of genetic modification, protecting genetic diversity, agricultural biotech vesus the environment, corporate patents versus farmers' rights

* Hormone Replacement Theory and Menopause: overview of the Women's Health Initiative, history of hormone replacement therapy, the medicalization of menopause, hormone replacement therapy and clinical trials

* Smallpox: historical and medical overview of smallpox, government policies for public health, the Emergency Health Powers Act, public resistance vs. cooperation.
[more]

Courting Justice
Ten New Jersey Cases That Shook the Nation
Tractenberg, Paul L
Rutgers University Press, 2013
Since 1947 a modernized New Jersey Supreme Court has played an important and controversial role in the state, nation, and world.  Its decisions in cutting-edge cases have confronted society’s toughest issues, reflecting changing social attitudes, modern life’s complexities, and new technologies.

Paul Tractenberg has selected ten of the court’s landmark decisions between 1960 and 2011 to illustrate its extensive involvement in major public issues, and to assess its impact. Each case chapter is authored by a distinguished academic or professional expert, several of whom were deeply involved in the cases’ litigation, enabling them to provide special insights. An overview chapter provides context for the court’s distinctive activity.

Many of the cases are so widely known that they have become part of the national conversation about law and policy. In the Karen Ann Quinlan decision, the court determined the right of privacy extends to refusing life-sustaining treatment. The Baby M case reined in surrogate parenting and focused on the child’s best interests. In the Mount Laurel decision, the court sought to increase affordable housing for low- and moderate-income residents throughout the state. The Megan’s Law case upheld legal regulation of sex offender community notification. A series of decisions known as Abbott/Robinson required the state to fund poor urban school districts at least on par with suburban districts.

Other less well known cases still have great public importance. Henningsen v. Bloomfield Motors reshaped product liability and tort law to protect consumers injured by defective cars; State v. Hunt shielded privacy rights from unwarranted searches beyond federal standards; Lehmann v. Toys ‘R’ Us protected employees from sexual harassment and a hostile work environment; Right to Choose v. Byrne expanded state constitutional abortion rights beyond the federal constitution; and Marini v. Ireland protected low-income tenants against removal from their homes.   

For some observers, the New Jersey Supreme Court represents the worst of judicial activism; others laud it for being, in its words, “the designated last-resort guarantor of the Constitution's command.” For Tractenberg, the court’s activism means it tends to find for the less powerful over the more powerful and for the public good against private interests, an approach he applauds.
[more]

Curiosity
How Science Became Interested in Everything
Philip Ball
University of Chicago Press, 2013
With the recent landing of the Mars rover Curiosity, it seems safe to assume that the idea of being curious is alive and well in modern science—that it’s not merely encouraged but is seen as an essential component of the scientific mission. Yet there was a time when curiosity was condemned. Neither Pandora nor Eve could resist the dangerous allure of unanswered questions, and all knowledge wasn’t equal—for millennia it was believed that there were some things we should not try to know. In the late sixteenth century this attitude began to change dramatically, and in Curiosity: How Science Became Interested in Everything, Philip Ball investigates how curiosity first became sanctioned—when it changed from a vice to a virtue and how it became permissible to ask any and every question about the world.
 
Looking closely at the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, Ball vividly brings to life the age when modern science began, a time that spans the lives of Galileo and Isaac Newton. In this entertaining and illuminating account of the rise of science as we know it, Ball tells of scientists both legendary and lesser known, from Copernicus and Kepler to Robert Boyle, as well as the inventions and technologies that were inspired by curiosity itself, such as the telescope and the microscope. The so-called Scientific Revolution is often told as a story of great geniuses illuminating the world with flashes of inspiration. But Curiosity reveals a more complex story, in which the liberation—and subsequent taming—of curiosity was linked to magic, religion, literature, travel, trade, and empire. Ball also asks what has become of curiosity today: how it functions in science, how it is spun and packaged for consumption, how well it is being sustained, and how the changing shape of science influences the kinds of questions it may continue to ask.
 
Though proverbial wisdom tell us that it was through curiosity that our innocence was lost, that has not deterred us. Instead, it has been completely the contrary: today we spend vast sums trying to reconstruct the first instants of creation in particle accelerators, out of a pure desire to know. Ball refuses to let us take this desire for granted, and this book is a perfect homage to such an inquisitive attitude.

[more]

The Dana Guide to Brain Health
A Practical Family Reference from Medical Experts
Edited by Floyd E. Bloom, M.D.; M. Flint Beal, M.D.; and, David J. Kupfer, M.D.
Dana Press, 2006

A child crashes to the ground from the monkey bars head-first. A high school student prepares for months to take the SAT. A grandmother slowly slips away from her family through the deadly progression of Alzheimer’s Disease. Whether we realize it or not, the importance of brain health to our daily lives goes far beyond just being able to walk and talk. The Dana Guide to Brain Health offers the first comprehensive home medical reference book on the brain, providing an unparalleled, authoritative guide to improving the fitness of our brains and, ultimately, enriching our lives.


With contributions from over one hundred of the most prominent scientists and clinicians in the United States, The Dana Guide to Brain Health is an extensive and wholly accessible manual on the workings of the human brain. This richly illustrated volume contains a wealth of facts and advice, on simple yet effective ways to take care of our brains; the intimate connection between brain health and body health; brain development from the prenatal period through adulthood; and how we learn, remember, and imagine.

The brain is far too important to be excluded any longer from our daily health concerns. The Dana Guide to Brain Health remedies this oversight with a clearly written, definitive map to our brains that reveals how we can take care of them in order to sustain a long and rich life.

[more]

The Deepening Shade
Psychological Aspects of Life-Threatening Illness
Barbara M. Sourkes
University of Pittsburgh Press, 1982
The Deepening Shade is an elegant synthesis of the psychology of life-threatening illness.  The book’s evocative power derives from the interweaving of clinical conceptualization with the words of patients and family members.  Rather than focusing on death, Sourkes explores <I>living</I> with a life-threatening illness.
[more]

The Demon in the Machine
How Hidden Webs of Information Are Solving the Mystery of Life
Paul Davies
University of Chicago Press, 1991
Physics World Book of the Year

A Financial Times, Sunday Times, and Telegraph Best Science Book of the Year


What is life? For generations, scientists have struggled to make sense of this fundamental question, for life really does look like magic: even a humble bacterium accomplishes things so dazzling that no human engineer can match it. Huge advances in molecular biology over the past few decades have served only to deepen the mystery.

In this penetrating and wide-ranging book, world-renowned physicist and science communicator Paul Davies searches for answers in a field so new and fast-moving that it lacks a name; it is a domain where biology, computing, logic, chemistry, quantum physics, and nanotechnology intersect. At the heart of these diverse fields, Davies explains, is the concept of information: a quantity which has the power to unify biology with physics, transform technology and medicine, and force us to fundamentally reconsider what it means to be alive—even illuminating the age-old question of whether we are alone in the universe.

From life’s murky origins to the microscopic engines that run the cells of our bodies, The Demon in the Machine journeys across an astounding landscape of cutting-edge science. Weaving together cancer and consciousness, two-headed worms and bird navigation, Davies reveals how biological organisms garner and process information to conjure order out of chaos, opening a window onto the secret of life itself.
[more]

Do You Really Need Surgery?
A Sensible Guide to Hysterectomy and Other Procedures for Women
Moore, M.D., Michele C
Rutgers University Press, 2004

At last, here is a user-friendly guide to gynecologic surgery. The authors' guiding principle is that each woman for whom any kind of surgery is recommended should be well informed about the indications, the risks, and the expected results.

Using anecdotes drawn from a combined fifty years of experience, doctors Moore and de Costa provide clear and accurate information about women's anatomy, physiology, common gynecological ailments, diagnosis, alternative treatments, and, finally, full details about surgery itself. Among the surgeries discussed are removal of the uterus (hysterectomy), removal of the ovaries (oophorectomy), and removal of fibroids. The various ways of performing these procedures are examined, including minimally invasive surgery done through the laparoscope.

The authors also help the patient through the post-operative phase, revealing what to expect, how to make the recovery easier, and how to take care of yourself after the surgery. The result is a book that empowers women as they weigh their options with regard to gynecologic surgery.

[more]

A Doctor's Dozen
Twelve Strategies for Personal Health and a Culture of Wellness
Catherine Florio Pipas
Dartmouth College Press, 2018
Burnout affects a third of our population and over half of our health professionals. For the second group, the impact is magnified, as consequences play out not only on a personal level, but also on a societal level and lead to medical errors, suboptimal care, low levels of patient satisfaction, and poor clinical outcomes. Achieving wellbeing requires strategies for change. In this book, Dr. Pipas shares twelve lessons and strategies for improved health that she has learned from patients, students, and colleagues over her twenty years working as a family physician. Each lesson is based on observation and research, and begins with a story of an exemplary patient whose challenges and successes reflect the theme of the lesson. Along with the lessons, the author offers plans for action, which taken together create the framework for a healthy life. Each lesson concludes with resources and a “health challenge.”
[more]

Does It Run in the Family?
A Consumer's Guide to DNA Testing for Genetic Disorders
Zallen, Dorris Teichler
Rutgers University Press, 1997

What if your father had Alzheimer's disease? And what if there was a test to tell you if, as you grew older, you might develop it, too? Would you have the test? And if you did, how would the results affect the way you live your life? How would they affect your family? Your job? Your medical insurance?

Breast cancer, sickle-cell anemia, Huntington disease, muscular dystrophy--every day, people have to face the fact that a hereditary disorder runs in their family. The painful knowledge that they or their children might be at risk for a genetic disorder influences all their decisions about the future. They ask, "Is there a genetic test to let us know if we are really at risk? If there is such a test, do we really want to have it done?"

For an ever-growing number of disorders, testing is possible--but the existence of a test can raise new and troubling questions. In this book, geneticist and science policy expert Doris Teichler Zallen explains clearly and sympathetically how genetic disorders are passed along in families; which hereditary disorders can be tested for using genetic technology; how the new DNA tests for genetic disorders work; what genetic tests can and can't reveal, and why the tests often do not give clear-cut answers; what questions one should ask doctors and genetic counselors; how the health care system, government policies, and insurance companies influence our options; and what the resources are for obtaining more information and counseling.

Through the stories of real families and the choices they made about genetic testing, Zallen helps readers think through their own alternatives and discuss them with relatives. Does it Run in the Family? is essential reading for every family coping with inherited medical conditions and for the medical and genetics professionals involved in their decisions. It will also interest all readers who seek a clear explanation of the new DNA tests and the issues surrounding them.

[more]

Down to Earth
Satellite Technologies, Industries, and Cultures
Parks, Lisa
Rutgers University Press, 2012

Down to Earth presents the first comprehensive overview of the geopolitical maneuvers, financial investments, technological innovations, and ideological struggles that take place behind the scenes of the satellite industry. Satellite projects that have not received extensive coverage—microsatellites in China, WorldSpace in South Africa, SiriusXM, the failures of USA 193 and Cosmos 954, and Iridium—are explored. This collection takes readers on a voyage through a truly global industry, from the sites where satellites are launched to the corporate clean rooms where they are designed, and along the orbits and paths that satellites traverse. Combining a practical introduction to the mechanics of the satellite industry, a history of how its practices and technologies have evolved, and a sophisticated theoretical analysis of satellite cultures, Down to Earth opens up a new space for global media studies.

[more]

The Earwig's Tail
A Modern Bestiary of Multi-legged Legends
May R. Berenbaum
Harvard University Press, 2009
Throughout the Middle Ages, enormously popular bestiaries presented people with descriptions of rare and unusual animals, typically paired with a moral or religious lesson. In The Earwig's Tail, entomologist May Berenbaum and illustrator Jay Hosler draw on the powerful cultural symbols of these antiquated books to create a beautiful and witty bestiary of the insect world.
[more]

Embryos under the Microscope
Jane Maienschein
Harvard University Press, 2014
Jane Maienschein examines how understanding of embryos evolved from the speculations of natural philosophers to bioengineering, with its life-enhancing therapies. She shows that research on embryos has always seemed promising to some but frightening to others, and makes the case that public understanding must be informed by scientific findings.
[more]

An Equation That Changed the World
Newton, Einstein, and the Theory of Relativity
Harald Fritzsch
University of Chicago Press, 1994
Fritzsch offers readers the opportunity to listen in on a meeting of Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, and a present-day physicist. While he introduces the theory of relativity, Fritzsch teaches its sources, its workings, and the ways it has revolutionized our view of the physical world. An Equation That Changed the World dramatizes the importance of relativity, for the human race, and the survival of our planet.

"Fritzsch could not give the modern reader a more memorable introduction to the personalities and science of Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein unless somehow he could find the keys to H. G. Wells' time machine. . . . Many readers will applaud Fritzsch for this lively but profoundly insightful book." —Booklist, starred review

"[Fritzsch] has dreamed up a dialogue between the two great physicists, helped along by a fictional modern physicist. . . . The conversation builds up to an explanation of E=mc2, and on the way illuminates the important points where Newtonian and Einsteinian theory diverge." —David Lindley, New York Times Book Review
[more]

From Stone to Star
Claude J. Allègre
Harvard University Press, 1992

The Genetic Gods
Evolution and Belief in Human Affairs
John C. Avise
Harvard University Press, 1998

They mastermind our lives, shaping our features, our health, and our behavior, even in the sacrosanct realms of love and sex, religion, aging, and death. Yet we are the ones who house, perpetuate, and give the promise of immortality to these biological agents, our genetic gods. The link between genes and gods is hardly arbitrary, as the distinguished evolutionary geneticist John Avise reveals in this compelling book. In clear, straightforward terms, Avise reviews recent discoveries in molecular biology, evolutionary genetics, and human genetic engineering, and discusses the relevance of these findings to issues of ultimate concern traditionally reserved for mythology, theology, and religious faith.

The book explains how the genetic gods figure in our development--not just our metabolism and physiology, but even our emotional disposition, personality, ethical leanings, and, indeed, religiosity. Yet genes are physical rather than metaphysical entities. Having arisen via an amoral evolutionary process--natural selection--genes have no consciousness, no sentient code of conduct, no reflective concern about the consequences of their actions. It is Avise's contention that current genetic knowledge can inform our attempts to answer typically religious questions--about origins, fate, and meaning. The Genetic Gods challenges us to make the necessary connection between what we know, what we believe, and what we embody.



Table of Contents:

Preface
Prologue

1. The Doctrines of Biological Science
2. Geneses
3. Genetic Maladies
4. Genetic Beneficence
5. Strategies of the Genes
6. Genetic Sovereignty
7. New Lords of Our Genes?
8. Meaning
Epilogue

Notes
Glossary
Index



Reviews of this book:
Our genes, [Avise] says, are responsible not only for how we got here and exist day to day, but also for the core of our being--our personalities and morals. It is our genetic make-up that allows for and formulates our religious belief systems, he argues. Avise does not eschew spirituality but seeks a more informed, less confrontational approach between science and the pulpit.
--Science News

Reviews of this book:
For the general scientific reader, the book is an excellent distillation of a broad and increasingly important field, a course of causation that cannot be ignored. From advising expectant parents to getting innocent people off death row, genetics increasingly dominates our lives. The sections on genetics are expertly written, particularly for those readers without in-depth knowledge. The author explains slowly and carefully just how genetics operates, using multiple metaphors. His genetic discourse proceeds in a neighborly fashion, as one might tell stories while sitting in a rocking chair at a country store. He seems to be invigorated by genes and just can't wait to tell about them.
--David W. Hodo, Journal of the American Medical Association

Reviews of this book:
As a whole, this book is quite informative and stimulating, and sections of it are beautifully written. Indeed, Professor Avise has a real gift for prose and scientific expositions, and I would suspect that he must be a formidable lecturer...At its core, [The Genetic Gods] is a survey, and a very nice one at that, of evolutionary genetics, the field of the author's major research interests. There is a strong sociobiological cast to the arguments, and the work and ideas of E. O. Wilson figure prominently. The presentation of evolutionary genetics is imbedded in a more general discussion of modern human and molecular genetics...However, this book is, most of all, a philosophical treatise that attempts, admittedly with the bias of a biologist, to examine the intersection of the fundamental premises of evolution and religion. Professor Avise has given us plenty to think about in this book [and]...it was a real pleasure to wrestle with the ideas he was presenting. I would suggest that other readers give it a try.
--Charles J. Epstein, Trends in Genetics

Reviews of this book:
[Avise's] account of the role genes play in shaping the human condition is wholly involving, paying particular attention to issues of reproduction, aging and death. In addition to presenting ample biological information in a form accessible to the nonspecialist, Avise does a superb job of discussing many of the ethical implications that have arisen from our growing knowledge of human genetics. Just a few of the topics covered are genetic engineering, the patenting of life, genetic screening, abortion, human cloning, gene therapy and insurance-related controversies.
--Publishers Weekly

Reviews of this book:
Avise explains thoroughly how evolution operates on a genetic level. His goal is to show that humans can look to this information as a way to answer fundamental questions of life instead of looking to traditional religious beliefs...Avise includes some very interesting discussions of ethical concerns related to genetic issues.
--Eric D. Albright, Library Journal

This is a splendid account of a subject that affects us all: the breathtaking increase in understanding of human genetics and the insight it provides into human evolution. John Avise speaks with authority of molecular evolutionary genetics and with affecting compassion of what it might mean.
--Douglas J. Futuyma, State University of New York at Stony Brook

The Genetic Gods is many things. It is a wonderful introduction to modern molecular biology, by a man who knows his subject backwards. It is a stimulating account of the ways in which genetics impinges on human nature--our thinking and our behavior. It is a remarkably level-headed and sympathetic account of the implications of our new findings for traditional and not-so-traditional issues in philosophy and religion. In an age of genetic counseling, cloning, construction of new life forms, the book is worth its weight in gold for this alone. But most of all, it is a huge amount of fun to read--you want to applaud or argue with the author on nigh every page. Highly recommended!
--Michael Ruse, University of Guelph

The Genetic Gods makes a valuable contribution to the on-going task of sorting out the implications of evolutionary biology and genetics for human self-understanding. Avise addresses, with authority and grace, the most consequential intellectual issues of our time. A challenging and insightful book.
--Loyal Rue, Harvard University

A wonderfully informative and engaging book. Avise offers a lucid, accessible primer on our genes, angelic and demonic, and examines religious and ethical issues, all too human, now confronted by genetic science. He makes a compelling case that anyone seeking to 'Know Thyself' should study the DNA molecular scriptures, our most ancient and universal legacy.
--Dudley Herschbach, Harvard University, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry
[more]

Great Expectation
A Father's Diary
Dan Roche
University of Iowa Press, 2008
In Great Expectation, Dan Roche gives a man's perspective on what it means to start and expand a family relatively later in life. Through a series of diary entries in turns humorous, angst ridden, and full of hope and joy, Roche describes his own thoughts and concerns during the nine months of his wife's pregnancy.

With five years of parenting his irrepressible daughter Maeve under his belt, Roche, already forty-five years old, and his wife, Maura, face the prospect of another arrival and the myriad of emotions that come with a second child. From revelling in the joys of pregnancy such as Maura's delight at "having cleavage" and being able to eat whatever she desires; to assuaging the parental anxieties of choosing the right obstetrician, correcting the mistakes one made with the first child, and sending children to college in the future; to navigating the unforeseen, experiencing the unexpected death of a parent, and feeling trepidation toward the thought of having a son, Roche records his emotions with unusual candidness and intimacy.

Reflecting on day-to-day events and their significance in his family’s life together, Roche wonders what he is getting himself into and how much deeper he can immerse himself into parenting. Together, he and his wife face the bittersweet intersections of death and new life, menace and hopefulness. With sincerity and a mature wit, Great Expectation stands as a wise recounting of nine months’ time, with all of its chaos and charms, and offers a fresh perspective for first-time and veteran parents alike.

[more]

Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler
Visiting Astronomy and Space Exploration Sites across America
Nickell, Duane S
Rutgers University Press, 2008
Finding all the fascinating scientific sites to visit throughout America can be a daunting task. This guidebook does all the work for you. The first in a series of travel books that will celebrate science and technology in America, Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler describes astronomy and space-related museums and attractions that conventional travel guides tend to ignore. So, gas up the car, grab some snacks for the road, and get started on the voyage.
Written in clear, easy-to-read language, Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler lists more than 50 of the most important and intriguing astronomical and space-related sites in the United States. The book encompasses both popular and obscure places of interest, all of which are open to the public. Grouping the attractions by theme—such as Native American astronomy, optical and radio telescopes, NASA and space exploration, and space rocks—Duane S. Nickell provides a scientific and historical overview of each theme followed by detailed descriptions of the related sites within that theme. With over 40 illustrations, the book gives readers a visual understanding of what they will experience at most of the sites. For those readers who want to use the book as a trip planner, Nickell also includes a state-by-state listing of the attractions and identifies “must-see” exhibits at many of the space museums featured.
Travelers and armchair tourists alike will be entertained by the illustrations and scientific descriptions of these “out of this world” attractions.
-Perfect for science and astronomy enthusiasts
-Contains detailed visitorinformation on each site
-Includes over 50 of the top astronomy and space-related sites
-Filled with interesting descriptions of all sites
-Over 40 photographs
-State-by-state appendix
[more]

Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler
Visiting Physics and Chemistry Sites Across America
Nickell, Duane S
Rutgers University Press, 2010
Imagine visiting a top-secret government lab, one that was a key site for the development of nuclear weapons and nuclear fusion technology in the twentieth century. Well, even in today's world of color-coded security levels, the doors of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California are open to you. And it's just one of the many surprising stops along the way in Duane S. Nickell's captivating new edition of the Scientific Traveler series, Guidebook for the Scientific Traveler: Visiting Physics and Chemistry Sites across America.

Are you in the mood for a trip to the Titan Missile Museum in Tucson? Want to spend some time at the Fermi National Accelerator Center near Chicago? Perhaps quench your thirst for knowledge and discovery at the Anheuser-Busch Brewery in St. Louis, where brewers are chemists at heart? Set your own pace. As an active participant or living room traveler, you'll be mesmerized as Nickell leads you on a tour of physics and chemistry sites.

Written in an easy-to-read and accessible style, this comprehensive guide is a practical and fun way to promote scientific literacy. You'll meet some of the world's great physicists, engineers, and chemists as you turn pages filled with more than fifty photographs. Organized into chapters on individuals, places, and sites--from universities of science to national laboratories, particle accelerators to energy labs and beyond--Nickell illuminates the history of each topic and paints a panorama of stunning achievements in physics and chemistry.

Whether you're traveling in California or Maine, or taking to the road in Texas or Illinois, Nickell helps complete your trip with a state-by-state list of monumental sites and resources. From the east coast to the west, north by northwest, or south in search of the Florida Solar Power Energy Center, you'll enjoy all your scientific travels with Visiting Physics and Chemistry Sites across America.
[more]

Heal Your Heart
How You Can Prevent or Reverse Heart Disease
Gould, K. Lance
Rutgers University Press, 2000
In Heal Your Heart, Dr. K. Lance Gould’s goals are better survival and improved health through the prevention and reversal of heart and vascular disease. His program provides practical, do-it-yourself steps and explores options beyond traditional invasive medical procedures for more definitive solutions. Designed for the general reader, Heal Your Heart can be used by anyone. Scientific information and practical guidelines are presented in simple, full-color illustrations, summary graphs or tables with brief, nontechnical text that incorporate the most recent medical knowledge. Dr. Gould introduces readers to new non-invasive medical imaging technologies such as cardiac PET that may potentially provide early diagnoses for people who may be at risk. Dr. Gould demonstrates how patients and physicians can work together to conquer one of the relentless causes of disability and death. He outlines what questions to ask medical staff and how to manage your own reversal program including your doctors, whether specialists or general practitioners. The principles of reversing cardiovascular disease in this program may be adapted to various lifestyles, habits, tastes, time constraints, and personalities. Dr. Gould’s program avoids multiple medical consultations and special facilities or equipment. The essentials are healthy living habits combined with medical management at home and work. This reversal program may replace surgical or catheter procedures for treating cardiovascular disease in most patients. In some specific cases, some people may also need balloon dilation or bypass surgery. Dr. Gould furnishes the criteria used to identify the minority of patients who need them. For this minority, Dr. Gould’s reversal program in addition to surgical treatment will provide optimal outcome by dramatically lowering further risk. For most people, this program produces a sense of well-being and reduces or eliminates symptoms. 
[more]

The Hoarders
Material Deviance in Modern American Culture
Scott Herring
University of Chicago Press, 2014
The verb “declutter” has not yet made it into the Oxford English Dictionary, but its ever-increasing usage suggests that it’s only a matter of time. Articles containing tips and tricks on how to get organized cover magazine pages and pop up in TV programs and commercials, while clutter professionals and specialists referred to as “clutterologists” are just a phone call away. Everywhere the sentiment is the same: clutter is bad.

In The Hoarders, Scott Herring provides an in-depth examination of how modern hoarders came into being, from their onset in the late 1930s to the present day. He finds that both the idea of organization and the role of the clutterologist are deeply ingrained in our culture, and that there is a fine line between clutter and deviance in America. Herring introduces us to Jill, whose countertops are piled high with decaying food and whose cabinets are overrun with purchases, while the fly strips hanging from her ceiling are arguably more fly than strip. When Jill spots a decomposing pumpkin about to be jettisoned, she stops, seeing in the rotting, squalid vegetable a special treasure. “I’ve never seen one quite like this before,” she says, and looks to see if any seeds remain. It is from moments like these that Herring builds his questions: What counts as an acceptable material life—and who decides? Is hoarding some sort of inherent deviation of the mind, or a recent historical phenomenon grounded in changing material cultures? Herring opts for the latter, explaining that hoarders attract attention not because they are mentally ill but because they challenge normal modes of material relations. Piled high with detailed and, at times, disturbing descriptions of uncleanliness, The Hoarders delivers a sweeping and fascinating history of hoarding that will cause us all to reconsider how we view these accumulators of clutter.
[more]

How to Grow a Human
Adventures in How We Are Made and Who We Are
Philip Ball
University of Chicago Press, 2019
Two summers ago, scientists removed a tiny piece of flesh from Philip Ball’s arm and turned it into a rudimentary “mini-brain.” The skin cells, removed from his body, did not die but were instead transformed into nerve cells that independently arranged themselves into a dense network and communicated with each other, exchanging the raw signals of thought. This was life—but whose? 

In his most mind-bending book yet, Ball makes that disconcerting question the focus of a tour through what scientists can now do in cell biology and tissue culture. He shows how these technologies could lead to tailor-made replacement organs for when ours fail, to new medical advances for repairing damage and assisting conception, and to new ways of “growing a human.” For example, it might prove possible to turn skin cells not into neurons but into eggs and sperm, or even to turn oneself into the constituent cells of embryos. Such methods would also create new options for gene editing, with all the attendant moral dilemmas. Ball argues that such advances can therefore never be about “just the science,” because they come already surrounded by a host of social narratives, preconceptions, and prejudices. But beyond even that, these developments raise questions about identity and self, birth and death, and force us to ask how mutable the human body really is—and what forms it might take in years to come. 
 
[more]

How We See the Sky
A Naked-Eye Tour of Day and Night
Thomas Hockey
University of Chicago Press, 2002

Gazing up at the heavens from our backyards or a nearby field, most of us see an undifferentiated mess of stars—if, that is, we can see anything at all through the glow of light pollution. Today’s casual observer knows far less about the sky than did our ancestors, who depended on the sun and the moon to tell them the time and on the stars to guide them through the seas. Nowadays, we don’t need the sky, which is good, because we’ve made it far less accessible, hiding it behind the skyscrapers and the excessive artificial light of our cities. 

How We See the Sky gives us back our knowledge of the sky, offering a fascinating overview of what can be seen there without the aid of a telescope. Thomas Hockey begins by scanning the horizon, explaining how the visible universe rotates through this horizon as night turns to day and season to season. Subsequent chapters explore the sun’s and moon’s respective motions through the celestial globe, as well as the appearance of solstices, eclipses, and planets, and how these are accounted for in different kinds of calendars. In every chapter, Hockey introduces the common vocabulary of today’s astronomers, uses examples past and present to explain them, and provides conceptual tools to help newcomers understand the topics he discusses.


Packed with illustrations and enlivened by historical anecdotes and literary references, How We See the Sky reacquaints us with the wonders to be found in our own backyards.

[more]

Ice
The Nature, the History, and the Uses of an Astonishing Substance
Mariana Gosnell
University of Chicago Press, 2007
More brittle than glass, at times stronger than steel, at other times flowing like molasses, ice covers 10 percent of the earth’s land and 7 percent of its oceans.

Mariana Gosnell here explores the history and uses of ice in all its complexity, grandeur, and significance. From the freezing of Pleasant Lake in New Hampshire to the breakup of a Vermont river at the onset of spring, from the frozen Antarctic landscape that emperor penguins inhabit to the cold, watery route bowhead whales take between Arctic ice floes, Gosnell examines icebergs, icicles, and frostbite; sea ice and permafrost; ice on Mars and in the rings of Saturn; and several new forms of ice developed in labs. Arecord of the scientific surprises, cultural magnitude, and everyday uses of frozen water, Ice is a sparkling illumination of a substance whose ebbs and flows over time have helped form the world we live in.

“Gosnell travels to the ends of the earth, into the clouds and under the frozen sea to conduct her investigations . . . By the time you finish this remarkable book, you’ll never think about freezing and melting in quite the same way.”—New York Times Book Review

“To read Ice is to discover just how astonishing it is and how necessary.”—San Francisco Chronicle

“A bright, curious, omnidirectional tour that will entrance nature readers.”—Booklist

“An encyclopedic work with surprises on every page . . . . Illustrated with images of ice castles, skaters, and bubble-filled frozen sculpture, Gosnell’s book breathes life into the crystals dubbed ‘glorious spangles’ by Henry David Thoreau.”—Discover

[more]

In Search of Cell History
The Evolution of Life's Building Blocks
Franklin M. Harold
University of Chicago Press, 2014
The origin of cells remains one of the most fundamental problems in biology, one that over the past two decades has spawned a large body of research and debate. With In Search of Cell History, Franklin M. Harold offers a comprehensive, impartial take on that research and the controversies that keep the field in turmoil.

Written in accessible language and complemented by a glossary for easy reference, this book investigates the full scope of cellular history. Assuming only a basic knowledge of cell biology, Harold examines such pivotal subjects as the relationship between cells and genes; the central role of bioenergetics in the origin of life; the status of the universal tree of life with its three stems and viral outliers; and the controversies surrounding the last universal common ancestor. He also delves deeply into the evolution of cellular organization, the origin of complex cells, and the incorporation of symbiotic organelles, and considers the fossil evidence for the earliest life on earth. In Search of Cell History shows us just how far we have come in understanding cell evolution—and the evolution of life in general—and how far we still have to go.
[more]

Law in Everyday Life
Austin Sarat and Thomas R. Kearns, Editors
University of Michigan Press, 1995
"Sarat and Kearns . . . have edited a truly marvelous work on the impact of the law on daily life and vice versa. . . . the essays are all exemplary, thought- provoking works worthy of a long, contemplative read by scholars, lawyers, and judges alike." --Choice
"The subject of law in everyday life is timely in theory and in practice. The essays collected here are stimulating for the very different ways in which they reconfigure the meanings of 'the law' as cultural practice, and 'the everyday' as a cultural domain in which the state expresses a range of interests and engagements. Readers looking for an introduction to this topic will come away from the book with a clear sense of the varied voices and modes of inquiry now involved in sociolegal studies, and what distinguishes them. More experienced readers will appreciate the book's meticulous reconsideration of the instrumentalities, agencies, and constructedness of law." --Carol Greenhouse, Indiana University
Contributors include David Engel, Hendrik Hartog, Thomas R. Kearns, David Kennedy, Catharine MacKinnon, George Marcus, Austin Sarat, and Patricia Williams.
Austin Sarat is William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science, and Chair of the Department of Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought, Amherst College. Thomas R. Kearns is William H. Hastie Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought, Amherst College.
[more]

The Light of Christ
An Introduction to Catholicism
Thomas Joseph White
Catholic University of America Press, 2017
The Light of Christ provides an accessible presentation of Catholicism that is grounded in traditional theology, but engaged with a host of contemporary questions or objections. Inspired by the theologies of Iranaeus, Thomas Aquinas and John Henry Newman, and rooted in a post-Vatican II context, Fr. Thomas Joseph White presents major doctrines of the Christian religion in a way that is comprehensible for non-specialists: knowledge of God, the mystery of the Trinity, the Incarnation and the atonement, the sacraments and the moral life, eschatology and prayer.

At the same time, The Light of Christ also addresses topics such as evolution, the modern historical study of Jesus and the Bible, and objections to Catholic moral teaching. Touching on the concerns of contemporary readers, Fr. White examines questions such as whether Christianity is compatible with the findings of the modern sciences, do historical Jesus studies disrupt or confirm the teaching of the faith, and does history confirm the antiquity of Catholic claims.

This book serves as an excellent introduction for young professionals with no specialized background in theology who are interested in learning more about Catholicism, or as an introduction to Catholic theology. It will also serve as a helpful text for theology courses in a university context.

As Fr. White states in the book’s introduction: “This is a book that offers itself as a companion. I do not presume to argue the reader into the truths of the Catholic faith, though I will make arguments. My goal is to make explicit in a few broad strokes the shape of Catholicism. I hope to outline its inherent intelligibility or form as a mystery that is at once visible and invisible, ancient and contemporary, mystical and reasonable.”
[more]

Living With Cancer
A Practical Guide
Visel, Dave
Rutgers University Press, 2006

In this essential guide, Dave Visel draws on expertise hard-won during his wife’s battle with lymphoma. He provides an overview of the varieties of cancer and all the basic types of treatments available. Chapters dispel common myths associated with these treatments and provide tips on nutrition and physical fitness. Visel also moves beyond the hospital to provide information and strategies to help with the emotional, practical, and financial effects of a diagnosis. Cancer patients will find the tools they need to make well-informed decisions on questions ranging from the right time to tell coworkers to whether to travel for treatment.  Because medical bankruptcies affect nearly two million Americans each year, Visel devotes several chapters to financial issues.  He also addresses the effects of cancer on relationships, such as how to deal with a difficult parent or whether to reconcile with an estranged spouse. In addition, Living with Cancer provides a comprehensive overview of the most useful corporate, government, and non-profit resources available. Anyone looking for help in understanding the full range of personal, professional, and legal issues associated with cancer will welcome this book. As inspiring as it is informative, it is a survival guide in the truest sense.

[more]

Living with Polio
The Epidemic and Its Survivors
Daniel J. Wilson
University of Chicago Press, 2005
Polio was the most dreaded childhood disease of twentieth-century America. Every summer during the 1940s and 1950s, parents were terrorized by the thought that polio might cripple their children. They warned their children not to drink from public fountains, to avoid swimming pools, and to stay away from movie theaters and other crowded places. Whenever and wherever polio struck, hospitals filled with victims of the virus. Many experienced only temporary paralysis, but others faced a lifetime of disability.

Living with Polio is the first book to focus primarily on the personal stories of the men and women who had acute polio and lived with its crippling consequences. Writing from personal experience, polio survivor Daniel J. Wilson shapes this impassioned book with the testimonials of more than one hundred polio victims, focusing on the years between 1930 and 1960. He traces the entire life experience of the survivors—from the alarming diagnosis all the way to the recent development of post-polio syndrome, a condition in which the symptoms of the disease may return two or three decades after they originally surfaced.

Living with Polio follows every physical and emotional stage of the disease: the loneliness of long separations from family and friends suffered by hospitalized victims; the rehabilitation facilitieswhere survivors spent a full year or more painfully trying to regain the use of their paralyzed muscles; and then the return home, where they were faced with readjusting to school or work with the aid of braces, crutches, or wheelchairs while their families faced the difficult responsibilities of caring for and supporting a child or spouse with a disability.

Poignant and gripping, Living with Polio is a compelling history of the enduring physical and psychological experience of polio straight from the rarely heard voices of its survivors.
[more]

The Lost Species
Great Expeditions in the Collections of Natural History Museums
Christopher Kemp
University of Chicago Press, 2017
The tiny, lungless Thorius salamander from southern Mexico, thinner than a match and smaller than a quarter. The lushly white-coated Saki, an arboreal monkey from the Brazilian rainforests. The olinguito, a native of the Andes, which looks part mongoose, part teddy bear. These fantastic species are all new to science—at least newly named and identified; but they weren’t discovered in the wild, instead, they were unearthed in the drawers and cavernous basements of natural history museums. As Christopher Kemp reveals in The Lost Species, hiding in the cabinets and storage units of natural history museums is a treasure trove of discovery waiting to happen.

With Kemp as our guide, we go spelunking into museum basements, dig through specimen trays, and inspect the drawers and jars of collections, scientific detectives on the hunt for new species. We discover king crabs from 1906, unidentified tarantulas, mislabeled Himalayan landsnails, an unknown rove beetle originally collected by Darwin, and an overlooked squeaker frog, among other curiosities. In each case, these specimens sat quietly for decades—sometimes longer than a century—within the collections of museums, before sharp-eyed scientists understood they were new. Each year, scientists continue to encounter new species in museum collections—a stark reminder that we have named only a fraction of the world’s biodiversity. Sadly, some specimens have waited so long to be named that they are gone from the wild before they were identified, victims of climate change and habitat loss. As Kemp shows, these stories showcase the enduring importance of these very collections.

The Lost Species vividly tells these stories of discovery—from the latest information on each creature to the people who collected them and the scientists who finally realized what they had unearthed—and will inspire many a museumgoer to want to peek behind the closed doors and rummage through the archives.
 
[more]

Lung Cancer Chronicles
Meyer, M.D., John
Rutgers University Press, 1990
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[more]

The Lying Stones of Marrakech
Stephen Jay Gould
Harvard University Press, 2011
Gould covers topics as diverse as episodes in the birth of paleontology to lessons from Britain’s four greatest Victorian naturalists. This collection presents the richness and fascination of the various lives that have fueled the enterprise of science and opened our eyes to a world of unexpected wonders.
[more]

March of the Microbes
Sighting the Unseen
John L. Ingraham
Harvard University Press, 2010
A Choice Outstanding Academic Title Renowned microbiologist John Ingraham rescues the supremely important and ubiquitous microorganisms from their unwonted obscurity by showing us how we can, in fact, see and appreciate them.
[more]

Marriage and Divorce in the Jewish State
Israel's Civil War
Susan M. Weiss and Netty C. Gross-Horowitz
Brandeis University Press, 2012
Israel currently has two recognized systems of law operating side by side: civil and religious. Israeli religious courts possess the exclusive right to conduct and terminate marriages. There is no civil marriage or divorce in Israel, irrespective of one’s religious inclinations. All Muslims must marry and divorce in accordance with shariya laws, all Catholics in accordance with canon law, and all Jews in accordance with Torah law (halakha). The interpretation and implementation of Torah law is in the hands of the Orthodox religious establishment, the only stream of Judaism that enjoys legal recognition in Israel. The rabbinic courts strenuously oppose any changes to this so-called status quo arrangement between religious and secular authorities. In fact, religious courts in Israel are currently pressing for expanded jurisdiction beyond personal status, stressing their importance to Israel’s growing religious community. This book shows how religious courts, based on centuries-old patriarchal law, undermine the full civil and human rights of Jewish women in Israel. Making a broad argument for civil marriage and divorce in Israel, the authors also emphasize that religious marriages and divorces, when they do occur, must benefit from legislation that makes divorce easier to obtain. Making this issue their focal point, they speak to a larger question: Is Israel a democracy or a theocracy?
[more]

Missing Words
Kay Thomsett
Gallaudet University Press, 1993

The Misunderstood Gene
Michel Morange
Harvard University Press, 2001

News from Mars
Mass Media and the Forging of a New Astronomy, 1860-1910
Joshua Nall
University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019

Mass media in the late nineteenth century was full of news from Mars. In the wake of Giovanni Schiaparelli’s 1877 discovery of enigmatic dark, straight lines on the red planet, astronomers and the public at large vigorously debated the possibility that it might be inhabited. As rivalling scientific practitioners looked to marshal allies and sway public opinion—through newspapers, periodicals, popular books, exhibitions, and encyclopaedias—they exposed disagreements over how the discipline of astronomy should be organized and how it should establish acceptable conventions of discourse.

News from Mars provides a new account of this extraordinary episode in the history of astronomy, revealing how major transformations in astronomical practice across Britain and America were inextricably tied up with popular scientific culture and a transatlantic news economy that enabled knowledge to travel. As Joshua Nall argues, astronomers were journalists, too, eliding practice with communication in consequential ways. As writers and editors, they played a pivotal role in the emergence of a “new astronomy” dedicated to the study of the physical constitution and life history of celestial objects, blurring harsh distinctions between those who produced esoteric knowledge and those who disseminated it. 

[more]

Newton's Apple and Other Myths about Science
Ronald L. Numbers
Harvard University Press, 2015
A falling apple inspired the law of gravity—or so the story goes. Is it true? Perhaps not. But why do such stories endure as explanations of how science happens? Newton’s Apple and Other Myths about Science brushes away popular misconceptions to provide a clearer picture of scientific breakthroughs from ancient times to the present.
[more]

Ninety-nine More Maggots, Mites, and Munchers
May R. Berenbaum
University of Illinois Press, 1993
What lives in a reindeer’s nose? Glad you asked. In this sequel to Ninety-nine Gnats, Nits, and Nibblers, National Medal of Science winner May Berenbaum offers another classic compendium of creepy-crawly cameos. Read up on our myriad arthropodan indignities and allies as Berenbaum reveals:
Why the rove beetle gives mind-altering drugs to ants
How the snail-killing fly enjoys its escargot
Why Piophila casei doesn’t care when you eat its larvae
What strange fate awaits a honey ant worker engorged with nectar
 
As lively as a fly in the buttermilk, Ninety-nine More Maggots, Mites, and Munchers is a who’s who and what’s THAT? guide to Lilliputian life-forms both familiar and obscure.
 
[more]

No Easy Answers
Science and the Pursuit of Knowledge
Allan Franklin
University of Pittsburgh Press, 2007
In No Easy Answers, Allan Franklin offers an accurate picture of science to both a general reader and to scholars in the humanities and social sciences who may not have any background in physics. Through the examination of nontechnical case studies, he illustrates the various roles that experiment plays in science. He uses examples of unquestioned success, such as the discoveries of the electron and of three types of neutrino, as well as studies that were dead ends, wrong turns, or just plain mistakes, such as the “fifth force,” a proposed modification of Newton's law of gravity. Franklin argues that science is a reasonable enterprise that provides us with knowledge of the natural world based on valid experimental evidence and reasoned and critical discussion, and he makes clear that it behooves all of us to understand how it works.
[more]

An Orchard Invisible
A Natural History of Seeds
Jonathan Silvertown
University of Chicago Press, 2009

The story of seeds, in a nutshell, is a tale of evolution. From the tiny sesame that we sprinkle on our bagels to the forty-five-pound double coconut borne by the coco de mer tree, seeds are a perpetual reminder of the complexity and diversity of life on earth. With An Orchard Invisible, Jonathan Silvertown presents the oft-ignored seed with the natural history it deserves, one nearly as varied and surprising as the earth’s flora itself.

Beginning with the evolution of the first seed plant from fernlike ancestors more than 360 million years ago, Silvertown carries his tale through epochs and around the globe. In a clear and engaging style, he delves into the science of seeds: How and why do some lie dormant for years on end? How did seeds evolve? The wide variety of uses that humans have developed for seeds of all sorts also receives a fascinating look, studded with examples, including foods, oils, perfumes, and pharmaceuticals. An able guide with an eye for the unusual, Silvertown is happy to take readers on unexpected—but always interesting—tangents, from Lyme disease to human color vision to the Salem witch trials. But he never lets us forget that the driving force behind the story of seeds—its theme, even—is evolution, with its irrepressible habit of stumbling upon new solutions to the challenges of life.

"I have great faith in a seed," Thoreau wrote. "Convince me that you have a seed there, and I am prepared to expect wonders." Written with a scientist’s knowledge and a gardener’s delight, An Orchard Invisible offers those wonders in a package that will be irresistible to science buffs and green thumbs alike.

[more]

Orchid of the Bayou
A Deaf Woman Faces Blindess
Cathryn Carroll
Gallaudet University Press, 2001

In graduating from Gallaudet University, finding a job in Washington, D.C., and starting a family with her college sweetheart, Kitty Fischer tacitly abandoned the Louisiana Cajun culture that had exposed her to little more than prejudice and misery as a child. Upon discovering that she suffered from Usher syndrome (a genetic condition that causes both deafness and blindness), however, Fischer began an unlikely journey toward reclaiming her heritage. She and Cathryn Carroll tell the story of her heroic struggle and cultural odyssey in Orchid of the Bayou: A Deaf Woman Faces Blindness.

“By this time Mama knew I was ‘not right,’” Fischer says of her early childhood. “She knew the real words for ‘not right,’ too, though she never said those words. I was deaf and dumb.” Initially Fischer’s parents turned to folk healers to try and “cure” their daughter’s deafness, but an aunt’s fortunate discovery of the Louisiana School for the Deaf would rescue Fischer from misunderstanding and introduce her to sign language and Deaf culture. She weathered the school’'s experiments with oralism and soon rose to the top of her class, ultimately leaving Louisiana for the academic promise of Gallaudet.

While in college, Fischer met and married her future husband, Lance, a Jewish Deaf man from Brooklyn, New York, and each landed jobs close to their alma mater. After the birth of their first child, however, Fischer could no longer ignore her increasing tunnel vision. Doctors quickly confirmed that Fischer had Usher syndrome.

While Fischer struggled to come to terms with her condition, the high incidence of Usher syndrome among Cajun people led her to re-examine her cultural roots. “Could I still be me, Catherine Hoffpauir Fischer, had I not been born of a mix that codes for Usher syndrome?” she asks. “To some extent, the history of my people explains the constitution of my genes and the way my life has unfolded.” Today Fischer prospers, enjoying her time with family and friends and celebrating the Deaf, Cajun, Blind, and Jewish cultures that populate her life. Her lively story will resonate with anyone who recognizes the arduous journey toward claiming an identity.

[more]

Overcoming Hearing Aid Fears
The Road to Better Hearing
Burkey, John M.
Rutgers University Press, 2003

Named one of the Best Consumer Health Books by the Library Journal 2003

There are dozens of misconceptions about hearing aids:

  • “They make you look old.”
  •  “They cause ear infections.”
  • “They increase hearing loss.”
  • “I can’t afford one.” 
This misinformation impairs a person’s quality of life by discouraging them from pursuing help. Technological advances have enabled hearing aids to address a greater range of hearing losses, while making them smaller, better designed, and easier to use than those of the past. More people than ever can benefit from a hearing aid, yet of the nearly thirty million people with a hearing impairment, only about 20 percent choose to use one.

In Overcoming Hearing Aid Fears, audiologist John M. Burkey addresses common fears, concerns, and misconceptions about hearing aids to help readers decide whether these devices will prove useful. Using an informal, anecdotal style informed by years of clinical practice, Burkey provides practical information about hearing aid styles, options, and costs. His expertise and experience in caring for more than 50,000 patients will help people with hearing loss address their personal concerns. The book also helps friends and family understand why a loved one might resist getting a hearing aid, and offers tips on counseling. Audiologists will find this text an important educational tool in advising their own patients.

Approximately 10 percent of Americans (and nearly one-third of people age seventy and older) have some degree of hearing loss that, if left untreated, causes frustration, isolation, and depression. A hearing aid is a simple tool to improve careers, relationships, and self-esteem, and to provide independence and security. Overcoming Hearing Aid Fears can help readers take that first step to a better life.
[more]

Owning and Managing Forests
A Guide to Legal, Financial, and Practical Matters
Thom J. McEvoy; Foreword by Carl Reidel
Island Press, 2006
Owning and Managing Forests is both an accessible overview of the privileges, rights, and obligations that accompany forest ownership and a guidebook to help active forest owners and managers use laws to their advantage and avoid the pitfalls of expensive and exhausting litigation. The book is a revised, expanded, and updated edition of Legal Aspects of Owning and Managing Woodlands, published in 1998 by Island Press and named Best Forestry Book of the Year by the National Woodland Owners Association.
This edition provides current information on recent changes in property, environmental, and tax laws, while also discussing new directions in forest management. It offers expanded treatment of topics including private property, searching property records, easements, estate planning, timber sale contracts, working with forestry professionals, and how to pass woodlands intact to future generations. The book also describes the many different facets of trusts, changes in forestland taxation methods, and new licensing and certification options. Included, too, is a section on avoiding disputes and how to use alternative dispute resolution methods to avoid costly, troubling, and time-consuming court battles.
Owning and Managing Forests provides clear and concise descriptions of often confusing concepts and difficult subjects, and addresses issues in a competent yet conversational tone. Anyone involved with owning or managing forestland will find the book an essential guide and reference.
[more]

A Palette of Particles
Jeremy Bernstein
Harvard University Press, 2013
Jeremy Bernstein guides readers through high-energy physics from early twentieth-century atomic models to leptons, mesons, quarks, and the newly discovered Higgs boson, drawing them into the excitement of a universe where 80 percent of all matter has never been identified. From molecules to galaxies, the more we discover, the less we seem to know.
[more]

Parkinson's Disease and the Family
Nutan Sharma
Harvard University Press, 2005
Too often, with Parkinson's disease, a loved one serves as medical interpreter, patient advocate, and caregiver. Sharma and Richman draw on the latest research and clinical practice techniques to offer valuable suggestions for managing patient care and, perhaps more important, for healing the family unit.
[more]

Planet of Microbes
The Perils and Potential of Earth's Essential Life Forms
Ted Anton
University of Chicago Press, 2017
We live in a time of unprecedented scientific knowledge about the origins of life on Earth. But if we want to grasp the big picture, we have to start small—very small. That’s because the real heroes of the story of life on Earth are microbes, the tiny living organisms we cannot see with the naked eye. Microbes were Earth’s first lifeforms, early anaerobic inhabitants that created the air we breathe. Today they live, invisible and seemingly invincible, in every corner of the planet, from Yellowstone’s scalding hot springs to Antarctic mountaintops to inside our very bodies—more than a hundred trillion of them. Don’t be alarmed though: many microbes are allies in achieving our—to say nothing of our planet’s—health.
           
In Planet of Microbes, Ted Anton takes readers through the most recent discoveries about microbes, revealing their unexpected potential to reshape the future of the planet. For years, we knew little about these invisible invaders, considering them as little more than our enemies in our fight against infectious disease. But the more we learn about microbes, the more it’s become clear that our very lives depend on them. They may also hold the answers to some of science’s most pressing problems, including how to combat a warming planet, clean up the environment, and help the body fight off a wide variety of diseases. Anton has spent years interviewing and working with the determined scientists who hope to harness the work of microbes, and he breaks down the science while also sharing incredible behind-the-scenes stories of the research taking place everywhere from microbreweries to Mars.
           
The world’s tiniest organisms were here more than three billion years before us. We live in their world, and Planet of Microbes at last gives these unsung heroes the recognition they deserve.
 
[more]

Practical Botany for Gardeners
Over 3,000 Botanical Terms Explained and Explored
Geoff Hodge
University of Chicago Press, 2013
Gardening can be frustratingly shrouded in secrecy. Fickle plants make seemingly spontaneous decisions to bloom or bust, seeds sprout magically in the blink of an eye, and deep-rooted mysteries unfold underground and out of sight. Understanding basic botany is like unlocking a horticultural code; fortunately learning a little science can reveal the secrets of the botanical universe and shed some light on what’s really going on in your garden.

Practical Botany for Gardeners provides an elegant and accessible introduction to the world of botany. It presents the essentials that every gardener needs to know, connecting explanations of scientific facts with useful gardening tips. Flip to the roots section and you’ll not only learn how different types of roots support a plant but also find that adding fungi to soil aids growth. The pruning section both defines “lateral buds” and explains how far back on a shoot to cut in order to propagate them.

The book breaks down key areas and terminology with easy-to-navigate chapters arranged by theme, such as plant types, plant parts, inner workings, and external factors. “Great Botanists” and “Botany in Action” boxes delve deeper into the fascinating byways of plant science. This multifaceted book also includes two hundred botanical illustrations and basic diagrams that hearken to the classic roots of botany.

Part handbook, part reference, Practical Botany for Gardeners is a beautifully captivating read. It’s a must for garden lovers and backyard botanists who want to grow and nurture their own plant knowledge.
[more]

The Practical Guide to Michigan Law
Fred S. Steingold
University of Michigan Press, 1983

Prostate Cancer
Making Survival Decisions
Sylvan Meyer and Seymour C. Nash, M.D., F.A.C.S.
University of Chicago Press, 1994
Written by a surviving prostate cancer patient and his urologist, Prostate Cancer: Making Survival Decisions provides not just a physician's overview of the disease, but the compassion, understanding, and frankness of a man who's lived through the experience. From the first symptoms to early diagnosis to life after treatment, journalist Sylvan Meyer details every facet of the disease from the patient's point of view. Along with a clear, complete guide to the latest treatments, techniques, and findings, Meyer outlines the tough decisions the patient will face; describes what it's like to go through all the tests, the treatment, and the recovery; and provides an understanding of how the patient himself can affect the outcome.

Thoroughly researched and imbued with great sensitivity, Prostate Cancer: Making Survival Decisions is the most informative and illuminating book about prostate cancer available. Not just an indispensable tool for those who have been diagnosed or are at risk, this is an important guide for anyone who seeks a better understanding of this enigmatic disease and the controversies surrounding it.
[more]

Randomness
Deborah J. Bennett
Harvard University Press, 1998
From the ancients’ first readings of the innards of birds to your neighbor’s last bout with the state lottery, humankind has put itself into the hands of chance. Today life itself may be at stake when probability comes into play—in the chance of a false negative in a medical test, in the reliability of DNA findings as legal evidence, or in the likelihood of passing on a deadly congenital disease—yet as few people as ever understand the odds. This book is aimed at the trouble with trying to learn about probability. A story of the misconceptions and difficulties civilization overcame in progressing toward probabilistic thinking, Randomness is also a skillful account of what makes the science of probability so daunting in our own day. To acquire a (correct) intuition of chance is not easy to begin with, and moving from an intuitive sense to a formal notion of probability presents further problems. Author Deborah Bennett traces the path this process takes in an individual trying to come to grips with concepts of uncertainty and fairness, and also charts the parallel path by which societies have developed ideas about chance. Why, from ancient to modern times, have people resorted to chance in making decisions? Is a decision made by random choice “fair”? What role has gambling played in our understanding of chance? Why do some individuals and societies refuse to accept randomness at all? If understanding randomness is so important to probabilistic thinking, why do the experts disagree about what it really is? And why are our intuitions about chance almost always dead wrong? Anyone who has puzzled over a probability conundrum is struck by the paradoxes and counterintuitive results that occur at a relatively simple level. Why this should be, and how it has been the case through the ages, for bumblers and brilliant mathematicians alike, is the entertaining and enlightening lesson of Randomness.
[more]

RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTAR
In Search of the Soul of the Sea
Philip Hoare
University of Chicago Press, 2018
“Every day is an anxiety in my ways of getting to the water. . . . I’ve become so attuned to it, so scared of it, so in love with it that sometimes I can only think by the sea. It is the only place I feel at home.”
 
Many of us visit the sea. Admire it. Even profess to love it. But very few of us live it. Philip Hoare does. He swims in the sea every day, either off the coast of his native Southampton or his adopted Cape Cod. He watches its daily and seasonal changes. He collects and communes with the wrack—both dead and never living—that it throws up on the shingle. He thinks with, at, through the sea.
 
All of which should prepare readers: RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTAR is no ordinary book. It mounts no straight-ahead argument. It hews to no single genre. Instead, like the sea itself, it moves, flows, absorbs, transforms. In its pages we find passages of beautiful nature and travel writing, lyrical memoir, seams of American and English history and much more. We find Thoreau and Melville, Bowie and Byron, John Waters and Virginia Woolf, all linked through a certain refusal to be contained, to be strictly defined—an openness to discovery and change. Running throughout is an air of elegy, a reminder that the sea is an ending, a repository of lost ships, lost people, lost ways of being. It is where we came from; for Hoare, it is where he is going.
 
“Every swim is a little death,” Hoare writes, “but it is also a reminder that you are alive.” Few books have ever made that knife’s edge so palpable. Read RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTAR. Let it settle into the seabed of your soul. You’ll never forget it.
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Scorpion
Louise M. Pryke
Reaktion Books, 2016
No creature has quite the sting in our mythology and folklore as the scorpion. From the dawn of human civilization they have been a dangerous figure in our imaginations—poisonous, precise, and deadly quiet—but as Louise M. Pryke shows in this book, their bad reputation has overshadowed many exceptional qualities. Scurrying across hundreds of millions of years and across every continent except Antarctica, this book gives the scorpion its due as one of nature’s longest lasting survivors.
           
Indeed scorpions are older than dinosaurs. An ancient arthropod, their form—notable for its pair of pincers and an elegant tail that holds a menacing stinger high in the air in a permanent striking position—hasn’t changed since prehistoric times, though today there are some 1700 different species. Throughout our existence scorpions have served as a powerful cultural and religious symbol—sometimes dangerous, sometimes protecting—from the Egyptian goddess Serket to Zodiac astrology to folk medicine. A fascinating tour that takes us from the art of North Africa to the American Civil War to the markets of Beijing, Scorpion is an homage to one of earth’s oldest residents. 
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Seeds
A Natural History
Carolyn Fry
University of Chicago Press, 2016
From the magnificence of a towering redwood to the simple elegance of a tiny dandelion, seed-bearing plants abound on planet Earth. The sheer diversity of plants thriving today is largely thanks to the evolution of the seed, as this made plants resilient to environmental changes by enabling them to await optimum conditions for growth before springing to life. In a time of declining biodiversity, studying seeds is now helping scientists preserve this plant diversity for future generations.

With Seeds, Carolyn Fry offers a celebration of these vital but unassuming packages of life. She begins with a sweeping tour through human history, designed to help us understand why we should appreciate and respect these floral parcels. Wheat, corn, and rice, she reminds us, supply the foundations of meals eaten by people around the world. Countless medicines, oils, clothing materials, and building supplies are available only because of the versatility and variety of seed-bearing plants. Fry then provides a comprehensive history of the evolution of seeds, explaining the myriad ways that they have adapted, survived, and thrived across the globe. Delving deeper into the science of seeds, she reveals the fascinating processes of dormancy, reproduction, germination, and dispersal, and showcases the estimable work conservationists are doing today to gather and bank seeds in order to prevent species from going extinct.

Enriched by a stunning array of full-color images, Seeds offers a comprehensive exploration of some of the most enduring and essential players in the natural world.
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Six Modern Plagues and How We Are Causing Them
Mark Jerome Walters
Island Press, 2003
West Nile Virus -- Mad Cow Disease -- HIV/AIDS -- Hantavirus -- Lyme Disease ... and a new strain of Salmonella. Such modern epidemics have emerged over the past few decades as mysterious, yet significant risks to human health. These "plagues" are forcing us to modify our lifestyles in ways that minimize our chances of becoming a statistic in the latest tally of the afflicted. In Six Modern Plagues, Mark Jerome Walters offers us the first book for the general reader that connects these emerging health risks and their ecological origins. Drawing on new research, interviews, and his own investigations, Mark Jerome Walters weaves together a compelling argument: that changes humans have made to the environment, from warming the climate to clearing the forests, have contributed to, if not caused a rising tide of diseases that are afflicting humans and many other species. According to Mark Jerome Walters, humans are not always innocent bystanders to infectious disease. To the contrary, in the case of many modern epidemics, we are the instigators. Six Modern Plagues, a ground-breaking introduction to the connection between disease and environmental degradation should be read by all those interested in their health and the health of others.
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Spinal Cord Injury and the Family
A New Guide
Michelle J. ALPERT
Harvard University Press, 2008
Combining clinical experience with patients’ own stories, the authors cover the causes of and prognosis for SCI through case studies, review common courses of rehabilitation, and answer the “what now?” questions—from daily routines to larger issues concerning sex, education and employment, childbearing, and parenting with SCI.
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Sublime Dreams of Living Machines
Minsoo Kang
Harvard University Press, 2010
Kang’s central contention is that the automaton, a machine that can move by itself (better known today as the robot), is one of the essential ideas with which people in the West have pondered the very nature of humanity itself. In Kang’s telling, automata are mirrors of the ideas, fears, and anxieties of a given era, in that attitudes towards the machines have always been indicative of a moment’s zeitgeist. The book is historically sweeping, but not comprehensive; the focus is on what Kang takes to be key changes in the representations of and responses to automata. His main interest is on how Europeans in different periods of the past thought about the very notion of a self-moving machine that acted as if it were alive and how they used it for various symbolic and intellectual purposes.
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The Thinking Person's Guide to Climate Change
Second Edition
Robert Henson
American Meteorological Society, 2019
Everybody can be a thinking person when it comes to climate change, and this book is a perfect roadmap.  Start a web search for “climate change” and the first three suggestions are “facts,” “news,” and “hoax.” The Thinking Person's Guide to Climate Change is rooted in the first, up to date on the second, and anything but the last. Produced by one of the most venerable atmospheric science organizations, it is a must-read for anyone looking for the full story on climate change.

Using global research and written with nonscientists in mind, the Guide breaks down the issues into straightforward categories: “Symptoms” covers signs such as melting ice and extreme weather, while “Science” lays out what we know and how we figured it out. “Debates” tackles the controversy and politics, while “Solutions” and “Actions” discuss what we can do as individuals and communities to create the best possible future. Full-color illustrations offer explanations of everything from how the greenhouse effect traps heat to which activities in everyday life emit the most carbon. Special-feature boxes zoom in on locations across the globe already experiencing the effects of a shifting climate.

The new edition of The Thinking Person's Guide to Climate Change has been thoroughly updated, including content on new global record highs, new research across the spectrum, and the Paris Agreement to cut greenhouse gases. This reference provides the most comprehensive, yet accessible, overview of where climate science stands today, acknowledging controversies but standing strong in its stance that the climate is changing—and something needs to be done.
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Treating the Brain
What the Best Doctors Know
Walter G. Bradley DM FRCP
Dana Press, 2009

Even in this information age, it is a daunting task to find clear, concise, and credible sources for essential medical facts. And for those dealing with the symptoms of often serious neurological disorders, finding trustworthy and straightforward information is gravely important.

Treating the Brain is precisely what has been missing for non-specialists. Focusing on the most common neurological conditions, it provides accurate, reliable information to patients, caregivers, and health practitioners from the neurologist whose professional text informs neurologists worldwide.. Walter G. Bradley, one of the nation’s foremost neurologists and the editor of the leading neurology textbook Neurology in Clinical Practice, navigates the complexities of the brain in highly accessible language. Treating the Brain is the definitive resource for patients, offering a coherent and up-to-date understanding of what physicians know about the brain. In the United States alone, one-quarter of all new consultations between patients and their family physician is a result of a neurological problem. Using case histories as examples, Treating the Brain explains the neurological examinations and tests and clinical features, causes, and treatments available for Alzheimer’s disease, migraines, stroke, epilepsy, Parkinson’s and other frequently diagnosed neurological disorders.

For anyone who has ever had a neurological symptom, from a headache to tingling hands, and for anyone with a personal interest in how the brain works in health and disease, Treating the Brain will prove to be a valuable, easy-to-read source of a wide-range of information.

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Under the Mask
A Guide to Feeling Secure and Comfortable During Anesthesia and Surgery
Cottrell, James M.D.
Rutgers University Press, 2001

Every year, about forty million Americans require surgery. Few truly understand what happens to them during the procedure-especially what the anesthesiologist does to ensure their survival and well being. An anesthesiologist disarms your entire nervous system with the most effective drugs for your body chemistry; keeps you alive while you're subjected to manipulations that would otherwise kill you; and ensures your safe return to consciousness. Yet despite their crucial role, anesthesiologists are often the unseen doctors. Under the Mask, written by a compassionate practitioner, demystifies the surgical process with detailed information that will make you a better-informed consumer.

Part One describes the development and current scope of anesthesiology, the medications and techniques used, and what the anesthesiologist does both in and outside the operating room. It explains your-the patient's- rights and advises you how to use the preoperative consultation with the anesthesiologist to your best advantage, specifying what information you need provide and what questions you should ask.

Part Two details the most common surgical and diagnostic procedures requiring anesthesia or conscious sedation. Using clear language, it explains each procedure, the possible risks, and the choices to make if there is more than one option. It also covers the anesthesiologist's crucial role in controlling pain caused by chronic conditions. The last chapter describes the newest anesthetic and pain control techniques available.

The author also helps you understand anesthesiology within the managed care system and explains what you can expect and what to do if you aren't getting what you need. This book enables you to make informed decisions regarding surgical anesthesia and subsequent pain control within the managed care system to protect your well-being and hasten your recovery.
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A User’s Guide to Bypass Surgery
Ted Klein
Ohio University Press, 1996

What Every Senior Needs To..
J Nora
University Press of Colorado, 2004
At a time when astonishing medical advances appear in the media almost daily, access to even the most routine health care and satisfactory doctor-patient relationships is becoming increasingly difficult to find. Moreover, the rapidly growing population of
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Why Don't Jumbo Jets Flap Their Wings?
Flying Animals, Flying Machines, and How They Are Different
Alexander, David
Rutgers University Press, 2009
What do a bumble bee and a 747 jet have in common? It’s not a trick question. The fact is they have quite a lot in common. They both have wings. They both fly. And they’re both ideally suited to it. They just do it differently.

Why Don’t Jumbo Jets Flap Their Wings? offers a fascinating explanation of how nature and human engineers each arrived at powered flight. What emerges is a highly readable account of two very different approaches to solving the same fundamental problems of moving through the air, including lift, thrust, turning, and landing. The book traces the slow and deliberate evolutionary process of animal flight—in birds, bats, and insects—over millions of years and compares it to the directed efforts of human beings to create the aircraft over the course of a single century.

Among the many questions the book answers:
  • Why are wings necessary for flight?
  • How do different wings fly differently?
  • When did flight evolve in animals?
  • What vision, knowledge, and technology was needed before humans could learn to fly?
  • Why are animals and aircrafts perfectly suited to the kind of flying they do?

David E. Alexander first describes the basic properties of wings before launching into the diverse challenges of flight and the concepts of flight aerodynamics and control to present an integrated view that shows both why birds have historically had little influence on aeronautical engineering and exciting new areas of technology where engineers are successfully borrowing ideas from animals.
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A Woman's Concise Guide to Common Medical Tests
Moore, M.D., Michele C
Rutgers University Press, 2005

Every year, millions of healthy women undergo a variety of screening tests without understanding why or the meaning of the outcome. If you are among those women, overwhelmed by information and baffled by results, this is the book you've been waiting for. In straightforward, personable prose, A Woman's Concise Guide to Common Medical Tests surveys a wide variety of standard tests commonly suggested by doctors.

Using the recommendations of the U.S. Preventative Health Services Task Force as a starting point, physicians Michele C. Moore and Caroline M. de Costa describe and explain screening tests for STDs and other communicable diseases, diabetes, thyroid disease, bone loss, various genetic tests, pregnancy, and cancer (including breast, colon, and skin). A section on common blood tests demystifies the numerical results that can be virtually impossible to interpret for women outside the medical profession. The authors detail what is considered "normal" as well as what's not-to help women make sense of their results.

As practicing physicians, both authors have fielded patients' questions about standard screening tests and understand what women should know but often feel afraid to ask about. For each test, there is an explanation of why it may be ordered, how it is done, what sort of preparation may be involved, and what risks may be incurred.

As the health-care industry continues to evolve, the amount of medical information available to women about their health can be overwhelming and confusing. Without being encyclopedic or intimidating, A Woman's Concise Guide to Common Medical Tests offers all the facts you need about screening tests, all in one place.

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You and the Law in New Jersey
A Resource Guide
Holness, Leighton A.
Rutgers University Press, 1998

What are your rights if you are fired from your job? What should you do if you are a crime victim or witness? How can you fight a child custody battle? What can you do if your landlord refuses to provide you with heat in the winter?

You and the Law in New Jersey, newly updated, is the ideal guidebook to assist readers in understanding the law, their rights, and how to get legal help. In clear, straightforward language, the book describes how law is made, how to do legal research, how the state and federal court systems work, how to get help if you can't afford a lawyer, how to hire a lawyer, and what to do if you are sued. The second edition contains much new information, including a chapter on credit, debt, and banking, and others on the rights of senior citizens, veterans, and people with disabilities. The authors have also expanded their information on the rights of renters, homeowners, and consumers of public utilities, as well as their treatment of employment law. They have rewritten chapters on health and public benefits to address the recent sweeping reforms of federal and state law. Other topics include family matters such as marriage, divorce, adoption, and domestic violence; the landlord-tenant relationship and buying a home; consumer rights; the criminal justice system; and citizen involvement in environmental law.

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You've Got Some Explaining To Do
Advice for Neuroscientists Writing for Lay Readers
Jane Nevins
Dana Press, 2014

What are people who read opinion-page articles looking for? How can you reach people who read general-interest magazines? Hint: It's not the same as your colleagues or science journals.

This compact book offers the reasons and information that can help scientific writers adopt new habits to be successful and happy writing for a non-science audience. Go ahead and write journal-style for science journals and colleagues, says longtime science editor Jane Nevins, but you'll need to try different styles to reach a different audience.

The book is divided into three parts: The Meet-up, Simple Fixes, and Science and Style. In The Meet-up, Nevins describes the different venues for lay writing, from opinion pages to popular magazines, and what readers of each expect and respond to best.  In Simple Fixes, she shows how jargon, "cross-over words," and hackneyed expressions can be remedied, clearing away confusion for your readers. In Science and Style, she discusses what to put first, how to quote and paraphrase in lay copy, and what to leave out.

Throughout You've Got Some Explaining to Do, Nevins gives concrete, specific examples tied to neuroscience.  The author, who served as the first editor in chief of the Dana Press, brings more than 20 years of experience in translating neuroscience to lay readers. 

"No one is better at helping one learn to write for the non-professional public, as I can personally testify, than Jane Nevins."-Nobel laureate Eric R. Kandel, M.D., Director, Kavli Institute for Brain Science, Columbia University College of Physicians and Scientists.

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