The Journey of Man

The Journey of Man
Author: Spencer Wells
Publisher: Random House
Total Pages: 230
Release: 2012-10-31
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0307830454

Around 60,000 years ago, a man—genetically identical to us—lived in Africa. Every person alive today is descended from him. How did this real-life Adam wind up as the father of us all? What happened to the descendants of other men who lived at the same time? And why, if modern humans share a single prehistoric ancestor, do we come in so many sizes, shapes, and races? Examining the hidden secrets of human evolution in our genetic code, Spencer Wells reveals how developments in the revolutionary science of population genetics have made it possible to create a family tree for the whole of humanity. Replete with marvelous anecdotes and remarkable information, from the truth about the real Adam and Eve to the way differing racial types emerged, The Journey of Man is an enthralling, epic tour through the history and development of early humankind.

Mapping the Travel Behavior Genome

Mapping the Travel Behavior Genome
Author: Konstadinos G. Goulias
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 734
Release: 2019-10-26
Genre: Transportation
ISBN: 0128173408

Mapping the Travel Behavior Genome covers the latest research on the biological, motivational, cognitive, situational, and dispositional factors that drive activity-travel behavior. Organized into three sections, Retrospective and Prospective Survey of Travel Behavior Research, New Research Methods and Findings, and Future Research, the chapters of this book provide evidence of progress made in the most recent years in four dimensions of the travel behavior genome. These dimensions are Substantive Problems, Theoretical and Conceptual Frameworks, Behavioral Measurement, and Behavioral Analysis. Including the movement of goods as well as the movement of people, the book shows how traveler values, norms, attitudes, perceptions, emotions, feelings, and constraints lead to observed behavior; how to design efficient infrastructure and services to meet tomorrow's needs for accessibility and mobility; how to assess equity and distributional justice; and how to assess and implement policies for improving sustainability and quality of life. Mapping the Travel Behavior Genome examines the paradigm shift toward more dynamic, user-centric, demand-responsive transport services, including the "sharing economy," mobility as a service, automation, and robotics. This volume provides research directions to answer behavioral questions emerging from these upheavals.

Junk DNA

Junk DNA
Author: Nessa Carey
Publisher: Icon Books
Total Pages: 376
Release: 2015-03-05
Genre: Science
ISBN: 184831826X

From the author of the acclaimed The Epigenetics Revolution (‘A book that would have had Darwin swooning’ – Guardian) comes another thrilling exploration of the cutting edge of human science. For decades after the structure of DNA was identified, scientists focused purely on genes, the regions of the genome that contain codes for the production of proteins. Other regions – 98% of the human genome – were dismissed as ‘junk’. But in recent years researchers have discovered that variations in this ‘junk’ DNA underlie many previously intractable diseases, and they can now generate new approaches to tackling them. Nessa Carey explores, for the first time for a general audience, the incredible story behind a controversy that has generated unusually vituperative public exchanges between scientists. She shows how junk DNA plays an important role in areas as diverse as genetic diseases, viral infections, sex determination in mammals, human biological complexity, disease treatments, even evolution itself – and reveals how we are only now truly unlocking its secrets, more than half a century after Crick and Watson won their Nobel prize for the discovery of the structure of DNA in 1962.

Human Genome Research

Human Genome Research
Author:
Publisher: Allied Publishers
Total Pages: 276
Release: 1999
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 9788170238621

Contributed articles presented at an "International Symposium on Human Genome Studies: Emerging Ethical and Socio-Economical Issues" during May 22-25, 1998 in Goa.

A History of Genomics across Species, Communities and Projects

A History of Genomics across Species, Communities and Projects
Author: Miguel García-Sancho
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 387
Release: 2023-03-31
Genre: Science
ISBN: 3031061306

This open access book offers a comprehensive overview of the history of genomics across three different species and four decades, from the 1980s to the recent past. It takes an inclusive approach in order to capture not only the international initiatives to map and sequence the genomes of various organisms, but also the work of smaller-scale institutions engaged in the mapping and sequencing of yeast, human and pig DNA. In doing so, the authors expand the historiographical lens of genomics from a focus on large-scale projects to other forms of organisation. They show how practices such as genome mapping, sequence assembly and annotation are as essential as DNA sequencing in the history of genomics, and argue that existing depictions of genomics are too closely associated with the Human Genome Project. Exploring the use of genomic tools by biochemists, cell biologists, and medical and agriculturally-oriented geneticists, this book portrays the history of genomics as inseparably entangled with the day-to-day practices and objectives of these communities. The authors also uncover often forgotten actors such as the European Commission, a crucial funder and forger of collaborative networks undertaking genomic projects. In examining historical trajectories across species, communities and projects, the book provides new insights on genomics, its dramatic expansion during the late twentieth-century and its developments in the twenty-first century. Offering the first extensive critical examination of the nature and historicity of reference genomes, this book demonstrates how their affordances and limitations are shaped by the involvement or absence of particular communities in their production.

From Molecular Genetics to Genomics

From Molecular Genetics to Genomics
Author: Jean-Paul Gaudillière
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2004-10-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 1134334087

With the rise of genomics, the life sciences have entered a new era. This book provides a comprehensive history of molecular genetics and genomics.

The Social Management of Genetic Engineering

The Social Management of Genetic Engineering
Author: Peter Wheale
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 313
Release: 2019-05-23
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0429752164

First published in 1998, this volume why and how genetic engineering has emerged as the technology most likely to change our lives, for better or worse, in the opening century of the third millennium. Over twenty international experts, including moral philosophers and social scientists, describe the issues and controversies surrounding modern biotechnology and genetic engineering. They explore ways in which lay individuals and groups can join in an effective and constructive dialogue with scientists and industrialists over the assessment, exploitation and safe management of these new and important technologies. Topics covered include a discussion of the issues surrounding ‘Dolly’, the cloned sheep, the politics and ethics of the international research programme to sequence the entire human genome, the ethical questions raised by the creation of transgenic farm animals, the morality of genetic experimentation on animals, the controversy surrounding the patenting of genetic material and of the transgenic animals themselves, the ethical implications of engineering animals for transplanting their organs into humans, and the environmental hazards of releasing genetically engineered organisms.

A Journey Through Genetics

A Journey Through Genetics
Author: Karobi Moitra
Publisher: Biota Publishing
Total Pages: 84
Release: 2014-10-01
Genre: Science
ISBN: 1615046631

“A Journey Through Genetics Part II” is designed to continue on the incredible journey initiated in Part I to explore the exciting discoveries in genetics and molecular biology. In Part I, the reader embarked on a genetic odyssey that started with the “Father of Genetics,” Gregor Mendel, and culminated in the invention of one of the most powerful tools in molecular biology—the polymerase chain reaction. The second part of the book will take the reader on a journey to explore the frontiers of genetic diversity, gene cloning, the human journey, and the human genome project! The book is targeted toward undergraduate non-majors and also as a “companion” to a standard genetics textbook for biology majors. The book will also prove to be useful for anyone that wants to understand the stories behind the science of genetics.

Genetic Imaginations

Genetic Imaginations
Author: Peter Glasner
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 151
Release: 2017-07-05
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1351934317

The title of this book derives from C. Wright Mills’ classic The Sociological Imagination (Penguin, 1970), in which he sees the essential project of social science as the use of the imagination to 'grasp history and biography and the relations between the two in society'. This enables the social scientist to 'range from the most impersonal and remote transformations to the most intimate features of the human self'. Another of Mills’ concerns was the relationship between 'the personal troubles of the milieu' and 'the public issues of social structure' and these are most acutely illustrated in human genetics, the most personal of the new technologies. The chapters in this volume address these issues through discussions of choice and informed decision-making, risks and hazards, the economic and political organization of new technology, and the public as well as the scientist’s understanding of science. The methods used range from detailed ethnographies, through deconstruction's of text and action, to surveys and interviews.