By the award-winning author of A (Very) Short History of Life on Earth: a history of humanity on the brink of decline.A Next Big Idea Club Must-Read SelectionWe are living through a period that is unique in human history. For the first time in more than ten thousand years, the rate of human population growth is slowing down. In the middle of this century population growth will stop, and the number of people on Earth will start to d...

**The Royal Society's Science Book of the Year"[A]n exuberant romp through evolution, like a modern-day Willy Wonka of genetic space. Gee’s grand tour enthusiastically details the narrative underlying life’s erratic and often whimsical exploration of biological form and function.” —Adrian Woolfson,**The Washington PostIn the tradition of Richard Dawkins, Bill Bryson, and Simon Winchester—An entertaining and uniquel...

For billions of years, Earth was an inhospitably alien place – covered with churning seas, slowly crafting its landscape by way of incessant volcanic eruptions, the atmosphere in a constant state of chemical flux. And yet, despite facing literally every conceivable setback that living organisms could encounter, life has been extinguished and picked itself up to evolve again. Life has learned and adapted and continued through the billions of years that followed. It has weathered fire and ic...

This book brings together 97 short stories that seek to answer the question 'what will the future look like?' First published in the leading science journal Nature, these 900-word tales come from scientists, journalists and many of the most famous SF writers in the world.Initially published in book form as Futures from Nature, this is the first time this collection has been available as an eBook. A unique blend of satires, vignettes, fictional book reviews, science...

"With a delightfully irascible sense of humor, Henry Gee reflects on our origin . . . an excellent primer on how—and how not—to think about human evolution." —Carl Zimmer, author of Parasite RexThe idea of a missing link between humanity and our animal ancestors predates evolution and popular science and actually has religious roots in the deist concept of the Great Chain of Being. Yet, the metaphor has lodged itself in the contemporary imagination, and new...

One hundred writers - including Neal Asher, Elizabeth Bear, Gregory Benford, Tobias Buckell, Brenda Cooper, Kathryn Cramer, David Langford, Tanith Lee, Ken Liu, Nick Mamatas, Norman Spinrad, Ian Stewart, Rachel Swirsky, Adrian Tchaikovsky and Ian Watson - offer their take on what the future will look like in Nature Futures 2, an anthology of sci-fi short stories from the award-winning Futures column in the science journal Nature.

"Addresses an important topic for biologists and zoologists about vertebrates' place in the 'grand scheme' . . . genuinely witty and charming . . . magnificent." —Neil J. Gostling, University of SouthamptonOur understanding of vertebrate origins and the backbone of human history evolves with each new fossil find and DNA map. Many species have now had their genomes sequenced, and molecular techniques allow genetic inspection of even non-model organisms. But as longti...

Discover the story of life on our planet as you have never seen it before! The perfect gift for the curious of any age.From the first tiny bubbles of life in the ocean to the arrival of endlessly adaptable apes, this is the ultimate survival story.In 30 bite-size chapters, Nature editor and author of the award-winning A (Very) Short History of Life on Earth, Henry Gee tells the incredible, unlikely story of life on our planet, with vibrant colour i...

Discover the story of life on our planet as you have never seen it before! The perfect gift for the curious of any age.From the first tiny bubbles of life in the ocean to the arrival of endlessly adaptable apes, this is the ultimate survival story.In 30 bite-size chapters, Nature editor and author of the award-winning A (Very) Short History of Life on Earth, Henry Gee tells the incredible, unlikely story of life on our planet, with vibrant colour i...

A marvellously engaging writer' – The TimesFrom the winner of the 2022 Royal Society Science Book Prize, a thrilling and thought-provoking account of the rise and fall of humankind.For the first time in over ten millennia, the rate of human population growth is slowing down. The global population is forecast to begin declining in the second half of this century, and in 10,000 years’ time, our species will likely be extinct.In The Decline and Fall of the...

What makes us as humans all alike and yet as individuals so different?Jacob's Ladder delivers a remarkably lucid explanation of what the sequencing of the human genome really tells us. Decoding the sequence, evolutionary biologist Henry Gee shows, is just the beginning: seeing the letters and words. The next frontier is in understanding snatches of conversation between genes—how they interact to direct the growth of an organism. Gee takes us into the heart...

The Royal Society's Science Book of the Year"...Henry Gee presents a pithy, fascinating account of the stages of biological evolution. He's a deliberate, engaged narrator whose slow pacing will require adaptation. This and creative background music and sound effects (dinosaur sounds?) create a meditative and friendly listening experience. From spineless water creatures and egg-laying reptiles to mammals and the great apes, the concise details assoc...