The collision of the Indian and Eurasian plates around fifty million years ago profoundly altered earth's geography and regional climates. The rise of the Himalaya led to intensification of the monsoon, the birth of massive glaciers and turbulent rivers, and an efflorescence of ecosystems along the most extreme elevational gradient on Earth. When the Ice Age ended, humans became part of this mix, and today nearly one quarter of the world's population inhabits its river basins, from Afghanistan to Myanmar. Life in the Himalaya examines the region's geophysical and biological systems and explores the past and future of human sustainability in the mountain's shadow. Maharaj Pandit divides the Himalaya's history into four phases. During the first, the mountain and its ecosystems formed. In the second, humans altered the landscape, beginning with nomadic pastoralism, continuing to commercial deforestation, and culminating in pockets of resistance to forest exploitation. The third phase saw a human population explosion, accompanied by road and dam building and other large-scale infrastructure that degraded ecosystems and caused species extinctions. Pandit outlines a future networking phase which holds the promise of sustainable living within the mountain's carrying capacity. Today, the Himalaya is threatened by recurrent natural disasters and is at risk of catastrophic loss of life. If humans are to have a sustainable future there, Pandit argues, they will need to better understand the region's geological vulnerability, ecological fragility, and sociocultural sensitivity. Life in the Himalaya outlines the mountain's past in order to map a way forward.

A modern approach to understanding the evolution and diversification of land plants, one of the most exciting areas of plant systematics. It consists of three sections - origin and diversification of primitive land plants; origin and diversification of angiosperms; speciation and mechanisms of diversification - each section corresponding to a major area in plant evolution. In each case, data from molecular, morphological, and paleontological approaches are presented, backed by recent progress and new findings, together with proposals for future research. A guide to the latest in plant systematics, heightening awareness of prospective future problems.

This book presents modern approaches for understanding the evolution and diversification of land plants, one of the most exciting areas of plant systematics. It consists of three sections: origin and diversification of primitive land plants; origin and diversification of angiosperms; speciation and mechanisms of diversification. These sections correspond to the three major areas in the evolution of plants. In each section, data from molecular, morphological, and paleontological approaches are presented. Each author introduces recent progress and new findings, and proposes future research. For example, the morphological evolution of reproductive organs, or flowers in angiosperms, is now being clarified from the molecular genetic point of view through the study of regulatory genes such as MADS gene family. With this book, readers can readily understand the state-of-the-art in plant systematics and become aware of prospective future problems.

Long acclaimed as the definitive introductory botany text, Raven Biology of Plants stands as the most significant revision in the book's history. Every topic was updated with information obtained from the most recent primary literature, making the book valuable for both students and professionals. This textbook is available with LaunchPad. LaunchPad combines an interactive ebook with high-quality multimedia content and ready-made assessment options, including LearningCurve adaptive quizzing. See `Instructor Resources' and `Student Resources' for further information.

This timely collection of 15 original essays written by expert scientists the world over addresses the relationships between human population growth, the need to increase food supplies to feed the world population, and the chances for avoiding the extinction of a major proportion of the world's plant and animal species that collectively makes our survival on earth possible. These relationships are highly intertwined, and changes in each of them are increasingly decreasing humankind's chances to achieve environmental stability on our fragile planet. The world population is projected to be nine to ten billion by 2050, signaling the need to increase world food production by more than 70 percent on the same amount of land currently under production-and this without further damaging our fragile environment. The essays in this collection, written by experts for laypersons, presents the problems we face with clarity and assess our prospects for solving them, calling for action but holding out viable solutions.

How can environmental degradation be stopped? How can it be reversed? And how can the damage already done be repaired? The authors of this volume argue that a two-pronged approach is needed: reducing demand for ecosystem goods and services and better management of them, coupled with an increase in supply through environmental restoration."Restoring Natural Capital" brings together economists and ecologists, theoreticians, practitioners, policy makers, and scientists from the developed and developing worlds to consider the costs and benefits of repairing ecosystem goods and services in natural and socioecological systems. It examines the business and practice of restoring natural capital, and seeks to establish common ground between economists and ecologists with respect to the restoration of degraded ecosystems and landscapes and the still broader task of restoring natural capital. The book focuses on developing strategies that can achieve the best outcomes in the shortest amount of time as it: considers conceptual and theoretical issues from both an economic and ecological perspective examines specific strategies to foster the restoration of natural capital and offers a synthesis and a vision of the way forwardNineteen case studies from around the world illustrate challenges and achievements in setting targets, refining approaches to finding and implementing restoration projects, and using restoration of natural capital as an economic opportunity. Throughout, contributors make the case that the restoration of natural capital requires close collaboration among scientists from across disciplines as well as local people, and when successfully executed represents a practical, realistic, and essential tool for achieving lasting sustainable development."

Faced with widespread and devastating loss of biodiversity in wild habitats, scientists have developed innovative strategies for studying and protecting targeted plant and animal species in "off-site" facilities such as botanic gardens and zoos. Such ex situ work is an increasingly important component of conservation and restoration efforts.
Ex Situ Plant Conservation, edited by Edward O. Guerrant Jr., Kayri Havens, and Mike Maunder, is the first book to address integrated plant conservation strategies and to examine the scientific, technical, and strategic bases of the ex situ approach. The book examines where and how ex situ investment can best support in situ conservation. Ex Situ Plant Conservation outlines the role, value, and limits of ex situ conservation as well as updating best management practices for the field, and is an invaluable resource for plant conservation practitioners at botanic gardens, zoos, and other conservation organizations; students and faculty in conservation biology and related fields; managers of protected areas and other public and private lands; and policymakers and members of the international community concerned with species conservation.

It has long been recognized that plants and animals profoundly affect one another's characteristics during the course of evolution. However, the importance of coevolution as a dynamic process involving such diverse factors as chemical communication, population structure and dynamics, energetics, and the evolution, structure, and functioning of ecosystems has been widely recognized for a comparatively short time. Coevolution represents a point of view about the structure of nature that only began to be fully explored in the late twentieth century. The papers presented here herald its emergence as an important and promising field of biological research. Coevolution of Animals and Plants is the first book to focus on the dynamic aspects of animal-plant coevolution. It covers, as broadly as possible, all the ways in which plants interact with animals. Thus, it includes discussions of leaf-feeding animals and their impact on plant evolution as well as of predator-prey relationships involving the seeds of angiosperms. Several papers deal with the most familiar aspect of mutualistic plant-animal interactions-pollination relationships. The interactions of orchids and bees, ants and plants, and butterflies and plants are discussed. One article provides a fascinating example of more indirect relationships centered around the role of carotenoids, which are produced by plants but play a fundamental part in the visual systems of both plants and animals. Coevolution of Animals and Plants provides a general conceptual framework for studies on animal-plant interaction. The papers are written from a theoretical, rather than a speculative, standpoint, stressing patterns that can be applied in a broader sense to relationships within ecosystems. Contributors to the volume include Paul Feeny, Miriam Rothschild, Christopher Smith, Brian Hocking, Lawrence Gilbert, Calaway Dodson, Herbert Baker, Bernd Heinrich, Doyle McKey, and Gordon Frankie.

From earliest times, human beings have noticed patterns in nature: night and day, tides and lunar cycles, the changing seasons, plant succession, and animal migration. While recognizing patterns conferred great survival advantage, we are now in danger from our own success in multiplying our numbers and altering those patterns for our own purposes. It is imperative that we engage again with the patterns of nature, but this time, with awareness of our impact as a species. How will burgeoning human populations affect the health of ecosystems? Is loss of species simply a regrettable byproduct of human expansion? Or is the planet passing into a new epoch in just a few human generations? Nature and Human Society presents a wide-ranging exploration of these and other fundamental questions about our relationship with the environment. This book features findings, insights, and informed speculations from key figures in the field: E.O. Wilson, Thomas Lovejoy, Peter H. Raven, Gretchen Daily, David Suzuki, Norman Myers, Paul Erlich, Michael Bean, and many others. This volume explores the accelerated extinction of species and what we stand to lose?medicines, energy sources, crop pollination and pest control, the ability of water and soil to renew itself through biological processes, aesthetic and recreational benefits?and how these losses may be felt locally and acutely. What are the specific threats to biodiversity? The book explores human population growth, the homogenization of biota as a result in tourism and trade, and other factors, including the social influences of law, religious belief, and public education. Do we have the tools to protect biodiversity? The book looks at molecular genetics, satellite data, tools borrowed from medicine, and other scientific techniques to firm up our grasp of important processes in biology and earth science, including the "new" science of conservation biology. Nature and Human Society helps us renew our understanding and appreciation for natural patterns, with surprising details about microorganisms, nematodes, and other overlooked forms of life: their numbers, pervasiveness, and importance to the health of the soil, water, and air and to a host of human endeavors. This book will be of value to anyone who believes that the world's gross natural product is as important as the world's gross national product. Table of Contents Front Matter Introduction Part 1 Defining Biodiversity Barriers to Perception: From a World of Interconnection to Fragmentation The Creation of Biodiversity The Dimensions of Life on Earth The Sixth Extinction: How Large, Where, and When? The Meaning of Biodiversity Loss The Loss of Population Diversity and Why It Matters Keeping a Finger on the Pulse of Marine Biodiversity: How Healthy Is It? Countryside Biogeography and the Provision of Ecosystem Services Part 2 Less Well-Known Individual Forms of Life Microbial Diversity and the Biosphere Biodiversity, Classification, and Numbers of Species of Protists Estimating the Extent of Fungal Diversity in the Tropics Nematodes: Pervading the Earth and Linking All Life Global Diversity of Mites Biodiversity of Terrestrial Invertebrates in Tropical Africa: Assessing the Needs and Plan of Action Global Diversity of Insects: The Problems of Estimating Numbers Part 3 The Role of the Group in Biodiversity The World Beneath Our Feet: Soil Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning Natural Investment in Diversity: The Role of Biological Communities in Soil Part 4 Means to Measure Biodiversity Conservation Biology and the Preservation of Biodiversity: An Assessment Conservation Genetics: Applying Molecular Methods to Maximize the Conservation of Taxonomic and Genetic Diversity Application of Geospatial Information for Identifying Priority Areas for Biodiversity Conservation Hawaii Biological Survey: Museum Resources in Support of Conservation Building the Next-Generation Biological-Information Infrastructure Part 5 Threats to Sustainability Nature Displaced: Human Population Trends and Projections and Their Meanings Population Growth, Sustainable Development, and the Environment Nonindigenous Species - A Global Threat to Biodiversity and Stability Part 6 Infrastructure for Sustaining Biodiversity - Science Science and the Public Trust in a Full World: Function and Dysfunction in Science and the Biosphere The Response of the International Scientific Community to the Challenge of Biodiversity The Millennium Seed Bank at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew Charting the Biosphere: Building Global Capacity for Systematics Science Science and Technology in the Convention on Biological Diversity Ecology and the Knowledge Revolution Part 7 Infrastructure for Sustaining Biodiversity - Society Biodiversity: A World Bank Perspective Creating Cultural Diversity: Tropical Forests Transformed Endangered Plants, Vanishing Cultures: Ethnobotany and Conservation Religion and Sustainability Reaching the Public: The Challenge of Communicating Biodiversity Center for Environmental Research and Conservation (CERC): A New Multi-Institutional Partnership to Prepare the Next Generation of Environmental Leaders Natural Capitalism Part 8 Infrastructure for Sustaining Biodiversity - Policy Liking Science and Policy: A Research Agenda for Colombian Biodiversity Sustainability and the Law: An Assessment of the Endangered Species Act Government Policy and Sustainability of Biodiversity in Costa Rica National Security, National Interest, and Sustainability Biodiversity and Organizing for Sustainability in the United States Government Part 9 Examples of Sustainability How to Grow a Wildland: The Gardenification of Nature Measures to Conserve Biodiversity in Sustainable Forestry: The Ro Cndor Project Chemical Prospecting: The New Natural History Conservation Medicine: An Emerging Field How Countries with Limited Resources are Dealing with Biodiversity Problems Biodiversity and Sustainable Human Development: The Costa Rican Agenda The National Biodiversity Information System of Mexico Community Involvement and Sustainability: The Malpai Borderlands Effort Index

More than eighty years ago, before we knew much about the structure of cells, Russian botanist Boris Kozo-Polyansky brilliantly outlined the concept of symbiogenesis, the symbiotic origin of cells with nuclei. It was a half-century later, only when experimental approaches that Kozo-Polyansky lacked were applied to his hypotheses, that scientists began to accept his view that symbiogenesis could be united with Darwin's concept of natural selection to explain the evolution of life. After decades of neglect, ridicule, and intellectual abuse, Kozo-Polyansky's ideas are now endorsed by virtually all biologists.

Kozo-Polyansky's seminal work is presented here for the first time in an outstanding annotated translation, updated with commentaries, references, and modern micrographs of symbiotic phenomena.

What is the origin of the universe? How did life appear on Earth and why was much of that life destroyed at various times in Earth's history? In this book four noted scientists-physicist Alan H. Guth, astronomer George Wetherill, biologist Lynn Margulis, and paeleobiologist David Raup- propose answers to these questions, discussing the newest developments in some exciting areas of current research. "Comprises four excellent essays. . . . The authors of this book seek to elucidate the remote, unusual events that most influenced the history of the cosmos and the earth. They describe alternative models and the evidence on which these models are based."-Laurie R. Godfrey, Science Books and Films "For a scientist who specializes in cosmology and earth history, this book is a worthwhile documentation of the opinions of four very different scientists."-G. Ledyard Stebbins, BioScience "Beginning with a tracing of the universe back to its beginnings, this fascinating little book presents the current state of knowledge and recent theories relating to the origins of the universe, our earth and life on earth. The last chapter explores extinction in our geologic past. Written by distinguished scientists, all papers attempt to establish patterns that may characterize other planets as well as our own."-New Technical Books