Human Biological Variation

Book Description

This text explores human biological variation in its broadest sense--from the molecular to the physiological and morphological--focusing on the micro-evolutionary analysis of genetic variation among recent human populations. Authoritative yet accessible, Human Biological Variation opens with an introduction to basic genetics and the evolutionary forces that set the stage for understanding human diversity. It goes on to offer a detailed and clear discussion of molecular genetics and its uses and relationship to anthropological and evolutionary models. The text features up-to-date discussions of "classic" genetic markers (blood groups, enzymes, and proteins), along with extensive background on DNA analysis and detailed coverage of satellite DNA, single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), Alu inserts, and the coalescent model. The book addresses such current issues as the meaning and significance of "race," quantitative genetics and the "nature versus nurture" debates, biocultural interactions, population structure, and cultural and historical influences on patterns of human variation. Human Biological Variation lucidly explains the use of probability and statistics in studies of human variation and adaptation, keeping the mathematics at the level of basic algebra. It also presents computer simulations in a manner that makes complex issues easily understandable. Integrating examples on topics that are of particular interest to students--including dyslexia, IQ, and homosexuality--Human Biological Variation provides the most thorough thorough view of our biological diversity and is ideal for upper-level undergraduate and graduate classes on human adaptation and variation.

The Anthropology of Modern Human Teeth: Dental Morphology and its Variation in Recent Human Populations (Cambridge Studies in Biological and Evolutionary Anthropology)

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Here's an excellent reference book for those interested in teeth!

The Anthropology of Modern Human Teeth: Dental Morphology and its Variation in Recent Human Populations (Cambridge Studies in Biological and Evolutionary Anthropology)
G. Richard Scott , and Christy G. Turner
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0521455081

Book Description

Dental anthropologists focus on the variation around a commonly shared pattern, a variation expressed by differences in tooth size and morphology. This book centers on the morphological characteristics of tooth crowns and roots that are either present or absent in any given individual and that vary in frequency among populations. These nonmetric dental traits are controlled largely by genetic factors and provide a direct link between extinct and extant populations. The book illustrates more than thirty tooth crown and root traits and reviews their biological and genetic underpinnings. From a database of more than 30,000 individuals, the geographic variation of twenty-two crown and root traits is graphically portrayed. A global analysis of tooth morphology shows both points of agreement and disagreement with comparable analyses of genetic and craniometric data. These findings are relevant to the hotly contested issue of timing and geographic context of modern human origins.

Customer Reviews:

Here's an excellent reference book for those interested in teeth!.......2007-08-25

As a pre-dental student, I found that reading and reviewing this book was very beneficial to me. It clearly explained essential terminology and anatomical structures of each tooth in the human jaw. From this, one could understand almost every intricacy included in this book. Such fascinating information ranged from tooth and crown morphology to trait relationships and geographic variation. It also provided great background information on the inception of this valuable discipline, illustrating the research conducted by many individuals around the world along with important dates and facts. The other point I'd like to make about this book is that it identifies many new facets of research that has not yet been started, but could provide a sundry of new knowledge and practical application.

The Evolution of Modern Human Diversity: A Study of Cranial Variation (Cambridge Studies in Biological and Evolutionary Anthropology)

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Death knell to multiregionalism
it's coincident with my interests

The Evolution of Modern Human Diversity: A Study of Cranial Variation (Cambridge Studies in Biological and Evolutionary Anthropology)
Marta Mirazón Lahr
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 052102031X

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Exactly how modern humans evolved is a subject of intense debate. This book deals with the evolution of modern humans from an archaic ancestor and the differentiation of modern populations from each other. The first section of the book investigates whether modern populations arose from regional archaic hominid groups that were already different from each other, and argues that in fact, most lines of evidence support a single, recent origin of modern humans in Africa. Dr. Lahr then goes on to examine ways in which this diversification could have occurred, given what we know from fossils, archaeological remains and the relationships of existing populations today.

Customer Reviews:

Death knell to multiregionalism.......2001-02-27

Dr Lahr's book provides an excellent rebuttal to the multiregionalists who believe their work is based on the fossil evidence, while the Out-of-Africanists are concerned with "suspect" genetic data. This book demonstrates how weak the case of multiregionalism actually is.

it's coincident with my interests.......1999-12-06

i'm investigator of behavior, and personality related to craneal and facial types, my speciality is graphology and i'm correlating specific writting data with facial data in order to locate authors of anonymous and criminal writing by reading faces.

Human Variation: Races, Types, and Ethnic Groups

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Science at a low level
Human Variation and Genetics
A diverse, useful, yet disorganized work on human variation.
Ho hum textbook on what ought to be a fascinating topic

Human Variation: Races, Types, and Ethnic Groups
Stephen Molnar
Manufacturer: Prentice Hall College Div
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

ASIN: 0134461622

Book Description

Discarding the concept of race as misleading, this book examines the biological basis for human variation and biological diversity at the population level—appropriate because of the many ways in which humans can adapt to environments, organize activities, and regulate breeding behavior. It reviews the history, behavior, and demographic structure of contemporary populations, and their effects on the distribution of major genetic polymorphisms and distinctions of body form, size, and skin color. Chapter topics include racial variation and the perception of human differences, the biological basis for human variation, traits of simple inheritance, hemoglobin variants and DNA markers, traits of complex inheritance, distribution of human differences, human variability and behavior, and changing dimensions of the human species. For individuals interested in genetic science—and the recent significant achievements in this field.

Customer Reviews:

Science at a low level.......2006-03-24

I have very mixed feelings about this book. It is a good introduction to the human DNA, Chromosomes and Genes, and it is also good at showing the diversity around the world when it comes to Blood Groups, Enzymes and Hemoglobin Variants.

But Mr. Molnar is so afraid of admitting that races exists that he hides away important facts that he don't like. He strongly denies that there are different behavior among the races when the opposite actually is prooved all over. Just ask prison officers and teachers. That Negroids has up to 20 % more of the Hormone Testosterone than Whites is a so importent fact that it indeed should have been paid attention to in this book, but it is not mentioned at all! Where else than in a book like this should it have been discussed??? This high Testosterone-level makes people more aggressive and sexually active and is an importent reason for behavioral differences among the races. It explains, among many other things, the high crime-rate among Negroids (149 per 100 000 is a murder or rapist in USA), and the rellative low crime-rate among Whites (42 per 100 000 in USA) because Whites have less Testosteron. I know this is taboo, but it is altso facts that Molnar obvious hide in his book to stay politically correct.

When there are theories that not fit in with Molnar's bias, he just call them pseudo-science instead of trying to argue against it. An excample is the measure of the skulls of different races. This has been done in more than a hundred years and always brings out the same results; that Asians have biggest brains, Europeans middle, an Negroids the smallest. A hundred years with IQ-testing shows also a relationship between races concerning brain-size an intelligence. Molnar tries to cope with this by pointing to a couple of writers long time ago who had medium to small brains, and by this "argument" prove that there are no correlation with brain-size and IQ. As if there is an eternal rule that writers are more intelligent than others! This is science at a very low level. Molnar must know that the brains of two random writers from long ago can't proove anything about brain-size and IQ among races. In Norway, where I live, you have to pass an exam called Exam Philosophicum if you want to study at the university, and during The Exam Philosophicum you learn, among many other things, logical argumentation. The way Molnar argue wouldn't pass this test at all. To find out the correlation between IQ and brain-size you have to measure a lot of brains from different races. This have been done in more than a hundred years and the result are always the same: Asians have biggest brains and score highest on IQ-tests, Europeans in the middle, and Negroids at the bottom. This is well known facts, but Molnar call it pseudo-science and refuse to discuss it further. I think that is cowardly.

In the book, Molnar don't like to divide Etnic populations into races, but suddenly he finds it useable although in attacking the IQ-results of Negroids because, as he argue, there are different "races" in Africa with different mental ability, and therefore it is wrong to test all Negroes from Sub-Sahara as if they where one race. So in attacking the IQ he suddenly find it acceptable to do divide people into races nevertheles.

It is very confusing when Molnar, as an expert, try to fool the reader the way he does. But as I mentioned, the book also has it's better sides. Skip the pages about intelligence or read J. P. Rusthons book "Race, Evolution and Behavior" instead. It's a much more honest book.

Human Variation and Genetics.......2005-09-21

Molnar's book is a wonderful introduction to human genetics, variation, and racial classification (that is, race is an illusion), just as the title suggests. Parts of the book are highly involved and technical, giving both the amateur and the professional room for learning. The book would be great for undergrads and graduate students.

A diverse, useful, yet disorganized work on human variation........2003-09-05

Having survived a quarter-long course in anthropology using this as a textbook, I've acquired a pretty good feel for its strengths and its faults.

Let's start with the latter and work toward the former. What will bother most people is the occasionally lacking organization/illustration of the subject matter. While this is fine in a college environment, the layman can easily get lost in its pages. The chapters were probably practical enough from the author's perspective, the bulk going from one "racial" feature to another and exposing the actual evolutionary roots, but I would have liked more theoretical continuity.

Also, despite the mass of excellent data, the book lacks a proper genetic analysis of human variation. Research has given us an idea of how far various conventional "groups" are from each other, genetically speaking--sometimes in direct contravention to the expected associations. This sort of analysis is elementary to tracking our remarkable journey into the far reaches of the world, and should not be omitted in a text that considers what happened in the process.

As an extension of my first complaint, it's the lack of theoretical perspective which makes "A reader's" review possible. Had the author made the meta-scientific point of race being an irrelevant construct, my fellow reviewer would not have spoken of "...the big *racial* differences in size, speed, leaping ability, and muscularity...," since there are quite valid selective factors behind such variation, independent of any perceived "race." To Molnar's credit, he *does* take a look at stature in its evolutionary context. In any case, one must not turn "a feature present in people seen as belonging to a race" into "a racial feature." Accordingly, Molnar should have noted the inherent logical circularity of racial distinctions: Races are defined by certain features, and those features are racial because they define races. How do they define races? Because races have them. What defines a race? Those features. It is our perceptual emphasis on apparent differences that creates racial categories, and only secondarily do some intrepid pseudo-scientists attempt to provide a more sophisticated academic "justification" of those categories. This book is rife with detailed information to use against these sorts, but it helps to grasp the bigger picture in advance.

Ultimately, Molnar fails to ask a rather philosophical question: What makes a category scientifically real? If you're going to say that races don't really "exist," the standard of existence must be made explicit. The short answer is that things are scientifically real insofar as they fit into science's theoretical machine; in this case, evolutionary theory and its applications. The concept of distinct "races" arose in less enlightened times, and it is thus incommensurable with the language of modern biology. Science has no use for it, since, functionally, there is only the genetic paint of human inheritance spread over a geographical canvas, tinted by natural selection. Internally, there is no way to rigidly divide the resulting image, since one shade blends into another through space and time; externally, the substrate and the tint are often indistinguishable. Does the blending occur in more or less dramatic ways? Certainly. However, as Molnar amply illustrates, there are no simple *primary* colors in human variation (save Homo sapiens sapiens itself), and the belief that they do exist overlooks a complex history of inheritance and selection. As a result, attributing features to those "colors" is scientifically sloppy, and socially sloppy as well. "Black" Entertainment Television, "Black" crime, "Black" culture, "Black" poverty, "Black" genetic resistance to disease: Some forget the generality of racial terms, and all hide the functional factors, be they cultural, historical, selective or deeply hereditary. Race is the ultimate red herring, and Molnar should have made that explicit. Intelligent readers will find that his data can speak for itself, or at least it will help the reader recognize that understanding can only be found in that data, which, taken unto itself, contains no meta-categories.

All in all, "Human Variation, Races, Types, and Ethnic Groups" is best seen as the educated man's reference book on race, for use in illustrating your own arguments. If you're seeking a guided journey through the subject, look elsewhere.

Ho hum textbook on what ought to be a fascinating topic.......1998-10-09

Everybody is supposed to "celebrate diversity" these days, but in practice that seems to mean stomping on anybody who actually want to do it. Few things are less welcome these days in American academia than a discussion of what we all see as we walk down the street each day: the remarkable biodiversity of the human species. Only a few selectively bred species like dogs exceed humans in variability of size, color, and temperment.

This textbook reviews most of the duller, politically less incendiary topics in human biodiversity: e.g., blood types, sickle cell genes for preventing malaria, and high-altitude adjustments. He shies away from the more fun topics like the big racial differences in size, speed, leaping ability, and muscularity, which we all see so vividly illustrated in the Olympics and in American pro sports. (What are all those huge Samoans doing in the NFL if human biodiversity doesn't matter much?) And, to prove that his heart is in the right place politically, Molnar mails in a pro forma denunciation of Arthur Jensen and the other Bell Curvers. Ho hum.

Book Description

Plasticity refers to the ability of many organisms to change their biology or behavior to respond to changes in the environment. Humans are probably the most plastic of all species, and hence the most variable. This is the first book to examine the history of research in this area and it provides information on state-of-the-art research methods and discoveries. It also maps out some areas of future research in human plasticity and variability. Topics discussed include child growth, starvation, diseases of both young and old, and the effects of migration, modernization and other life-style changes. The book will be especially useful to biological anthropologists, human biologists and medical scientists interested in knowing more about how and why humans vary.

Genetic Variation and Human Disease: Principles and Evolutionary Approaches (Cambridge Studies in Biological and Evolutionary Anthropology)

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Genetic Variation and Human Disease: Principles and Evolutionary Approaches (Cambridge Studies in Biological and Evolutionary Anthropology)
Kenneth M. Weiss
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0521336600

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Modern laboratory and computing advances have made it possible to identify which genes are responsible for a disease (or other biological traits) and to identify those genes. This book presents a survey of the methods that are being used to generate these successes, especially to study disease in families. The methods of epidemiology and genetics are surveyed, and related to molecular genetic data, with examples from both pediatric and chronic disease. The pattern of variation that has been found is best understood from the evolutionary perspective. Because these methods and ideas apply to any biological trait, not just to disease, this is a general book about the genetic control of biological traits.

The Value of Life: Biological Diversity And Human Society

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Comprehensive Intro. of Biodiversity and Human Interference

The Value of Life: Biological Diversity And Human Society
Stephen R. Kellert
Manufacturer: Island Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1559633174

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The Value of Life is an exploration of the actual and perceived importance of biological diversity for human beings and society. Stephen R. Kellert identifies ten basic values, which he describes as biologically based inherent human tendencies that are greatly influenced and moderated by culture, learning, and experience. Drawing on twenty years of original research, he considers:

the universal basis for how humans value nature
differences in those values by gender, age, ethnicity, occupation, and geographic location
how environment-related activities affect values
variation in values relating to different species
how vlaues vary across cultures
policy and management implications

Throughout the book, Kellert argues that the preservation of biodiversity is fundamentally linked to human well-being in the largest sense as he illustrates the importance of biological diversity to the human sociocultural and psychological condition.

Customer Reviews:

Comprehensive Intro. of Biodiversity and Human Interference.......2000-06-15

Kellert does a wonderful job of carefully exploring how humans define and perceive nature, respective of their cultural backgrounds, gender, economic status, et. al. His study, one that took a couple of decades to accomplish, provides readers with an abundance of information about bioligical diversity, ideas about biophilia, and ways in which we can lessen our destructive impact on the natural world.

His discussion of the history, effectiveness, and ineffectiveness of the Endangered Species Act (one of the strongest sections of the book)is especially revealing in regard to problems that are encountered yearly in the environmental movement. One of Kellert's main organzing ideas is that we need to stop looking at biological diversity in purely economic terms. His research intimates that this mindset is changing, but it could be way too late.

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For centuries, links between biology and behavior have been mined for ammunition in the gender wars. Western science has often tainted the discussion by skewing the norm toward men so that the biological underpinnings of their weaknesses and strengths are applauded while those of women are denigrated. Sex on the Brain is a chatty, fairly evenhanded report on a broad range of animal and human studies intended to provide insight into hot-button issues such as aggression, nurturing behavior, infidelity, homosexuality, hormonal drives, and sexual signals. According to one researcher, "We inherit the behavior essentially of our past." Morning sickness, for example, which steers some women away from strong tastes and smells, may once have protected babes in utero from toxic items. Infidelity is a way for men to ensure genetic immortality. Interestingly, when we deliberately change sex-role behavior--say men become more nurturing or women more aggressive--our hormones and even our brains respond by changing, too.

Book Description

Go beyond the headlines and the hype to get the newest findings in the burgeoning field of gender studies. Drawing on disciplines that include evolutionary science, anthropology, animal behavior, neuroscience, psychology, and endocrinology, Deborah Blum explores matters ranging from the link between immunology and sex to male/female gossip styles. The results are intriguing, startling, and often very amusing. For instance, did you know that. . .
*Male testosterone levels drop in happy marriages; scientists speculate that women may use monogamy to control male behavior
*Young female children who are in day-care are apt to be more secure than those kept at home; young male children less so
*Anthropologists classify Western societies as "mildly polygamous" The Los Angeles Times has called Sex on the Brain "superbly crafted science writing, graced by unusual compassion, wit, and intelligence, that forms an important addition to the literature of gender studies."

Customer Reviews:

Definitely not a tight plot.......2005-06-26

Deborah Blum was "raised in one of those university-based, liberal-elite families" and as such, was raised to believe that there were no differences between men and women. It wasn't until she had her own career, a husband, and two boys that she actually realized there were basic biological differences between male and female behaviour. Her son was playing dinosaur and "I looked down at him one day as he was snarling around my feet and doing his toddler best to gnaw off my right leg, and I thought, This is not a girl thing-- this goes deeper than culture."

So begins her book. Much of the evidence that is presented is done as studies of sex in other animals (the birds and the monkeys- yes, literally) and her lines of reasoning as to "how this happened" are based along lines of possible biological evolutional forces- things that she admits are really little more than educated guesses dressed up as theories.

The chapter on the differences between male and female brains was interesting in that she spent about 90% of the time either denying the validity of the studies or minimizing the verified physical results. (Sure, that spot is bigger, but we don't know that it does anything.)

Occasionally, you come across a gem of the absurd. This one is a good example:

"One leading French scientist of the nineteenth century sought to prove the existence and potency of this magical male stuff [testosterone] by injecting himself with pureed dog testes. He insisted that the extract boosted his energy and sex drive and enabled him to pee in a higher arc, a major issue for men, obviously, in contrast to women." (pg. 158, beginning of chapter six)

She is quite open and forthright about her own left of center feminist viewpoint on the whole subject, and freely gives her opinion on what she WANTS to be true (and making it clear that it IS her opinion).

One basic concept to follow underneath it all is that if evolution has made us "this way" (biologically), there is no reason to conclude that it has stopped now... and since we have the ability to change our culture, we may tap into evolutionary pressures to change the biology of our race in regards to the basic makeup of our sexes. At the end of the book, she admits she has no idea if this is really possible, but it's obvious that she feels it certainly ought to be. Given her basic premises, it is a logical conclusion. If you look at the past as having created this current biology from something else, why should the process stop now?

But to sum it up, I have to agree with the comments about tediousness, in particular towards the end. The last third or so of the book was read simply so I could be satisfied that I had read it, not because it still had my riveted and interested attention. It would have benefited either from a better organization of the material into a coherent overall development (aka a plot, if this were fiction) or of simply dropping the last third of the book.

dont let this one be your first read.......2005-06-04

Having read six books on this exact subject in the past week, I feel information is poorly presented in this one. Sometimes misleading, and sometimes even contradictory.

I highly suggest that you read other books and/or papers on the subject before braving this one. Even then, take this read with a grain of agenda-salt.

Journalistic not scientific.......2005-03-11

Blum's style is horrendous. She traipses from one anecdote about her son to the findings of scientists she has interviewed without the blink of an eye. She does not so much advance arguments or conclusions as much as merely advance dumbed-down versions of scientific studies. Matters such as which questions underlie the research and what the research reveals are interspersed with bad puns and Blum's own opinion as to whether something is insulting or disgusting. Her attempts to lighten the fare are patronizing and distracting.

She wrote way too much about non-humans. This or that primate species is simply not the human species. The differences between them are so great that their relevance for the human species does not seem to be established.

Most of the research she chose was physiological, behavioral, and anthropological. Evolutionary biology (a.k.a. sociobiology) gets only occasional treatment, despite its recent progress in explaining male and female differences.

Note also that the book was published in 1997. I write in 2005, so the book is eight years old. Try to find something more up to date on the subject.

Overall, the book's faults can most easily be attributed to the fact that the author is a journalist and not a scientist. She sarificed too much to appealing to the general readership and is not well-schooled in the science of human sex differences herself.

sex on whose brain?.......2005-02-07

I gave this one one star, but it might rate two. If you're looking for a chatty, rambling, disorganized treatise on gender and biology, and think that you can really learn something valuable about humans from the animal kingdom, then this book is for you. I bought this book because I thought it was going to be about the brain. It's more about gender behavior. You're left to draw you own concllusions about what's going on in the brain. There's gotta be a better book than this.

Tedious.......2004-05-18

It as only recently I was aware that Deborah Blum had written a book called the Monkey Wars, about the animal rights/ vivisectionist's debate. I was not aware of that previous book whist I was reading this one. But it comes to no surprise, that her obvious slant or justification would be on the vivisectionist side. Again I read Sex on The Brain without any prior knowledge of her other writings. The first three chapters relating to hormonal, and testosterone and oestrogen studies, and female male brain size - involved nearly every page describing how cats, monkeys, and rodents had been sliced up, been castrated, cells extracted, brought up in cruel studies (ie cat forced to never see daylight). To access a possible link to human equivalent mind and hormonal changes, ie brain size observation, and testosterone and hormonal levels changes. But as any advocate of valid and proper testing would argue, that animal testing is unnecessary and cruel and non conclusive. Within the first two chapters from pages 18 to 63, she trys to convince the reader that there is some validity in accessing mood changes and brain changes from animal testing (and applying to human brains) - but fails to but conclude the chapter with, and I quote " The contrast (human brains) are too tiny and still far too mysterious". Point one for anti vivisectionist's argument

Sex on the Brain is a tedious book, with an arduous writing style. There are however some interesting points raised in the book, regarding male aggression, risk taking and cognitive skills of both men and women. Unfortunately they end up contradiction each other. Yes men are aggressive due to high levels of testosterone, but female chimpanzees are just as aggressive. Deborah Blum doesn't really explain in detail the correlation to human aggression, and why men and women share similarities.
I found segments in the book that talked about risk taking and why men and women are different in that sense, but it came across in somewhat of sexist overtone. That men take unnecessary risks and women sit and ponder a collective solution - which is? Never explained in any biological sense. The questions would be asked, why do huge portions of women smoke cigarettes, and take unnecessary risks to their own health. How does it differ from male posturing in regards to male personal risk, ie drinking, excess etc. Or biologically does it assume that we take the risk to show some social adequacy?

Also other confusing segments in the book regarding male female attraction, eg women choose men on immune systems similar to them, through possible similarities in appearance. Yet early stages in the book describe how it would be wise for a evolving specie (humans) to mix up their genes, to create stronger offspring. Indifference, not a similarity. So what is it?
Sex on Brain also doesn't go into enough detail research on cultural influence and evolution, in which cultural influence has far out weighed evolution biology, consider the declining western birth rates, women are now having children into their 30's, increasing the risk of down syndrome.

Book Description

The health of a population is most accurately reflected in the rate of growth of its children. This theme, prevalent in this book, underlies the analysis and presentation of what is by far the largest compilation of growth data ever assembled in one source. The first edition, published in 1976, included all known reliable recent results on height, weight, skinfolds, and other body measurements from all parts of the globe. In this edition, numerous subsequent measurements taken between 1976 and 1988 have been included, as well as the results of a large number of new studies made on rate of maturation as evinced by bone age and pubertal development stages. Many sections of the book dwell on disentangling the effects of the environment and heredity on growth, and attempt to answer the question of whether one universal standard suffices for all peoples of the world or whether different populations (such as races or nations) should each have their own optimal growth standards.

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Biodiversity and Human Health

Manufacturer: Island Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1559635002

Book Description

The implications of biodiversity loss for the global environment have been widely discussed, but only recently has attention been paid to its direct and serious effects on human health. Biodiversity loss affects the spread of human diseases, causes a loss of medical models, diminishes the supplies of raw materials for drug discovery and biotechnology, and threatens food production and water quality.

Biodiversity and Human Health brings together leading thinkers on the global environment and biomedicine to explore the human health consequences of the loss of biological diversity. Based on a two-day conference sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and the Smithsonian Institution, the book opens a dialogue among experts from the fields of public health, biology, epidemiology, botany, ecology, demography, and pharmacology on this vital but often neglected concern.

Contributors discuss the uses and significance of biodiversity to the practice of medicine today, and develop strategies for conservation of these critical resources. Topics examined include:

the causes and consequences of biodiversity loss
emerging infectious diseases and the loss of biodiversity
the significance and use of both prescription and herbal biodiversity-derived remedies
indigenous and local peoples and their health care systems
sustainable use of biodiversity for medicine
an agenda for the future

In addition to the editors, contributors include Anthony Artuso, Byron Bailey, Jensa Bell, Bhaswati Bhattacharya, Michael Boyd, Mary S. Campbell, Eric Chivian, Paul Cox, Gordon Cragg, Andrew Dobson, Kate Duffy-Mazan, Robert Engelman, Paul Epstein, Alexandra S. Fairfield, John Grupenhoff, Daniel Janzen, Catherine A. Laughin, Katy Moran, Robert McCaleb, Thomas Mays, David Newman, Charles Peters, Walter Reid, and John Vandermeer.

The book provides a common framework for physicians and biomedical researchers who wish to learn more about environmental concerns, and for members of the environmental community who desire a greater understanding of biomedical issues.

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