Showing titles in Biological Sciences

Come along with horticulturist Daniel Fuller as we enter a hidden world of horticultural, ecological and landscape gardening knowledge with featured experts, industry professionals and enthusiasts. We inform and inspire you with weekly episodes to help you become an unstoppable plant whisperer.

Combining fascinating tales of the peculiarities of memory as well as cutting-edge science, Dr Ranganath shows the surprising ways our brains record the past and how we use that information to understand who we are in the present, and to guide our futures. Memory shapes how we experience the world, and it does that in often invisible and sometimes destructive ways. Dr Ranganath argues that we can use this knowledge to make better use of our flawed memories, whether in daily tasks like finding our keys or dealing with memory loss as we age.

Australopithecines, dinosaurs, trilobites - such fossils conjure up images of lost worlds filled with vanished organisms. But in the full history of life, ancient animals, even the trilobites, form only the half-billion-year tip of a nearly four-billion-year iceberg. Andrew Knoll explores the deep history of life from its origins on a young planet to the incredible Cambrian explosion, presenting a compelling new explanation for the emergence of biological novelty.

Recent years have seen rapid advances in 'artificial' intelligence, which increasingly appears to be something stranger than we ever imagined. At the same time, we are becoming more aware of the other intelligences which have been with us all along, unrecognised. These other beings are the animals, plants and natural systems that surround us, and are slowly revealing their complexity and knowledge - just as the new technologies we've built are threatening to cause their extinction, and ours.

This memoir is soaked in the sunshine of Corfu, where Gerald Durrell lived as a boy, surrounded by his eccentric family - as well as puppies, toads, scorpions, geckoes, ladybugs, glowworms, octopuses, bats, and butterflies.

Genome unravels the secrets of human nature without the usual reams of technical jargon. It shows outstanding breakthroughs in gene research, how we've gone from knowing almost nothing to knowing almost everything, and how our genes reveal more about our past, our evolution, and even our minds. Every important event in human history is written into our genes, whether it happened four billion or a few hundred years ago. All you need to know is where to look.

The unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything, Joshua Foer's part-memoir, part-guide on mastering your memory. Read by Mike Chamberlain. On average, people squander forty days annually trying to remember things they’ve forgotten. Joshua Foer used to be one of those people. But after a year of training, he found himself in the finals of the U.S.

In this irreverent and illuminating popular science show, award-winning geneticist Dr Adam Rutherford teams up with mathematics guru Dr Hannah Fry to solve puzzling conundrums sent in by listeners. For the past five years, they've been scrutinising a cornucopia of cases using the power of science - from why people shout on their mobile phones to how much the bacteria in our body weighs. In these 50 episodes, they tackle topics including what makes gingers ginger, how to make the perfect cup of tea, whether being left-handed affects your brain and why we get static shocks.

For fans of The Lost City of Z, Walking the Amazon, and Turn Right at Machu Picchu comes naturalist and explorer Paul Rosolie’s extraordinary adventure in the uncharted tributaries of the Western Amazon - a tale of discovery that vividly captures the awe, beauty, and isolation of this endangered land and presents an impassioned call to save it.

In this fascinating and thought-provoking book, author Nick Lane brings together the latest research findings in the exciting field of mitochondria research to reveal how our growing understanding of mitochondria is shedding light on how complex life evolved, why sex arose (why don't we just bud?), and why we age and die. This understanding is of fundamental importance, both in understanding how we and all other complex life came to be, but also in order to be able to control our own illnesses, and delay our degeneration and death.

Throughout his research into memory theory, Nelson Dellis found existing memory improvement guides to be wanting - overcomplicated, dry, and stodgy. So he decided to create a book that is approachable and fun, centered on what people actually need to remember. In Remember It!, Dellis teaches us how to make the most of our memory, using his competition-winning techniques.

Aticia Grey - Teesh as she is known to friends and family - picked up her first team of kelpies in 2013 and has never looked back. In her area of rugged rangeland in West Australia's Pilbara region, mustering with aircraft, buggies and motorbikes has become the norm, alongside horses. But stepping into the world of working dogs, Teesh found herself on a roller-coaster ride of laughter, love, heartbreak - and revelation - as the economic and animal-welfare benefits of handling cattle with skilled herding dogs became clear.

The key to living a happier, healthier life is inside us. Our gut is almost as important to us as our brain or our heart, yet we know very little about how it works. In Gut, Giulia Enders shows that rather than the utilitarian and - let's be honest - somewhat embarrassing body part we imagine it to be, it is one of the most complex, important, and even miraculous parts of our anatomy.

Thinking on My Feet is an inspiring journal of walks divided into seasonal sections. Discover the joys and benefits of walking, encounters with the natural and urban world, with the familiar and strange, with animals, people and events. Kate charts her feelings and impressions throughout, capturing the perspectives that only a journey on foot allows. Find out what makes you curious, what makes something memorable.

This humbling and revelatory book shows how infectious disease has shaped humanity at every stage, from the first success of Homo sapiens over the equally intelligent Neanderthals to the fall of Rome and the rise of Islam. How did an Indonesian volcano help cause the Black Death, setting Europe on the road to capitalism? How could 168 men extract the largest ransom in history from an opposing army of eighty thousand? The latest science reveals that infectious diseases are not just something that happens to us, but a fundamental part of who we are.

In A Good Horse Is Never a Bad Color, Mark Rashid continues to share his talent for training horses through communication rather than force. Rashid uses humorous, feel-good stories to relate his techniques of teaching horses by examining their view of the world. This book is a must-have for compassionate horse trainers and owners. Tales of Arabs, appaloosas, and paints - mistrusted and mistreated because of their breed - will give listeners a new perspective on these breeds and others.

The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe is your guide through this maze of modern life. It covers essential critical thinking skills as well as giving insight into how your brain works and how to avoid common pitfalls in thinking. They discuss the difference between science and pseudoscience, how to recognise common science news tropes, how to discuss conspiracy theories with that crazy colleague of yours and how to apply all of this to everyday life. As fascinating as it is entertaining, this enthralling audiobook is your essential guide to our increasingly confusing world.

Stepping effortlessly from myth to cutting-edge science, Mutants gives a brilliant narrative account of our genetic code and the captivating people whose bodies have revealed it - a French convent girl who found herself changing sex at puberty; children who, echoing Homer's Cyclops, are born with a single eye in the middle of their foreheads; a village of long-lived Croatian dwarves; one family, whose bodies were entirely covered with hair, was kept at the Burmese royal court for four generations and gave Darwin one of his keenest insights into heredity.

Beasts in My Belfry is the wonderfully funny memoir about Gerald Durrell's time at Whipsnade Zoo and his experiences as a young zookeeper. Following the Second World War, Durrell joined Whipsnade Zoo as a junior keeper - an opportunity that fulfilled a lifelong dream. Thanks to Rupert Degas's brilliant voicing, which captures all of Durrell's charm and wit, the listener can enjoy being taken behind the scenes of one of the world's very first zoos. This is a delightful portrait of the animals who lived there and those who looked after them.

Through the moving stories of real people, neurologist Suzanne O'Sullivan explores the complex world of modern diagnosis, comparing the impact of a medical label to the pain of not knowing. With scientific authority and compassionate storytelling, she opens up new possibilities for how we might approach our health and our suffering.