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The Music of Life Biology beyond the Genome

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Life Sciences - General Issues

Philosophy

Physiology

The Music of Life

Biology beyond the Genome

Denis Noble

168 pages | 7 figures | 196x129mm

978-0-19-929573-9 | Hardback | 08 June 2006

Also available as: Paperback

Price: £23.00

This item is printed to order. Items which are printed to order are normally despatched and charged within 5-10 days.

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Tackles how biologists should seek to understand life itself. There are no simple answers, but this book is likely both to enchant and provoke the reader.
This short, personal, and lyrical essay uses the metaphor of music to present a 'systems biology' view of life.
Urges a change in the way we think about life - can be considered an equivalent to Erwin Schrodinger's classic 1944 essay 'What is Life?' , for the post-human genome project age.

What is Life? Decades of research have resulted in the full mapping of the human genome - three billion pairs of code whose functions are only now being understood. The gene's eye view of life, advocated by evolutionary biology, sees living bodies as mere vehicles for the replication of the genetic codes.

But for a physiologist, working with the living organism, the view is a very different one. Denis Noble is a world renowned physiologist, and sets out an alternative view to the question - one that becomes deeply significant in terms of the living, breathing organism. The genome is not life itself. Noble argues that far from genes building organisms, they should be seen as prisoners of the organism.

The view of life presented in this little, modern, post-genome project reflection on the nature of life, is that of the systems biologist: to understand what life is, we must view it at a variety of different levels, all interacting with each other in a complex web. It is that emergent web, full of feedback between levels, from the gene to the wider environment, that is life. It is a kind of music.

Including stories from Noble's own research experience, his work on the heartbeat, musical metaphors, and elements of linguistics and Chinese culture, this very personal and at times deeply lyrical book sets out the systems biology view of life.

Readership: An intelligent and erudite book that will appeal to anyone interested in ideas and the nature of life. It will appeal to the popular science market, and as an informal and inspiring introduction for students of biology and philosophy. It should also find interest amongst biologists for its deeper message.

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The specification in this catalogue, including without limitation price, format, extent, number of illustrations, and month of publication, was as accurate as possible at the time the catalogue was compiled. Occasionally, due to the nature of some contractual restrictions, we are unable to ship a specific product to a particular territory. Jacket images are provisional and liable to change before publication.

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