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Book review – Superlative: The Biology of Extremes

5-minute read

Extremes fascinate us: the biggest, the fastest, the oldest, the tallest. Books and TV-programmes regularly scratch our itch for records, whether it is feats of engineering or biological extremes, and many sporting events revolve around humans attempting to set new records. One glance at the cover of Matthew D. LaPlante’s book Superlative and you might think that this is yet another book offering lots of gee-whiz factoids. You would also be wrong. Instead, this is an amusing and fascinating book that digs just that much deeper into the biology behind extremes, and why studying them is so worthwhile.

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Book review – Strange Survivors: How Organisms Attack and Defend in the Game of Life

From the perspective of biology, the rules for the game of life are simple: acquire energy, avoid becoming food for someone else in the process, and pass on your genetic information. This simple theme has given rise to an incredibly rich and diverse panoply of approaches and solutions. Strange Survivors, written by Puerto Rican biologist Oné R. Pagán, is a love letter to the many wonders that biology has to offer. I am sure he would approve if I said: “Prepare to be amazed!”

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