History of Life
About this book
This text is designed for students and anyone else with an interest in the history of life on our planet. The author describes the biological evolution of Earth's organisms, and reconstructs their adaptations to the life they led, and the ecology and environment in which they functioned. On the grand scale, Earth is a constantly changing planet, continually presenting organisms with challenges. Changing geography, climate, atmosphere, oceanic and land environments set a stage in which organisms interact with their environments and one another, with evolutionary change an inevitable result. The organisms themselves in turn can change global environments: oxygen in our atmosphere is all produced by photosynthesis, for example. The interplay between a changing Earth and its evolving organisms is the underlying theme of the book.
The book has a dedicated website which explores additional enriching information and discussion, and provides or points to the art for the book and many other images useful for teaching. See: www.wiley.com/go/cowen/historyoflife.
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Table of contents
- Cover
- Title page
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Preface
- About the Companion Website
- ONE: The Origin of Life on Earth
- TWO: Earliest Life on Earth
- THREE: Sex and Nuclei: Eukaryotes
- FOUR: The Evolution of Metazoans
- FIVE: The Metazoan Radiation
- SIX: Changing Life in a Changing World
- SEVEN: The Early Vertebrates
- EIGHT: Leaving the Water
- NINE: Tetrapods and Amniotes
- TEN: Early Amniotes and Thermoregulation
- ELEVEN: The Triassic Takeover
- TWELVE: Dinosaurs
- THIRTEEN: The Evolution of Flight
- FOURTEEN: The Modernization of Land and Sea
- FIFTEEN: The Origin of Mammals
- SIXTEEN: The End of the Dinosaurs
- SEVENTEEN: Cenozoic Mammals
- EIGHTEEN: Geography and Evolution
- NINETEEN: Primates
- TWENTY: Evolving Toward Humans
- TWENTY-ONE: Life in the Ice Age
- Index
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