Life sciences: general issues Books

Preservation of nature and the environment has become one of the most important issues of the end of the twentieth century. It has become evident that the methods used for industrial and agricultural production in many...

during the past few years increasing interest has been focused on the role of gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) outside the central nervous systems (CNS).Biochemical, pharmacological, histochemical, physiological approaches have...

Aquatic hyphomycetes were discovered 50 years ago by C.T. Ingold. They remained a relatively obscure group until their role as intermediaries between deciduous leaves and stream invertebrates was established some 20 ...

Palms are tropical miracles. Heinrich Heine, the German poet, stated "Unter den Palmen wandert man nicht ungestraft", i.e., one does not wander unpunished under the palms. It was Professor H.C.D. de Wit who taught me this in...

El Niño is a meteorological and oceanographic phenomenon, which occurs at irregular intervals in the eastern tropical Pacific. Its most obvious characteristic is the warming of surface waters, which causes enormous disturbances...

It is a great honor and pleasure for me to introduce this book; an honor, because of the scientific renown and authority of the investigators who have edited the volume and contributed the chapters; a pleasure, because my own...

Biology of Antarctic Fish presents the most recent findings on the biology of fish in the unique environment of the Antarctic ocean. At present the year-round temperature of the coastal waters is very near -1,87 ° C, the...

In their very first lecture biochemists learn that biomolecules, namely nucleic acids, proteins and lipids, are extremely temperature sensitive and will denature and lose their function easily. Then how do Archaebacteria...

Being both broad - perception and motor organization - and narrow - just onegroup of animals - at the same time, this book presents a new unified framework for understanding perceptuomotor organization, stressing the ...

Latest issue in the CURRENT TOPICS IN NEUROENDOCRINOLOGY se- ries which has been gaining a great deal of reputation as a primary source for reviews in neuroendocrinology and related areas in the past few years.

A host of environmental factors regulate the embryonic development of neurons. In adults, the survival of neurons, the regeneration of damaged axons, and plastic changes in axonal arborization are also controlled by a complex...

During germination, the most resistant stage of the life cycle - the seed - changes to the most sensitive stage, namely the seedling. Therefore, in desert plant species seed dispersal and subsequent germination in the optimum...

In 1977, the Volkswagen Foundation sponsored the first of a series of International Symposia on Fire Ecology at Freiburg University, Federal Republic of Germany. The scope of the congresses was to create a platform for...

In this volume experts present the latest status of mathematical and statistical methods in use for the analysis and modeling of plant disease epidemics. Topics treated are - methods in multivariate analyses, ordination and...

This book is based on our two books, published in the USSR and translated in a number of other countries Conservation of living nature: problems and perspectives (1983) and The levels of conservation of living nature (1985). It...

1 Introduction.- 2 Fundamental Equations of Radiative Transfer in Leaf Canopies, and Iterative Methods for Their Solution.- 1 Boundary Problem for the Transfer Equation.- 2 Separation of First-Order Scattering.- 3 Iterative Methods.- 4 Concluding Remarks...

Ecophysiology of Desert Arthropods and Reptiles starts with a new classification of the world's deserts, based upon the type of precipitation and the effect on their faunas of arthropods and reptiles. This is followed by an...

By their powers of reason scientists will be able to extract from nature the answers to their questions. From: Critique of Pure Reason, 1781 Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), German Philosopher History is a composite of stories. The...

It is a great privilege and pleasure for me to write the foreword to this book, which is the result of considerable effort on the part of Dr. Makoto Matsuura and Mr. Seiki Yamane. Such an introduction might sound like a cliche,...

The present book is the outcome of a symposium on magnesium and excitable membranes, held in September 1989 on the occasion of the 12th annual meeting of the European Neuroscience Associ­ ation in Torino. Leading specialists...

There is a growing need for cooperation between disciplines, not only to deal with the burning problems of the present, but to study the interaction of societies and their ecosystems in the past. In the 1970s studies in...

All relevant ecological aspects of plankton, especially seasonal changes in the species composition, the role of competition for limiting resources in species replacements, the role of parasitism, predation and competition in...

This volume is based on contributions to the second Brain Dynamics Conference, held in Berlin on August 10-14, 1987, as a satellite conference of the Budapest Congress of the International Brain Research Organization. Like the...

Air pollutants provide environmental conditions that drastically differ in many respects from those to which forest trees are naturally adapted. Leading experts in the field here consider these questions of immediate relevance...

In March, 1983 a workshop on Pollutants in Porous Media was hosted by the Institute of Soils and Water of the Agricultural Research Organi­ zation in Bet Dagan, Israel. At this workshop, the unsaturated zone be­ tween the soil...

7. 2 The Pilot Zone of the FerIo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 7. 2. 1 Geographical Zoning and Administrative Setup. . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 7. 2. 2 Climate . . . . . . . . . . . ...

The understanding of pollutant transformations, sorption and transport in soils and uptake by plants is the key to controlling contaminant movement towards groundwater and accumulation in food-chains. Some of these major...