Cav's Reviews > How Biology Works: The Facts Visually Explained

How Biology Works was quite a comprehensive book. A lot of ground is covered in these pages, which would make it a very good reference guide. The PDF version I have is full of illustrations; which really helped bring some context to the writing.

Publishers Dorling Kindersley Limited are a British multinational publishing company specialising in illustrated reference books for adults and children in 63 languages. It is part of Penguin Random House, a subsidiary of German media conglomerate Bertelsmann.

The formatting of the book is pretty mechanical. It is almost like a long-form encyclopedia article. There is no commentary by the author, and the book both opens and closes without an intro or epilogue.

Although I enjoyed most of this presentation, there was some minor incorrect information here. I'll go through a few that stuck out to me:
1) The book says that "dangerous" levels of radioactivity in nature are relatively low. UV radiation is ionizing, and depending on where you live and how much you are exposed to it, it can be very high and is definitely dangerous. Some scientists have hypothesized that the sun's UV drives genetic mutation and evolution.
Also, radon is a uranium decay product that is naturally occurring ionizing radiation. It is commonly found in basements, as it is the heaviest of the noble gases. It is alpha radiation that kills thousands of people per year, second only to smoking.
2) The book mentions prions, and calls them misfolded proteins (which they are). It then says that prion diseases are very rare. While specific prion diseases may be rare, protein-folding disorders are not; Alzheimer, Huntington's Parkinson's, ALS, etc are all protein-folding disorders, and they are relatively common.
3) It also incorrectly states that photosynthesis directly or indirectly feeds all life. This is not true. Some bacteria live and life thrives around thermal vents in the ocean floor, and some bacteria can metabolize rock.

The book's contents are broken into the following parts:
• Types of life
• Origins of life
• Life on other planets; our solar system
• The chemistry of life
• How cells work
• Reproduction and genetics
• Evolution
• The tree of life
• How plants work
• How animals work
• Ecology
• Biotechnology

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How Biology Works was a great presentation. As mentioned above, it would make for an excellent quick reference guide.
5 stars.