Skip to main content

Books in Life sciences

Elsevier's Life Sciences collection helps researchers get comprehensive coverage and up-to-date information on the study of living organisms, their processes, and interrelationships, spanning disciplines like biology, genetics, and biochemistry, and addressing emerging trends such as genomics, biotechnology, and sustainability, essential for advancing knowledge and driving innovation in the field.

    • Visual Psychophysics and Physiology

      • 1st Edition
      • December 2, 2012
      • John Armington
      • English
      • Paperback
        9 7 8 0 1 2 4 1 4 4 6 0 6
      • eBook
        9 7 8 0 3 2 3 1 4 7 7 8 1
      Visual Psychophysics and Physiology: A Volume Dedicated to Lorrin Riggs illustrates a particular approach to the study of vision. It also celebrates Lorrin Riggs' retirement from formal teaching duties. During his teaching career Riggs advised and directed about fifty doctoral and postdoctoral students, many of whom wrote the chapters that make up this volume. The book is organized into six parts. Part 1 explains the approach to the study of vision, thus providing the philosophical theme for the chapters that follow. Part 2 on physiological mechanisms presents examples of comparative and physiological investigations. Part 3 on sensitivity and adaptation examines new research that bears directly upon the classical problems of visual psychophysics. Here, there is an initial concern with measurement, visual sensitivity, scaling, and adaptation. Part 4 discusses research on color vision while Part 5 on acuity, contrast, and movement considers some of the factors that contribute to these perceptions. Part 6 deals with applications of visual science to other disciplines. Specific examples are given that link visual research with ophthalmology, child development, and the investigation of cognitive variables such as meaning, activation, and so forth.
    • Psychophysical Judgment and Measurement

      • 1st Edition
      • December 2, 2012
      • Edward Carterette
      • English
      • Paperback
        9 7 8 0 1 2 4 1 4 2 1 8 3
      • eBook
        9 7 8 0 3 2 3 1 4 5 3 4 3
      Handbook of Perception, Volume II: Psychophysical Judgment and Measurement brings together a very large, diverse, and widely scattered literature on human perception, with emphasis on psychophysical judgement and measurement. The book reviews the history of research on choice, judgement, and measurement in order to provide a background for contemporary work. This volume is organized into five sections encompassing 14 chapters and begins with a historical background on psychophysics and the evolution of thinking about the central measurement problem in judgement. The basic psychological context in which choice and judgement occur is considered next, touching on topics such as the problem of information selection and the sources of bias and variability in judgemental processes in relation to memory. The chapters that follow discuss the theoretical frame of measurement models and their applications. In particular, examples of algebraic fundamental measurement, algebraic derived measurement, and probabilistic derived measurement are given. The book also introduces the reader to various psychophysical scaling methods and theories of scaling. This book will serve as a basic source and reference work for psychologists and natural scientists, as well as for anyone in the arts or sciences or those who are interested in human perception.
    • Plant Pigments, Flavors and Textures

      • 1st Edition
      • December 2, 2012
      • N.A.M. Eskin
      • English
      • Paperback
        9 7 8 0 1 2 4 3 3 6 3 7 7
      • eBook
        9 7 8 0 3 2 3 1 5 9 5 3 1
      Plant Pigments, Flavors and Textures: The Chemistry and Biochemistry of Selected Compounds focuses on the chemistry and biochemistry of compounds responsible for the pigments, flavors, and textures of some fruits and vegetables. Since much of the information presented is scattered in the scientific literature, an attempt has been made to integrate the material into a concise yet comprehensive text. The book is organized into three sections that deal separately with pigments, flavors, and textures. Section I discusses pigment degradation during processing and storage as well as attempts to prevent color deterioration. Section II examines the biogenesis of several groups of compounds that contribute to flavor. Section III deals with the chemistry and biochemistry of plant cell wall components and their relation to texture. This book will be useful to food scientists as well as those interested in foods. The extensive references cited in the text will enable the reader to pursue any of the topics discussed, in more depth.
    • The Biology of Amoeba

      • 1st Edition
      • December 2, 2012
      • Kwang Jeon
      • English
      • Paperback
        9 7 8 0 1 2 4 1 2 4 8 9 9
      • eBook
        9 7 8 0 3 2 3 1 4 4 0 4 9
      The Biology of Amoeba discusses the general biology, morphology, movement and related phenomena, and biochemical and physiological studies of amoeba. This book is organized into five parts, encompassing 21 chapters that primarily focus on large free-living amoeba. After briefly discussing the highlights of studies involving amoeba, the book goes on describing the biological aspects of amoeba, including its taxonomy, phylogeny, culture, and maintaining methods. The second part describes the general morphology, ultrastructure, and cellular membrane of amoeba. The third part includes discussions on the movement of Chaos-Amoeba group; the amoeboid behavioral and motile responses; the molecular mechanism of amoeboid movement and cytoplasmic streaming; and the mechanism of endocytosis in the freshwater amoeba. Part 4 covers the effects of various groups of mutagens, antibiotics, radiation, and high pressure on phenotype change and cell activities of amoeba. The concluding part deals with the isolation and purification of amoeba's nucleic acids, as well as physical and chemical characterizations of these compounds. This part also describes the characteristics of structural features of amoeba's cell surface and the chemistry of tripartite surface. Discussions on cell cycle, nucleocytoplasmic interactions, nuclear-nuclear interactions, genetics, and strain specificity in amoeba are also covered. The book is intended as a comprehensive literature source for students in cell biology as well as for those who are using amoeba as research organisms.
    • Neurobiology of Feeding and Nutrition

      • 1st Edition
      • December 2, 2012
      • Jacques Magnen
      • English
      • Paperback
        9 7 8 0 1 2 4 3 1 4 3 7 5
      • eBook
        9 7 8 0 3 2 3 1 5 2 3 8 9
      Neurobiology of Feeding and Nutrition focuses on feeding as the behavior of primal survival. This book discusses the sensory, brain, and endocrine involvement in the behavioral and nutritional regulatory processes. Organized into 12 chapters, this book starts with an overview of the initial survey of works on the normal feeding of an animal model with emphasis on the basic periodicity of the behavior and the significance of this behavior. This text then explores the overall stimulation to eat, which results from the combination of sensory and systematic stimuli. Other chapters examine the other compounds of the stimulation to eat and discuss the targets of the systematic stimulus to eat or not to eat. This book describes as well the general organization of sensory projection in the central nervous system. The final chapter deals with the ontogeny of feeding behavior from birth to adulthood. This book is a valuable resource for scientists and technologists interested in feeding and nutrition.
    • Nuclear Trafficking

      • 1st Edition
      • December 2, 2012
      • Carl Feldherr
      • English
      • Paperback
        9 7 8 0 1 2 4 3 1 4 9 6 2
      • eBook
        9 7 8 0 3 2 3 1 5 2 9 8 3
      Nuclear Trafficking is a summary of the state of knowledge in nuclear trafficking, and is organized into five parts. The book begins by discussing the diffusion and signal-mediated transport through the pores. It then looks into the detailed accounts of pore structure and composition, nuclear localization signals, signal binding proteins, RNA efflux, and biochemical factors influencing nucleocytoplasmic exchange. This book will be very useful to those people new to this field of interest.
    • Habituation, Sensitization, and Behavior

      • 1st Edition
      • December 2, 2012
      • Harman Peeke
      • English
      • Paperback
        9 7 8 0 1 2 4 1 4 5 3 7 5
      • eBook
        9 7 8 0 3 2 3 1 4 8 5 6 6
      Habituation, Sensitization, and Behavior reviews some of the important advances that have been made toward understanding the mechanisms underlying, and the significance of, the phenomena traditionally associated with habituation, sensitization, and behavior in intact organisms. Habituation and sensitization are used to refer to underlying theoretical processes, and behavior changes are described at the response level. Comprised of 12 chapters, this book begins with an overview of approaches, constructs, and terminology used in the study of response change in the intact organism. The discussion then turns to a two-factor dual-process theory of habituation and sensitization, together with a theory of the mechanism of habituation that emphasizes the assignment of responses to stimuli. Subsequent chapters explore the link between memory and habituation; statistical strategies for analyzing repeated-measures data; cellular approaches used in the analysis of habituation and sensitization in Aplysia; and intrinsic and extrinsic mechanisms of habituation and sensitization. The habituation of central nervous system evoked potentials is also considered, with particular reference to intrinsic habituation in the neocortex, allocortex, and mesencephalon. The final chapter is devoted to evolutionary determination of response likelihood and habituation. This monograph should be of interest to practitioners in the fields of behavioral biology, psychobiology, psychology, and psychiatry.
    • Isozymes

      • 1st Edition
      • December 2, 2012
      • Clement Markert
      • English
      • eBook
        9 7 8 0 3 2 3 1 4 2 1 0 6
      Isozymes, I: Molecular Structure contains manuscripts presented at the Third International Conference on isozymes convened in April 1974 at Yale University. Separating 52 manuscripts into chapters, this book discusses the biology and biochemistry of isozymes. It also elucidates the multiple forms of mammalian DNA-dependent DNA polymerases, as well as RNA polymerases of maize, fungi, and Escherichia coli. Significant topics on some specific isozymes are given separately in other chapters.
    • Variable plants and herbivores in natural and managed systems

      • 1st Edition
      • December 2, 2012
      • Robert Denno
      • English
      • Paperback
        9 7 8 0 1 2 4 1 2 3 7 2 4
      • eBook
        9 7 8 0 3 2 3 1 4 2 8 7 8
      Variable Plants and Herbivores in Natural and Managed Systems examines individual, population, species, and community responses of herbivores to plant variation, with emphasis on insects, fungi, bacteria, and viruses. It is divided into five parts encompassing 18 chapters that discuss variability as a mechanism of defense used by plants against their parasites and the effects of variability on herbivores at several different levels of complexity. After a brief discussion on plant-herbivore interactions, the first part of this book considers sources of within-plant variation and effects on the distribution and abundance of herbivores. Part II examines interplant variation, the co-evolutionary problems it poses for herbivores, and the ecological and evolutionary responses of these animals. It discusses the effects of host-plant variability on the fitness of sedentary herbivorous insects. Part III discusses the role of host variability in the evolution of feeding specialization, genetic differentiation, and race formation. The importance of host variation to the organization of herbivore communities and the manipulation of host-plant variability for the management of herbivore pest populations are presented in the remaining parts. This book will be helpful to agriculturists, silviculturists, biologists, and researchers who wish to expand their knowledge in dynamics of plant-herbivore relationships.