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The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life - Paperback | Diverse Reads

The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life

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In this New York Times bestseller and longlist nominee for the National Book Award, “our greatest living chronicler of the natural world” (The New York Times), David Quammen explains how recent discoveries in molecular biology affect our understanding of evolution and life’s history.

In the mid-1970s, scientists began using DNA sequences to reexamine the history of all life. Perhaps the most startling discovery to come out of this new field—the study of life’s diversity and relatedness at the molecular level—is horizontal gene transfer (HGT), or the movement of genes across species lines. It turns out that HGT has been widespread and important; we now know that roughly eight percent of the human genome arrived sideways by viral infection—a type of HGT.

In The Tangled Tree, “the grandest tale in biology....David Quammen presents the science—and the scientists involved—with patience, candor, and flair” (Nature). We learn about the major players, such as Carl Woese, the most important little-known biologist of the twentieth century; Lynn Margulis, the notorious maverick whose wild ideas about “mosaic” creatures proved to be true; and Tsutomu Wantanabe, who discovered that the scourge of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is a direct result of horizontal gene transfer, bringing the deep study of genome histories to bear on a global crisis in public health.

“David Quammen proves to be an immensely well-informed guide to a complex story” (The Wall Street Journal). In The Tangled Tree, he explains how molecular studies of evolution have brought startling recognitions about the tangled tree of life—including where we humans fit upon it. Thanks to new technologies, we now have the ability to alter even our genetic composition—through sideways insertions, as nature has long been doing. “The Tangled Tree is a source of wonder....Quammen has written a deep and daring intellectual adventure” (The Boston Globe).

ISBN-13: 9781476776637

Media Type: Paperback

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Publication Date: 08-06-2019

Pages: 480

Product Dimensions: 6.10(w) x 8.80(h) x 1.20(d)

David Quammen’s books include Breathless, The Tangled Tree, The Song of the Dodo, The Reluctant Mr. Darwin, and Spillover. He has written for The New Yorker, Harper’s Magazine, The Atlantic, National Geographic, and Outside, among other magazines, and is a three-time winner of the National Magazine Award. Quammen shares a home in Bozeman, Montana, with his wife, Betsy Gaines Quammen, author of American Zion, and with three Russian wolfhounds, a cross-eyed cat, and a rescue python. Visit him at DavidQuammen.com.

Table of Contents

Three Surprises: An Introduction xi

Part I Darwin's Little Sketch 1

Part II A Separate Form of Life 35

Part III Mergers and Acquisitions 111

Part IV Big Tree 163

Part V Infective Heredity 213

Part VI Topiary 269

Part VII E Pluribus Human 313

Acknowledgments 387

Notes 391

Bibliography 403

Illustration Credits 441

Index 443