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OverviewHuman beings have astonishing genetic vulnerabilities. More than half of us will die from complex diseases that trace directly to those vulnerabilities, and the modern world we’ve created places us at unprecedented risk from them. In It Takes a Genome, Greg Gibson posits a revolutionary new hypothesis: Our genome is out of equilibrium, both with itself and its environment. Simply put, our genes aren’t coping well with modern culture. Our bodies were never designed to subsist on fat and sugary foods; our immune systems weren’t designed for today’s clean, bland environments; our minds weren’t designed to process hard-edged, artificial electronic inputs from dawn ‘til midnight. And that’s why so many of us suffer from chronic diseases that barely touched our ancestors. Gibson begins by revealing the stunningly complex ways in which multiple genes cooperate and interact to shape our bodies and influence our behaviors. Then, drawing on the very latest science, he explains the genetic “mismatches” that increasingly lead to cancer, diabetes, inflammatory and infectious diseases, AIDS, depression, and senility. He concludes with a look at the probable genetic variations in human psychology, sharing the evidence that traits like introversion and agreeableness are grounded in equally complex genetic interactions. It Takes A Genome demolishes yesterday’s stale debates over “nature vs. nurture,” introducing a new view that is far more intriguing, and far closer to the truth. See how broken genes cause cancer Meet the body’s “genetic repairmen”—and understand what happens when they fail The growing price of the modern lifestyle Why one-third of all Westerners have obesity, Type 2 diabetes, or other signs of “metabolic syndrome” The Alzheimer’s generation Why some of us are predisposed to dementia What’s really normal: the deepest lessons of the human genome The remarkable diversity of physical and emotional “normality” Full Product DetailsAuthor: Greg GibsonPublisher: Pearson Education (US) Imprint: Financial TImes Prentice Hall Dimensions: Width: 15.80cm , Height: 2.10cm , Length: 23.40cm Weight: 0.390kg ISBN: 9780137137466ISBN 10: 013713746 Pages: 208 Publication Date: 26 March 2009 Audience: Professional and scholarly , Professional & Vocational Replaced By: 9780134770246 Format: Hardback Publisher's Status: Out of Print Availability: In Print Limited stock is available. It will be ordered for you and shipped pending supplier's limited stock. Table of ContentsPreface: How a genetic culture clash with modern life is making us sick ix Chapter 1: The adolescent genome 1 Chapter 2: Breast cancer’s broken genes 19 Chapter 3: Not so thrifty diabetes genes 41 Chapter 4: Unhealthy hygiene 65 Chapter 5: Genetic AIDS 85 Chapter 6: Generating depression 99 Chapter 7: The alzheimer’s generation 121 Chapter 8: Genetic normality 135 Endnotes 151 About the author 175 Index 177ReviewsAuthor InformationGreg Gibson is Professor of Genetics at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, and of Integrative Biology at the University of Queensland, Australia. He is a leader in the new field of genomics, studying how interactions between genes and the environment affect human health and organismal evolution. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Basel, Switzerland, and did postdoctoral work at Stanford University. He is on the editorial boards of PLoS Genetics, Current Biology, Genetics, and other leading journals, and with Spencer V. Muse, coauthored A Primer of Genome Science, one of the field’s leading textbooks, now in its third edition. Tab Content 6Author Website:Countries AvailableAll regions |