Life Unfolding
How the Human Body Creates Itself
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Narrated by:
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Napoleon Ryan
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By:
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Jamie A. Davies
About this listen
Where did I come from? Why do I have two arms but just one head? How is my left leg the same size as my right one? Why are the fingerprints of identical twins not identical? How did my brain learn to learn? Why must I die? Questions like these remain biology's deepest and most ancient challenges. They force us to confront a fundamental biological problem: How can something as large and complex as a human body organize itself from the simplicity of a fertilized egg?
A convergence of ideas from embryology, genetics, physics, networks, and control theory has begun to provide real answers. Based on the central principle of "adaptive self-organization", it explains how the interactions of many cells, and of the tiny molecular machines that run them, can organize tissue structures vastly larger than themselves, correcting errors as they go along and creating new layers of complexity where there were none before. Life Unfolding tells the story of human development from egg to adult, from this perspective showing how our whole understanding of how we come to be has been transformed in recent years.
Highlighting how embryological knowledge is being used to understand why bodies age and fail, Jamie A. Davies explores the profound and fascinating impacts of our newfound knowledge.
Download the accompanying reference guide.©2014 Jamie A. Davies (P)2014 Audible Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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What is life? Humans have been asking this question for thousands of years. But as technology has advanced and our understanding of biology has deepened, the answer has evolved. For decades, scientists have been exploring the limits of nature by modifying and manipulating DNA, cells, and whole organisms to create new ones that could never have previously existed on their own.
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The Goldilocks book on what is life
- By Gary on 07-11-13
By: Adam Rutherford
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Evolving Ourselves
- How Unnatural Selection and Nonrandom Mutation are Changing Life on Earth
- By: Juan Enriquez, Steve Gullans
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 10 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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Why are conditions like autism, asthma, obesity, and allergies exploding at unprecedented rates? Why are we living longer, getting smarter, having far fewer kids? If Darwin were alive today, how would he explain this new world?
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fascinating ideas and science
- By Joel on 07-04-15
By: Juan Enriquez, and others
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The Compatibility Gene
- How Our Bodies Fight Disease, Attract Others, and Define Our Selves
- By: Daniel M. Davis
- Narrated by: Christopher Grove
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Most of the 25,000 genes we possess are the same for all of us. Compatibility genes are those that vary most from person to person and give each of us a unique molecular signature. These genes determine both the extent to which we are susceptible to a vast range of illnesses and the different ways each of us fights disease.
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If interested in medicine, got to read
- By Howard Sterling on 06-29-16
By: Daniel M. Davis
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The Accidental Mind
- How Brain Evolution Has Given Us Love, Memory, Dreams, and God
- By: David J. Linden
- Narrated by: Ray Porter
- Length: 7 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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You've probably seen it before: a human brain dramatically lit from the side, the camera circling it like a helicopter shot of Stonehenge, and a modulated baritone voice exalting the brain's elegant design in reverent tones... to which this book says: Pure nonsense.
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Best general-public Brain Science book to date
- By Francisco on 02-14-11
By: David J. Linden
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Arrival of the Fittest
- Solving Evolution's Greatest Puzzle
- By: Andreas Wagner
- Narrated by: Sean Pratt
- Length: 8 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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In Arrival of the Fittest, renowned evolutionary biologist Andreas Wagner draws on over 15 years of research to present the missing piece in Darwin's theory. Using experimental and computational technologies that were heretofore unimagined, he has found that adaptations are not just driven by chance, but by a set of laws that allow nature to discover new molecules and mechanisms in a fraction of the time that random variation would take.
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Robustness makes for an interesting life and book
- By Gary on 11-29-14
By: Andreas Wagner
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Herding Hemingway's Cats
- Understanding How Our Genes Work
- By: Kat Arney
- Narrated by: Kat Arney
- Length: 8 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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The language of genes has become common parlance. We know they make your eyes blue, your hair curly or your nose straight. The media tells us that our genes control the risk of cancer, heart disease, alcoholism or Alzheimer's. The cost of DNA sequencing has plummeted from billions of pounds to a few hundred, and gene-based advances in medicine hold huge promise. So we've all heard of genes, but how do they actually work?
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A non-scientists misguided interpretation
- By AraSevera on 05-15-16
By: Kat Arney
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The Blind Watchmaker
- Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design
- By: Richard Dawkins
- Narrated by: Richard Dawkins, Lalla Ward
- Length: 14 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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The Blind Watchmaker, knowledgably narrated by author Richard Dawkins, is as prescient and timely a book as ever. The watchmaker belongs to the 18th-century theologian William Paley, who argued that just as a watch is too complicated and functional to have sprung into existence by accident, so too must all living things, with their far greater complexity, be purposefully designed. Charles Darwin's brilliant discovery challenged the creationist arguments; but only Richard Dawkins could have written this elegant riposte.
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Challenging textbook more than an enjoyable listen
- By Eric on 01-15-12
By: Richard Dawkins
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How to Build a Dinosaur
- Extinction Doesn't Have to Be Forever
- By: Jack Horner, James Gorman
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 6 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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In movies, in novels, in comic strips, and on television, we've all seen dinosaurs - or at least somebody's educated guess of what they would look like. But what if it were possible to build, or grow, a real dinosaur without finding ancient DNA? Jack Horner, the scientist who advised Steven Spielberg on the blockbuster film Jurassic Park and a pioneer in bringing paleontology into the 21st century, teams up with the editor of the New York Times's Science Times section to reveal exactly what's in store.
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Good book but misplaced title
- By Robert on 06-19-15
By: Jack Horner, and others
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The Ancestor's Tale
- A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Evolution
- By: Richard Dawkins
- Narrated by: Richard Dawkins, Lalla Ward
- Length: 8 hrs and 55 mins
- Abridged
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In The Ancestor's Tale, evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins offers a masterwork: an exhilarating reverse tour through evolution, from present-day humans back to the microbial beginnings of life four billion years ago. Throughout the journey, Dawkins spins entertaining, insightful stories and sheds light on topics such as speciation, sexual selection, and extinction. The Ancestor's Tale is at once an essential education in evolutionary theory and riveting in its telling.
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Please do an unabridged version!
- By MovieExpertise on 09-29-16
By: Richard Dawkins
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The Cancer Chronicles
- Unlocking Medicine's Deepest Mystery
- By: George Johnson
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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When the woman he loved was diagnosed with a metastatic cancer, science writer George Johnson embarked on a journey to learn everything he could about the disease and the people who dedicate their lives to understanding and combating it. What he discovered is a revolution under way - an explosion of new ideas about what cancer really is and where it comes from. In a provocative and intellectually vibrant exploration, he takes us on an adventure through the history and recent advances of cancer research that will challenge everything you thought you knew about the disease.
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A quick read - hard to put down
- By Digital Dilema on 09-06-13
By: George Johnson
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A Crack in Creation
- Gene Editing and the Unthinkable Power to Control Evolution
- By: Jennifer A. Doudna, Samuel H. Sternberg
- Narrated by: Erin Bennett
- Length: 9 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Not since the atomic bomb has a technology so alarmed its inventors that they warned the world about its use. Not, that is, until the spring of 2015, when biologist Jennifer Doudna called for a worldwide moratorium on the use of the new gene-editing tool CRISPR - a revolutionary new technology that she helped create - to make heritable changes in human embryos.
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In to the abyss we ascend, a scary future
- By Philomath on 06-17-17
By: Jennifer A. Doudna, and others
What listeners say about Life Unfolding
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Tim
- 03-01-15
Fascinating Biology ; Distracting Narration
Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?
I would recommend the text of the book, but not the narrator.
What did you like best about this story?
Morphogenesis is utterly fascinating. This book is aimed at laypeople, but it goes into great detail.
How could the performance have been better?
The performer should completely stop paying attention to pronunciation. I'm guessing that Napoleon Ryan was trying hard to use received pronunciation, and for this reason he was not paying much attention to Jamie Davies's line of thought. Received pronunciation adds exactly nothing to a book like this. In the future, please just read the book using whatever accent you feel most comfortable with, or just stop focusing on accents altogether.
Pronunciation is nowhere near as important as a passion for what is being said.
No matter who you are, your most beautiful accent is the one you use every day, when you are not thinking about accents. When narrating, use that one!
Was Life Unfolding worth the listening time?
The biological details are immensely fascinating. However, it is very hard to pay attention to the text because Ryan's pronunciation is so distracting.
If you like reading books before bedtime, this book is nearly perfect, because it's impossible to read it without your mind drifting off.
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10 people found this helpful
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- Mr
- 12-09-16
Brilliant
A clear culmination of the knowledge and principles behind our understanding of embryology and biology in general. Easily understood by anyone with an amatuer grounding in biology, but go slow on the heavy parts, if you miss something you'll miss the foundations for later concepts. Well worth the time to take it in.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Todd Lacher
- 04-23-17
Enlightening on many levels.
This is an amazing book that takes you on a journey, albeit a bit technical, of human biological development.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Marida
- 11-05-18
Really wonderful
This book has a lot of diagrams which you should download. But even with just the audio, you will understand at both a conceptual and cellular level how it is possible for a functioning human being composed of hundreds of complex interconnected parts to arise from a single cell. The beginning on how a cell divides is a little dry but hang in there, it just gets better and better: how a single mutation can cascade down to a life-threatening disease, sex change, or enhanced ability to use language. This is my go-to book for reclaiming a sense of wonder.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Thomas
- 07-12-15
Finally Some Explanation For Protein Evolution
Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in science; chemistry; evolution; or life
Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
This book provided some new insight into the miraculous development of life and the concept of 'Self-Assembly' was captivating
Any additional comments?
FYI -- I listed to the first three chapters almost a half-dozen times just so that I could take notes-
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3 people found this helpful
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- Jeffrey Holden
- 05-04-15
How we came to be
This book really details how our life and everyone of us started and developed into ourselves. From conception to a body that lives and adjusts itself along the way.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Thinker77
- 01-22-17
Detailed, Fascinating and Awe Inspiring
This book does a good job of presenting enough detail for interest while inspiring awe about the mysterious way we are made.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 05-08-22
I loved this book.. nano nano
Nano stuff is dwelled on & nano written. Emergence from the blob/egg.
Nice detailed PDF
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- Amazon Customer
- 04-10-24
A great synthesis of embryonic development details across many medical specialties
The author goes into exhilarating details for a specific example of a biological process and then explains how this can typically be generalized for many, many other processes.
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- Bitsy
- 01-30-16
Excellent in performance and composition
Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
Yes, a fantastic examination and presentation on the subject.
What was one of the most memorable moments of Life Unfolding?
The interrelationships of geometry and chemistry in the formation of the embryo.
Any additional comments?
I really enjoyed the narration. I would consider Ryan for a comparable video production's narration. I don't care for the popular Ira Glassian style.
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