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Shvoong Home>Science>Biology>Biology is the science of life Summary

Biology is the science of life

Book Summary   by:swing18     Original Author: Swing
  • Summary rating: 4 stars (10 Ratings)
  • Visits : 537
  • words:600 
  • Comments : 3
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Biology is the science of life. It used to be called, earlier, by the name, Natural History, which was succeeded by the term, Natural Science. Often separated into Botany and Zoology. Natural History Remained for Long to be the cataloguing of plants and animals, classifying them (based on their similarities) and establishing relationships, and studying the morphology, physiology and embryology as well as life_histories, if any) of individual species. The science was mostly a descriptive one, unlike Physics and Chemistry which have all long been exact sciences. Compared to the spectacular developments in these physical scienceswhich stole the thunder, the natural sciences were relatively unimpressive till Charles Darwin postulated the theory evolution; he published his book, Origin of Species, in 1859 and it revolutionised the thinking world. The relationships of diverse groups of animals and plants and their evolution into more and more complex organizations were sought to be resolved.
Mendel''s enunciation of the principles of heredity was yet another significant milestone in the history of the life sciences. Early in the twentieth century, descriptive embryology of animals gave place to causal Embryology which was called developmental mechanics. This was followed by Chemical Embryology. Several scientists, including Wilhelm Roux. contributed to develop causal Embryology. Although earlier scientists could guess that chromosomes are involved in heridity, it was T.H. Morgan who gave the conclusive proof for the fact that genes which are responsible for inheritance of traits, are contained in the chromosomes. T.H. Morgan and his illustrious pupils, like C.B. Bridges, H.J. Muller, A.H. Sturtevant and T.H. Dobzhansky, made significant contributions towards the progress of Genetics. What Darwin could not explain in his Origin of species, viz., the cause for variations and how variations are inherited, could well be explained in the light of Mendel''s and Morgan''s theories. Thus was born the genetic theory of Natural selection. Julian S. Huxley emphasized this in his Evolution, the Modern synthesis.
Published: November 04, 2007   
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  1. 3. philip

    biology

    this is a good abstract. http://greatscienceblog.blogspot.com

    0 Rating Wednesday, January 23, 2008
  2. 2. philip

    life sciences

    this abstract is usefull for biology students

    0 Rating Monday, November 12, 2007
  3. 1. midaro bano

    biology

    this summary is well written.

    0 Rating Friday, November 09, 2007
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