Books about Biogeochemistry from Amazon.com

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Price: $12.95 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The most colossal environmental disturbance in human history is under way. Ever-rising levels of the potent greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO₂) are altering the cycles of matter and life and interfering with the Earth's natural cooling process. Melting Arctic ice and mountain glaciers are just the first relatively mild symptoms of what will result from this disruption of the planetary energy balance. In CO₂ Rising, scientist Tyler Volk explains the process at the heart of global warming and climate change: the global carbon cycle. Vividly and concisely, Volk describes what happens when CO₂ is released by the combustion of fossil fuels (coal, oil, and natural gas), letting loose carbon atoms once trapped deep underground into the interwoven web of air, water, and soil.

To demonstrate how the carbon cycle works, Volk traces the paths that carbon atoms take during their global circuits. Showing us the carbon cycle from a carbon atom's viewpoint, he follows one carbon atom into a leaf of barley, then into an alcohol molecule in a glass of beer, through the human bloodstream, and then back into the air. He also compares the fluxes of carbon brought into the biosphere naturally with those created by the combustion of fossil fuels and explains why the latter are responsible for rising temperatures.

Knowledge about the global carbon cycle and the huge disturbances that human activity produces in it will equip us to consider the hard questions that Volk raises in the second half of CO₂ Rising: projections of future levels of CO₂; which energy systems and processes (solar, wind, nuclear, carbon sequestration?) will power civilization in the future; the relationships among the wealth of nations, energy use, and CO₂ emissions; and global equity in per capita emissions. Answering these questions will indeed be our greatest environmental challenge..
Price: $12.20 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Microbial Ecology of the Oceans, 2nd Edition reviews the basics of marine microbiology, provides a foundation for researchers and students new to the field, and examines the important issues in modern ocean microbial ecology. Explore the latest advances in biological and chemical oceanography and limnology and understand the role of marine microbes and viruses in the oceans. Like the successful first edition, this updated and revised text combines concepts from autoecological studies of individual bacterial groups and from ecological studies of microbial assemblages in the oceans..
Price: $75.96 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Ocean Biogeochemical Dynamics provides a broad theoretical framework upon which graduate students and upper-level undergraduates can formulate an understanding of the processes that control the mean concentration and distribution of biologically utilized elements and compounds in the ocean. Though it is written as a textbook, it will also be of interest to more advanced scientists as a wide-ranging synthesis of our present understanding of ocean biogeochemical processes.

The first two chapters of the book provide an introductory overview of biogeochemical and physical oceanography. The next four chapters concentrate on processes at the air-sea interface, the production of organic matter in the upper ocean, the remineralization of organic matter in the water column, and the processing of organic matter in the sediments. The focus of these chapters is on analyzing the cycles of organic carbon, oxygen, and nutrients.

The next three chapters round out the authors' coverage of ocean biogeochemical cycles with discussions of silica, dissolved inorganic carbon and alkalinity, and CaCO₃. The final chapter discusses applications of ocean biogeochemistry to our understanding of the role of the ocean carbon cycle in interannual to decadal variability, paleoclimatology, and the anthropogenic carbon budget. The problem sets included at the end of each chapter encourage students to ask critical questions in this exciting new field. While much of the approach is mathematical, the math is at a level that should be accessible to students with a year or two of college level mathematics and/or physics.

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Price: $57.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

For the past 4 billion years, the chemistry of the Earth's surface, where all life exists, has changed remarkably. Historically, these changes have occurred slowly enough to allow life to adapt and evolve. In more recent times, the chemistry of the Earth is being altered at a staggering rate, fueled by industrialization and an ever-growing human population. Human activities, from the rapid consumption of resources to the destruction of the rainforests and the expansion of smog-covered cities, are all leading to rapid changes in the basic chemistry of the Earth.
The Second Edition of Biogeochemistry considers the effects of life on the Earth's chemistry on a global level. This expansive text employs current technology to help students extrapolate small-scale examples to the global level, and also discusses the instrumentation being used by NASA and its role in studies of global change. With the Earth's changing chemistry as the focus, this text pulls together the many disparate fields that are encompassed by the broad reach of biogeochemistry. With extensive cross-referencing of chapters, figures, and tables, and an interdisciplinary coverage of the topic at hand, this text will provide an excellent framework for courses examining global change and environmental chemistry, and will also be a useful self-study guide.

* Emphasizes the effects of life on the basic chemistry of the atmosphere, the soils, and seawaters of the Earth
* Calculates and compares the effects of industrial emissions, land clearing, agriculture, and rising population on Earths chemistry
* Synthesizes the global cycles of carbon, nitrogen, phosphorous, and sulfur, and suggests the best current budgets for atmospheric gases such as ammonia, nitrous oxide, dimethyl sulfide, and carbonyl sulfide
* Includes an extensive review and up-to-date synthesis of the current literature on the Earths biogeochemistry.
Price: $58.18 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The ecosystem approach to ecology treats organisms and the physical elements of their environment as components of a single, integrated system. This comprehensive textbook outlines the central processes that characterize terrestrial ecosystems, tracing the flow of water, carbon, and nutrients from their abiotic origins to their cycles through plants, animals, and decomposer organisms. As human activity becomes an increasingly dominant factor in natural processes around the globe, landscape dynamics over time and space have become the focus of recent attention. This book synthesizes current advances in ecology with established theory to offer a complete survey of ecosystem pattern and process in the terrestrial environment. Featuring review questions at the end of each chapter, suggestions for recommended reading, and a glossary of ecological terms, Principles of Terrestrial Ecosystem Ecology will be an important text suitable for use in all courses on ecosystem ecology. Resource managers, land use managers, and researchers will also welcome its thorough presentation of ecosystem essentials. About the Authors F. Stuart Chapin, III is Professor of Ecology at the Institute for Arctic Biology, University of Alaska at Fairbanks. Pamela Matson is Professor in the Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences and the Institute of International Studies, Stanford University; Director of the Earth Systems Degree Program and co-director of the Center for Environmental Science and Policy, Stanford University; and currently serves as president of the Ecological Society of America. Harold A. Mooney is Professor of Environmental Biology at Stanford University..
Price: $45.36 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Global warming is a complicated problem. Gas Trees and Car Turds is a fun, fast read about the carbon cycle: trees are made of air and water, electricity is made from coal that is made from trees, gasoline is made from plankton, and all of these things are related to each other and to our climate through carbon dioxide. This colorfully illustrated book makes carbon dioxide, an invisible odorless gas responsible for global warming and plant growth, into something that can be imagined and understood by children..
Price: $5.60 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Stable isotopes are frequently used as tracers in biological systems, and their ability to track changes and processes over time has made them increasingly important to ecological research. For ecologists, stable isotopes provide a natural way to directly trace details of element cycling in the environment.

Stable Isotope Ecology provides a solid introduction to this advanced subject, and can also be used as an instructive review for more experienced researchers and professionals. The book approaches the use of isotopes from the perspective of ecological and biological research, but its concepts can be applied within other disciplines as well. In order to enable scientists to establish source-sink connections in ecological settings, Stable Isotope Ecology begins by reviewing fundamental topics of tracer fractionation and mixing. Several mini-reviews profile problems and successes encountered with isotope tracing in particular focus areas, while emphasizing the role that humans increasingly play in changing our planetary ecosphere. A novel, step-by-step spreadsheet modeling approach is also presented for circulating tracers in any ecological system, including any favorite system an ecologist might dream up while sitting at a computer. Just type in values and watch the isotope action unfold in the dynamic models.

Fry's humorous and lighthearted style painlessly imparts the principles of isotope ecology, using a unique, hands-on approach to engage students. The mechanics of fractionation and mixing are laid out in simple steps, with numerous examples and accessible mathematics (algebra only).  The book encourages students to begin their own pilot project with stable isotopes.

The attached CD-ROM contains color illustrations, spreadsheet models, technical appendices, and problems and answers. The CD materials are accessible for novices and experts alike, and enhance the learning experience, adding electronic dynamics to the printed book. 

About the Author:

Dr. Brian Fry is a Professor in the Coastal Ecology Institute and the Department of Oceanography and Coastal Studies at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. His mother and father both used isotopes in their research careers, so he is a second generation isotope scientist.

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Price: $50.11 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Though long unknown in the West, Vladimir Vernadsky's The Biosphere, first published in 1926, revolutionized our view of life on Earth. In it he set forth his idea that the emergence of life can be viewed as an astrophysical phenomenon subject to physical laws governing the interactions of matter and energy, and that the biosphere has profound effects on Earth's climate, its landforms, and the contents of its atmosphere. These ideas helped found numerous scientific fields and originated the concept of life a geological force that forms the foundation of Gaia theory. Although Vernadsky's work diffused across the Iron Curtain out of Soviet Russia only slowly and indirectly, the concept of the biosphere in use today is largely his.

With this milestone publication of the first English translation of the entire text, English-speaking readers can at last read one of the great classics of modern science in their own language. Mark McMenamin has written extensive annotations to explain the structure of Vernadsky's arguments and their modern relevance, Jacques Grinvald has provided an introduction that places the book in historical context, and a stellar cast of international experts have co-signed the foreword..
Price: $20.79 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Mathematical modelling is an essential tool in present-day ecological research. Yet for many ecologists it is still problematic to apply modelling in their research. In our experience, the major problem is at the conceptual level: proper understanding of what a model is, how ecological relations can be translated consistently into mathematical equations, how models are solved, steady states calculated and interpreted. Many textbooks jump over these conceptual hurdles to dive into detailed formulations or the mathematics of solution. This book attempts to fill that gap. It introduces essential concepts for mathematical modelling, explains the mathematics behind the methods, and helps readers to implement models and obtain hands-on experience. Throughout the book, emphasis is laid on how to translate ecological questions into interpretable models in a practical way.

The book aims to be an introductory textbook at the undergraduate-graduate level, but will also be useful to seduce experienced ecologists into the world of modelling. The range of ecological models treated is wide, from Lotka-Volterra type of principle-seeking models to environmental or ecosystem models, and including matrix models, lattice models and sequential decision models. All chapters contain a concise introduction into the theory, worked-out examples and exercises. All examples are implemented in the open-source package R, thus taking away problems of software availability for use of the book. All code used in the book is available on a dedicated website.

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Price: $87.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]