Product Description

In ten weeks, one female fruit fly can produce more descendants than there are people on Earth. Some fruit flies are born without genitals - scientists call these mutants 'Ken and Barbie' - whereas others are born with their legs on their heads. They can be trained by punishment and reward, and have a work-and-rest schedule based on the 24-hour clock. They can become addicted to crack cocaine. Males have toxic semen, which is bad news for females: too much sex can kill them. And there are more than 1,000 species living in Hawaii. The amazing fruit fly is, in fact, an unsung hero in the history of science. No popular account exists of the fruit fly or its pioneering role in many of this century's greatest discoveries. This book corrects this poor public image by telling the story of modern biology - from genetics to evolution, physiology to ecology, medicine to psychology - through the life of the fly. In a highly original and entertaining style, Martin Brookes takes us through successive stages in the life cycle of the fly, each illustrating an important concept in biology. From the incredible journey from embryo to adult, to the nature of memory and learning and theories of ageing, this book reveals how one short and seemingly insignificant life has informed almost every aspect of human existence. The result is a broad introduction to biology, evolution and genetics based around the personality of the fly, and a 'warts and all' insight into the practical realities of science. Often dismissed as irrelevant, the fruit fly will, through this unique synthesis, come to be recognised for what it really is: an icon of modern science and a window on our own biological world.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #258849 in Books
• Published on: 2001-03-15
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 192 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Every school child has dozed over texts describing the life cycle of the humble fruit fly; it's so ubiquitious in experimental biology as to seem hardly worth lingering over. Martin Brookes aims to swat that notion with the wonderfully entertaining Fly: An Experimental Life.

The principles of evolutionary biology can be usefully applied to literary fashions. As soon as a commercially successful adaptation has been established in the bookshop ecology, a plethora of offspring and imitators will rush to fill the niche: until the whole section is crowded out and another adaptation is needed. Such an adaptation is the popular science book focusing on a relatively mundane item. In recent years we've seen winning books on the potato, and codfish, among others--now here's one on fruit flies.

Happily, this book shows there's life yet in this particular niche. Brookes, a biologist of eight years' standing, has spent much of that time studying the fruit fly, an insect "less than half the size of a grape pip", that for reasons of happenstance and accident, as well as simplicity of design and genetics, has featured in more bio-evolutionary research than any other. This book is an attempt to explain where, when and how the humble fruit fly achieved its scientific fame, and what that fame means for that other much-studied creature, man.

Brookes's style, as he saunters through the fly's life cycles, visiting various labs and institutes on the way, is chatty, discursive, humorous, accessible and friendly. He also packs in plenty of fruit fly information. Fly mutants with heads in their stomachs, a fly called Groucho because of its Marx Brother eyebrows, flies on crack cocaine walking backwards, they're all in here. It's a real buzz. --Sean Thomas

Review
How genetics, with the help of the humble fruit fly, moved into the forefront of modern science. Brookes ("Get a Grip on Genetics", not reviewed) begins where modern biology begins: with Darwin. But the father of evolution was, like his naturalist predecessors, an observer and collector rather than an experimenter. As the 19th century came to a close, a new generation of scientists champed at the bit, anxious to test their theories in the laboratory. As Thomas Hunt Morgan of Columbia University discovered, the fruit fly-short-lived, prolific, easy to raise in a bottle-was an ideal experimental subject. A few years later, his student Herman Muller learned that exposure to X-rays would bring about a rash of bizarre mutations in the flies: legs growing where antennae ought to, or doubled body segments. By the 1930s, this discovery had opened the door to the study of the individual genes responsible for the mutations, and new insight into the developmental patterns of growing organisms. The saliva glands of the fly contain oversized chromosomes that allow scientists to observe individual genes directly. The connection between genetics and evolution was reestablished by Theodosius Dobzhansky, whose studies of wild-fruit-fly populations pointed up the genetic diversity within a single species that is the raw material of evolutionary development. Later experiments with "jumping" genes led to the discovery of a rudimentary form of genetic engineering, of the genetic foundations of behavior, and hints of the secrets of longevity. Brookes gives enough detail of the various experiments to give the layperson a grasp of their significance, and provides an entertaining glimpse of the daily workings of a genetics lab. A well-written and cohesive treatment of the fundamentals of genetics, as revealed through its favorite experimental subject. (Kirkus Reviews)

About the Author
MARTIN BROOKES has a PhD in evolutionary biology. He is now a freelance science writer for New Scientist, the Guardian and BBC Wildlife Magazine.

Customer Reviews

The incredible 'Life of Fly'.
Having an interest in evolution as well as a fascination with insects I was led to this unusual book. I wasn't really surprised at how interesting and entertaining it was, as the fruit fly seems to get at least a passing mention in many mainstream popular biological science works. The book was a pleasure to read, and although a difficult book to recommend I think it deserves a wider audience. The book will undoubtedly attract a narrow band of very selective readers but I'm sure that anyone with an interest in science would find the book fascinating.

A refreshingly entertaining book!
I loved this book. It's not often that an entymological tome makes me laugh aloud, but this one did regularly. And it's marvellously informative. I spent a year working in a fly lab, and found Brookes' description of this endeavour to be remarkably evocative! A great read for biologists and non-biologists alike, I thoroughly recommend it.