This book investigates new agricultural systems such as organic and green manuring, as well as integrated pest management practices, and looks at how they can improve farm productivity against the enhancements for the environment....

Risk and reliability analysis is an area of growing importance in geotechnical engineering, where many variables have to be considered. Statistics, reliability modeling and engineering judgement are employed together to develop risk and decision analyses for civil engineering systems....

This book offers a fresh perspective on the controversial topic of criminal and antisocial behavior. It synthesizes findings from behavioral and population genetics, evolutionary biology and criminology and presents the latest findings in twin studies, adoption cohort studies, molecular genetics and animal models for human aggression....

This book draws together contributions from some of the leading investigators in the field of autism to consider specific problem areas in current research. Each contributor brings expertise from a different field, providing a balanced view of the whole spectrum of study of this disorder....

To understand the brain and its devastating diseases, we need to reveal the mechanisms that produce it and the ways in which it can constantly change throughout a lifetime. This book features a timely and insightful discussion between developmental neurobiologists and clinicians who deal with disorders of the nervous system....

This book brings together material on all aspects of immunological tolerance. Basic mechanisms of tolerance are examined in detail, including mechanisms of peripheral T cell tolerance, molecular and genetic mechanisms for maintaining self tolerance, partial T cell activation, and the role of apoptosis in tolerance....

A timely volume dealing with the evolutionary and structural links between the clotting and fibrinolytic proteins and plasminogen-related growth factors. The role of individual domains for enzymatic proteins and plasminogen-related growth factors is also comprehensively examined. ...

The field of lymphokine research has grown in parallel to the exciting developments around the two sets of cells which defend the body. While lymphokines are the «property» of immunologists, the molecular regulators of hemopoiesis (CSFs) belong to the hematologists....

Many common human diseases have a multifactorial origin: they are influenced by a person\"s genetic predisposition as well as by factors in the environment. This volume deals with the application of recombinant DNA techniques to the identification of diseases that have more than one inherited component....

This book is a comprehensive and up-to-date account of where we stand in immunological strategies for preventing or treating type 1 diabetes (T1D)....

This book explores the possibility that life exists on Mars. It provides an interdisciplinary overview of the early evolution of life in hydrothermal ecosystems on Earth, focusing on the problem of remote sensing and incorporating geological work relevant to the search for evidence of early life on Earth and Mars....

Dengue virus is a member of the Flaviviridae family, which includes viruses associated with human diseases such as yellow fever, Japanese encephalitis and hepatitis C. Dengue fever is transmitted by mosquitoes, principally Aedes aegypti. There are four serotypes of dengue virus, of which DENV-2 has been the most prevalent in many recent epidemics....

Much recent research in evolutionary developmental biology has focused on the origin of new body plans. However, most evolutionary change at the population and species level consists of tinkering: small-scale alterations in developmental pathways within a single body plan....

Understanding stem cells at the molecular level is essential to understanding their behaviour in a physiological context. This volume in our acclaimed Novartis Foundation series features animated discussion from the world’s experts in this topic on the important ethical issues that are raised by research on stem cells....