Biology

by OpenStax College

Biology is designed for multi-semester biology courses for science majors. It is grounded on an evolutionary basis and includes exciting features that highlight careers in the biological sciences and everyday applications of the concepts at hand. To meet the needs of today’s instructors and students, some content has been strategically condensed while maintaining the overall scope and coverage of traditional texts for this course. Instructors can customize the book, adapting it to the approach that works best in their classroom. Biology also includes an innovative art program that incorporates critical thinking and clicker questions to help students understand—and apply—key concepts.Biology is grounded in an evolutionary basis and includes exciting features that highlight careers in the biological sciences and everyday applications of the concepts at hand. To meet the needs of today's instructors and students, some topics have been condensed and combined; for example, phylogenetic trees are presented in the various ways they are currently being developed by scholars, so instructors can adapt their teaching to the approach that works best in their classroom. The book also includes an innovative art program that incorporates critical thinking and clicker questions to help students understand-and apply-key concepts. This book is available online for free onlineViewed from space, Earth offers no clues about the diversity of life forms that reside there. The first forms of life on Earth are thought to have been microorganisms that existed for billions of years in the ocean before plants and animals appeared. The mammals, birds, and flowers so familiar to us are all relatively recent, originating 130 to 200 million years ago. Humans have inhabited this planet for only the last 2.5 million years, and only in the last 200,000 years have humans started looking like we do today.

Genres: Textbooks

Kindle Edition

First published March 1, 2013

About the author

OpenStax College is a nonprofit organization committed to improving student access to quality learning materials. Their free textbooks are developed and peer-reviewed by educators to ensure they are readable, accurate, and meet the scope and sequence requirements of your course. Through their partnerships with companies and foundations committed to reducing costs for students, OpenStax College is working to improve access to higher education for all. OpenStax College is an initiative of Rice University and is made possible through the generous support of several philanthropic foundations.

Reviews

[Vincent · Rating 1 out of 5]

Read and annotated this entire textbook. One of the worst things I have ever done. At least I got an A in the class!

[Matthew VanZoest · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have learned more than I've learned in years.

[Laureena Mardini · Rating 3 out of 5]

Considering the fact that this reference in Biology is provided for free to all learners, it is pretty okay. Simple, straightforward, and offers many exercises and extra scripts that provoke further thought and research. It is not that aesthetically appealing, but this should not bother a student who wants to get the information clearly and quickly.
I used this reference to study for an online biology class and it was actually much better than the reference that was mandatory in my prior college studies.
You can find it among other free references provided by OpenStax here:
https://openstax.org/subjects/science

[Lauren Schaefer]

Reference textbook, might read through later

[Rob Mamede · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good text book. A free copy of this textbook can be viewed online or downloaded in various formats from openstax college. http://cnx.org/content/col11448/latest/