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The Weird and Wonderful Science of Reproduction
by Dr. Lixing Sun
From split-gill mushrooms to duck-billed platypuses, the spectacular science of sexual reproduction and creation of biodiversity on Earth.
Let's talk about sex. Not boring, human sex, but the endlessly fascinating, varied, and complex forms of reproduction in the rest of the natural world. Biologist Lixing Sun has spent decades researching sexual reproduction and evolution using behavioral experiments, genetic testing, and mathematical and computer modeling. In On the Origin of Sex, he reveals the wild and weird world of how creatures reproduce.
In slime molds, sex can involve dozens—or even hundreds—of mating types, or proto-sexes. Among certain algae, nearly every individual can mate with almost any other—a veritable free-for-all. Meanwhile, whiptail lizards and California condors are just two among the many vertebrate species capable of parthenogenesis. Clownfish sequentially change from male to female, and bearded dragons can undergo temperature-dependent sex reversal, all of which challenge the notion that sex is binary and fixed in the natural world.
Assiduously researched and narrated with humor and verve, On the Origin of Sex offers an expert and entertaining investigation into the science of how our planet is populated.
"Sun distills complex genetic concepts for general audiences with irreverence and humor. Sun's analysis emphasizes the breadth of diversity in nature while reminding readers that sex and gender are neither fixed nor binary." ―Booklist
"An entertaining and enlightening look at the ever-changing 'juicy mysteries' of sex." ―Kirkus Reviews
"People make two mistakes about biological sex: first, that it's simple. Second, that we can backsolve its purpose and evolution based on that assumption. Lixing Sun rightfully skewers these assumptions in this wonderful and wide-ranging book. Smart, thoughtful, and witty, this book will make you rethink what you thought you knew about sex." ―Cat Bohannon, author of Eve
"Sex is costly, dangerous and weird. Why on earth should natural selection smile on a mechanism that creates individuals radically different from those who have, by reproducing, already demonstrated their fitness? Lixing Sun, in this thrilling biological detective story, brilliantly told and relentlessly entertaining, romps towards an answer." ―Charles Foster, author of The Edges of the World
This information about On the Origin of Sex was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Dr. Lixing Sun is a distinguished research professor at Central Washington University and a 2024–2025 Radcliffe fellow at Harvard University. He is author of The Liars of Nature and the Nature of Liars and The Fairness Instinct. He lives in Washington.
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