In 1861, just a few years after the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species, a scientist named Hermann von Meyer made an amazing discovery. Hidden in the Bavarian region of Germany was a fossil skeleton so exquisitely preserved that its wings and feathers were as obvious as its reptilian jaws and tail. This transitional creature offered tangible proof of Darwin's theory of evolution. Hailed as the First Bird, Archaeopteryx has remained the subject of heated debates for the last 140 years. Are birds actually living dinosaurs? Where does the fossil record really lead? Did flight originate from the "ground up" or "trees down"? Pat Shipman traces the age-old human desire to soar above the earth and to understand what has come before us. Taking Wing is science as adventure story, told with all the drama by which scientific understanding unfolds.

Whether the Archaeopteryx was the first bird or a somewhat clumsy airborne dinosaur is still uncertain. But Rachel's Archaeopteryx---the name given her airplane by twelve-year-old daughter, Cathy---may face extinction as she flies to remote airports making pickups for Utah's largest bank. Ever trusting and optimistic, Rachel overlooks the obvious: she is being stalked. So why would she think the disappearance of an acquaintance has anything to do with her? The bullet hole in the wing of her airplane catches her attention. But wasn't that just a potshot from a drunken hunter? Rachel wants to put these distractions behind her. She has more important things on her mind, like keeping pace with her increasingly independent daughter and her growing friendship with the beautiful and athletic, Sherry Sanchez. No time for unpleasant thoughts until her lofty view of the world snares her in a complex--and dangerous--web.

This book synthesises the growing body of evidence which suggests that modern-day birds have evolved from theropod dinosaurs of prehistoric times. The author argues that the ancestor-descendant relationship can also be reversed.

Surveying the major facts, concepts, theories, and speculations that infuse our present comprehension of time, the Encyclopedia of Time: Science, Philosophy, Theology, and Culture explores the contributions of scientists, philosophers, theologians, and creative artists from ancient times to the present. By drawing together into one collection ideas from scholars around the globe and in a wide range of disciplines, this Encyclopedia will provide readers with a greater understanding of and appreciation for the elusive phenomenon experienced as time. Features · Surveys historical thought about time, including those that emerged in ancient Greece, early Christianity, the Italian Renaissance, the Age of Enlightenment, and other periods+ Covers the original and lasting insights of evolutionary biologist Charles Darwin, physicist Albert Einstein, philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, and theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin + Discusses the significance of time in the writings of Isaac Asimov, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Fyodor M. Dostoevsky, Francesco Petrarch, and numerous other authors+ Includes the contributions of naturalists, philosophers, physicists, theologians, astronomers, anthropologists, geologists, paleontologists, and psychologists+ Includes artists+ portrayals of the fluidity of time, including painter Salvador Dali+s The Persistence of Memory and The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus, and writers Gustave Flaubert+s The Temptation of Saint Anthony and Henryk Sienkiewicz+s Quo Vadis+ Provides a truly interdisciplinary approach, with discussions of Aztec, Buddhist, Christian, Egyptian, Ethiopian, Islamic, Hindu, Navajo, and many other cultures+ conceptions of time

An exploration of all that is known about the origin of birds and of avian flight. It draws on fossil evidence and studies of the structure and biochemistry of living birds to present knowledge and data on avian evolution and to propose a new model of this evolutionary process.

The emphasis in this volume is on the structure and functional design of the integument. The book starts with a brief introduction to some basic principles of physics (mechanics) including Newton’s Three Laws of Motion. These principles are subsequently used to interpret the problems animals encounter in motion. It is in only the last 40 or so years that we have begun to understand how important a role the integument plays in the locomotion of many marine vertebrates. This involves the crossed-fiber architecture, which was first discovered in a classic study on nemertean worms. As a design principle we see that the crossed-fiber architecture is ubiquitous in nature. Research on some of the most dynamic marine vertebrates of the oceans – tuna, dolphins and sharks, and the extinct Jurassic ichthyosaurs – shows precisely how the crossed-fiber architecture contributes to high-speed swimming and (in lamnid sharks) may even aid in energy conservation. However, this design principle is not restricted to animals in the marine biota but is also found as far afield as the dinosaurs and, most recently, has been revealed as a major part of the microstructure of the most complex derivative of the integument, the feather. We see that a variety of phylogenetically diverse vertebrates take to the air by using skin flaps to glide from tree to tree or to the ground, and present detailed descriptions of innovations developed in pursuit of improved gliding capabilities in both extinct and modern day gliders. But the vertebrate integument had even greater things in store, namely true or flapping flight. Pterosaurs were the first vertebrates to use the integument as a membrane in true flapping flight and these interesting extinct animals are discussed on the basis of past and cutting-edge research , most intriguingly with respect to the structure of the flight membrane. Bats, the only mammals that fly, also employ integumental flight membranes. Classic research on bat flight is reviewed and supplemented with the latest research, which shows the complexities of the wing beat cycle to be significantly different from that of birds, as revealed by particle image velocimetry. The book’s largest chapter is devoted to birds, given that they make up nearly half of the over 22,000 species of tetrapods. The flight apparatus of birds is unique in nature and is described in great detail, with innovative research highlighting the complexity of the flight structures, bird flight patterns, and behavior in a variety of species. This is complimented by new research on the brains of birds, which shows that they are more complex than previously thought. The feather made bird flight possible, and was itself made possible by β-keratin, contributing to what may be a unique biomechanical microstructure in nature, a topic discussed in some depth. A highly polarized subject concerns the origin of birds and of the feather. Alleged fossilized protofeathers (primal simple feathers) are considered on the basis of histological and taphonomic investigative studies in Chapter 6. Finally, in Chapter 7 we discuss the controversies associated with this field of research. Professor Theagarten Lingham-Soliar works at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Port Elizabeth and is an Honorary Professor of Life Sciences at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.