Immune: How Your Body Defends and Protects You (Bloomsbury Sigma) (2017) (PDF) by Catherine Carver

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Ebook Info

  • Published: 2017
  • Number of pages: 304
  • Format: PDF
  • File Size: 7.45 MB
  • Authors: Catherine Carver

Description

The human body is like an exceedingly well-fortified castle, defended by billions of soldiers–some live for less than a day, others remember battles for decades, but all are essential in protecting us from disease. This hidden army is our immune system, and without it we could not survive the eternal war between us and our microscopic enemies.

Immune explores the incredible arsenal that lives within us–how it knows what to attack and what to defend, and how it kills everything from the common cold to the plague bacterium. We see what happens when the immune system turns on us, and conversely how impossible life is without its protection. We learn how diseases try to evade the immune system, how they exploit vulnerabilities and even subvert it to their own advantage, and we discover how scientists are designing new drugs to harness the power of the system to advance medicine in the 21st century.

Some of the topics explored include why are so many people allergic to cats, but so few to hamsters? Do transplants ever reject their new bodies? What is pus? How does your body develop new weapons for new enemies? Why is cancer so hard for our immune system to fight? How does our immune system remember? Why did the 1918 flu pandemic kill mainly young, healthy people? Why did the 2009 swine flu outbreak lead to a spike in sleep disorders? Can we smell someone else’s immune system, and does that help us subconsciously decide who we fall in love with?

Immune provides an entertaining, intriguing, and accessible account of the body’s defenses against disease. Drawing on everything from ancient Egyptian medical texts to cutting-edge medical science, the book takes readers on an adventure packed with weird and wonderful facts about their own defense mechanisms, making this both informative and great fun to read.

User’s Reviews

Review “. . . Carver ably explains it all.” – Kirkus Reviews”A spectacular
contribution to popular science writing.” – Christopher van Tulleken,
doctor and TV presenter”With exuberance and clarity, Catherine Carver makes
the complex science easy to understand in this refreshing read.” – Danny
Altmann, Professor of Immunology, Imperial College London”Immune is a
fascinating journey through the body’s defences. Carver’s writing fizzes
with descriptions, metaphors, and stories, taking us right into the inner
workings of the immune system with flair and enthusiasm.” – Kat Arney,
science writer, broadcaster, and author of HERDING HEMINGWAY’S
CATS”[Carver] transforms a data-heavy research area into an entertainingly
informative survey of the immune system . . . This splendid guide offers
historical and scientific context on a subfield of biology that affects
everyone and that is increasingly being harnessed to improve and save
lives.” – Publishers Weekly

Reviews from Amazon users, collected at the time the book is getting published on UniedVRG. It can be related to shiping or paper quality instead of the book content:

⭐ A casual introduction to biochem and immunology for those of us without
PhDs. Fun and easy to read, but with good info.

⭐ Immune by Catherine Carver is a free NetGalley ebook that I read in late
October.Carver’s tone is cheerful, up-front and the immune system portrayed
as positive, almost heroic, while impending parasites/germs/allergens are
evil and wiley. There are also analogical and visual (like either exact,
clinical illustrations or kooky caricature visual) case studies on man-made
counteractive antibodies, people that have a total lack of immunity,
inheritable cellular properties, understanding compromised immune systems,
and the effects and implications of bioterrorism.

⭐ My wife brought this book from the library for me as she thought I would
be interested. I thoroughly enjoyed it to the extent that I have now
purchased a copy. Not sure about the credentials of other reviewers, but I
personally have a degree in bio sciences, a PhD in applied microbiology, am
a fellow of the royal society of biology and have spent the last 40 years
in the pharmaceutical industry, latterly as quality director for a
biotechnology company. I was delighted at how much of my initial training
in immunology I could still remember, and even more so to see references to
compounds on which my last company worked! A thoroughly readable and in
places humorous introduction to an extremely complex subject! Very well
written!

⭐ I haven’t finished the book yet, but it seems very interesting so far.

⭐ I am writing this review quite early in the book – as it is hard to keep
track of such details. But I’m only up to page 33 and already come across 3
problems in the book.1. Page 15 The cilia in the lungs showing to beat at
1,000 to 1,500 times per minute. Most references seem to show much slower
rates, and the author seems to have picked the highest number to be found
to sound exciting.2. Page 16/17. The author talks about the scientist
William Beaumont – but the writing sounds like a copy+paste description I
have read elsewhere very recently. Many sentences sounded completely
identical (and since this is a brand new book I must assume the author is
the one plagiarising).3. Page 33. The author says that blood turns from a
‘vivacious red’ to a ‘sombre dark blue’ as it loses oxygen. But blood turns
dark red when it loses oxygen.This sort of book needs to be very accurate
given the number of facts being given out – and it seems the author hasn’t
handed the book to any other scientist before hitting publication. Surely
any scientist given the book would have pointed out that blood turns dark
red when it loses oxygen.The book is a fairly light read, which is what I
was looking for (reading to relax and learn a bit at the same time). But I
am not sure if I can continue reading since I can’t rely on the facts to be
true.

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