Living at Micro Scale: The Unexpected Physics of Being Small [Paperback]

Kermit the Frog famously said that it isnt easy being green, and in Living at Micro Scale David Dusenbery shows that it isnt easy being smallexisting at the size of, say, a rotifer, a tiny multicellular animal just at the boundary between the visible and the microscopic. Imagine, he writes, stepping off a curb and waiting a week for your foot to hit the ground. At that scale, we would be small enough to swim inside the letter O in the word rotifer. What are the physical consequences of life at this scale? How do such organisms move, identify prey and predators and (if theyre so inclined) mates, signal to one another, and orient themselves?

In clear and engaging prose, Dusenbery uses straightforward physics to demonstrate the constraints on the size, shape, and behavior of tiny organisms. While recounting the historical development of the basic concepts, he unearths a corner of microbiology rich in history, and full of lessons about how science does or does not progress. Marshalling findings from different fields to show why tiny organisms have some of the properties they are found to have, Dusenbery shows a science that doesnt always move triumphantly forward, and is dependent to a great extent on accident and contingency.

The book draws on 20 years of Dusenberys own research, and he doesnt compromise on the science; informed readers will find all the equations they could need. But it is rarely dry or uninteresting, and benefits from a liberal scattering of anecdotes going back 2500 years. My favorite is the idea that Galileo fell foul of the church because of his atomist view of matter.David Dusenberys book Living at Micro Scale does an excellent job of explaining the physics that is relevant at this scale and, later in the book, how this physics affects the behavior of microorganisms& The book will be accessible and useful to a wide audience of people interested in biology, physics or engineering. And the provocative questions presented lc!