The many lives of carbon / Dag Olav Hessen.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hessen, Dag Olav, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Carbon.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (261 pages) : illustrations

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

London, UK : Reaktion Books, 2017.

Summary:

In its pure form, carbon appears as the soft graphite of a pencil or as the sparkling diamond in a woman's engagement ring. Underneath the surface, carbon is also the basic building block of the cells in our bodies and of all known life on earth. And at a molecular level, carbon bonds with oxygen to create carbon dioxide-a gas as vital to our life on this planet as it is detrimental at high levels in our atmosphere. As we face the climate change crisis, it's now more important than ever to understand carbon and its life cycle. The Many Lives of Carbon is the story of this all-important chemical element, labeled C on our periodic tables. It's the story of balance-between photosynthesis and cell respiration, between building and burning, between life and death. Dag Olav Hessen is our guide as we discover carbon in minerals, rocks, wood, and rain forests. He explains how carbon is studied by scientists, as well as its role in the greenhouse effect, and, not least, the impact of manmade emissions. Hessen isn't afraid to ask the difficult questions as he confronts us with the literally burning issue of climate change. How will ecosystems respond to global change, and how will this feed back into our climate systems? How bad could climate change be, and will our ecosystems recover? What are our moral obligations in the face of excess carbon production? Neither alarmist nor moralistic, Hessen takes readers on a journey from atom to planet in informative, compelling prose.

Contents:

Cover

Title Page

Imprint Page

Contents

Part I: Carbon, Carbon Everywhere

Carbon in Everything

Fire Explained

The Master of Disguise: Soft, Hard and Round

Nylon Tights and their Descendants

Carbon on Wheels

Plastic Fantastic

Synthias as a Carbon Company

To Build and to Burn: Carbon in the Life Equation

From C3 to C4 - and the World's Most Important Protein

Atomic Physics's Solution to Photosynthesis

Photosynthesis in Reverse

Good Neighbours

C and 4H: A Hot Partnership

The Benefits of Methane

Archaea

Part II: The C in Cycle

The Keeling Curve

A Swede before His Time

One or Many Cycles?

Pyramids, Chains and Webs

The Carbon Queen Emiliania

Borealis

Paradise Lost

The Long Carbon Cycle

The Anthropocene

Gaia and Feedbacks

Bluer and More Acidic

Methane Bombs

Between a Snowball and Hell

Oxygen's Evolution

Nitrogen and Phosphorus: The Great Circulatory Changes

Part III: The Footprint

Paradise Lost II

Shoe Size

How Bad are Bananas?

Petroholism's Withdrawal

Afterlives

References

Bibliography

Acknowledgements

Index.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781780238746

1780238746