Biology

General understanding of biology

All branches of biology can be unified in a framework of the knowledge of five basic aspects about living beings. Studying the details of these five ideas provides is the center of biological research:

• Cell theory: there are three parts to cell theory: the cell is the basic unit of life, all living things are composed of cells and all cells are born from pre-existing cells.
• Energy: all living beings require energy and energy flows between organisms and between organisms and the environment.
• Heredity: all living things have DNA and genetic information encodes the structure and function of all cells.
• Homeostasis: all living beings must maintain homeostasis, a state of balanced equilibrium between the organism and its environment.
• Evolution: this is the general unifying concept of biology. Evolution is the change over time that is the engine of biological diversity.

Biology and other sciences

Biology is often studied in conjunction with other sciences, such as mathematics and engineering, and even with social sciences. Here are some examples:

Biophysics involves life models in life and analyzes them with physics and mathematics, according to the Biophysical Society.

Biomathematics involves creating mathematical models to better understand models and phenomena within the biology world.

Bioengineering is the application of engineering principles to the principles of biology and vice versa.

Sociologists often study how biology can shape social structures, cultures and interactions.

History of biology

The fascination with biology has a long history. Even the first human beings had to study the animals they hunted and know where to find the plants they collected for food. The invention of agriculture was the first great progress of human civilization. Medicine has been important to us since the most ancient history. The first known medical texts come from China (2500 BC), from Mesopotamia (2112 BC) and from Egypt (1800 BC).

In classical times, Aristotle is often considered the first to practice so-called scientific zoology. He is known to have conducted extensive studies on marine life and plants. His student, Theophrastus, wrote one of the oldest botanical texts of the West in 300 BC on the structure, the life cycle and the uses of the plants. The Roman physician Galen used his experience in patching up the gladiators for the arena to write texts on surgical procedures in 158 AD

During the Renaissance, Leonardo da Vinci risked censorship by participating in human dissection and creating detailed anatomical drawings that are still considered among the most beautiful ever made.

One of the first illustrated biology books was a botanical text written by the German botanist Leonhard Fuchs in 1542. The binomial classification was inaugurated by Carolus Linnaeus in 1735, using Latin names to group species according to their characteristics.

Microscopes have opened up new worlds for scientists. In 1665, Robert Hooke used a simple compound microscope to examine a thin piece of cork. He observed that the plant tissue consisted of rectangular units that reminded him of the tiny rooms used by the monks. He called these “cell” units. In 1676, Anton von Leeuwenhoek published the first drawings of single-cell living organisms. Theodore Schwann added the information that animal tissue is also composed of cells in 1839.

During the Victorian era, and throughout the 19th century, “Natural Sciences” became a sort of mania. Thousands of new species were discovered and described by fearless adventurers and botanists and courtyard entomologists. In 1812, Georges Cuvier described fossils and hypothesized that the Earth had suffered “successive attacks of creation and destruction” for long periods of time. On November 24, 1859, Charles Darwin published “On the Origin of Species”, the text that changed the world forever by demonstrating that all living things are interrelated and that species were not created separately but derived from ancestral forms that have changed and shaped by adapting to their environment.

While much of the world’s attention has been captured by questions of biology at the level of a macroscopic organism, a silent monk was studying how living things pass traits from one generation to another. Gregor Mendel is now known as the father of genetics although the inheritance papers, published in 1866, have largely gone unnoticed at the time. His work was rediscovered in 1900 and quickly followed the further understanding of the inheritance.

The 20th and 21st centuries can be known by future generations as the beginning of the “Biological Revolution”. Starting from Watson and Crick which explain the structure and function of DNA in 1953, all fields of biology have expanded exponentially and touch every aspect of our lives.