Neil Shubin's The Universe Within: Discovering the Common History of Rocks, Planets, and People
takes a fascinating journey from a tooth in exposed rock on the surface of Greenland to a supernova and back to the daily rings on corral. Trace elements in our body were created as a result of a supernova.We share similar biologic clocks with hamsters and fruit flies. Genetic mutations that cause altered sleep patterns in fruit flies are similar to those that cause sleep pattern disruptions in humans.
He describes the evidence for the plate tectonics and past climate change. He relays the discovery of 44 million year old Redwood tree stumps on the continent of Antarctica. The still burnable tree stumps provide evidence for a time when that continent was much warmer than it is today.
Neil Shubin's primary work as a paleontologist involves very patient studies of rock formations for transition creatures. Based on the fossil record they expected to find a creature bridging the gap between fish and amphibian in sedimentary rock near the end of the Devonian period. He and a team of researchers spent five years studying exposed late Devonian (375 million years ago) rock layers in Canada and unearthed Tiktaalik (Wikipedia) a transition creature between fish and amphibian.
I found this a fascinating book linking humans and what we are made of with the origin of the Universe and the creation of our solar system.
The Universe Within - 19 minutes
Your inner fish - PBS - 55 minutes
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