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The Song of the Cell
- An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human
- Narrated by: Dennis Boutsikaris
- Length: 16 hrs and 2 mins
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The Song of the Cell
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Summary
Brought to you by Penguin.
From the author of The Emperor of All Maladies, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, and The Gene, a number one New York Times best seller, comes his most spectacular book yet, about the fundamental unit of life. Rich with Mukherjee's revelatory and exhilarating stories of scientists, doctors and the patients whose lives may be saved by their work, The Song of the Cell is the third book in this extraordinary writer's exploration of what it means to be human.
In the late 1600s, a distinguished English polymath, Robert Hooke, and an eccentric Dutch cloth-merchant, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, look down their hand-made microscopes. What they see introduces a radical concept that sweeps through biology and medicine, touching virtually every aspect of the two sciences and altering both forever. It is the fact that complex living organisms are assemblages of tiny self-contained, self-regulating units. Our organs, our physiology, our selves—hearts, blood, brains—are built from these compartments. Hooke christens them "cells".
The discovery of cells—and the reframing of the human body as a cellular ecosystem—announced the birth of a new kind of medicine based on the therapeutic manipulations of cells. A hip fracture, a cardiac arrest, Alzheimer's dementia, AIDS, pneumonia, lung cancer, kidney failure, arthritis, COVID pneumonia—all could be re-conceived as the results of cells, or systems of cells, functioning abnormally. And all could be perceived as loci of cellular therapies.
In The Song of the Cell, Mukherjee tells the story of how scientists discovered cells, began to understand them and are now using that knowledge to create new humans. He seduces listeners with writing so vivid, lucid and suspenseful that complex science becomes thrilling. Told in six parts, laced with Mukherjee's own experience as a researcher, a doctor and a prolific reader, The Song of the Cell is both panoramic and intimate—a masterpiece.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
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What listeners say about The Song of the Cell
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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- Amazon Customer
- 09-12-23
Great content bit wondering
Very important topics are well covered. Sometimes the personal stories go on a bit. Summaries per chapter are needed.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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- Matt
- 23-10-23
What an opus
I work in biology, after a 10yr career break I thought this would be a good listen. To revise and catch up with the world of cell biology.
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- KT
- 03-08-23
Flowing, fascinating book.
Beautiful, informative book written with an ebb and flow, vignettes of autobiography weaving the scientific information and knitting the whole together. Most enjoyable listen and the added pdf is an excellent resource.
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- Chris H.
- 02-08-23
Masterful writing
A masterful weaving of history and new research that brings insight, challenge and sensitivity. It combines the widest sweep with personal incidents and patients to make the book very readable. The narrator completes the set making sometimes quite dense information able to be taken in. I especially appreciated the chapter content headings being shown as well as the chapter number to help me keep on track with where we were going.
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- Sinéad
- 27-12-22
Enchanting- a remarkable journey through some of the most fascinating science
I had high expectations based on his previous two works and this did not disappoint. Incredible.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Andrew M Kimberley
- 02-03-23
A fascinating book, I couldn’t stop listening.
A fantastic book that follows the experiments which slowly developed our understanding of the cell all the way to recent cutting edge technology.
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- Liz
- 05-12-23
Fascinating
As a medical student, anatomy, physiology and pathophysiology are learned about in abstract. This book helps pull all the information together and give an overall understanding of how the ‘parts’ fit and work together. Excellent listen.
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- Amazon Customer
- 10-03-24
Fascinating
Beautifully written and the process of discovery so well documented. I can see why this book was up for an awards.
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- Suke
- 12-05-23
Fascinating
Great book. Fantastic to hear author. So interesting. Really good balance between anecdote and explanation.
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- veyza
- 04-12-22
Satisfying and fascinating
I studied cell biology as an undergraduate many years ago. Life has since taken me in a totally different direction. This book provided a satisfying and fascinating overview and update of the field as it is today.
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1 person found this helpful