Summary: How do humans influence changes in other species? Has Homo sapiens itself stopped evolving? This program explores natural selection as an ongoing phenomenon, showing how evolutionary processes continue to shape the future of all life on Earth. Exploring the competition for resources, territory, and mates that occurs in any ecosystem, the video illustrates how species differentiation takes...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program tours a greenhouse to describe the four main classifications of plants, and their structure and reproduction.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: In this visually dazzling TEDTalk presentation, Jonathan Drori shows the extraordinary ways that flowering plants - over a quarter-million species - have evolved to attract insects to spread pollen. Some flowers grow landing strips to guide the bugs in, or build ingenious, elaborate traps, while others actually deceive by mimicking an insect in heat. Using gorgeous visuals including electron...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: What gave Charles Darwin the confidence to finally make his radical ideas on evolution public? Presented by well-known science interpreter Jim Doherty, this program explores Darwin's research during the years leading up to his publication of On the Origin of Species. Doherty explains and reconstructs several experiments that Darwin undertook on the grounds of his English estate. These include...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Do the world's rainforests contain a cure for cancer and AIDS? This intriguing program travels to Jakarta, Surabaya, and the jungles of Kalimantan to investigate the preparation and use of natural remedies to combat illnesses such as skin fungus, malaria, and even AIDS. But logging continues unabated, even as ethnobiologists from the National Cancer Institute and the Harvard Medical School...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: While acknowledging the achievements of the pharmaceutical industry, this program offers an alternative perspective on the production of medicines, emphasizing the use of plants and herbs instead of synthetic compounds. Beginning with a historical overview of plant remedies-including evidence of sophisticated herbalism in ancient Mesopotamian, Egyptian, and Arab cultures-the video describes how...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Surveying the vast biodiversity of the medicinal plant world, this program examines the challenges facing countries rich in such natural resources. The video presents interviews with numerous alternative health experts-including Dr. Jean-Pierre Willem, renowned surgeon, ethnologist, and the last field assistant of Dr. Albert Schweitzer-and documents their knowledge in a wide range of herbal and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: From selective breeding in agriculture to animal cloning and the production of recombinant proteins, science continues to develop ways to modify the genetic code. This program spotlights the basic tools and techniques for manipulating DNA and how these are also used to investigate genetic functions. Viewers will learn about the coding and non-coding sections of DNA; the basics of PCR or the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Public controversy surrounding cloning and genetic modification increases with each new development in the field. Illustrating concepts at the heart of the debate, this program shows how biotechnology now drives large-scale agriculture through genetic engineering and sophisticated selective breeding. Outlining ways in which humans have indirectly modified plants and animals since the dawn of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Featuring author, journalist, activist, and professor Michael Pollan, and based on his best-selling book, this program takes viewers on an eye-opening exploration of the human relationship with the plant world - seen from the plants' point of view. Narrated by Frances McDormand, the program shows how four familiar species - the apple, the tulip, marijuana, and the potato - evolved to satisfy...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: This Science Screen Report studies the Wollemi Pine, its 100-million-year history, and the methods used to protect and sustain it. Describing the tree's physical characteristics, its unusual way of propagating, and the medically valuable fungi that grow on its leaves and stems, the program explains how this living organism closely resembles fossils of long-extinct species, and how seed...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Many critics of "Big Pharma" see a pattern of exploitation in the industry's dealings with the developing world. This program identifies new ways for drug manufacturers to operate globally, promoting increased cooperation with local producers of traditional, plant-based medicines. Recognizing that worldwide demand for alternative medicine may create new producer countries, the program visits...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program details the structure, germination, growth, and response of seeds using greenhouse examples.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Today his name is closely associated with human evolution. Why, then, was Charles Darwin such a tireless observer of plants? This program illustrates Darwin's quest to further support his assertions in On the Origin of Species using the familiar surroundings of his garden. Science interpreter Jim Doherty guides viewers through Darwin's studies of insect-eating plants, including the common...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Agrawal, Anurag A.
Summary: Monarch butterflies are one of nature's most recognizable creatures, known for their bright colors and epic annual migration from the United States and Canada to Mexico. Yet there is much more to the monarch than its distinctive presence and mythic journeying. In Monarchs and Milkweed, Anurag Agrawal presents a vivid investigation into how the monarch butterfly has evolved closely alongside the...
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: Princeton University Press 2017
Copies Available at Kingsley
1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 592 AGRCopies Available at Woodmere
1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 592 AGRSummary: From the sponge to the giraffe, from mosses to redwoods, this program examines the similarities and differences between the denizens of the animal and plant kingdoms. Distinctive characteristics of plants and animals, including physical structure, methods of reproduction, and life cycle, as well as where they find their food and how they interact with other organisms are discussed. Vivid images...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Weatherford, Carole Boston
Summary: "Written in the voice of Mother Africa, who speaks to her children--human beings--this stunning picture book thrums with the love between mother and child as it celebrates humanity's common roots. Before words or tools or fire, Mother Africa's caves sheltered us and her forests fed us. She could not protect us from all dangers, but, like mothers everywhere, she gave her children all she could...
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: Astra Young Readers, an imprint of Astra Books for Young Readers 2023
Copies Available at Woodmere
1 available in Juvenile Easy, Call number: JE WEAGladstone, James
Summary: Describes the formation of planet Earth, from its beginnings as molten rock and poison gas, to the formation of oceans, to the evolution of life.
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: Owlkids Books Inc. 2017