Boston Flora

Tag: Emily Monosson

  • Wednesday, October 4, 7:00 pm – Natural Defense: Enlisting Bugs and Germs to Protect Our Food and Health

    Emily Monosson, PhD, Environmental Toxicologist, Writer, and Adjunct Professor, Department of Environmental Conservation, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, will speak on Wednesday, October 4, 7:00–8:15pm at the Hunnewell Building of the Arnold Arboretum.

    For more than a century, we have relied on chemical cures to keep our bodies free from disease and our farms free from bugs and weeds. We rarely consider human and agricultural health together, but both are based on the same ecology, and both are being threatened by organisms that have evolved to resist our antibiotics and pesticides. Fortunately, scientists are finding new solutions that work with, rather than against, nature. Emily Monosson will speak about some of science’s most innovative strategies and the growing understanding of how to employ ecology for our own protection. Natural Defense: Enlisting Bugs and Germs to Protect Our Food and Health, Monosson’s newest book, will be available for purchase and signing. Fee: Free for Arboretum members and students, $5 nonmember. Register at http://my.arboretum.harvard.edu or call 617-384-5277.

  • Wednesday, March 4, 7:00 pm – Unnatural Selection

    Join author Emily Monosson at Porter Square Books, 25 White Street (Porter Square Shopping Center in Cambridge) on Wednesday, March 4 at 7 pm for a discussion on her latest book Unnatural Selection: How We are Changing Life, Gene by Gene.

    Gonorrhea. Bed bugs. Weeds. Salamanders. People. All are evolving, some surprisingly rapidly, in response to our chemical age. In Unnatural Selection, Emily Monosson shows how our drugs, pesticides, and pollution are exerting intense selection pressure on all manner of species. And we humans might not like the result.  Monosson reveals that the very code of life is more fluid than once imagined. When our powerful chemicals put the pressure on to evolve or die, beneficial traits can sweep rapidly through a population. Species with explosive population growth — the bugs, bacteria, and weeds — tend to thrive, while bigger, slower-to-reproduce creatures, like ourselves, are more likely to succumb.

    Monosson explores contemporary evolution in all its guises. She examines the species that we are actively trying to beat back, from agricultural pests to life-threatening bacteria, and those that are collateral damage — creatures struggling to adapt to a polluted world. Monosson also presents cutting-edge science on gene expression, showing how environmental stressors are leaving their mark on plants, animals, and possibly humans for generations to come.

    Unnatural Selection is eye-opening and more than a little disquieting. But it also suggests how we might lessen our impact: manage pests without creating super bugs; protect individuals from disease without inviting epidemics; and benefit from technology without threatening the health of our children.

    Emily Monosson is an environmental toxicologist, writer, and consultant. She is an adjunct professor at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, author of Evolution in a Toxic World: How Life Responds to Chemical Threats, and editor of Motherhood: The Elephant in the Laboratory.

    For more information visit www.portersquarebooks.com.

  • Wednesday, December 11, 7:00 pm – 8:00 pm – Evolution in a Toxic World

    With pesticides in produce, mercury in fish, and flame retardants permeating our homes, the world has become a toxic place. But as Emily Monosson demonstrates in her groundbreaking book, Evolution in a Toxic World, it has always been toxic. When oxygen first developed in Earth’s atmosphere, it threatened the very existence of life: now we literally can’t live without it. According to Monosson, understanding life’s evolutionary response to environmental poisons and how rapidly or slowly life adapted to such threats can teach us a great deal about today’s and tomorrow’s most dangerous contaminants. Emily Monosson, PhD, is Environmental Toxicologist and Adjunct Professor at University of Massachusetts, Amherst.   She will speak on Wednesday, December 11, from 7 – 8 in the Hunnewell Building, Arnold Arboretum, Jamaica Plain, and the fee is free for members of the Arboretum, $10 for nonmembers.  Students: call 617.384.5277 to register  free.  To sign up, visit http://my.arboretum.harvard.edu/Info.aspx?DayPlanner=1260&DayPlannerDate=12/11/2013&utm_source=November-December+2013+Lectures+and+Classes&utm_campaign=Fall+2013+Classes&utm_medium=email.

    http://bookwanderer.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/evo.jpg

  • Thursday, August 16, 6:00 pm – Evolution in a Toxic World: How Life Responds to Chemical Threats

    The Harvard Museum of Natural History welcomes Emily Monosson on Thursday, August 16 at 6 pm for a free lecture and book signing at The Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford Street in Cambridge. Toxic chemicals: They have shaped our bodies, our world, and all life around us. Today, species are rapidly evolving in response to toxins like PCBs, dioxins and pesticides. Emily Monosson, adjunct professor at UMass Amherst and author of the new book, Evolution in a Toxic World (Island Press), will discuss how life on Earth survives in the face of increased amounts of both age-old and new synthetic chemicals in our environment. Dr. Monosson is an environmental toxicologist. A diversity of past research experience, and data synthesis of the health and environmental impacts of contaminants from nanoparticles, to organochlorines, and personal health care products have laid the groundwork for Monosson’s current academic interest – investigating the evolutionary history of the toxic response.

    Beyond academics her interest in increasing public awareness about their role in the environment and the importance of science education, has led to her service on the Gill-Montague School Committee and on the board of the Montague Reporter, where she occasionally contributes as a writer.  For more information, visit www.hmnh.harvard.edu.  Photo from toxicevolution.wordpress.com.