Frances Ashcroft – författare

The debut of a female Steve Jones – likeable, literate, lucid and laconic. A sprightly, lavishly illustrated book on the science of human survival.How do people survive extremes of heat, cold, depth, speed and altitude? This book explores the limits of human survival and the physiological adaptations which enable us to exist under extreme conditions. In man’s battle for survival in the harshest of environments, the knowledge imparted by physiology, the ‘logic of life’, is crucial. What causes mountain sickness? Why is it possible to reach the top of Everest without supplementary oxygen, yet be killed if a plane depressurises suddenly at the same altitude. Why are astronauts unable to stand without fainting when they return to Earth? Why do human divers get the bends but sperm whales don’t? Will men always be able to run faster than women? Why don’t penguins get frostbite?

'A wonderful book' Bill Bryson'Ashcroft achieves the sort of rich simplicity most science writers can only dream about ... this book carries the eponymous spark of life' Sunday Telegraph From before birth to the last breath we draw, from consciousness to sexual attraction, fighting infection to the beating of our hearts, electricity is essential to everything we think and do.In The Spark of Life award-winning physiologist Frances Ashcroft reveals the secrets of ion channels, which produce the electrical signals in our cells. Can someone really die of fright? How do cocaine, LSD and morphine work? Why do chilli peppers taste hot? Ashcroft explains all this and more with wit and clarity. Anyone who has ever wondered about what makes us human will find this book a revelation.'A rare gift for making difficult subjects accessible and fascinating' Bill Bryson 'She communicates complex science with engaging passion and eloquence' Helen Dunmore, Observer'Compelling and very readable, an excellent writer' Literary Review'Riveting ... she has a stock of good tales' New Scientist'Lively, conversational prose, refreshingly accessible to any lay reader ... a positively charged little book' Daily TelegraphFrances Ashcroft is Professor of Physiology at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Trinity College Oxford. She is also Director of OXION, a consortium of scientists studying ion channels, the heroes of this book. Her scientific research focuses on how a rise in your blood sugar level stimulates the release of insulin and what why this process goes wrong in diabetes. She has won many prizes for her research, most recently the L'Oreal/UNESCO 2012 Women in Science award. She is also a recipient of the Lewis Thomas Prize for Science Writing for The Spark of Life. Her first book for the general reader was Life at the Extremes: The Science of Survival.