The Suffering Gene: Environmental Threats to Our Health

Numerous environmental hazards threaten to damage our genes, this book warns, including daily sunlight, air pollutants (e.g., coal, oil and automobile exhaust) and synthetic chemicals surrounding us (e.g., in dyes, pesticides, paints and food additives). Burdon, professor emeritus of bioscience and biotechnology at the University of Strathclyde, explains for lay readers what genes are, how they work and how these hazards threaten genes' functioning and our health. Burdon is not a hysterical doomsayer but a reasoned scientist:""Although the threats from ionizing radiation are very real,"" he notes,""there is a growing tendency to see risk everywhere."" To that end, Burdon examines the possibility of danger from""threats"" like cell phones (possible damage to DNA is more likely indirect than direct, he concludes). He looks at nuclear warfare, the irradiation of food, the danger of free radicals, genetic engineering and a host of other genetic dangers in a calm, balanced tone.