Tuesday, May 20, 2008

A Book in Review – The Secret Life of Dust

Book Count: 43

The Secret Life of Dust By: Hannah Holmes
Non-Fiction: science, current events 204 pages 2001

This book is all about dust. From how it started the universe to how it could one day kill us all. It was very interesting, but also disturbing. I learned dozens of new ways that just breathing could kill you and the fact that in many cases there is nothing that you can do about it. It also talks a lot about what might be causing global warming, what might be counteracting it and how the science of dust is too young to say with accuracy what to do about it. For example, adding iron to ocean water increases the amount of plankton that eats up co2; however, it also leads to more funguses attacking coral reefs killing off coral and leading to less bio-diversity. Or that the color of dust and its local in the air depends on whieter it absorbs heat into the earth or reflects it back out into space.

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