William Collins Endless Forms. The Secret World of Wasps Sumner Seirian

До того, как Нил Армстронг ступил на Луну, группа профессионалов работала как "человеко-компьютеры", рассчитывая траектории полета, которые позволили бы осуществить эти исторические достижения. Среди них была группа ярких, талантливых афроамериканских женщин. Отделенные от своих белых коллег, они использовали карандаш и бумагу для написания уравнений, которые должны были запускать ракеты и астронавтов в космос • Переходя от Второй мировой войны к золотому веку НАСА, затрагивая эпоху гражданских прав, космическую гонку, холодную войну и движение за права женщин, книге Марго Ли Шеттерли "Скрытые фигуры. Нерассказанная история афроамериканских женщин, которые помогли выиграть космическую гонку" переплетают богатую историю величайшего приключения человечества с личными историями пяти сильных женщин, чья работа навсегда изменила мир

Увлекательный, забавный рассказ из первых рук о удивительно уникальных млекопитающих Австралии и о том, как наше восприятие влияет на их будущее • Представьте себе утконосов: они откладывают яйца (из которых вылупляются утконосы), они производят молоко без сосков и яд без клыков, и они могут улавливать электричество. Или вомбат: у них никогда не перестают расти зубы, они какают кубиками и защищаются усиленными задними лапами. Утконосы, поссумы, вомбаты, ехидны, дьяволы, кенгуру, кволлы, дибблеры, даннарты, ковари: в Австралии есть поистине удивительные млекопитающие с невероятными, незнакомыми чертами лица. Но как мир относится к этим существам? И что это значит для их сохранения? • В книге "Утконосы" натуралист Джек Эшби делится своей любовью к этим часто неправильно понимаемым животным

Did you know that pigs frequently throw tantrums? • That chickens are capable of complex communication? • That sheep know their own names? • That cows grieve when their calves are taken away from them? • Jeffrey Masson delves deep into the mysterious world of farm animals and reveals just how sophisticated these creatures truly are - capable of joy, sadness, love and friendship - just like us

For those fascinated by neurology and for fans of The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat comes a powerful exploration of the mind during night time. Here are the mysteries of sleep, explained – from known conditions to the extreme • World-renowned neurologist and sleep expert, Doctor Guy Leschziner, takes you through various sleep conditions and how they arise and affect people. Insomnia, narcolepsy, night terrors and apnoea are just some of the conditions afflicting those struggling with sleep • Then there are the extreme cases • The people frighten into paralysis by hallucinations. The woman in a state of deep sleep who gets dressed and goes for a drive. The teenager with ‘Sleeping Beauty Syndrome’, stuck in a cycle of excessive unconsciousness

"Тайный мир растений. Рассказы о более чем 100 замечательных цветах, деревьях и семенах" - это вечная сокровищница из более чем 100 историй из невероятного царства растений, рассказанных автором и экспертом по природе Беном Хором • Растения встречаются почти повсюду на Земле, но для многих людей их жизнь остается загадкой. Узнайте, как цветет морская трава под водой, как венерина мухоловка рассчитывает, чтобы наверняка поймать свою добычу, и почему некоторые тюльпаны раньше стоили дороже дома! Эта увлекательная книга для детей исследует обширное царство растений и объясняет, как устроены растения, а также странные и чудесные отношения, которые они связывают с животными • Книга на английском языке • A timeless treasury of more than 100 stories from the incredible kingdom of plants, told by author and nature expert Ben Hoare

Nobody sees and understands woodland better than Ray Mears • With deep natural history knowledge and practical woodcraft skills, gained over a lifetime of learning from the world's last remaining indigenous peoples, Ray offers a different way to experience our wooded landscapes. He challenges the old concepts. He looks to our ancestors and shows how man's hand in shaping woodland is critical. We are not separate from nature, we just need to ensure that our interactions have a positive impact • With the emphasis on interaction, British Woodland is structured by usage. We learn that sycamore and clematis are among the best woods for burning, pine and oak help us navigate, and hawthorn and beech have edible leaves. Rope can be made from willow, utensils and tools from hazel, and historically, weapons were made from yew and wych elm

Where do our thoughts come from? • How can we manipulate our dreams? • What is the role of the unconscious? • How do we make decisions and trust the judgement of both others and ourselves? • In this mind-bending international bestseller by Mariano Sigman, one of the world’s leading neuroscientists reveals his life’s work exploring the intricacies of the human brain. Building on his awe-inspiring TED talk and drawing on examples in science and the arts, The Secret Life of the Mind offers an accessible guide to how the human brain works and its impact on our everyday life. This informative, lucid book is essential reading for anyone curious about how we perceive, reason and communicate

In 2017 the Salvator Mundi was sold at auction for $450m. But is it a real da Vinci? In a thrilling narrative built on formidable research, Ben Lewis tracks the extraordinary journey of a masterpiece lost and found, lied and fought over across the centuries • In 2017, Leonardo da Vinci's small oil painting, the Salvator Mundi was sold at auction for $450m. In the words of its discoverer, the image of Christ as saviour of the world is 'the rarest thing on the planet by the greatest human being who ever lived'. Its dazzling price also makes it the world's most expensive painting • For two centuries art dealers had searched in vain for the Holy Grail of art history: a portrait of Christ as the Salvator Mundi by Leonardo da Vinci. Many similar paintings of greatly varying quality had been executed by Leonardo's assistants in the first half of the sixteenth century

Introducing the Collins Modern Classics, a series featuring some of the most significant books of recent times, books that shed light on the human experience – classics which will endure for generations to come • What if intelligent life on earth not only evolved on land, but also in the sea? • Other Minds is a bold new story of how nature became aware of itself – a story that largely occurs in the ocean, where animals first appeared. Tracking the mind’s fitful development over millennia, Other Minds explores the incredible evolutionary journey of the cephalopods. What kind of intelligence do they possess? And how did the octopus, a solitary creature with little social life, become so smart? • Heralded as the ‘scuba-diving philosopher’ when Other Minds first published, Peter Godfrey-Smith explores the underwater world and the concept of sentience to trace the question of inner life back to its roots

Starting from the ocean and from the forgotten histories of ocean-facing communities, this is a new history of the making of our world • After revolutions in America and France, a wave of tumult coursed the globe from 1790 to 1850. It was a moment of unprecedented change and violence especially for indigenous peoples. By 1850 vibrant public debate between colonised communities had exploded in port cities. Yet in the midst of all of this, Britain struck out by sea and established its supremacy over the Indian and Pacific Oceans, overtaking the French and Dutch as well as other rivals • Cambridge historian Sujit Sivasundaram brings together his work in far-flung archives across the world and the best new academic research in this remarkably creative book

A new, fully updated narrative edition of David Attenborough’s seminal biography of our world, The Living Planet • Nowhere on our planet is devoid of life. Plants and animals thrive or survive within every extreme of climate and habitat that it offers. Single species, and often whole communities adapt to make the most of ice cap and tundra, forest and plain, desert, ocean and volcano. These adaptations can be truly extraordinary: fish that walk or lay eggs on leaves in mid-air; snakes that fly; flightless birds that graze like deer; and bears that grow hair on the soles of their feet • In The Living Planet, David Attenborough’s searching eye, unfailing curiosity and infectious enthusiasm explain and illuminate the intricate lives of the these colonies, from the lonely heights of the Himalayas to the wild creatures that have established themselves in the most recent of environments, the city

Coal is the commodity that made Britain. Dirty and polluting though it is, this black rock has acted as a midwife to genius. It drove industry, religion, politics, empire and trade. It powered the industrial revolution, turned Britain into the first urban nation and is the industry that made almost all others possible • In this brilliant social history, Jeremy Paxman tells the story of coal mining in England, Scotland and Wales from Roman times, through the birth of steam power to war, nationalisation, pea-souper smogs, industrial strife and the picket lines of the Miner’s Strike • Written in the captivating style of his bestselling book The English, Paxman ranges widely across Britain to explore stories of engineers and inventors, entrepreneurs and industrialists – but whilst coal inevitably helped the rich become richer, the story told by Black Gold is first and foremost a history of the working miners – the men, women and often children who toiled in appalling conditions down in the mines; the villages that were thrown up around the pit-head