The Oceans

Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0071352538, Hardcover)

Recently named a "Hero of the Planet" by Time magazine, Sylvia Earle now comes together with her friend and under-the-sea colleague, Ellen Prager, to provide readers with an in-depth exploration and study of aqua-science, or what is happening under the surface of the seas. Part ocenaography, biology, environmental science, chemistry, animal behavor, geology, and old-fashioned exploration, the study of Earth's oceans has fascinated people for years. But beyond the work of Jacques Costeau and a few others, no one has really been able to capture for a general audience the complex workings of today's oceans. Less than five percent of the world's oceans has been explored. Only in the last five years have the trenches and abyssal depths been touched upon, and there is much more of the ocean floor that is still beyond human reach. More of the Moon's surface has been mapped than that of our own planet. The ocean is the Earth's last frontier, and Drs. Earle and Prager have served as two of its msot steadfast pioneers. The Oceans explains how the study of oceans is more than just oceanography--it is an intertwined science that must deal with everything from plate tectonics to climate to air pressure to wildlife biology to paleontology, among other scientific disciplines. Prager and Earle offer readers an exciting, yet authoritative, exploration of the oceans from their origins (including how fossil records are used to determine how life in the sea and the sea itself has evolved over the eons) to the complicated issues surrounding the harvesting of energy and food from depleted ocean sources. This book presents an even-handed discussion of the health of the oceans, the amazing technological advances being made in the study of the ocean floor, and more.