A Tale of Feathers Alan Brush Enjoys a Compelling Narrative on the Discoveries That Have Illuminated the Complexities and Evolution of Plumage

The splendid tail feathers of a peacock are displayed during courtship; feathers with the same basic structure fulfil roles from aerodynamics to insulation.

EVOLUTION A tale of feathers Alan Brush enjoys a compelling narrative on the discoveries that have illuminated the complexities and evolution of plumage.

his book, about the natural history of origin and evolution of feathers and the birds to the air, and the alternative ‘wing-assisted feathers, begins with Archaeopteryx. that produce them. incline running’ hypothesis. This late-Jurassic (about 150-mil- Hanson explains the physics of how feather Thanks to feathers’ myriad qualities, Tlion-year-old) fossil, something between a structures interact with light to produce people have used them as quill pens to sign reptile and bird, confounded and delighted amazing iridescent colours. He catalogues significant historical papers, as badges and D. STEWART/SPL P. evolutionists Charles Darwin and Thomas how different feathers with the same hollow, advertisements, on clothing and in fishing Huxley and palaeontologist Richard Owen. branching structure provide insulation flies and as stuffing for garments, mattresses, A small beast with reptilian teeth, long tail (down), protection (contour), aerodynamic quilts and cushions. Hanson’s style makes the and skeletal features of both groups, it had surfaces (wing and tail) and sensory input concepts of chemical morphogenesis, coher- clearly identifiable feathers with modern (filoplumes). Plumage helps with species ent scattering and reaction-diffusion waves shape and structure. Archaeopteryx feathers identification, dictates behaviour and provides accessible. His narrative is accompanied by were identical to those that today fascinate the spectacular decorations that birders enjoy. a small number of diagrams and images and laymen, ornithologists, fashionistas and Hanson also traces an appendix illustrating feather types. That casual collectors. the long arguments NATURE.COM it is not a picture book is an accomplishment Thor Hanson’s storytelling is enhanced between advocates of Biologist Nicky when writing about colourful plumage and by his infectious excitement. In Feathers, the ‘ground-up’ and Clayton on birds and exotic behaviours. he interviews the leading proponents on all ‘tree-down’ theories of the tango: In the 1970s, debate on the evolution- sides of the controversies that surround the how the first birds took go.nature.com/tawyyn ary origin of birds was reinvigorated by the

US palaeontologist John Ostrom, who posited that birds, Books in brief as vertebrates with feathers, were related Sex on the Moon: The Amazing Story Behind the Most Audacious to theropod dino- Heist in History saurs. Ostrom’s claim Ben Mezrich Doubleday 320 pp. $26.95 (2011) was based on fossil In 2002, NASA fellow Thad Roberts, aided by three interns, stole evidence and sup- lunar and martian samples from a Johnson Space Center vault in plemented by others’ Houston, Texas. As writer Ben Mezrich deftly recounts, Roberts’s Feathers: The work on metabolism motivation was not geological obsession, but a desire to impress Evolution of a one of his accomplices, Tiffany Fowler. In a bizarre act that was both Natural Miracle and behaviour. But THOR HANSON for decades, the con- poetic and literal-minded, Roberts made love to her on a bed strewn Basic Books: 2011. troversial argument with Moon rocks — hence the book’s title. Rarely has career suicide 352 pp. $25.99 that birds and dino- been so entertaining. saurs were related lacked a key element: an evolutionary history of feathers. A Martian Stranded on Earth: Alexander Bogdanov, Blood At the time, the dogma was that all Transfusions, and Proletarian Science birds — and only birds — have feathers. Nikolai Krementsov University of Chicago Press 192 pp. $35 (2011) This changed in the 1990s, with the dis- We sometimes forget that the Russian revolution convulsed covery of ‘feathered dinosaurs’ from the science as well as society. Now philosopher of science Nikolai Yixian Formation in Liaoning Province in Krementsov gives a portrait of a Bolshevik scientist at the epicentre China. The rich fossil findings stimulated of that revolution. A political rival to Lenin, Alexander Bogdanov was a re-evaluation of the evolutionary history a physician, philosopher and sci-fi writer. Krementsov sketches a of both feathers and the animals that bear rounded picture of a polymath who set up the world’s first institute them. Phylogenetic analysis confirmed that for blood-transfusion research and whose philosophical work laid the theropods and birds are sister groups, and foundations of systems theory. the feather structures on the Yixian fossils provided direct evidence for the evolution of feathers. These findings complemented Finding Everett Ruess: The Life and Unsolved Disappearance of a other data from ontogeny, molecular biol- Legendary Wilderness Explorer ogy and morphology. Finally, a clear picture David Roberts Broadway Books 416 pp. $24.99 (2011) of the evolution of feathers has emerged. American wilderness artist and writer Everett Ruess, a contemporary Hanson’s tale is comprehensive, accurate, of photographer Ansel Adams, was an archaeologist–naturalist timely and engaging. One thing missing is manqué who ventured solo into remote areas of Arizona, Colorado, the story of the technical breakthroughs that New Mexico and Utah, starting when he was just 15. Ruess was a led to the understanding of feather structure prodigious journal-keeper, poet and printmaker, but disappeared in (keratin) and genomics. The fact that feath- November 1934 near Escalante, Utah, aged just 20. His fate remains ers are insoluble is partly because of their a mystery but his works continue to astound. Roberts shows that we structure — they are made from highly can still ‘find’ Ruess in compilations of his art and writings. organized filaments — and partly because of their amino-acid composition (they con- tain many stable intra- and intermolecular Sustainability Management: Lessons from and for New York City, disulphide bonds). America, and the Planet In the late 1960s, a group in the protein- Steven Cohen Columbia University Press 256 pp. $35 (2011) chemistry division of the Commonwealth Some 25 years after the concept of sustainability emerged, policy Scientific and Industrial Research Organisa- solutions to implementing it remain elusive. Cohen, executive director tion in Australia isolated and identified the of Columbia University’s Earth Institute in New York, argues that we soluble monomer of feather keratin, and now have enough successful examples to draw up blueprints for revealed the characteristics of the gene fam- keeping the planet viable and economies afloat. Through case studies ily involved. Ornithologists quickly became such as New York’s community gardens, Cohen looks at sustainable interested. This accomplishment provided practice in business, energy, water and food supply, and the technical, ways to test directly the ‘feathers arose from financial and political challenges of transmuting ideas into action. scales’ hypothesis and to map molecular evolution more widely onto lineages derived from other features. Comparative work on the Litmus: Short Stories from Modern Science proteins of the other epidermal structures, Edited by Ra Page Comma Press 298 pp. £9.99 (2011) such as claws, scales and beaks, soon followed. From Jeremiah Horrocks’s observation of the transit of Venus in Feathers is a compelling introduction to 1639 to Alan Turing’s revelations about morphogenesis in 1952, one of nature’s wonders. ■ ‘eureka’ moments shift our take on the cosmos. They can also make for supercharged narratives. In 17 short stories, novelists and poets Alan Brush is professor emeritus in including Sean O’Brien and Kate Clanchy retell lightbulb moments ornithology at the University of Connecticut, from centuries of science. Each has an afterword by an expert, from Storrs, USA. Jim Al-Khalili on Einstein’s special theory of relativity to Denis Noble e-mail: [email protected] on heart modelling and Giacomo Rizzolatti on mirror neurons.