Biology

Biology is a branch of natural science that deals with the learning about life and living organisms, as well as their function, structure, growth, development, taxonomy and distribution. Modern biology is a huge and diverse field, which is composed of several disciplines and sub-disciplines. However, in spite of the wide scope of biology, there are some common and unifying theories in it that manage all learning and research, combining it into sole, coherent fields. Generally, biology identifies the cell as the fundamental life unit, genes as the fundamental heredity unit, and development as the engine that drives the synthesis and construction of new species. Nowadays, it is as well, understood that all organisms live by consuming and changing energy and by controlling their inner environment to uphold a steady and essential condition.

History

The word biology is originated from derived from bios, the Greek word, which means "life" and the suffix “logy”, which means "study of." The Latin form of the word first emerged during 1736 when a Swedish physician, botanist, and zoologist, Linnaeus, used the word biologi in his work, Bibliotheca botanica. The word came into its current usage with the six-volume essay written by Gottfried Reinhold Treviranus, a German botanist and naturalist. Even though modern biology is comparatively a recent improvement, sciences associated with and incorporated into it have been examined since olden times. Natural philosophy was examined as early as the antique civilizations of Egypt, Mesopotamia, China and the Indian subcontinent. However, the sources of modern biology and its approach to the learning about nature are more frequently traced back to antique Greece. While the official study of drug dates back to Hippocrates, it was Aristotle who played a vital role in the growth of biology.

Biology sub-disciplines

The biology sub-disciplines are defined by the level at which life forms are studied, the types of life forms studied, and the techniques employed to study them. The sub-disciplines of biology and their studies include:

· Molecular biology examines the difficult interactions among biological molecules.

· Biochemistry studies the basic chemistry of life.

· Ecology examines the way life forms interact with their surroundings.

· Botany examines the biology of plants.

· Physiology studies the chemical and physical functions of organs, tissues, and organ systems of the life of a life form.

· Cellular biology studies the fundamental building-block of all life, the cell.

· Evolutionary biology studies the processes that created the diversity of life.

Bases of current biology

The main foundations of the modern biology include:

· Evolution

· Cell theory

· Genetics

· Energy

· Homeostasis

Basic unanswered problems in biology

In spite of the deep advances made over current decades in the understanding of the fundamental processes of life, a few basic problems have lingered unresolved. One among the main unresolved problems in biology is the key adaptive function of gender, and chiefly its important processes in meiosis, eukaryotes, and homologous recombination. One observation is that gender evolved chiefly as a version for increasing hereditary diversity. A different view is that gender is an adaptation for encouraging exact DNA repair in bug-line DNA, and that amplified hereditary diversity is chiefly a byproduct, which may be helpful in the long run.

One more fundamental unsettled problem in biology is the biologic foundation of aging. Presently, there is no compromise view on the fundamental cause of aging. A variety of opposing theories are summarized in Ageing Theories.