This open access book assesses the prospects of (re)adopting organization as a pivotal concept in biology. It shows how organization can nourish biological thinking and practice, by reconnecting with the idea of biology as the science of organized systems. The book provides a comprehensive state-of-the-art picture of the characterizations and uses of the concept of organization in both biological science and philosophy of biology. It also deals with a variety of themes – including evolution, organogenesis, heredity, cognition and ecology – with respect to which the concept of organization can guide the elaboration of original models and new experimental protocols. It will be of interest to biologists and scholars working in philosophy of science alike.

Biology education, like science education in general, is in the midst of a revolution that is worldwide in scope. The changes in the ways science education researchers think about learning and understanding represent a major paradigm shift. In this book, international leaders in the field of biology education research give summaries of problems and solutions in biology learning and teaching at various grade levels. Based on a NATO workshop in the Special Programme on Advanced Educational Technology, it provides practical information for teachers, especially in using new interactive, constructivist teaching methods. For science education researchers, it offers a concise summary of a number of research issues in biology education.

The epistemological synthesis of the various theories of evolution, since the first formulation in 1802 with the transmission of the inherited characters by J.B. Lamarck, shows the need for an alternative synthesis to that of Princeton (1947). This new synthesis integrates the scientific models of self-organization developed during the second half of the 20th century based on the laws of physics, thermodynamics, and mathematics with the emergent evolutionary problematics such as self-organized memory. This book shows, how self-organization is integrated in modern evolutionary biology. It is divided in two parts: The first part pays attention to the modern observations in paleontology and biology, which include major theoreticians of the self-organization (d’Arcy Thompson, Henri Bergson, René Thom, Ilya Prigogine). The second part presents different emergent evolutionary models including the sciences of complexity, the non-linear dynamical systems, fractals, attractors, epigenesis, systemics, and mesology with different examples of the sciences of complexity and self-organization as observed in the human lineage, from both internal (embryogenesis-morphogenesis) and external (mesology) viewpoints.

Biological membranes protect cells and organelles from the surrounding environment, but serve also as organising platforms for physiological processes such as cell signalling. The hydrophobic core of membranes is composed of lipids and proteins influencing each other. Local membrane composition and properties define its molecular organisation and, in this way, regulate the function of all associated molecules. Therefore, studying interactions of components, biophysical properties and overall membrane dynamics provides essential information on its function in the context of cell activities. Such knowledge can contribute to biomedical fields such as pharmacology, immunology, neurobiology and many others. The goal of the Research Topic entitled ‘Molecular organisation of membranes: where biology meets biophysics’ was to provide a comprehensive platform for publishing articles, reviews and opinions focused on membrane organisation and the forces behind its heterogeneous and dynamic structure. We collected 11 works which cover topics as diverse as general membrane organisation models, membrane trafficking and signalling regulation, biogenesis of caveolae, protein-lipid interactions and the importance of membrane-associated tetraspanins networks. The prevalent theme was the existence of membrane nanodomains. To this point, new emerging technologies are presented which own the power to bring a novel insight on how membrane nanodomains are formed and maintained and what is their function. We believe that the collection of works in this Research Topic brings forward some important questions which will stimulate further research in this difficult but exciting field.

Processes and Foundations for Virtual Organizations contains selected articles from PRO-VE'03, the Fourth Working Conference on Virtual Enterprises, which was sponsored by the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP) and held in Lugano, Switzerland in October 2003. This fourth edition includes a rich set of papers revealing the progress and achievements in the main current focus areas: -VO breeding environments; -Formation of collaborative networked organizations; -Ontologies and knowledge management; -Process models and interoperability; -Infrastructures; -Multi-agent approaches. In spite of many valid contributions in these areas, many research challenges remain. This is clearly stated in a number of papers suggesting a new research agenda and strategic research roadmaps for advanced virtual organizations. With the selected papers included in this book, PRO-VE pursues its double mission as a forum for presentation and discussion of achievements as well as a place to discuss and suggest new directions and research strategies.

Introduction: working together on individuality / Lynn K. Nyhart and Scott Lidgard -- The work of biological individuality: concepts and contexts / Scott Lidgard and Lynn K. Nyhart -- Cells, colonies, and clones: individuality in the volvocine algae / Matthew D. Herron -- Individuality and the control of life cycles / Beckett Sterner -- Discovering the ties that bind: cell-cell communication and the development of cell sociology / Andrew S. Reynolds -- Alternation of generations and individuality, 1851 / Lynn K. Nyhart and Scott Lidgard -- Spencer's evolutionary entanglement: from liminal individuals to implicit collectivities / Snait Gissis -- Biological individuality and enkapsis: from Martin Heidenhain's synthesiology to the völkisch national community / Olivier Rieppel -- Parasitology, zoology, and society in France, ca. 1880-1920 / Michael A. Osborne -- Metabolism, autonomy, and individuality / Hannah Landecker -- Bodily parts in the structure-function dialectic / Ingo Brigandt -- Commentaries: historical, biological, and philosophical perspectives -- Distrust that particular intuition: resilient essentialisms and empirical challenges in the history of biological individuality / James Elwick -- Biological individuality: a relational reading / Scott F. Gilbert -- Philosophical dimensions of individuality / Alan C. Love and Ingo Brigandt

Yearbook of International Organizations is the most comprehensive reference resource and provides current details of international non-governmental (NGO) and intergovernmental organizations (IGO). Collected and documented by the Union of International Associations (UIA), detailed information on international organizations worldwide can be found here. Besides historical and organizational information, details on activities, events or publications, contact details, biographies of the leading individuals as well as the presentation of networks of organizations are included.