Return to the Sea: The Life and Evolutionary Times of Marine Mammals
ISBN: 9780520951440
Platform/Publisher: Oxford Academic / University of California Press
Digital rights: Users: Unlimited; Printing: Unlimited; Download: Unlimited
Subjects: Evolutionary Biology; Marine and Estuarine Biology;

Return to the Sea portrays the life and evolutionary times of marine mammals--from giant whales and sea cows that originated 55 million years ago to the deep-diving elephant seals and clam-eating walruses of modern times. This fascinating account of the origin of various marine-mammal lineages--some extinct, others extant but threatened--is for the nonspecialist. Against a backdrop of geologic time and changing climates and geography, this volume takes evolution as its unifying principle to help us to understand today's diversity of marine mammals and their responses to environmental challenges. Annalisa Berta explains current controversies and explores patterns of change now taking place, such as shifting food webs and predator-prey relationships, habitat degradation, global warming, and the effects of humans on marine-mammal communities.

Berta Annalisa :

Annalisa Berta is Professor in the Department of Biology at San Diego State University. She has served as the President of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, and Associate Editor of the scientific journal Marine Mammal Science.


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