BIOL 004. First Year Seminar: Making Earth: How Plants & Soils Transform Our Planet

Before terrestrial earth was colonized by plants and animals, land habitats were transformed from mineral rock substrate to a nurturing material, known as soil, that could support the new occupants. The early terrestrial plant pioneers, and their close symbiotic relationships with bacteria and fungi, made planet earth habitable for the present diversity life on earth. Today, the existence of most species, including Homo sapiens, continues to depend on the plant kingdom and the soils that sustain it. Understanding how plants, microorganisms and soils have influenced life on earth is fundamental as we consider current issues of food security, climate change and species extinction. Readings will include Beerling’s Making Eden: How Plants Transformed a Barren Planet; Sheldrake’s Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures; and Montgomery’s Growing a Revolution: Bringing Our Soil Back to Life; as well as primary and review articles from scientific literature.
Prerequisite: Previous background in biology not required.
Natural Sciences and Engineering.
1 Credit.
Eligible for ENVS.
Catalog chapter: Biology
Department website: https://www.swarthmore.edu/biology

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