The Quantum Universe: Everything That Can Happen Does Happen

Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw. Allen Lane 272 pp. £20 (2011)

If quantum entanglement leaves you tongue-tied or you burn to know what fills 'empty' space, this offering from Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw is a solid introduction to the “inescapable strangeness” of the subatomic world. Particle physicist and presenter Cox and theoretical physicist Forshaw nip through the territory with brio, unveiling the quantum cornucopia with clarity and concision — from the double-slit experiment, the wave–particle phenomenon and the key principles and constants, to the illusion of movement, the uneven spin of electrons and the death of stars.

Baby-Making: What the New Reproductive Treatments Mean for Families and Society

Bart Fauser and Paul Devroey. Oxford University Press 289 pp. £16.99 (2011)

One in 25 European infants now gets its start in the test tube. But taking the sex out of conception has spawned vast scientific, ethical and social complexities. In this succinct overview, fertility experts Bart Fauser and Paul Devroey cover techniques from cryopreservation of embryos to egg donation. They explore baby 'design', parental demands, infertility, genetic issues and the social, ethical and scientific limits of assisted reproduction.

Eradication: Ridding the World of Diseases Forever?

  • Nancy Leys Stepan
Reaktion Books 312 pp. £25 (2011)

The idea of vanquishing diseases globally, one by one, has been contested ever since it emerged in the twentieth century. Historian Nancy Leys Stepan's book ranges from imperialist politics to medical technology. She probes the role of the World Health Organization and the Rockefeller Foundation, the efforts of “arch-eradicationist” Fred Lowe Soper to wipe out malaria, and other campaigns such as that against Guinea worm disease. Success, she shows, is rarely absolute: the 1980 eradication of smallpox was a triumph that now, with the threat of bioterrorism, teeters into uncertainty.

A Great Aridness: Climate Change and the Future of the American Southwest

  • William deBuys
Oxford University Press 384 pp. $27.95 (2011)

The bone-dry American Southwest is a trainwreck waiting to happen, says writer William deBuys. A swelling population with water-guzzling habits, combined with the impacts of climate change, threaten the balance of the region's vast interlocking ecosystems. Drawing on the work of climatologists and other scientists, deBuys's analysis of the eco-crisis — rising temperatures, wildfires, water shortages, disappearing wildlife — is a reasoned warning to heavily populated arid regions round the world.

Relics: Travels in Nature's Time Machine

  • Piotr Naskrecki
University of Chicago Press 384 pp. £26 (2011)

Conservation biologist and photographer Piotr Naskrecki delves into 'deep time' in this gorgeously illustrated paean to flora and fauna that have changed little from their fossil forebears. Through his lens, we get a hint of prehistoric times from ecosystems such as the Papuan highlands or New Zealand's fern forests. His photos of ancient subjects — including Indonesian forest dragons (Hypsilurus dilophus) and the sagebrush cricket (Cyphoderris strepitans) of Wyoming — are a call to conserve these venerable survivors.