Life sciences

The life sciences comprise the fields of science that involve the scientific study of living organisms, like plants, animals, and human beings. While biology remains the centerpiece of the life sciences, technological advances in molecular biology and biotechnology have led to a burgeoning of specializations and new, often interdisciplinary, fields.

The following is an incomplete list of life science fields, as well as topics of study in the life sciences, in which several entries coincide with, are included in, or overlap with other entries:

Affective neuroscience
Anatomy
Biomedical science
Biochemistry
Biocomputers
Biocontrol
Biodynamics
Bioinformatics
Biology
Biomaterials
Biomechanics
Biomonitoring
Biophysics
Biopolymers
Botany
Cell biology
Cognitive neuroscience
Computational neuroscience
Developmental biology
Ecology
Ethology
Environmental science
Evolutionary biology
Evolutionary genetics
Food science
Genetics
Genomics
Health sciences
Immunogenetics
Immunology
Immunotherapy
Marine biology
Medical devices
Medical imaging
Microbiology
Molecular biology
Neuroscience
Oncology
Optometry
Parasitology
Pathology
Pharmacogenomics
Pharmacology
Physiology
Plant sciences
Population dynamics
Proteomics
Sociobiology
Sports science
Structural biology
Systems biology
Zoology

Special Collection: Australopithecus sediba

The transition in human ancestry from Australopithecus, the genus that existed for 2 million years before Homo, has been enigmatic. A key fossil from near the time of this transition is Australopithecus sediba, which is represented by several specimens discovered in a cave in South Africa. Five Reports in the 9 September 2011 Science, as well as a related News Focus package and podcast interview, discuss important features of the A. sediba fossils, including some that are not well preserved in other similar hominid remains.

http://www.sciencemag.org/site/extra/sediba/index.xhtml