A grasp of the logic and practice of science is essential to understand the rest of the world around us. To that end, the CMB3e iText (like earlier editions) remains focused on experimental support for what we know about cell and molecular biology, and on showing students the relationship of cell structure and function. Rather than trying to be a comprehensive reference book, CMB3e selectively details investigative questions, methods and experiments that lead to our understanding of cell biology. This focus is nowhere more obvious than in the chapter learning objectives and in external links to supplementary material. The Basic CMB3e version of the iText includes links to external web-sources as well as the author’s short, just-in-time YouTube VOPs (with edited, optional closed captions), all embedded in or near relevant text. Each video is identified with a descriptive title and video play and QR bar codes.

By the end of this section, you will be able to do the following:

Identify and describe the properties of life
Describe the levels of organization among living things
Recognize and interpret a phylogenetic tree
List examples of different subdisciplines in biology