Southeastern professor has second book published

Press Release Date: 04-24-2009

DURANT, Okla. -- Southeastern Oklahoma State University's Dr. Stanley Rice, Associate Professor in the Biological Sciences Department, has just had his second book published.

"Green Planet: How Plants Keep the Earth Alive," was released in late February by Rutgers University Press.

In this book, Rice answers the question "Of what use are plants, to humans and to the world?" Plants are not just a pretty part of the landscape. Rice devotes a chapter to each of the things that plants do that keep the world alive.

According to Rice, the plants produce oxygen; they absorb carbon dioxide and thus help to limit the greenhouse effect; they create cool shade; they prevent floods and recharge groundwater; they create soil; they create and reclaim habitats; they are the source of all food; and the genetic diversity of plants is essential to the human economy.

The first chapter is an overview of how much destruction of wild plants has occurred during human history. The last chapter is a proposal for what we can do about the problem we have created.

This book is for a general, though science-literate, audience. It has lots of illustrations, many of them Rice's own photographs. His earlier book, "Encyclopedia of Evolution," came out in 2006 (hardcover) and 2007 (paperback).

A booksigning is scheduled at the Barnes and Noble Campus Bookstore, corner of N. 5th Avenue and University Boulevard, at 2 p.m. on Tuesday, May 5.