Life Science is the field of scientific study focusing on living things. The category “living things” includes humans, animals and plants. The field of study includes the biological aspects of living organisms, but only extends to the behavior of living things that have a biological root.
Bioinformatics
Molecular biology is the scientific study of the workings of a single cell and the interactions between that cell’s components. The use of statistics and computers to calculate and record molecular biology research is referred to as “Bioinformatics”. Therefore, Bioinformatics refers to the computerized analysis of molecular biological studies. The main focus of Bioinformatics is to systematize the study of biological processes.
Oncology
The branch of medicine focusing on the study of cancerous and non-cancerous tumors, oncology is a member of the Life Sciences to the extent that it focuses on tumor biology. Cancer cells are cells affected by abnormal growth. The formative components of those cancerous cells and their interactions to each other and other cells are the aspects of oncology related to Life Science. An oncologist that studies the alterations to the interactions of tumor components after treatment is also performing life science research.
Biology
The scientific field of biology focuses on the origin, evolution, structure, function and growth of living things. The category of “living things” includes all organisms or structures that are able to sustain themselves in the environment, for example by eating in the case of humans, or by absorbing sunlight in the case of plants. There are many sub-categories of biology, including cellular biology, ecology and physiology. Despite these categorizations, all biological studies contain the same principles of cell theory, genetics, homeostasis, energy and evolution.
Immunology
Immunology is the study of the anatomy of the immune system. Immunology is considered a part of the Life Sciences because it focuses on the living chemical components of different immune systems and any changes that occur to those components. Typically, immunologists investigate a healthy and a sick immune system as well as immune system disorders such as deficiencies or auto-immune illnesses. Study of immune systems is not limited only to humans.
Genetics and Genomics
Genetics is the scientific study of human genes and how they impact future generations. Human genes are passed from generation to generation and influence later generation’s appearance and other traits. The study was not developed until the 1900s, when Gregor Mendol researched the inheritance of specific traits through what today are called “genes”. Genomics is a specific branch of genetics that analyzes the impact of the environment on genes as it relates to disease development. Genomics mainly focuses on full DNA sequences and how those sequences function.
Human Biochemistry
The scientific field of human biochemistry investigates the human body’s processes, particularly its chemical processes that enable it to break down food into energy. Research of these chemical processes includes investigating the reactions of different chemicals such as proteins and acids as they come into contact with each other. The main purpose of human biochemistry studies is to determine the best fuels, i.e. foods, for human bodies. Therefore, human biochemistry is directly related to nutrition and nutritional studies.
Medicinal Botany
Medicinal botany, sometimes referred to as “herbalism”, is the use of plants and their extracts in medicine. Medications created from plants can be inhaled, ingested or applied to a patient’s skin. Medicinal botany is a member of the Life Sciences because it is concerned with how the living plant organism interacts with the living human body. While today the majority of the field of study is considered an alternative to traditional medicine, it is nonetheless a scientific field when the investigation is conducted according to the scientific method.
Additional Life Science Fields
There are many more scientific fields of study that fall within the Life Sciences category. These include cognitive neuroscience, cell biology, biochemistry, marine biology, ecology, optometry, pharmacology and zoology. Sometimes, these additional fields are subsets of larger fields, such as zoology is to biology, or pharmacology is to medicinal botany. The sites below contain information about the life sciences in general or one of its specific subsets.