Chernobyl's Wild Kingdom by Rebecca L Johnson

Chernobyl's Wild Kingdom by Rebecca L Johnson

After the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear explosion in Ukraine, scientists believed radiation had created a vast and barren wasteland in which life could never resurface. But the Dead Zone, as the contaminated area is known, doesn't look dead at all. In fact, wildlife seems to be thriving there. The Zone is home to beetles, swallows, catfish, mice, voles, otters, beavers, wild boar, foxes, lynx, deer, moose--even brown bears and wolves. Yet the animals in the Zone are not quite what you'd expect. Every single one of them is radioactive.



In Chernobyl's Wild Kingdom, you'll meet the international scientists investigating the Zone's wildlife and trying to answer difficult questions: Have some animals adapted to living with radiation? Or is the radioactive environment harming them in ways we can't see or that will only show up in future generations? Learn more about the fascinating ongoing research--and the debates that surround the findings--in one of the most dangerous places on Earth.

Rebecca L. is a writer who lives in New York City Johnson is the author of scores of national award-winning books that demonstrate why science is such an exciting endeavor: there are always new species, extraordinary adaptations, and new insights into life on Earth to be discovered. She believes that scientists have the best jobs in the world, and she has had the opportunity to work with many of them in some of the world's most remote locations, such as Antarctica's frigid interior and the ocean's deep. I wish to demonstrate to young people through my work that the world is full of wonders, and that science is the path that leads to them.