For Biology, and especially for Molecular biology I'd go for:
- Albert's Molecular Biology of the cell - https://www.amazon.com/dp/0815344325/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?... - It introduces basic Biochemistry, a lot of Genetics and Gene-regulation and Developmental biology. The book also touches other areas (but very vaguely) like Immunology... I think if you read this book you will be able to understand modern Molecular Biology papers.
- Biochem: Legninger's Principles of Biochemistry https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01K0PYUYQ/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?... - Our prof taught us from this, it has great visuals and covers a lot of areas.
- Developmental biology: Gilbert's - https://www.amazon.com/Developmental-Biology-Tenth-Scott-Gil... - it introduces more genetic regulation and development for all walks of life
- Human developmental biology: Bruce M. Carlson - Human Embryology and Developmental biology - https://www.amazon.com/Human-Embryology-Developmental-Biolog... - Again it's the choice of my prof, but I loved it, great images and visual explanations.
- Anatomy: I'd definitely go for anything by Netter -> https://www.amazon.com/Atlas-Human-Anatomy-Netter-Science/dp...
- Cancer: Robert A. Weinberg - The biology of cancer - https://www.amazon.com/Biology-Cancer-2nd-Robert-Weinberg/dp...
- Plant biochem: Biochemistry and Molecular Biology of Plants - https://www.amazon.com/Biochemistry-Molecular-Biology-Plants... - A very good book with great illustrations.
For electronics and Embedded:
- Art of Electronics by Paul Horovitz - https://www.amazon.com/Art-Electronics-Paul-Horowitz-ebook/d... - I saw that others also suggested it, great book
- Paul Scherz - Practical Electronics for inventors - https://www.amazon.com/Practical-Electronics-Inventors-Fourt... - I was introduced to electronics via this book. Not really a textbook but it's I think it's a great book to get started, it covers almost the same topics as the Art of Electronics but not as deep and with better visual explanations.
- Embedded systems - Michael Barr - Programming Embedded Systems in C and C++ - I was introduced to embedded software development by this book, when I was working for an IoT company and only had experience with systems and web programming.
Programming (my cherry picked favourites):
- Hacking: The Art of Exploitation - I love this book. I've read it after I had a few years of professional programming experience with C#. It introduces programming via C, also every example program is disassembled with GDB. It gives the reader an intuition of how C code compiled and what happens on the register level.
- C in a Nutshell: The Definitive Reference - Usually when you search for good books to learn C from, you get titles like The C programming language, Deep C Secret. But I think C in a Nutshell beats all other C books. (Especially when you read it together with C related chapters from The Art of Exploitation).
- Functional Programming in Scala - https://www.amazon.com/Concurrency-Go-Tools-Techniques-Devel... - I love the Go language and how it handles concurrency. This book does a great job of describing how the go runtime works, and does a great job explaining concurrency in general. Also there are a lot of good design patters in it.
- Professor Frisby's Mostly Adequate Guide to Functional Programming - https://www.amazon.com/dp/9332573905/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?... - This was the suggested textbook for https://courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse351/ that was also available on Coursera. Great book.
Read Molecular Biology of the Cell. It's an indispensable book for anyone studying or interested in cell biology and molecular genetics. It has been described as “the most influential cell biology textbook of its time.”
- Albert's Molecular Biology of the cell - https://www.amazon.com/dp/0815344325/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?... - It introduces basic Biochemistry, a lot of Genetics and Gene-regulation and Developmental biology. The book also touches other areas (but very vaguely) like Immunology... I think if you read this book you will be able to understand modern Molecular Biology papers.
- Biochem: Legninger's Principles of Biochemistry https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01K0PYUYQ/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?... - Our prof taught us from this, it has great visuals and covers a lot of areas.
- Developmental biology: Gilbert's - https://www.amazon.com/Developmental-Biology-Tenth-Scott-Gil... - it introduces more genetic regulation and development for all walks of life
- Human developmental biology: Bruce M. Carlson - Human Embryology and Developmental biology - https://www.amazon.com/Human-Embryology-Developmental-Biolog... - Again it's the choice of my prof, but I loved it, great images and visual explanations.
- Anatomy: I'd definitely go for anything by Netter -> https://www.amazon.com/Atlas-Human-Anatomy-Netter-Science/dp...
- Cancer: Robert A. Weinberg - The biology of cancer - https://www.amazon.com/Biology-Cancer-2nd-Robert-Weinberg/dp...
- Plant biochem: Biochemistry and Molecular Biology of Plants - https://www.amazon.com/Biochemistry-Molecular-Biology-Plants... - A very good book with great illustrations.
For electronics and Embedded:
- Art of Electronics by Paul Horovitz - https://www.amazon.com/Art-Electronics-Paul-Horowitz-ebook/d... - I saw that others also suggested it, great book
- Paul Scherz - Practical Electronics for inventors - https://www.amazon.com/Practical-Electronics-Inventors-Fourt... - I was introduced to electronics via this book. Not really a textbook but it's I think it's a great book to get started, it covers almost the same topics as the Art of Electronics but not as deep and with better visual explanations.
- Embedded systems - Michael Barr - Programming Embedded Systems in C and C++ - I was introduced to embedded software development by this book, when I was working for an IoT company and only had experience with systems and web programming.
Programming (my cherry picked favourites):
- Hacking: The Art of Exploitation - I love this book. I've read it after I had a few years of professional programming experience with C#. It introduces programming via C, also every example program is disassembled with GDB. It gives the reader an intuition of how C code compiled and what happens on the register level.
- C in a Nutshell: The Definitive Reference - Usually when you search for good books to learn C from, you get titles like The C programming language, Deep C Secret. But I think C in a Nutshell beats all other C books. (Especially when you read it together with C related chapters from The Art of Exploitation).
- Functional Programming in Scala - https://www.amazon.com/Concurrency-Go-Tools-Techniques-Devel... - I love the Go language and how it handles concurrency. This book does a great job of describing how the go runtime works, and does a great job explaining concurrency in general. Also there are a lot of good design patters in it.
- Professor Frisby's Mostly Adequate Guide to Functional Programming - https://www.amazon.com/dp/9332573905/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?... - This was the suggested textbook for https://courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse351/ that was also available on Coursera. Great book.
https://www.amazon.com/Molecular-Biology-of-the-Cell/dp/0815...
https://www.amazon.com/Molecular-Biology-Sixth-Bruce-Alberts...
- Organic Chemistry course on itunes U (don't remember which one, just first 4-5 lessons)
- Introduction to Genetics: A Molecular Approach by Terry Brown
- Virology course on iTunes U, by Vincent Racaniello - https://www.amazon.com/Molecular-Biology-Cell-Bruce-Alberts/... )
After going through that (took ~3 months full time), I went for a month to the Bay Area, went to Biocurious hackerspace, to get some practical experience, and within a month I did stuff like ordering custom dna online, and putting it into bacteria :)
All the above was sufficient to understand basics of whatever I'm reading now about biotech, and gain extra knowledge when necessary.
Some notes: - Virology may seem a weird addition, but the course by Racaniello is super-fun, and if you understand how viruses work, you will understand how everything else works - If, like me, you were afraid of Chemistry and Biology in high school, don't worry. Organic Chemistry deals just with just four basic elements, and Molecular Biology is really not much different from mechanics - not that much to remember, and a lot to understand. - Even if you complete just 3-4 first chapters of all the above, you will get nice foundations for understanding biotech. - There are bio hackerspaces in major cities in US (not so much in EU - regulations)
https://www.amazon.com/Molecular-Biology-Cell-Bruce-Alberts/...
It's standard reading at the very least as intro grad/senior undergrad student in the biosciences.
Great book, well written, well curated.
Parent commenter is correct, DNA->function is massively complicated. The main wiki article to start with is:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_dogma_of_molecular_bio...
As the article notes, there are endless exceptions and edge cases. It links to various examples of those.