Includes bibliographical references and index.

Why: biology by the numbers -- What and where: construction plans for cells and organisms -- When: stopwatches at many scales -- Who: "bless the little beasties" -- Mechanical and chemical equilibrium in the living cell -- Entropy rules! -- Two-state systems: from ion channels to cooperative binding -- Random walks and the structure of macromolecules -- Electrostatics for salty solutions -- Beam theory: architecture for cells and skeletons -- Biological membranes: life in two dimensions -- The mathematics of water -- A statistical view of biological dynamics -- Life in crowded and disordered environments -- Rate equations and dynamics in the cell -- Dynamics of molecular motors -- Biological electricity and the Hodgkin-Huxley model -- Sequences, specificity, and evolution -- Network organization in space and time -- Whither physical biology?