BOOKS TO FOLLOW FOR CSIRNET EXAM

I get it done of request of telling people about what books to follow for CSIRNET exam in life sciences. So
here I am writing the post for telling you the right books for all the different 13 modules of CSIR-NET life
science exam. But before revealing all the books that will be required in very important for the
preparation of NET exam in life sciences, I want to discuss about the necessity of reading books and
notes for the preparation of any type of competitive exam.

If you look at the syllabus of CSIRNET exam in life sciences, you will find a very huge syllabus including
almost all the topics that are present in biology. Have you ever wonder why so many things are included
in one exam syllabus? Let me tell you why. See a Senate exam in life sciences is distant for all the
aspirants of the different fields of biological sciences including zoology, physiology, botany,
microbiology, biochemistry, biotechnology, pharmacology, agricultural biology. So the number of
students of aspirants for the CSIRNET exam in life science is huge so as they are syllabus and field of
study. As CSIRNET is a unified single exam for all this field together, they made the syllabus big and
include all the topics from these described field of biological sciences so that everyone of the students
can appear and at them questions from the subjective fields.

For example, let’s say you are from the field of zoology, so you’ll be happier to see questions from the
classification of animal kingdom and the question from developmental biology but the questions from
biotechnology field might be a little difficult for you to attempt. The NET exam question paper in life
science is designed in a way so that you can attempt questions from your respective field but you have
to prepare some more topics to qualify the CSIRNET exam.

Now the important question is, do you really need a book to follow for preparing the topics for the
CSIRNET exam in life science? Well a single word answer would be yes. Books are well constructed with
writing and illustrations that will help us to understand the topic from its core. But we also need to
remember that the time we have a for preparing CSIR NET exam is very less income with the amount of
syllabus we need to go through. So if you want to take each chapter and start reading it from the
beginning of the book it will take ages to complete the whole syllabus and appear for the exam. So even
though we have access to a lot of books for different topics, we need to choose specific areas which are
more important in the perspective of CSIR NET exam and study those topics from the books. Keeping
this information in mind I found a really important book that covers almost all the topics in chapters
included in CSIR NET exam which is “biology concepts and connections” by Campbell and Reeece. You
can look into this book for your primary level of preparation for the CSIR NET exam. Except for this book,
if you want to study independent details of each different modules and chapters you can follow the
following books prescribed for the associated modules-

All in one book

1. Biology concepts and connections by Campbell and Reece.

Subject wise preparation books

1. Module 1 – Biochemistry and bioenergetics – Principles of biochemistry by Nelson and Cox
this is all in one and completely sufficient for studying biochemistry in a lucid and simplified
manner for the CSIR net exam.
2. Module 2 – Cell Biology – Molecular biology of the cell by Bruce Alberts
this book is one of my favorite book of all time. You cannot only find cell biology but also you
will find cancer biology, cell signaling, immunology lectures in this book very well described and
superbly illustrated which will be much beneficial for preparing all this topics of the CSIR UGC
NET exam.
3. Module 3 – Molecular Biology – Molecular Biology of gene by Watson et. al.
This book offers modern research and understanding of fundamental biological processes like
DNA replication, DNA transcription and protein synthesis. But for the structure of proteins and
functionality I will refer you to read from biochemistry by Voet and Voet.
4. Module 4 – Cell signaling and immunology and cancer biology –Molecular biology of the cell by
Bruce Alberts and Kuby immunology or Janeways immunology
immunology is a huge subject and to read and understand the whole part of it from Kuby book
will be time consuming.
5. Module 5 – Developmental Biology – Essential developmental biology by J.M.W SLACK or
Developmental biology by Scot F Gilbert
very few students honestly know about developmental biology subject even a little. So people
try to escape this part of the module. Though there are several questions allotted from the
developmental biology part in the CSIR net exam but the preparation for this topic from a knee
on this book will be very hard at the beginning and definitely time-consuming.
6. Module 6 – Plant physiology – Principles of plant physiology by Walter Stiles
this is a good book to understand about the plant anatomy and physiology. If you are from
botany background you’ve already read from this book.
7. Module 7 – Animal physiology – Human physiology by C C Chatterjee
although the animal physiology chapter includes all the physiologic processes of every animal
including human but the CSIR net exam in is to provide questions mostly from the human
physiology part. That is why this book is prescribed which will be enough to understand about
major or topics of the human physiology.
8. Module 8 – Genetics – iGenetics by Russel, Genetics concepts and connections by Klug and
cummings.
I Genetics by Russel is also efficient book for studying both classical genetics as well as molecule
Genetics. But if you’re looking for preparation of the genetics problems then Klug and cummings
is the best choice when you can find so many different varieties of Genetics maths problems and
you can practice using the exercise section.
9. Module 9 – Diversity of life forms –Arihant publication UGC CSIR NET Life sciences book
this is a very small part of the module which only includes few topics. You can read this from any
of those standard CSIR net life science books that are available in the market. One of the
example is provided here.
10. Module 10 – Ecology and environmental biology – Essentials of ecology and environmental
science by S.V.S. Rana
 this book is fairly sufficient for the preparation and understanding of ecology and environmental
biology well.
11. Module 11 – Evolutionary biology and animal behavior – Understanding evolutionary biology by
Rajeev Tyagi.
This is again another Indian writer book but it is quite fair book to understand evolutionary
biology for the preparation of CSIR net exam.
12. Module 12 – Applied biology – principles of gene manipulation and genomics by Sandy B
Primrose.
This is a very advanced a book for understanding the molecule level details as well as the
bioinformatics analysis techniques which is not always necessary for the CSIR net exam. You can
give it a try if you have enough time to prepare.
13. Module 13 – Methods in Biology and biological techniques – Principles and techniques of
biochemistry and molecular biology by Wilson and Walker.
This is a wonderful book and it includes all the biological technique processes that would require
prepare for not only CSIR net exam but also many different Biology entrance examinations.