Carl Zimmer's Blog, page 102

Green Power [Science Tattoo]

Charlie writes, "I am a scientist at the University of Minnesota. In 1999, as an undergrad on a plant science internship, a friend and I were sitting on our dorm roof, wondering what the best nerdy science tattoo would be. The double helix down the leg or back was suggested, but we concluded that a chloroplast was a better fit for our scientific interests. As the photon-collecting organelle in plants, it's the source of energy for nearly all plant life and a fascinating biochemical machine...

Cross-Cultural E. coli Aesthetics

A couple foreign editions of Microcosm have arrived. They got me thinking about book design across the globe. The Chinese edition takes my world-within-a-microbe metaphor to cosmic extremes.

All of my Japanese editions have covers that are both cute and relevant. Their edition of Microcosm is no exception. Who thought E. coli could have the delicacy of a crane?

The Front:

And one more for the back:

Drug-Free Hallucination

This optical illusion is so cool, you'll swear you've just damaged your brain. From Michael Bach's peerless collection.

Cosmology? Human Cell Cultures? The Colbert Report, Of Course

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Stephen Colbert is the twenty-first century Mister Wizard. He's had guests on to talk about great experiments in physics and shock their fingers, addressed the thorny issue of species delimitation, reveled in microbes, and even screamed in horror at the sight of tongue-eating parasites. If you still doubt me, look at the list of videos at Colbert Nation tagged "science."

What? You think science is a thing of the past on the show? Well, consider...

Blind Cousins to the Arthropod Superstars

Suddenly this obscure, blind cave dweller has become extremely interesting. It turns out to be a close cousin of the most diverse group of animals on Earth, the insects.

Insects–all one-million-plus-species of them–belong to a lineage of animals called arthropods. The arthropods emerged early in the history of animals, and while many of the early arthropods such as trilobites disappeared long ago, a vast diversity thrive on Earth today. Living arthropods share a number of traits in common...

Oh–And One Other Piece of Advice: That Way Madness Lies

Nature's Nicola Jones interviewed me about the art and business of writing books, and you can read it in this week's issue. It's part of a series of interviews about books that will be appearing this month.

Science and the Media: Blizzard Edition

Here at Fortress Zimmer, we're gradually getting buried under the latest Snowmageddon, Blizzaster, SnOMG, or whatever you want to call it. The real spectacle so far has been the giddiness of local meteorologists on television and on weather blogs. My wife Grace reminded me of this excellent 1954 essay by E.B. White, in which he described listening to the radio about Hurrican Edna. Suddenly, I feel linked to history.

It became evident to me after a few fast rounds with the radio that the...

Happy 100, Jacques Monod

The great French biologist Jacques Monod would have turned 100 today. I am personally fond of him for having said, "What is true for E. coli is true for the elephant," but he did much more than coin lovely phrases about microbes. His work on how genes switch on and off earned him a Nobel in 1965, and he also gave deep thought to the philosophy of biology, seeing it as the interplay of chance and necessity. Here's a blog post from Larry Moran with more, and here's Monod's 1971 book, Chance...

Darwin Out of Africa

Here's the course of Charles Darwin's ancestors out of Africa over the past 50,000 years or so. It's based on an analysis of the Y chromosome belonging to his great-great grandson. Details here.

How Do *You* Spell Brain? [Science Tattoo]

Tim writes,

I'm a post-doctoral cognitive neuroscientist working in MR research at the University of Pittsburgh.  I stumbled across the Science Tattoo Emporium and wanted to share my own science based ink.

The attached image shows my second tattoo and the most directly science-themed ink (although the others are also peripherally linked to the career I love so dear).  The four hieroglyphic characters are the earliest written form of the word "brain" and are found in the Edwin Smith Surgical...