Apes

Posted on by Lori Jia

The New York Times, May 31, 2013

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The stories of scientists create new scientists. Alexander von Humboldt — the most famous naturalist of the early 19th century — chronicled his epic expeditions, between 1799 and 1804, in his “Personal Narrative of a Journey to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent.” When a nature-loving student at Cambridge named Charles Darwin read the book, it changed his life. He read passages aloud to his professors and learned Spanish so that he could follow in Humboldt’s footsteps.

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Mountain Populations Offer Clues to Human Evolution

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The New York Times, May 30, 2013

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In the hearts of evolutionary biologists, mountains occupy a special place. It’s not just their physical majesty: mountains also have an unmatched power to drive human evolution. Starting tens of thousands of years ago, people moved to high altitudes, and there they experienced natural selection that has reworked their biology.

“This is the most extreme example in humans that you can find,” said Rasmus Nielsen, an evolutionary biologist at the University of California at Berkeley.

Humans have adapted to mountainous environments just as Charles Darwin predicted. To discover how this occurred, scientists are now examining the DNA of people who scaled mountains in different parts of the world.

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The High Life: My New Column For the New York Times

Posted on by Matt Kristoffersen

Humans have spread across the planet, settling in deserts and marshes and deep forests. They’ve adapted to their new homes, not just culturally but genetically, as natural selection has favored certain genes over others. But nowhere has this adaptation been more intense than at high altitudes–in places like Tibet, the Andes, and the Ethiopian highlands. For my Matter column in the New York Times this week, I look at the latest research on mountain life, and at the lessons it can teach us about evolution in general.

Originally published May 30, 2013. Copyright 2013 Carl Zimmer.

Today at 1 pm ET: Live Discussion About the New Virus MERS

Posted on by Matt Kristoffersen

I’ll be on HuffPost Live today at 1 pm ET to talk about the new virus that has emerged in the Middle East, known now as MERS-CoV (short for Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus).

This virus first came to light last summer. As I wrote here in March, the virus turned out to be a coronavirus, belonging to the same broad lineage of viruses that includes SARS. Like SARS, it appears to have hopped from bats and infects people’s lungs. So far, 44 people have been identified carrying the virus, and 24 have died. Continue reading “Today at 1 pm ET: Live Discussion About the New Virus MERS” →