The Boston Globe has set up an insanely beautiful feature called “The Big Picture.” Each week, they pick out a dozen or more stunning pictures on some topic and display them at huge size. The latest theme is “Earth From Above,” and the pictures are all from photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand. I don’t know why, but this picture really spoke to me (click through for the full size shot). It’s a fresh expanse of lava in Iceland that has cooled down enough for moss and other organisms to colonize it. Life always finds a way. 

Originally published October 6, 2008. Copyright 2008 Carl Zimmer.

Conservation Magazine is a snazzy publication from the Society of Conservation Biology that sports some great writers and great graphics. I was pleased to be asked to contribute a piece about some of my favorite living things–parasites. In particular, I look at new research that shows just how integral parasites are to the well-being of ecosystems. It’s just come out in the latest issue. Check it out. 

Originally published October 4, 2008. Copyright 2008 Carl Zimmer.

Steve Mirsky at Science Talk, the podcast of Scientific American , interviewed me about my story on intelligence–in the middle of a bad cold. I think my intelligence was affected…Listen here. 

Originally published October 1, 2008. Copyright 2008 Carl Zimmer.

I just got back from a pretty remarkable lecture by the husband-and-wife team of Peter and Rosemary Grant. The Grants started studying Darwin’s finches on the Galapagos Islands in 1973, and they made some of the most detailed studies of evolution in the wild ever carried out. Their adventures were chronicled 14 years ago by Jonathan Weiner in the Beak of the Finch, which won the Pulitzer Prize. But the Grants did not stop. They continued to observe the birds evolve, and make fascinating new discoveries. In 2002, I wrote an article on what they’d learned after some three decades of research. 

Continue reading “A Career Among The Finches” →

I’ll be talking today on “Word of Mouth” on New Hampshire Public Radio at noon EST. The topic will be my new article on the biology of intelligence in Scientific American. Listen here.

Update: The segment is archived here. 

Originally published September 29, 2008. Copyright 2008 Carl Zimmer.