A Virtual Conversation with
Carl Zimmer, Author of
Air-Borne: The Hidden History of
the Life We Breathe
Tuesday, March 11, at 7 P.M. EDT on Zoom
Science Writers in New York welcomes back New York Times science journalist Carl Zimmer (@carlzimmer.com) for a virtual conversation with SWINY chair David Levine (@dlloydlevine) about his book Air-Borne:
The Hidden History of the Life We Breathe (Penguin Random House, February 25).
Every day we draw in two thousand gallons of air—and thousands of living things. From the ground to the stratosphere, the air teems with invisible life. This last great biological frontier remains so mysterious that it took over two years for scientists to finally agree that the Covid pandemic was caused by an airborne virus. In Air-Borne, award-winning New York Times columnist and author Carl Zimmer leads us on an odyssey through the living atmosphere and through the history of its discovery.
We travel to the tops of mountain glaciers, where Louis Pasteur caught germs from the air, and follow Amelia Earhart and Charles Lindbergh above the clouds, where they conducted groundbreaking experiments. We meet the long-forgotten pioneers of aerobiology including William and Mildred Wells, who tried for decades to warn the world about airborne infections, only to die in obscurity. Air-Borne chronicles the dark side of aerobiology with gripping accounts of how the United States and the Soviet Union clandestinely built arsenals of airborne biological weapons designed to spread anthrax, smallpox, and an array of other pathogens.
About Carl Zimmer
Carl Zimmer writes the Origins column for The New York Times and has frequently contributed to The Atlantic, National Geographic, Time, and Scientific American. He has won the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s Science Journalism Award three times, among a host of other awards and fellowships.
Carl teaches science writing at Yale University, has been a guest on NPR’s RadioLab, Science Friday, and Fresh Air, and maintains an international speaking schedule. Carl is the author of 15 books about science. We had the pleasure of interviewing Carl about his last two books: She Has Her Mother’s Laugh: The Powers, Perversions, and Potential of Heredity and Life’s Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive.
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When:
Tuesday, March 11
7 to 8 P.M. EDT
Register: https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_jPJvT98sQb6RrVw8RQImbw#/registration
