Air-Born
Carl Zimmer
Dutton, $ 32
On March 10, 2020, 61 members of the choir repeated in a church room in the county of Skag, Washington. As they sang, a microscopic germ has traveled the air. Before the end of the month, 58 members were infected and five fell seriously ill. In the United States, the virus has wreaked havoc. In a few weeks, thousands of people died, schools and businesses closed and 700,000 people lost their jobs.
Many scientists have determined in 2020 that the coronavirus spread to the airBut more public health agencies would take to recognize it. The Supersprider event of the Skagist County helped the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention American to examine the airborne transmission of COVVI-19. But to date, some scientists believe that the delay in the call of the virus has been an error – that which blocked vital public health measures and has allowed the disease to spread more quickly. In his new book, AirborneThe scientific journalist Carl Zimmer Racine “error” in the past of a historically neglected field: aerobiology or the science of airborne life.
Zimmer began his chronicle in the 19th century with Louis PasteurSummit in an imposing glacier in the French Alps. As part of a great experience, the microbiologist tilted a glass room in the sky, stung life and proved that microscopic germs floated in the air. The discovery of pastor inspired the generations of scientists to seek aerial life themselves, including the pathologist Fred Meier, who stuck the Petri boxes from various planes and finally appointed the domain.
Through the stories of Pastor, Meier and dozens of other scientists, Zimmer transparently weaves centuries of aerobiology science. He richly humanizes the characters of honesty and complexity, simultaneously putting by emphasizing the revered and the unknown public. Its heavy, impactful and accessible language gives life to glamorous experiences, such as those made from hot air balloons, as well as unpretentious presentations in university basements.
But aerobiology is more than joyful sciences through the sky. The field was mired in the darkest moments of humanity, that Zimmer comes out of the shadow and in the light. Aerobiologists were at the heart of the debates on how fatal diseases such as black death, cholera and tuberculosis spread. And while some scientists have worked to combat airborne infections, others have undertaken to create them, writes Zimmer. During the Second World War, the United States was one of the many countries to create organic weapons. Some American researchers have helped build an arsenal of germs and fatal spores to potentially use against the enemies of the nation. For years after the war, aerobiology has remained enveloped in secrecy and was widely ignored by public health officials. It was only by COVID-19 that it started to change.
Readers will put an end to the book with a better understanding of how life can fly and to what extent the public knowledge of aerobiology has arrived. It is a reminder that current decisions that humans take concerning airborne life are informed by a deep history. Zimmer concludes his chronicle with a vision of harmonious coexistence with the life that turns into the atmosphere: “As long as there is life on earth, it will fly, and as long as we are here, we will breathe.”
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