Marlene Zuk: LA Times Riddled with Life Review

From the April 27, 2007 Los Angeles Times

BOOSTER SHOTS
Hug a microbe today
By Rosie Mestel

Bacteria, viruses and fungi cause of all kinds of major and minor plagues and pestilences: bird flu, Ebola, smallpox, athlete's foot. We blast the critters with antimicrobials and recoil in horror should a cookie we're about to eat fall on the ground. (Unless there's no one watching — in which case many folks, we suspect, eat the cookie.)

As for worms: Well, think tapeworm. And cringe.

But there is another way to think about microbes and worms — as entities that have lovingly helped shape the human form. Such is the viewpoint of evolutionary biologist Marlene Zuk of UC Riverside, author of "Riddled With Life: Friendly Worms, Ladybug Sex, and the Parasites That Make Us Who We Are."

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