It looks like the outbreak among the bonobos I blogged about last week is over. From an update from Vanessa Woods:

…the flu is over. Semendwa’s baby died, making it 7 bonobos that we’ve lost in the last month, 4 definitely from the flu, maybe 5.

I want to take the time to thank everyone who donated. we raised over $8,000 which will all go to bonobo food and medicine. We still have a $25,000 shortfall for bonobo food which we will try to make by the end of the year. I’ll make sure Sheryl thanks everyone individually, but they might come up on later posts. We haven’t forgotten you.

Everyone here is absolutely exhausted. but the staff have just worked so hard to save everyone, and they were saving bonobos left and right.

there will be more posts, some from the vet to talk about the exact nature of the illness, soem in response to people who think it’s some kind of ebola, it’s not, it’s a 24 hour bug that is harmless in humans, but apparently sometimes fatal to bonobos. and all the bonobos who will be released are in QUARANTINE and have been for six months so none of them was touched.

Vanessa is posting updates at the Friends of Bonobos site when she can get a good connection or when she can relay emails to people stateside. You can keep up with the news here.

Yesterday I passed on some grim news about a virus sweeping through bonobos. Some readers had questions, such as whether there was a quarantine and exactly what sort of virus is on the attack. Vanessa Woods kindly sent this email just now from the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The most important thing at the moment for us is to protect the bonobos for the release project. these bonobos are in complete quarantine, and only select members of staff go in and out. so again NO RELEASED BONOBOS HAVE GOT THE FLU. they are in an entire separate part of the sanctuary with no contact with sick bonobos and they rarely see people. Claudine has had them in quarantine for 6 months with these procedures in place, not just for the flu, but for other dieases as well. there have been 5 health checks and ALL the bonobos in the sanctuary have been vaccinated for all diseases recommended by IUCN. obviously they need a flu vaccine and we are working on it.

for the rest, we only have two enclosures and a night building. at the first sign of a cough or a runny nose, we keep the bonobo isolated in the night building. both to keep an eye on the bonobo, and to protect the other bonobos. the problem is, the virus is just too fast. unlike a zoo, or a biomedical laboratory, the bonobos are free to range around a huge forest in the day time. they disappear at about 8 in the morning, and show up at 11 and 4pm to eat, then at 7pm to sleep.

the only time we can really separate them is first thing in the morning then when they come into sleep. and the virus is just too fast. a bonobo who is fine in the morning can be almost falling over by the afternoon. if we lock the bonobos inside all day, then it makes contamination that much faster. everyone disinfects their hands all the time, they change clothes and shower both in the morning when they arrive and before they leave in the afternoon. apart from this, with the short fall in the budget this year, there’s no money and no time to organise more equipment or another emergency enclosure. we’re all just fighting it as best we can with what we’ve got.

We’ve had some people freak out that this is a virus called H5N1 which is fatal to humans, but it’s not. it”s not ebola or bird flu or any other disease lethal to humans. and we know that b/c the keepers have been getting sick from the bonobos, they get the flu and they are over it in 24 hours. It happens once every couple of years that a flu goign round kinshasa in jan/ feb hits the bonobos in march. bonobos, we think, have a much lower immune system than people, which is why the kinsahsa virus that lasted for 24 hours in humans, is so much more severe than bonobos. we think it is human respiratory syncytial virus , again non fatal to humans, but we’re not sure.  

I’ll relay more updates from Vanessa as they come.

Image courtesy of Vanessa Woods.

This is quite an honor, although the list of honorees is exactly backwards. If you’ve dedicated your career to fighting HIV or heart disease, let me step aside so you can head straight to the front of the line. I’ll just hang back and see if I can get an autograph from Bobby Baccalieri from the Sopranos.

Bonobos, along with chimpanzees, are our closest living relatives. Unfortunately the entire species has dwindled down to a few thousand survivors, all in the Democratic Republic of Congo. This morning I got a worrying email from Vanessa Woods, a bonobo expert who’s at a bonobo research facility in DRC:

In the last month, a flu epidemic has hit the bonobo sanctuary where we work: Lola ya bonobo (www.friendsofbonobos.org). It is the only bonobo sanctuary in the world, with over 60 orphans from the bushmeat trade.

The virus has infected over 20 bonobos and counting, and has already killed four. Another 3 have died, we aren’t sure of the cause, so it could be as many as seven, which means the sanctuary has already lost over a tenth of its population.

The symptoms are a dry cough, followed by a runny nose. But then the bonobos start hyperventilating, it’s like they can’t get enough air. They die as quickly as 72 hours after the initial symptoms. The problem is, the virus hasn’t seem to run its course, it’s been through the nursery twice, and is bouncing back and forth between the enclosures.

The only enclosure that is safe is the quarantined bonobos who will be released back into the wild in June this year.

Bonobos, known as the peaceful ape, are also the most endangered, with as few as 10,000 left in the wild. They share 98.7% of our DNA, like chimps, but unlike chimps who have murder, rape, and war in their societies, bonobos communities are female dominated and have very little violence. Their similarity to humans is why the virus could jump so quickly.

Lola ya Bonobo is critical to the conservation of bonobos, both through education (30,000 Congolese visit the sanctuary every year, most of them school children) and the release project which will be the first time bonobos have been released into the wild.

The economic crisis has also hit Congo, and the sanctuary is down $33,000 for food this year. No food = no medicine, and the drugs and equipment to treat this kind of epidemic are expensive.

If anyone has heard of anything like this illness in great apes, please write to v.woods@duke.edu. If people would like to donate, please visit www.friendsofbonobos.org/support.htm .

 [Image from Friends of Bonobos]

GrrlScientist is seeking submissions to Scientia, a new carnival for science, nature and medical blog writing. You can submit your entries here. The first edition is going to published Monday, April 6, so submit now!

Last summer I had a great time revisiting my geek childhood by watching old episodes of Carl Sagan’s Cosmos on Itunes. As I blogged here, it may be as badly dated as a disco ball, but it’s still wonderfully captivating to my twenty-first century daughters.

Well, if you didn’t fork over $1.99 per episode then, here’s a new recession-era deal you can’t refuse. Cosmos is now on Hulu. Here’s episode one…

Chris Mooney (the subject of a Loom post over the weekend) and Sheril Kirshenbaum have brought their blog, The Intersection, to Discover. I think I’ve been reading the Intersection ever since it started, years ago. Mooney and Kirshenbaum focus on the intersection (hence the name) of science and culture in all its manifestations, from scientific literacy to the way science gets treated by the government. Even when I’ve disagreed with them, I’ve found them thought-provoking. So be sure to check them out.

Over the past two summers I’ve paid visits to the lovely Isles of Shoals to speak to students and scientists at the Shoals Marine Lab. (I wrote a post about my 2007 trip here, and last summer’s journey here.) This year I’ll be trying something new: I’m teaching a week-long college-credit course on science writing. It will run from August 10 to 17, and, like all classes at Shoals, it will be intense. We’ll read a lot, write a lot more, and take advantage of the unique environment of Appledore Island, where you should never be surprised to encounter an underwater archaeologist, an ornithologist banding migratory birds, or a vet dissecting a seal on a picnic table.

The Lab will be taking registrations for the next few weeks. By the way, here’s the whole course list for the summer, including a class on the history of oceans that will start at Cornell and move through time and space to Appledore.

Image: Rick Holt, Wikipedia

When I recently gave a talk at Rockefeller University, I met a remarkable grad student named Alexis Gambis, who has organized the Imagine Science Film Festival. Last year was its launch, and this year they’re at it again. Alexis asked me to be on the jury, and while I warned him that I think bad science makes for good science fiction, I signed on. They’re now eager for submissions–visit their web site for more details. I’ll be waiting to watch.

The book costs $8,539. The reviews on Amazon are priceless.

(Hat tip, Dr. Prerogative of Harlots)

Last week I blegged for examples of great science writing from over the years, and you did not disappoint. Rania Masri, who teaches writing to scientists in Lebanon, asked if I could share the list. It’s the least I can do in exchange for everyone’s generosity, and this morning I’ve got some time as I listen to some interviews for good quotes. (I also have to say it’s very cool to be helping somebody out in Lebanon from my laptop.)

I’ve selected the readings that I think would work best for a class on the art of writing about science and nature. This is obvious a far from definitive list. For one thing, it underrepresents the great books about science. For another, it’s heavy on biology and light on physics, etc.–a reflection of the self-selected nature of the Loom’s readers, I suspect. And I’ve preferred pieces that can be read online. Imperfections notwithstanding, I hope this list brings people some unexpected pleasures from the past…

(more…)

I’m putting together a list of classic articles and essays about science for a writing class I’m designing, and I’m a bit frustrated. I’ve read plenty of great stuff over the years, but the list I’m coming up with feels too short. So allow me to launch a comment thread: can you name an article or essay about science that you read years ago in a magazine or newspaper that still sticks with you? (No books allowed.)

Update: Just to be clear, I’m not looking for scientific papers.