Blogs / The Loom

I’m honored to report that I’ve been asked to deliver this year’s John Wesley Powell Memorial Lecture.

Here is a description of the lecture series from its organizers, the Southwestern and Rocky Mountain Division of the American Association for the Advancement of Science:

The John Wesley Powell Memorial Lectures were inaugurated in 1929 in honor of the distinguished geologist and leader of the first expedition down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. Each year since then, with the exception of the years during WWII when the Division did not hold meetings, SWARM has invited a distinguished scholar to deliver a lecture at the Annual Meeting on a subject of his or her choosing. An attempt has always been made to select speakers who represent as wide a diversity of scientific endeavor as possible. Some of the previous Powell lecturers have included Oliver Sacks (2000), Holmes Rolston III (1998), Carl Sagan (1992), Lawrence Slobodkin (1987), Paul S. Martin (1978), Eugene Odum (1968), A.H. Compton (1939), Otto Struve (1934) and Aldo Leopold (1933).

The title of my lecture will be, “What Is Life? An Ancient Question Meets Twenty-First Century Science.” I’ll be delivering my lecture on the evening of March 29,  during AAAS-SWARM’s annual meeting. It will take place at the Allen Chapman Activity Center at the University of Tulsa in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

The talk is open to the public. More details can be found here.

I’m looking forward to visiting Oklahoma for the first time, and I hope readers in and around Tulsa will be able to join me.

[Image: Grand Canyon National Park]

A few cool items to report this snowy day about Microcosm, my book about life, E. coli, and everything.

1. I’m leaving the snow for a trip to LA next month. Microcosm is a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize.

2.  Library Journal also named Microcosm one of the top sci-tech books of 2008.

3. Joanne Manaster has started a nice YouTube series of science book reviews, including this one of Microcosm. (You can also see her review about Death from the Skies, by fellow Discover blogger Phil “Bad Astronomy” Plait).

My latest book, Microcosm, is about what it means to be alive, as seen from the point of view of E. coli. So it was a jolt to the system to discover that the guy who basically wrote the book on E. coli has just reviewed it for the American Society for Microbiology’s journal, Microbe. Frederick Neidhardt of the University of Michigan is the editor-in-chief of Escherichia coli and Salmonella: Cellular and Molecular Biology. I relied on this 2898-page tome a lot while I worked on Microcosm, lugging the two volumes off the shelf at the Yale med school library and dropping them with a crash on my table. In recent years the book has transcended its papery bonds and metamorphosed into a collossal, ever-updated web site with essays from experts on the latest developments in the field. I felt a bit like I had come to a county fair with an apple pie and discovered that Julia Child would be the judge.

The verdict? “Tour-de-force.”

Whew.

The BBC has launched a pair of spiffy new magazines about science–BBC Focus in the UK, and BBC Knowledge in the US. They’re running a special package of articles in honor of Darwin’s 200th birthday, which includes stuff from Richard Dawkins, PZ Myers, and me. They asked me to pay a visit to the lab of Richard Lenski, whose work documenting evolution in action I’ve written about on the Loom and in my book Microcosm. You can read about their work in what the BBC is calling a “digi-magazine” if you go here. (It requires Flash to see, and for some reason I can only see it on my Mac if I use Safari.)

2009 may be the year in which synthetic biology finally goes mainstream.

There have been plenty of articles about synthetic biology–reprogramming cells by inserting new genes and tweaking the connections between their own genes–over the past few years. (Here is one of mine.) But apparently most people are not paying attention. In a recent poll, most Americans said they had no clue what synthetic biology is.

Synthetic biology is important in part because it’s a new tool scientists are using to get at some basic questions about how life works. But, as I explained in my book Microcosm, it’s also important because it may open a new chapter in the history of biotechnology. Biologists can reprogram cells to do useful things and make valuable molecules. Now, synthetic biologists are turning their attention to energy. Obama’s pick for Energy Secretary, Steven Chu, has been a big supporter of making fuel through synthetic biology for years now, so I would expect that he’ll continue to champion it in his new post.

So now it’s high time to take synthetic biology seriously. What would happen, for example, if the United States got most of its gasoline from E. coli instead of a hole in the ground? Would that be good for the environment? Proponents of synthetic biology say yes, but what’s their evidence? After all, E. coli eats sugar, and sugar doesn’t come from thin air.

I take a look at these questions in a new piece I’ve written for Yale Environment 360. Check it out.

In the words of my kids: Wahoo!

I grabbed this image from Seed Magazine’s site, showing Microcosm with a few of the other picks, because I love how E. coli is sandwiched between life in the universe and humans. Seems like the right place for it to be.

PS: Amazon can still get you a copy for Xmas!

Here’s the list. (And here’s the book.)

[Update--fixed the paper's title. Sorry, people of Cleveland.]

Here’s the list.

Here’s a new review of Microcosm: E. coli and the New Science of Life in The Journal of Clinical Investigation. (Open access–most excellent.) The reviewer likes the book: “Mr. Zimmer has woven a fascinating tapestry, intercalating the energy of world-changing scientific discovery with the fascinating complexity of a well-understood living organism. His work will be welcomed by the scientist and the science enthusiast.”

On the other hand, it’s a little queasy to read that I’m “an American science writer at the zenith of his profession.” Does that mean it’s downhill from here?

All authors get nervous a few months after a book comes out, wondering if it will make the leap to a continued life in paperback. Fortunately Vintage will be publishing Microcosm in paperback, and it already has a page on Amazon. You can order now, although it won’t be out till July. So if there’s someone in your life who deserves an E. coli Christmas (and, really, who doesn’t?), you should get a hardback.

I just spoke yesterday about Microcosm, and brought a little recorder with me. This afternoon I fooled around with Soundslide and my Powerpoint, and produced this video. This is a format I’d like to experiment with more on this blog, so I’d be grateful if people would take a gander and offer their thoughts. The sound is a little scratchy (and a nearby fire company tested out their siren just as I was starting my talk), but all in all it should be easy listening.

On Thursday evening, I’ll be talking about Microcosm at the Guilford Free Library just down the road here in Guilford, Connecticut. It’s great to be talking in this lovely space on the Guilford Green, reopened at last after a year-long renovation. Here’s a flyer with more information. The event is free, but the library is taking reservations by phone at 203-453-8282.

It’s already end-of-the-year-list time, and I’m delighted to see that Amazon has picked Microcosm for their top ten science books of 2008. I must confess I’ve been slow this year on reading science books. What little free time I’ve got I’ve signed over to trying to finish War and Peace before I die. I’m enjoying it greatly, but at the rate I’m going, it’s a toss-up whether I’ll hit my biological deadline. Of the books on Amazon’s list, I can certainly recommend Your Inner Fish, having reviewed it in Nature. But are there any 2008 science books missing from this list, in your opinion?