When I think of the most recent helpful sources for understanding evolution, P.Z. Myers and this Carl Zimmer interview with Carl Bergstrom have made me feel inadequate at mathematics again.

In this podcast I talk to Carl Bergstrom of the University of Washington about the mathematics of microbes. Bergstrom is a mathematical biologist who probes the abstract nature of life itself. We talk about how life uses information, and how information can evolve. But in Bergstrom’s hands, these abstractions shed light on very real concerns in medicine, from the way that viruses jam our immune system’s communication systems to to the best ways to fight antibiotic resistance.

Systems! Systems! And, of course, where there are systems and information, there’s war.

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Filed under: Academia, Military, Podcasts, Population, Science Tagged: Biology, evolution, mathematics, meet the scientist, networks, systems analysis