[Photo : Ben Stechshulte. Also hi-res color or b/w]

The New York Times Book Review calls Carl Zimmer "as fine a science essayist as we have." In his books, essays, and articles, Zimmer reports from the frontiers of biology, where scientists are expanding our understanding of life. He is a frequent guest on radio programs, such as Fresh Air and This American Life. He also lectures regularly at universities, medical schools, and museums.

Zimmer's books include Soul Made Flesh, a history of the brain, which was named one of the top 100 books of 2004 by The New York Times Book Review, and dubbed a "tour-de-force" by The Sunday Telegraph. His book, Evolution: The Triumph of an Idea--"as fine a book as one will find on the subject" according to Scientific American--has recently been reissued with a new introduction. His other books include At the Water's Edge, a book about major transitions in the history of life; The Smithsonian Intimate Guide to Human Origins; and Parasite Rex, which the Los Angeles Times described as "a book capable of changing how we see the world."

Microcosm: E. coli and the New Science of Life, Zimmer's sixth book, will be published by Pantheon in May. It is a biography of the best-studied creature on Earth. While most people may only know E. coli as a lethal germ, we actually carry hundreds of billions of these bacteria in our bodies for our entire lives. Over the past fifty years, E. coli has been poked, probed, and dissected by thousands of biologists who seek answers to the most fundamental questions of biology, a number of whom have won Nobel Prizes for their work. Zimmer's exploration of this astonishingly complex germ is a meditation on the nature of life itself. Publisher's Weekly has praised the book: "Written in elegant, often poetic prose, Zimmer's well-crafted exploration should be required reading for all well-educated readers."

In addition to writing books, Zimmer contributes articles to the New York Times, as well as magazines including National Geographic, Discover, Scientific American, Science, and Popular Science. He also writes an award-winning blog, The Loom. From 1994 to 1998 Zimmer was a senior editor at Discover, where he remains a contributing editor.

Zimmer's work has been anthologized in The Best American Science and Nature Writing series. He has won fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. His honors include the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences Science Journalism Award, the Pan-American Health Organization Award for Excellence in International Health Reporting, the American Institute Biological Sciences Media Award, and the Everett Clark Award for science writing. In 2007 he was awarded the National Academies Science Communication Award for "his diverse and consistentl interesting coverage of evolution and unexpected biology."

Zimmer lives in Connecticut with his wife Grace and his children, Charlotte and Veronica.