2018-12-01 Discover

50 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM

SpTheider

Fly& the
How a
pitched
chemical battle
in our home
unwittingly
creates a
playground
for pests.
BY ROB DUNN
ILLUSTRATIONS BY DAWN COOPER

51December 2018 DISCOVER

You can accept that many of the insect
species around you are interesting, poorly
studied and more likely to help control
pests than to be them. Or you can go to war.

The modern way to wage such a ight The pesticide chlordane was irst which for a time was promoted by the
is with chemistry. But be warned: If used in homes in 1948. It was so toxic federal government for use on farms
you decide on a chemical war, the bat- to insects that it was thought to be and in households.
tles are not evenly matched. Not even invincible. By 1951, however, German
close. To each round of new chemicals cockroaches in Corpus Christi, Texas, Each time chemists cooked up a new
we apply, the insects we attack respond were resistant to chlordane. In fact, pesticide, it was just a few years, or
by evolving via natural selection. The the roaches were a hundred times sometimes just a few months, before
more aggressive the attack, the faster more resistant to the pesticide than some population of the pests evolved
the evolution. Insects evolve faster laboratory strains of the bug were. resistance. Sometimes, resistance to
than our ability to understand how By 1966, some of the critters had also an old pesticide conferred resistance
they have evolved, much less counter it. evolved resistance to then-popular to a new one. In those cases, the battle
It happens again and again, especially pesticides such as malathion, diazi- was over before it started. The roaches
among those pests we try hardest to non and fenthion. Soon thereafter, spread and thrived.
kill, such as the German cockroach German cockroaches were discovered
(Blattella germanica). that were fully resistant to DDT, Roaches aren’t the worst critters
in our homes, though. Yes, they can
Among the carry pathogens, but your neighbors
species killed by or children carry more. Also, experts
haven’t yet documented any cases in
pesticides are which someone has actually gotten
those that benefit sick from a pathogen that a cockroach
spread, whereas people get sick every
us, including day from pathogens spread by other
the natural humans. The most serious problem
enemies of the the bugs pose is that they are, in great
pests we are densities, a source of allergens. In
trying to control. response to this real problem, and
the many perceived problems, we
have spent enormous resources trying
to kill them.

The German cockroach appears to
have made its way through Europe dur-
ing the Seven Years War (1756-1763),
a time when people were traversing
Europe with containers large enough to
hold quite a few cockroaches. Just who
transported them is unknown. Carl
Linnaeus, the father of modern taxon-
omy, asserted it was the Germans, but
he might have been biased. Linnaeus
was Swedish, and during the Seven
Years War, the Swedes fought several
battles with the Germanic Prussians.
Linnaeus thought that “German cock-
roach” was a itting moniker for a spe-
cies he didn’t like.

By 1854, the insect was in New York
City. It now lives from Alaska to
Antarctica, having moved with peoples
of nearly every nation in their boats,
cars and planes. It is surprising the
roaches aren’t yet on the International
Space Station.

IF IT DOESN’T KILL YOU . . . pesticides. The second problem is that In the late 1950s, J.J. Steyn, a
Certain conditions are needed for among the species killed by pesticides researcher in South Africa, was trying
animals to adapt quickly to pesticides: are those that beneit us, including the to igure out how to control house ies
the targeted species must be genetically natural enemies of the pests we are (Musca domestica), longtime associ-
diverse (or borrow new genes from trying to control. ates of humans. House ies have spread
other species), the chemical kill almost around the world to nearly every
all of the targeted species, the chemical ALONG CAME A SPIDER region we inhabit. They can be a real
exposure happens repeatedly, and the Whether you like it or not, spiders are problem, especially when sanitation is
targeted species’ competitors (parasites great at pest control. If you kill them poor. House ies carry more pathogens
and pathogens) be missing. in your home — and this is precisely than cockroaches, including many
what we do with many kinds of pesti- that cause diarrhea and are associated
Cockroaches meet these condi- cide applications — you do so at your with more than 500,000 deaths a year.
tions, but so do nearly all the other own expense. House ies also evolve rapidly. By 1959,
pests we target. Besides roaches, bed those in South Africa were resistant to
bugs, head lice, house ies, mosqui- As children, we learned about the at least 15 major pesticides.
toes and other common insects in old woman who swallowed a spider
our houses have developed resistance after swallowing a y. That case didn’t Although the ies are largely invinci-
to our pesticides. turn out well. (Spoiler alert: She died.) ble to chemistry, they are not invincible
Others have turned out better. to spiders.
If a species becomes resistant to a
pesticide or other means of popu-
lation control, that species can
readily move to another home
that uses the same control
measure. In rural environ-
ments, the spread of resistant
species might be slow. But in cities,
it can happen rapidly because apart-
ments and houses are closer together.
Even though human social networks
often fall apart in cities, with people
feeling lonely and isolated, the resistant
pests stay connected. Their network is
a kind of river of our own making,
and it ows through our windows and
under our doors.

Although resistance is quick to
evolve among the pests, it is less likely
to evolve in species we don’t target.
This is doubly problematic. The irst
problem is the simple loss of the bio-
diversity around us, on which wild
ecosystems depend. A recent study
found that over the last 30 years, the
biomass of insects in Germany had
declined in wild forests by 70 percent.
The jury is still out on the cause, but
many scientists believe a likely one is

53December 2018 DISCOVER

Steyn gained a key insight ies effectively. Steyn repeated the exclusively or nearly exclusively on
from The Afrikaans Children’s experiment at the Plague Research prey rather than for defense. For spi-
Encyclopedia, perhaps while read- Laboratory in South Africa. The y ders, it is nearly always easier to ee
ing it to his own children. He learned population declined by 60 percent in than to ight.
that in parts of Africa, social spiders, three days in the lab’s animal house.
those that live together in colonies, One study even attempted to ind
are intentionally brought into houses “In order to help protect humans out how many pokes it takes to get 43
to control ies and other pests. The against y-borne diseases, it is sug- individual black widow spiders to bite
practice appears to have been used gested that colonies of the social artiicial ingers made out of congealed
irst by the Tsonga and the Zulu, spider be placed in public places like Knox gelatin. After one poke, none
who even set up sticks in their homes markets, restaurants, milk barns, of them bit. Nor did any bite after 60
to make it easier for spiders to build public houses, hotel kitchens, as well repeated pokes. Sixty percent of the
nests. The colonies, often the size of a as in abattoirs and dairies, and espe- widows bit only after being pinched
soccer ball, can easily be transported cially in kitchens and latrines on all between artiicial ingers three times
from house to house. possible premises,” Steyn wrote in a in a row, and even then, they released
paper published in 1959 in the South venom only half the time. Those bites
Steyn wondered if this technique African Medical Journal. “In cow- would not have been problematic to a
could be used again. sheds, they would also help to increase human, just painful. Venom is costly to
milk production.” spiders, and they don’t want to waste it
In home kitchens and in hospitals, on you; they are saving it for mosqui-
Steyn suspended spider webs by a string He imagined houses illed with giant toes and house ies.
attached to a nail. They controlled balls of spiders, a world in which ies
and the diseases they transmitted WASPS, FUNGUS TO THE RESCUE
would become rare. Spiders aren’t the only creatures in your
home involved in pest control. Many
He imagined types of solitary wasps prey on speciic
cockroach species.
houses filled
Their technique is far different from
with giant balls that of spiders. By using their sense
of smell, the tiny insects, some only
of spiders, a a quarter-inch in size, locate cock-
roach eggs and commandeer them.
world in which The mother wasp taps the egg cases
to make sure a roach is inside. Then,
flies and the she pierces the case with her oviposi-
tor, an organ used for egg laying, and
diseases they lays her own eggs inside. The wasps
hatch, devour the roach inside the egg
transmitted would case and escape by drilling a hole out
to freedom.
become rare.
In homes in Texas and Louisiana,
But don’t spiders bite humans? Each 26 percent of American cockroach
year, tens of thousands of “spider egg cases were parasitized by the wasp
bites” are reported around the world, Aprostocetus hagenowii, and others
and the numbers seem to be increas- were parasitized by yet another wasp,
ing. The truth is that spiders rarely Evania appendigaster, according to
bite us, and nearly all of the reports a study published in Environmental
are actually infections due to resistant Entomology.
Staphylococcus bacteria (MRSA), mis-
diagnosed by patients and doctors alike. Several researchers have attempted
If you think you have a spider bite, ask to release parasitoid wasps into
a doctor to test you for MRSA. Those homes to control roaches. All of
odds are much higher. those attempts have been, in one way
or another, successful (though also
One reason why bites are rare is typically poorly documented). Just
that most spiders use their venom know that if you ind in your house

54 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM

an egg case with a hole in it, the case
has likely birthed wasps rather than
roaches. And those wasps may be in
your house now, ying around and
entirely beneicial.

Along with those critters, another
natural pest control is Beauveria bassi-
ana, a fungus found in soils. A research
project has tested it on bed bugs.

If you spray the fungus on a surface
in your home, the spores sit waiting.
When a bed bug passes by, the spores
attach to the external layer of fats on
the bug’s exoskeleton, which the fun-
gus can then penetrate. Now inside
the body cavity, it kills the bed bug by
simultaneously clogging and poison-
ing its organs and starving its body of
key nutrients.

A PESKY FUTURE on bats when they are sleeping. Bed gone. In their place will be a diminu-
Throughout history, humankind has bugs, on the other hand, have become tive group that hides from us. And as
made choices to kill pests with ever nocturnal; they feast on us when we’re soon as we leave a room or turn off the
more powerful weapons. What will sleeping. Many species of cockroaches lights, those little creatures will regroup
happen if we continue this way? and rats have also become nocturnal. and reclaim our living space. We will be
Animals will also evolve to sneak surrounded by the consequences of our
The use of novel chemicals as through smaller cracks. The more we actions — thousands of tiny, resistant,
weapons favors the evolution seal up our buildings, the smaller these evasive cockroaches, bed bugs, lice,
of ever more behaviorally and organisms will become. house ies and eas. D
chemically defended pathogens
and pests. They will be resistant, If things continue as they have, thou-
but the rest of life, the broader sands of species of animals, each with
biodiversity, won’t be. We will an interesting story and most with no
unknowingly trade a richness of negative effect on us whatsoever, will be
wild species — of butter ies, bees,
ants, moths and the like — for a few From the book NEVER HOME ALONE: From Microbes to Millipedes,
resistant life-forms. Camel Crickets, and Honey Bees, the Natural History of Where We
Live by Rob Dunn. © 2018 by Rob Dunn. Reprinted by permission
The exoskeletons of those enduring of Basic Books, an imprint of Perseus Books, LLC, a subsidiary of
life-forms will be coated with barriers Hachette Book Group, Inc. New York, N.Y. All rights reserved.
that prevent toxins from entering their
bodies. Their individual cells will have
transporters that prevent toxins from
being absorbed. And the more homog-
enous and climate-controlled we make
our living spaces, the easier we make
indoor life for them.

Household pests will continue to be
nocturnal, active during the hours we
are not, the hours in which we fail to
pay attention (we kill pests when we
notice them). To some extent, this has
already happened.

During the time humans lived in
caves, bed bugs evolved from bat
bugs — diurnal critters that feast

55December 2018 DISCOVER



Devastating diseases
can catch us unaware,
but medical experts
are developing
digital tools to
prevent future chaos.

BY MALLORY LOCKLEAR

COMPOSITE: ALISON MACKEY/DISCOVER; SHUTTERSTOCK ELEMENTS: ROST9 (BACTERIA), 57December 2018 DISCOVER
ARTHEAD (NUMBERS), KASIA (GLOBE), PETER KOTOFF (LAPTOP)

IT’S 2014 IN LIBERIA. The country’s Pulling It
Together
largest hospital is already full to the brim, unable to
admit. Instead, the sick lie on the ground outside, Pathogens hitch rides on hosts,
writhing and crying in pain. They’re struck with severe
bouts of vomiting and diarrhea, impaired kidney and spreading microorganisms
liver function, perhaps even internal bleeding. Up to 90
percent of those sick will die. Their only hope of getting such as bacteria and viruses.
treatment is if someone else dies irst, freeing up a bed.
Researchers have studied many
The culprit behind the devastation? Ebola. By 2016,
the outbreak ended with more than 11,000 reported of these pathogens (human
deaths across West Africa. In the aftermath, experts
underscored that, during the worst months, few were immunodeiciency virus, for
prepared for such catastrophe — neither the countries
that suffered most, nor the international community at example). But the results of their
large. Though the World Health Organization eventually
declared a Public Health Emergency of International work aren’t all
Concern, it came late, and arguably, so did vital funding.
And while few cases spread outside the continent, the stored in the same
resulting panic certainly did.
place — they’re
But what if there were an early warning system for
the outbreak? Something that could have given health scattered across
organizations a heads-up, allowing them to organize an
effective response, contain the disease’s spread, save tens journals and
of thousands of lives and prevent an international crisis?
Such a system may be in the not-too-distant future. various databases.

Non-proit, university and non-government groups If experts
across the globe are tackling this idea from various
angles. From compiling information on potentially Marie sequence a
infectious agents to tracking real-time diagnoses in McIntyre pathogen’s DNA
disease hot spots, epidemiologists — those who study (which helps
the incidence and prevalence of disease — are getting epidemiologist, identify and track
us closer to a world with fewer surprise pandemics. Institute of it), that data
Infection and typically gets
In a Liberian classroom-turned-isolation ward for Ebola victims, a health worker disinfects Global Health,
the body of a man who died of the disease in August 2014. By its end in 2016, the outbreak,
which caught health officials off guard, killed more than 11,000 people across West Africa. University of uploaded to a
Liverpool public database,
58 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM
but it’s not paired

with any additional existing

descriptions. Instead, interested

researchers have to manually cross-

reference with various journals.

“We needed to ind a better

way of bringing the information

together,” says Marie McIntyre, an

epidemiologist at the Institute of

Infection and Global Health at the

University of Liverpool.

So McIntyre and her colleagues

created a new database: the

Enhanced Infectious Diseases

Database, or EID2. It’s

programmed to link publicly

available information about all

known pathogens of a given host,

all hosts of a given pathogen LEFT: JOHN MOORE/GETTY IMAGES. ABOVE: COURTESY OF MARIE MCINTYRE

and info about when and where

that pathogen showed up. “It’s

not about where the disease

is occurring today,” McIntyre

says. “It’s about where the

disease is occurring and who

the disease is occurring in.” That

combination of information can

help researchers look for long-

term drivers of disease, such as

how climate affects the spread

of a pathogen.

This representation of EID2
data shows the link between
pathogens and their human
and domestic animal hosts.
Each host is represented by
a node; the bigger the node,
the more pathogens found in
that host. The lines between
hosts indicate the number of
pathogens that show up in
both hosts; the thicker the
line, the more pathogens
the pair share. Colors simply
indicate the type of host:
human, rodents, other
mammals and birds.

TOP: MAYA WARDEH. LAPTOP INSET: COURTESY OF MARIE MCINTYRE. LAPTOP: KOSTOV/SHUTTERSTOCK By pooling information from various public databases, EID2 lets users see in one spot lots Pros
of data that’s usually scattered. Above is a look at sources of information on HIV overlaid
on areas where the pathogen exists. By bringing knowledge together in
one place, EID2 makes it easier to
investigate, anticipate and prepare
for a pathogen. McIntyre says the
database, which includes millions
of sequences and information on
thousands of pathogen species, is
also easily updated. Plus, it’s free,
and anyone can use it.

Cons

EID2 relies on public information,
so it’s limited to already published
knowledge. If researchers discover
a pathogen but its DNA isn’t se-
quenced, or if no one else has post-
ed information about it in a public
forum, EID2 can’t incorporate it.

UP NEXT

The EID2 team plans to expand the
database, incorporating diseases
that affect crops.

59December 2018 DISCOVER

A Learning Process

In the world of epidemiology, diseases the vast majority that don’t,” she whether it’s nocturnal or not.
that have seen an uptick in recent
years are called “emerging infectious says. “I want to know what the At the end of this sorting, the
diseases.” But are there really more
cases of these diseases, or have we data can give me, what can the algorithm will ideally have
just become better at spotting them?
According to Barbara Han, a disease data show me, about what distin- grouped species by whether
ecologist at the non-proit Cary
Institute of Ecosystem Studies in New guishes those two.” She turned to Barbara they’re disease carriers or not.
York, it’s not just us getting better. algorithms and machine learning. Han But this irst sort gets a fair
“It’s actually an increasing problem of
infectious diseases,” she says. And most Han starts with a list of species disease bit wrong. To make the algo-
of these diseases originate in animals. that researchers have already ecologist, rithm more accurate, Han has
Cary Institute the computer do another round
Han decided to igure out what agged as disease carriers or of Ecosystem of sorting, this time focusing
makes certain animals more likely non-disease carriers. She then Studies on the species it miscategorized
to host speciic diseases. “There is trains a computer algorithm
something inherent about a species that
enables it to carry disease, compared to to separate the species on the the irst time. When it does

list — not labeled in any way, so the this over and over again, the algorithm

algorithm doesn’t know which is which learns. And, importantly, it learns which

— by dozens of traits. For example, factors contribute to a species carrying a

the algorithm may start by looking at transferable disease or not. “At the end

an animal’s body mass, followed by its of that process, you get a very powerful

age of sexual maturity and inally by predictor,” Han says. When the model

1 To train an algorithm to identify
zoonotic species, known disease
carriers and non-disease carriers
from an animal group, in this case
rodents, are fed into the algorithm
as unlabeled data points. NOTE: Only
around 10 percent of disease carriers are
currently known, but we show a 50/50
split here, for simplicity.

2 The algorithm then sorts them into
groups using randomly selected traits.

No
Diseases that can process repeats non-disease carrier disease carrier
pass between
animals and humans TOP: COURTESY OF BARBARA HAN. BOTTOM: ALISON MACKEY/DISCOVER. SHUTTERSTOCK ELEMENTS FROM BASEL101658, POTAPOV ALEXANDER, HEIN NOUWENS, A SK (CREATURES); BLACK CREATOR (MAN)unlabeled for algorithm
are called zoonotic. Body mass

Key Yes Under1kg?
Not known to transmit disease
Known to transmit disease
Not yet classiied by algorithm

Misclassiied

Geographic TREE #1 Age of

range sexual maturity

Yes Under 150,000 No Yes More than No
50 days?
km2?

Group Litters Period of
per year activity
Life span population
Less than 3? Active during
Less than size
Yes No Yes day? No
Yes 1 year? No Yes Less than No
10?

carrier non-carrier carrier non-carrier carrier non-carrier carrier non-carrier

58% identi ed correctly

3 The algorithm gets a TREE #2 TREE #3
lot wrong (hollow
boxes) in its first 67% identi ed correctly process repeats 83% identi ed correctly
pass, so it repeats
the process multiple
times with other
randomly selected
traits, focusing on
misclassified species.
With each attempt, the
algorithm learns which
traits are most likely to
crop up in disease carriers.

60 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM

examines a species that’s a question THE HIGH COSTS OF
mark — whether or not it carries disease FIGHTING DISEASE
isn’t known beforehand — it can use what
it’s learned to study that species’s traits, Working to give people a heads-up when diseases break out is useless
compare them with traits from known without resources to deal with the situation. Once experts predict a potential
carriers and predict the likelihood of that outbreak, who funds the necessary preventive and containment measures?
species hosting a disease. And how much will they give?

The algorithm can also create a list Here’s a look at some of the major contributors and how much money
of animals ranked by their risk of they’ve committed to fighting significant disease outbreaks.
carrying disease, as well as a description
of the traits that determine that risk. THE BIG SPENDERS
For example, when Han trained the
algorithm with hundreds of mice species, OUTBREAK The World U.S. European
it determined disease-carrying risk was Bank government Union
associated with a rapid life cycle — early
sexual maturity, frequent reproduction Zika virus (2015) $150 million $1.7 billion $52.17 million
and fast growth rates. Knowing what $5.4 billion $939.33 million
animals and which traits are most likely Ebola (2014) $1.62 billion $7.7 billion N/A
to be associated with disease allows $6.1 billion $241 million
researchers to zero in on and prepare for H1N1 (2009) $500 million
where the next pandemic could originate.
Avian flu (2003) $500 million
Pros
Zika virus The World Bank
This model is based on objective facts (2015) U.S. government
about animals, so predictions are European Union
less prone to bias. And the model’s Ebola
predictions of risk are stable because (2014) 2468 $10 billion
they’re based on biological traits BILLIONS OF DOLLARS SPENT
that aren’t likely to change anytime H1N1
soon. (2009)

Cons Avian lu
(2003)
The ability to predict any species’s
disease risk relies on how much we 0
know about it. So if we don’t have
enough information, the algorithm NONPROFIT HELP OUTBREAK The Bill and
has little to work with — and that Melinda Gates
could lead to inaccurate predictions. Though governments and Foundation
international institutions are
There’s also the problem of the main funders of outbreak Zika virus (2015) $20.1 million
follow-up. “It’s almost like selling relief efforts, non-profits also
an insurance policy,” Han says. provide valuable money when Ebola (2014) $53.1 million
Her model can produce a list of diseases strike. Here’s what
CHART: ALISON MACKEY/DISCOVER. VALERI POTAPOVA/SHUTTERSTOCK potentially risky animals, but if no one of the biggest non-profit H1N1 (2009) $5.6 million
one investigates them firsthand, contributors has given during Avian flu (2003) $18 million
the prediction is just a prediction. major outbreaks.
So in many cases, confirming the
model’s output takes some time.

UP NEXT

Han is working on figuring out how
to turn prediction systems like her
algorithms, which can be valuable
tools for researchers already focused
on sniffing out emerging diseases,
into something more proactive, such
as an early warning system. She’s
now focusing on what types of data
are necessary for such an alert system
and what still needs to be collected.

61December 2018 DISCOVER

Location, Location, Location

EcoHealth Alliance, another New York-based non-proit that many of these hot spots of emerging diseases were
in tropical areas. Then, EcoHealth team members went
focused on global health, is also interested in how and when
out to these areas, testing local residents and wildlife
diseases jump from animals to humans. Not for disease to conirm their model’s accuracy. Those
regions host incredibly dense and diverse wildlife, and
only is it looking at which species put humans since each species comes with its own set of pathogens,
the more biodiversity you have, the greater the risk of
at risk, it also focuses on which regions and emerging diseases.

animal habitats are more susceptible to “We live in a globalized world where we’re changing
the environment so fundamentally that pathogens are
sparking pandemics. changing their behavior,” Daszak says. “They can jump
from one species to another more easily because we’re
“A few years ago, we compiled a database of butting up against different species.”

every known emerging disease to ind out what Based on data from past outbreaks, EcoHealth
Alliance’s mathematical model flags areas (usually
the reality is,” says Peter Daszak, a disease those rich in biodiversity) that are more likely to
spawn an emerging disease in the future. The
ecologist and the organization’s president. Peter warmer the color, the greater the likelihood.
“Around two-thirds of all emerging diseases, Daszak
maybe even more, are of animal origin.”
disease
Daszak and his team created a mathematical ecologist and
model that uses outbreak data from the last 50 president,
EcoHealth

years to predict where outbreaks might occur. Alliance

With that tool, he and his colleagues found

IMAGE AND MAP: ECOHEALTH ALLIANCE

62 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM

ere’s a Map for at

Doctors Without Borders (also known by the French name Médecins Sans

Pros Frontières, or MSF) and the British Red Cross (BRC) are collaborating to tackle

Using these analyses to the spread of disease in real time.
pinpoint potential outbreak
hot spots allows health Their efforts began with the Missing Maps Project, a 2014 initiative carried
care organizations and
governments to direct out by MSF, BRC, the American Red Cross and the U.S.-based
resources to that area.
Researchers and physicians non-proit Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team. The project
then can focus on that
region and directly test for trained citizen volunteers to digitally trace the buildings and
the emergence of diseases
from both wildlife and roads that appear in satellite images, creating maps. They
humans, allowing for a
better chance at prevention focused on regions that are most vulnerable to crises like
and containment.
disease outbreaks and natural disasters, but aren’t typically
Cons
mapped in detail — which can be a problem for aid workers
Relying on a mathematical
model requires researchers responding to a disaster. Simon
to make assumptions. For MSF and BRC applied this technique in Lubumbashi, a city Johnson
example, the model may
show that deforested in the Democratic Republic of Congo. They mapped buildings technical
areas are hot spots for and road networks, as well as details like neighborhood limits,
new outbreaks. But it identifying key areas where crisis victims might arrive. These leader, British
doesn’t explain the complex maps provided a basis on which to build an outbreak tracking
reasons that make up the Red Cross
whole picture of why this
occurs. So while the map is system: The team created software that
limited in what it can tell
researchers, it does point would combine the maps with patient
researchers to key places
to seek underlying causes. details collected by doctors, making it Pros
easier to check for patterns or signs of
UP NEXT an outbreak. The technology is open source and
can be developed rapidly, allowing
Emerging disease leaders Doctors and nurses enter patient new groups to use and customize it.
from around the world, information, including age, length of stay
including those from and admission date, into the software, Cons
EcoHealth Alliance, have
come together to form and an animated map shows where The output is only as good as the
the Global Virome Project. patients are coming from and when. The effort users put into it. If people
The goal is to identify all tool “will show a map of the city and the enter data inaccurately, the
currently unknown viruses administration areas, and will show colors mapping will be inaccurate as well.
that could emerge in the in different intensity where the outbreak Users must be properly trained.
future — an estimated
1.6 million. By knowing is occurring the highest,” says Simon
which viruses pose a
RIGHT: COURTESY OF SIMON JOHNSON. LAPTOP INSET: DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS. LAPTOP: PETER KOTOFF/SHUTTERSTOCK threat to humans and Johnson, a BRC technical leader who UP NEXT
which animals carry them, helped develop the software. “The idea is
EcoHealth and similar you can then start preventative exercises, The team is working to bring this
groups will be even better rather than just treatment of patients dashboard to more locations,
prepared to predict where coming in.” D according to former project leader
the next pandemic may Idriss Ait-Bouziad’s presentation
spring up. The project is Mallory Locklear is a freelance science writer of the work at an MSF conference
expected to take 10 years last year.
and cost up to $5 billion.
based in New York.

The British Red
Cross and Doctors
Without Borders
teamed up to
build this digital
dashboard. The
tool combines
local maps with
patient data, so
first responders can
track details that
could help them
spot an outbreak
in real time.

63December 2018 DISCOVER

Prognosis

The Antibiotic Eaters

Researchers design bacteria to gobble up antibiotics in the environment, before microbes
have a chance to turn deadly. BY JONATHON KEATS

→ When Gautam Dantas irst Gautam Dantas (above) discovered, while George FROM TOP: GAUTAM DANTAS/SCIENCE; STEVE JURVETSON VIA FLICKR; MATT MILLER/WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE
observed bacteria eating working in George Church’s lab at Harvard Church
antibiotics, he was sure there had to be University, that bacteria can consume
some mistake. The year was 2007, and antibiotics. A TASTE FOR PENICILLIN
he was trying to coax microbes to turn Biologists have known bacteria
plant waste into biofuels. Dantas was a response to overprescription and could consume antibiotics since the
postdoctoral researcher in the Harvard careless disposal. With any luck, early ’60s, but the knowledge was
University lab of George Church, a Dantas’ hungry bacteria will help, by neither widespread nor deep when
pioneer in genetics research. As part of preventing resistance from evolving Dantas accidentally witnessed his
his investigation, Dantas had exposed in the irst place. irst antibiotic feast. Intrigued, he
one group of soil microbes to a dose decided to follow up on forgotten old
of antibiotic, which he igured the studies by surveying the phenomenon
bacteria wouldn’t eat. A week later, a comprehensively. He bought all
group grown on a diet of plant matter the relevant drugs listed in the lab’s
— and exposed to no antibiotics microbiology supply catalog, and
— had grown only a little. In the collected soils from public parks,
dishes illed with antibiotic, however, secluded forests and cornields that
most of the microbes were having a were fertilized with manure. All 18
picnic. Instead of proving deadly, the drugs were eaten up by microbes
antibiotics were providing sustenance. in his soil samples, especially
alarming because the concentrations
“We igured we’d probably made a were 50 to 100 times greater than
mistake,” Dantas recalls a decade later. ordinary antibiotic-resistant bacteria
He’s now a professor of pathology, can tolerate.
immunology and biomedical
engineering at Washington University, Published in Science in 2008, the
managing a lab with more than a
dozen researchers studying everything
from biofuel production to the human
microbiome. But the mystery of those
antibiotic-eating bacteria has remained
a personal obsession.

Earlier this year, after hundreds of
experiments, Dantas inally published
his solution in Nature Chemical
Biology. What he discovered provides
important insights into antibiotic
resistance, the precipitous increase in
bacterial immunity to what should
be killer drug doses. Public health
oficials now consider it a medical
crisis. Every year, some 700,000 deaths
are attributed to pathogens that are
resistant to penicillin and other drugs
designed to kill them — largely in

64 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM

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Prognosis

results made a deep impression on the step, the bacteria swallow up the high concentrations of penicillin and
ield. “It’s one of those papers that
unveils a whole new area of research,” phenylacetic acid as an energy source. other drugs in runoff from farms
gushed McMaster University
biochemist Gerry Wright at the time. After determining which genes were and near pharmaceutical plants. If
But unveiling the ubiquity of antibiotic
eating only deepened the mystery. “The likely to give bacteria these abilities, these drugs could be eaten as rapidly
irst paper in 2008 was ‘gee whiz, that’s
surprising,’” Wright says in retrospect. Dantas put them to the test by adding as they’re dumped, the pathogens
“Gautam’s recent paper does the hard
biochemical and genomics work to them to the DNA of an unrelated wouldn’t have a chance to get familiar
igure out how bacteria in the soil
degrade [one category of] antibiotics.” species, the bacterial workhorse E. coli. with them. A major cause of resistance

The category Dantas chose to When the E. coli was thus fortiied, it could be killed at the source.
analyze includes the
granddaddy of all ate its irst penicillin buffet. Dantas believes that his transgenic
antibiotic drugs: penicillin.
Microbiologist Alexander E. coli might just do the job, though
Fleming serendipitously
discovered it in 1928, and ENGINEERING GLUTTONS not the strain that his lab engineered,
variations on the original
are so abundant that it Recently, Dantas traveled to Peru to which grows on penicillin very slowly
remains the most common
class of antibiotic even sample sewage. He wanted to learn and prefers eating sugars. For this plan
today.
how prevalent antibiotics were in to work, scientists will need to engineer
The whole category is
based on a molecule called antibiotic gluttons.
beta-lactam, which is
naturally secreted by the Wright sees great
Penicillium chrysogenum
fungus, giving the species potential in the idea,
a competitive advantage
against other microorganisms in the which could pre-treat
wild. Beta-lactam works by weakening
the cell wall of the creature under contaminated waste
attack. But bacteria have evolved to
resist beta-lactam by producing an products to remove
enzyme that breaks the ringlike part of
its molecular structure. antibiotics even before

Dantas set out to learn how some they get out into the open.
soil microbes not only thwart the
toxin, but also thrive on it. He found “The concentration of
three distinct stages of antibiotic
catabolism (as the process of breaking antibiotics coming from
apart complex molecules is technically
known). First, the microbe cleaves ef uents of manufacturing
the beta-lactam ring in the same way
that most any resistant bug would do sites is stunning,” says
it. Then it cuts off the broken ring
from the remainder of the penicillin Wright. “Pre-treatment to
molecule, leaving behind a substance
called phenylacetic acid. In the inal inactivate the compounds

Penicillium would be of great beneit.”
chrysogenum Preemptive treatment could

also be helpful in hospitals,

Meanwhile, eliminating antibiotics
scientists are before ef uent ows into the municipal
learning why sewage.

Unfortunately, the technique is
not risk-free. Researchers would

bacteria engage need different strains of these
in the seemingly microgourmands to disarm and
digest all relevant antibiotics, not just

counterintuitive penicillin. And there’s a danger in being
behavior of eating too successful. Bacteria are notorious
for sharing useful bits of DNA. The

substances meant drug-eating bacteria could seed the
to kill them. next crop of antibiotic-resistant bugs.
“If it goes bad, we may never be able to

come back,” cautions Dantas. GEOFF TOMPKINSON/SCIENCE SOURCE

wastewater treatment plants, where One workaround would be to use

pathogens are also likely to be the transgenic bacteria as factories

present, and thus could be actively for making enzymes that break down

evolving resistance. He found multiple antibiotics, and then releasing those

top-prescribed antibiotics in the enzymes into the environment. (The

wastewater. Other studies have shown enzymes are not alive and don’t have

66 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM

INCREASE AFFECTION

any antibiotic resistance genes to Created by
share. You just have to be sure the Winnifred Cutler,
bacteria don’t escape the factory.) Ph.D. in biology from
While promising in concept — and U. of Penn, post-doc
worth pursuing, according to Dantas
— the process would be far too Stanford. Co-
expensive to ill the world’s sewers and discovered human
cesspools, and even in the near future pheromones in 1986
would probably be practical only in
antibiotic hot spots such as hospitals. (Time 12/1/86; and
Newsweek 1/12/87)
So the ultimate answer might be to
deploy living bacteria after all, which Effective for 74% in
would ourish wherever antibiotics two 8-week studies
accumulate. Researchers including
Church are hard at work trying to PROVEN EFFECTIVE IN 3
mitigate the risks. One promising DOUBLE-BLIND STUDIES
approach is to spread out the essential
genes across the bacteria’s entire Unscented ATHENA PHEROMONEStm
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seemingly counterintuitive behavior
of eating substances meant to kill n Don (CA) 23 orders. “I know the Athena
them. Antibiotics are ancient, as is Pheromones are based on substantial science.
antibiotic resistance — evolutionary And they work to make women want to be in
consequences of competition in my company. At parties, I’ll invariably end up
the world’s soils. Dantas now sees surrounded by women. The Athena 10X claims
antibiotic catabolism as just another are absolutely true.”
part of this bigger survival game.
“Antibiotics are not these weird Not in stores tm 610-827-2200
privileged molecules,” says Dantas.
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History
Lessons

Fostering Fear America’s growing anti-vaccination
movement.
America’s anti-vaccine movement has shunned medical advances
for much longer than you might think. Measles is a highly infectious
disease with symptoms including high
BY SARA NOVAK fever and severe rash. In rare cases,
complications can lead to encephalitis,
a brain in ammation that causes
seizures. Ninety percent of people
exposed to someone with the virus
will become infected unless they’ve
been immunized or had measles
before. Through the middle of the 20th
century, up to 4 million Americans
got measles each year, and hundreds
died. But after two centuries of
vaccine improvement and subsequent
inoculation enforcement, the CDC

Skipping vaccination is
not new in America. he
country got its irst taste

in the 19th century.
Like today, many who
chose not to vaccinate
their children hailed
from large cities, were
educated and earned

a decent living.

Vaccinations have eradicated major human diseases, but some people still distrust them. announced in 2000 that measles had
been eliminated in the U.S.
→ In December 2014, a handful not been inoculated with the vaccine MARY EVANS/CLASSICSTOCK/CAMERIQUE
of Disneyland tourists left the for mumps, measles and rubella And yet measles keeps popping up
California theme park with more than (MMR), according to the Centers in large U.S. cities, such as Seattle,
just memories of Mickey Mouse and for Disease Control and Prevention. Portland, Phoenix, Austin and Kansas
Space Mountain. They also left with Ultimately, the outbreak resulted in City. The outbreaks are typically
the measles. 147 measles cases. due to white middle- and upper-class
parents choosing not to immunize their
Within weeks, 125 cases were The disease spread because people children. And the problem appears to
conirmed in the United States. Of had not been fully vaccinated, be getting worse.
the adults and kids infected, 110 lived according to a 2015 analysis published
in California — and nearly half had in JAMA Pediatrics. The culprit was “In Texas, 57,000 kids didn’t get
vaccinated this year,” says Peter Hotez,
co-author of a paper on the vaccine
movement published this year in
PLOS. That’s double what it was ive
years ago, he says. States like Texas

68 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM

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History
Lessons

allow legal loopholes called nonmedical and freedom of choice. And although Images from FROM TOP: THE HISTORICAL MEDICAL LIBRARY OF THE COLLEGE OF PHYSICIANS OF PHILADELPHIA; POPPERPHOTO/GETTY IMAGES; VACCINATION: A CURSE/J.M. PEEBLES/THE TEMPLE OF HEALTH PUBLISHING CO. 1900
exemptions, which give parents the medicine had made substantial anti-vaccination
right to refuse vaccinations for their advances in the 19th century, it was publications from
children on the basis of religious, still inding its way. For example, some 1892, left, and
philosophical or personal beliefs. doctors still practiced bloodletting, 1900, bottom;
sometimes by afixing leeches to a physician Edward
Skipping vaccination is not new patient’s skin, as a remedy for anything Jenner, below,
in America. The country got its irst developed a
taste in the 19th century. Like today, smallpox vaccine
many who chose not to vaccinate their in the late 18th
children hailed from large cities, were century that began
educated and earned a decent living. the eradication
Their reasons for opting out also of the disease.
mirror those of modern activists. But
instead of refusing MMR, the irst from acne to strokes. And it wasn’t
American vaccine opponents were until 1902 that vaccine manufacturers
refusing inoculation for a virus we were federally regulated.
almost never hear about today.
Around that time, Boston doctor
BIRTH OF A MOVEMENT Immanuel Pfeiffer declared that
By the 19th century, smallpox had healthy people were not at risk from
been killing people for centuries. Once smallpox. To prove his point, he visited
infected, patients had a 3 in 10 chance a hospital on Gallops Island in Boston
of dying. Harbor, where infected patients were
being quarantined. He caught the
In 1796, British doctor Edward virus and nearly died, but continued
Jenner developed a vaccine for the to oppose vaccines.
virus. It’s based on exposing people
to smallpox in a small dose, which Lora Little of Minneapolis believed
activates the immune system; they compulsory vaccine laws impinged on
might get a little sick, but afterward people’s personal liberty and parental
they’ll be immune. As more people get authority. Her activism was driven by
vaccinated, it creates herd immunity, the death of her 7-year-old son in 1896,
which gives the virus no place to go seven months after his vaccination.
because it can’t pass from person to
person. This is how diseases eventually
become eradicated.

The vaccine arrived in New England
in 1800 and was immediately embraced
by Thomas Jefferson. Starting with
Massachusetts in 1809, and for decades
after, states including Minnesota,
West Virginia and California enacted
mandatory vaccination laws.

But pushback was happening,
as well. Most of it came from
middle-class citizens who didn’t trust
government, science or medicine.

Rebellion against what is considered
excessive government oversight is as
American as apple pie and Chevys; in
1882, abolitionist Frederick Douglass
told a reporter that mandatory
vaccines encroached on people’s liberty

70 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM



History
Lessons

Little attributed his death to the Physician Andrew The reasons echo those of activists in PETER MACDIARMID/GETTY IMAGES; FROM DPT: VACCINE ROULETTE
vaccine. Several years later, she Wakefield, top, tried the late 19th century, says Willrich:
became editor of The Liberator, a erroneously to make impingement on parental authority
magazine critical of modern medicine, a connection between and personal liberty.
including vaccination. MMR vaccines and
autism. At left, a 1982 “Parents don’t like to be told how
Organized opposition to vaccines documentary focused to take care of their children,” says
was also ramping up. In 1879, on supposed health risks Willrich.
a wealthy businessman named of a triple vaccine.
William Tebb founded the Anti- THE NEXT OUTBREAK
Vaccination Society of America in diphtheria (a bacterial infection), Today, measles, smallpox, mumps,
New York. Other leagues popped pertussis (whooping cough) and polio and yellow fever are gone or
up in Pennsylvania, Maryland and tetanus. The documentary focused on mostly gone, thanks to mandatory
Massachusetts. the inoculation’s supposed health risks, immunization. But that also means
told many times through interviews people have forgotten how horrible
SUPREME COURT DECISION of mothers with sick kids. But the diseases are, says Willrich. That
By the early 20th century, nearly half health oficials said the documentary has contributed to the rise of the
of the states had vaccine requirements. overplayed the risks and ignored the anti-vaccine movement.
But enforcement beneits of inoculation.
was uneven, Continued education of the public
and some states Then, about 15 years later, the about vaccines, and redoubling efforts
repealed mandated MMR vaccine took a hit. Physician to understand why people might be
inoculations because Andrew Wakeield and colleagues concerned, could cut back on the
of vaccine protests, published a paper in 1998 in the uncertainty and debate surrounding
writes Michael British medical journal The Lancet the life-saving treatment, says Willrich.
Willrich in Pox: An that claimed a possible connection “Vaccines remain mysterious to many
American History. between MMR and the onset of people,” he says.
autism spectrum disorder. The paper
The turning point immediately sparked criticism and Though all 50 states make speciic
came in 1902. A smallpox outbreak was eventually retracted by 10 of the vaccines mandatory, most states
in Cambridge resulted in the city 12 authors. allow exemption for religious beliefs,
making inoculations mandatory. according to the National Conference
(Massachusetts had created legislation But the damage was done. A small of State Legislatures. And 18
giving cities power to mandate but vocal segment of the American states allow so-called philosophical
vaccines.) Oficials enforced the population has remained skeptical exemptions, which offer a wide range
legislation, bumping heads with of MMRs, and not necessarily of reasons to opt out.
residents, one of whom was named because they think it causes autism.
Henning Jacobson. He had refused After the Disneyland outbreak,
the vaccine, claiming that as a child the state of California passed a law
an inoculation had made him sick. removing personal belief exemptions
Jacobson also said his son had become from vaccination requirements. As a
ill after being vaccinated. result, the number of unvaccinated
kindergartners last year dropped to
The city iled charges against 3,133, the lowest that the state has seen
Jacobson, and the case wound its way in over a decade. More loopholes like
through the courts, eventually reaching this one need to be closed across the
the U.S. Supreme Court. In a landmark country, says Hotez, the director of the
decision in 1905, the court afirmed Texas Children’s Hospital Center for
that states had the power to create laws Vaccine Development.
making vaccinations mandatory.
“I’m worried,” he says. “With
After that decision, activism quieted vaccination rates at just 40 percent in
until 1982, when a documentary some schools, the next [outbreak] could
aired on American television called be devastating.” D
DPT: Vaccine Roulette. DTaP, as the
CDC calls it, is a triple vaccine for Sara Novak is a freelance journalist based in
Charleston, South Carolina.

72 DISCOVERMAGAZINE.COM

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20 Things You Didn’t Know About …

Penguins BYGEMMATARLACH

From top right: 1 Penguins loom large in pop culture, but they were the Adélie. Most species don’t even hang out on ice. FROM TOP: GEMMA TARLACH; BRYAN AND CHERRY ALEXANDER/NATUREPL.COM; TARLACH; MARY EVANS PICTURE LIBRARY; RECONSTRUCTION BY G. MAYR/SENCKENBERG RESEARCH INSTITUTE
Emperor penguins once even bigger. Several extinct giant penguins, such 12 The African penguin, as its name suggests, can be
gather on the Ross as human-sized Kumimanu biceae, described in 2017, found on southern African coastlines. The Humboldt
Ice Shelf; elsewhere could have tipped the scales at more than 200 pounds. penguin, meanwhile, likes to build nests on high
in Antarctica, an 2 Today, their sizes range from the blue penguin, just ground along the rocky beaches of Chile and Peru.
emperor chick over a foot tall, to the emperor penguin, nearly three 13 On New Zealand’s South Island, the yellow-eyed
begs for food; the times as big. Regardless of size, all penguins have the penguin, also known as the Hoiho, prefers forested
African penguin same body plan, including wings that have evolved or grassy locations. The least social of penguins, they
lives along near- into ippers and dense bones to counter buoyancy. space their nests well apart and hidden from each
tropical coastlines; 3 Hard evidence of the very irst penguins is lacking. other. 14 The South Island’s mountainous, dramatic
the great auk, southwestern coast is home to breeding colonies of
however, is now However, based on a 2014 genetic study, the Fiordland penguin, though the animals don’t
extinct; and so is the lineage may have split off from their maintain residence there year-round. 15 In August,
the human-sized closest relatives, a group of seabirds that a study published in PLOS ONE revealed that adult
Kumimanu biceae. today includes albatrosses and petrels, Fiordlands swim more than 1,500 miles from the
around 60 million years ago. 4 The limited colonies to speciic feeding grounds in the Southern
fossil evidence, though, suggests a deeper Ocean, covering sometimes more than 4,000 miles
past. Consider the oldest known penguin, total, once the breeding season is over. 16 These
Waimanu manneringi, which lived about epic journeys, called pre-molt dispersals, are crucial
61 million years ago in New Zealand. for survival. During breeding and chick-rearing on
5 In 2017, paleontologists found another land, when foraging opportunities are restricted,
penguin nearby that was about as old. This Fiordlands, like other penguins, can lose 50 percent
animal was different enough from W. manneringi to of their body mass. 17 After chick-rearing, the birds
suggest that the birds were already a diverse bunch. have about two to three months to head far out to
That hints at an earlier emergence, perhaps more sea — the pre-molt dispersal — and eat as much as
than 66 million years ago, when T. rex was still they can to put weight back on before what’s called
stomping around. 6 The roots of the word penguin catastrophic molting. 18 That’s not as bad as it
are also debated. But according to most dictionar- sounds: Unlike gradual molting, which most other
ies, it derives from “pen gwyn,” the Welsh term for birds experience, penguins’ old feathers are rapidly
“white head.” 7 The word originally described great shed and replaced. That “catastrophic” speed is
auks — a large, black-and-white, ightless aquatic important because, during this weekslong transition,
bird that once called the Northern Hemisphere home. the birds’ coats are not waterproof and they must
8 In the 16th century, The Golden Hind was exploring stay on land, going hungry. 19 Those feathers are
South America’s Strait of Magellan when a Welsh uniquely adapted for swimming in chilly water. While
sailor aboard noticed a black-and-white aquatic bird. there is some variation among species, penguin
Thinking it resembled an auk, he called it a penguin. feathers have features such as tiny interlocking barbs
9 Great auks went extinct in the mid-19th century, to trap air, hinder heat loss and repel water.
but their Welsh name lives on, forever associated with 20 In June, a study of feathers from nine penguin
a completely unrelated bird. Now that’s auk-ward. species found other unique microstructures, now
10 Auks were limited to the North Atlantic, while associated with coloration, probably irst evolved in
penguins are Southern Hemisphere-only animals — the marine birds for improved hydrodynamics. The
almost. The territory of the endangered Galapagos journal that published the paper? The Auk. D
penguin straddles the equator. 11 You might
think of Antarctica as Penguin Central, but it’s the Gemma Tarlach is senior editor at Discover.
exclusive home of only two species, the emperor and

DISCOVER (ISSN 0274-7529, USPS# 555-190) is published monthly, except for combined issues in January/February and July/August. Vol. 39, no. 10. Published by Kalmbach Media Co., 21027 Crossroads Circle, P.O. Box
1612, Waukesha, WI 53187-1612. Periodical postage paid at Waukesha, WI, and at additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to DISCOVER, P.O. Box 62320, Tampa, FL 33662-2320. Canada Publication
Agreement # 40010760. Back issues available. All rights reserved. Nothing herein contained may be reproduced without written permission of Kalmbach Media Co., 21027 Crossroads Circle, P.O. Box 1612, Waukesha, WI
53187-1612. Printed in the U.S.A.

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