Archibald, John. One plus one equals one: symbiosis and the evolution of complex life . Oxford University Press, USA, 2014.
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We are in the midst of a revolution. It is a scientific revolution built upon our understanding of DNA, the hereditary material of life. Using the tools of molecular biology, we probe and prod the world around us in ways unimaginable a few decades ago. Big or small, past or present, no organism is immune. Need to identify and track a bacterium at the root of a hospital outbreak? No problem: the offending germ’s complete genetic profile can be obtained in 24 hours. Curious about how we humans differ from our closest relatives, the now-extinct Neanderthals? Anthropologists are tackling this very question with DNA extracted from fossilized bone. With a simple cheek swab and a hundred dollars you can delve into your family history in ways that traditional genealogy cannot, and the same technology can reveal susceptibility to Alzheimer’s disease and certain cancers. It can even solve a crime. We insert human DNA into E coli bacteria to produce our insulin; we isolate spider silk protein from the milk of transgenic goats; we dream of solving the energy crisis with microbes engineered to produce alternative biofuels; we can clone our pets.