Could a fungus trigger a Last of Us-style apocalypse? The author of What If Fungi Win? says despite dangers, the organisms are of great use to science
Arturo Casadevall is a professor of molecular microbiology and immunology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. He has spent four decades investigating how fungi can both improve and devastate life as we know it. His new book, What If Fungi Win?, charts how we might overcome the rising threat.
What first fascinated you about fungi?
When I was in training as an infectious disease fellow [in the 1980s], Aids was the biggest problem we had. Patients were not dying of HIV infections [which attack the immune system, leaving it vulnerable to other diseases], they were dying of opportunistic infections – and these were often fungal. This was the first large-scale human fungal crisis in history. Once I began working on the medical side of fungi, I discovered the wonders of this kingdom.
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