Kathleen McAuliffe specializes in how microbes affect our bodies and influence how we think, feel and act.
Why you should listen
Kathleen McAuliffe is a science journalist with award-winning work in numerous national publications, including The New York Times, Smithsonian and Discover Magazine. She's best known for an article she wrote for The Atlantic in 2012 that went viral and temporarily broke the site. In it, she told the story of a tiny parasite that invades the brain and tinkers with its delicate chemistry, compelling its unsuspecting host (including, possibly, humans) to act in bizarre ways. That article inspired her 2016 book, This Is Your Brain on Parasites, as well as a fascination with the bacteria that reside in our gut, which, like parasites, can influence how their host thinks, feels and acts. She now teaches a course on the topic at the University of Miami.
