Call us alarmist, but when we first heard about the human microbiome — the 100 trillion micro-organisms that live and work within the human body — we immediately thought of an early Clive Barker story in which human hands develop an independent consciousness and plot violent revolt. Our bacterial cronies outnumber human cells 10 to 1: We are more them than we are us. But without them, even the digestion of food would be impossible. Their health has been linked to issues such as obesity, arthritis, depression, and Alzheimer's. Already, certain microbiota transplants are possible, and some researchers foresee a time when biological enhancements are achieved through microbes, rather than doping. In Surprising Benefits of Bacteria: The Human Microbiome, Katie Pollard — senior investigator at Gladstone Institutes and professor at the Institute for Human Genetics at UCSF — demonstrates the many ways fact is stranger than speculative fiction. She is joined in conversation by Shannon Bennett, the California Academy of Sciences' first associate curator of microbiology.
Meet your micro-organisms at 7:30 p.m. at the Nourse Theater, 275 Hayes St., S.F. $27; 392-4400 or cityarts.net. Silke Tudor
415-563-2463
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