Over the last six months or so, I’ve been taking a break from drafting my new book (I hope to be done by mid-2013!) to write a piece on poxviruses for Scientific American magazine. These viruses are related to the virus that causes smallpox, one of history’s great killers of homo sapiens. The worst of them–monkeypox–causes a disease indistinguishable from the “speckled monster” and is currently on the rise in parts of central Africa. Look out for my feature story in the March 2013 issue of Scientific American.

UPDATE: Here’s the link to the preview! The story is in this month’s magazine. -SS, 2/26/13