Emerging Microbes

Every age has had its emerging infectious diseases. Microbes and the diseases they cause are organized here by the era that they first emerged as a major threat to human populations. Some of them like malaria have been major pathogens since they emerged in the depths of Antiquity (or before). Others have come and gone, and some are still in their first emergence. All of them are interesting for our understanding of history and are still relevant for our future.

Paleomicrobiology & Epidemiology

• Old Germs, or Paleomicrobiology
• Tools of Paleomicrobiology
• Hunting Pathogens in Siberian Permafrost Graves
• Ancient Remnants: Biomolecules in Paleomicrobiology (non-nucleic acid)
• The Unnatural History of Emerging Infections (book review)
• Syndemics and Historic Diseases
• Challenging Virgin Soil Epidemic Assumptions

Antiquity (before c. 400 AD/CE)

Varicella-Zoster Virus (chicken pox and shingles)

• The spotty history of chicken pox

Anthrax

• Famine and Epidemic Anthrax, Saint-Domingue (Haiti), 1770
• When Anthrax first came to North America

Malaria (Plasmodium species)

• Malaria and the Boy Pharaoh
• Benjamin Rush on Malaria in Pennsylvania, 1785
• A Reversal of Seasons
• Mapping Malaria, Smallpox, and Leprosy
• Dr. Seuss Does Malaria
• Mapping Malaria in Anglo-Saxon England
• Malaria Near the Arctic Circle
• The Paleomicrobiology of Malaria Detection
• Plasmodium knowlesi: A New Ancient Malaria Parasite

Leprosy (Mycobacterium leprae, before 2000 BCE)

• Leprosy in Medieval Scandinavia
• A Migration Age Anglo-Saxon Leper

Lyme Disease (Borrelia burgdorferi, 5300 BP)

• Metagenomics, Lyme Disease, and the Tyrolean Iceman’s Tattoos

• Ötzi’s Lyme Disease in Context

Trench Fever (Bartonella quintana, 4000 BP)

• Detecting pathogens in medieval Venice
• Trench Fever and Plague in 14th Century France
• Lice, Ancient DNA, and Napoleon’s Grand Army
• Trench Fever in German Mass Burial
• Trench fever: An Ancient Zoonosis

Tuberculosis (Mycobacterium tuberculosis)

• Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberculosis in Former Soviet States
• War as a Driver in Tuberculosis Evolution

Smallpox

• Lincoln’s Illness at Gettysburg
• Mapping Malaria, Smallpox and Leprosy
• Siberian Mummy Yields 300-year-old Smallpox DNA
• Evolutionary Clues in 17th Century Smallpox Genome

Medieval (c. 400-1400 AD/CE)

Black Death at Tourinai, 1349

The Plague (Yersinia pestis, first pandemic 541 AD/CE)

• See the Plague page here at Contagions!
• Plague DNA from Late Antique Bavaria
• The Vampire in the Plague Pit
• Plague in 18th century Egypt
• Detecting pathogens in medieval Venice
• DNA of the Black Death from East Smithfield, London
• Keeping Bronze Age Yersinia pestis in Perspective

Yellow Fever (6th – 13th century)

• When Yellow Fever Came to the Americas

Measles (11th-12th century)

• Rinderpest, Measles, and Medieval Emerging Infectious Diseases

Modern (1400-present)

Red Cross during the Spanish Flu, St Louis, 1918

Influenza (first pandemic 1510)

• Influenza Pandemics: 1510-2010
• Epidemiology of the Russian Flu, 1889-1890
• Insights into the Pathogenesis of the Spanish Flu
• Defining pandemic
• Illustrations of the 1896-1897 Influenza Epidemic in Paris

 

Cholera (Vibrio cholerae, first pandemic 1832)

• Cholera in Illinois’ American Bottoms Region, 1849
• Clonal Origins of Haiti’s Cholera Epidemic
• Cradle of Cholera’s Seventh Pandemic Found
• Cholera’s Chain of Infection
• Historic Meanings of “Cholera”
• Personal ties to Cholera, 1833

Dengue Fever

• The Super Spreading Landscape of Urban Dengue Fever

Ebola virus (20th century)

• Ebola’s Chain of Infection

Zika Virus (early 21st century)

• El Niño and Possibly New World Primates Contributed to Zika Explosion