Book: Laboratory Yellowstone and the DNA Revolution

Although Yellowstone is famous for massive geological features and charismatic megafauna, there are actually more spectacular natural wonders than meet the eye—in fact, you’ll need a microscope. Laboratory Yellowstone and the DNA Revolution: A Field Guide to Thermophiles (Johnson Creek, $25) explores the fascinating world of microscopic life, and the importance of microorganisms to scientific understanding of the Yellowstone biome and beyond. This is the book’s second edition; we reviewed the first edition, loved it, and found the second to be even better. Studied by NASA to understand extraterrestrial life and used by geneticists to understand brucellosis in bison, Yellowstone’s thermophiles are surprisingly important to science—and Robert Lindstrom’s Laboratory Yellowstone translates this complicated microbiology into an interesting, sometimes challenging read (for those who are not scientifically inclined).