This Week in Virology (TWiV) is a podcast founded by Vincent Racaniello and Dicksom Despommier at the Columbia University Medical Center.  Reaching over 10,000 listeners per episode, TWiV is a model of effective science outreach, hosting informal  conversations about viruses for a broad audience. Science Picks for TWiV’s May 28th episode included Viruses, a cartoon booklet by SIPS Associate Director Magdalen Lindeberg.

Written in the late ’90s, the text for Viruses was inspired by Sandra Boynton’s popular board book, Dinosaurs!  Keith Perry, virologist in the SIPS Section of Plant Pathology and Plant-Microbe Biology, gave a copy to Racaniello during his April visit to Cornell. Racaniello read the booklet aloud as part of the May 28th podcast and provides a pdf on the TWiV website.  He describes it as “very cool” citing its “hand-drawn pictures with lovely little sayings.”