Carolyn Elya is the Zombiologist in Chief, aka incoming Assistant Professor in Molecular and Cellular Biology at Harvard University. She’s been obsessed with parasites for a while, but it was the flies zombified by a fungus that made them climb, perch, and die that really caught her fancy. We talked with Carolyn about how fungi control flies and other insects, and the evolutionary implications for the zombie-making fungus and its doomed victims.

This episode was produced by Devin Reese and mixed by Collin Warren. Art by Jace Steiner.