What might teach us unusual medical knowledge of wild animals star-news.press/wp

Two decades ago, Jap de Rudi Discover that changed his scientific career. While searching for ecology and the development of parasites and their hosts, it happened really suddenly: it seems that the butterflies of the monarch that he was studying seemed to take advantage of the medicinal properties of plants to treat themselves and their offspring.

At that time, the idea that the insect might be able to distinguish self -esteem. Now, De Rudd is a world expert in prosperous animal medicines, with his own laboratory at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. Talk to New world On his work, his new book, Doctors in nature: How to heal ants, monkeys and other animals themselvesAnd his belief that animals have medical knowledge that we can use to improve our health.

Graham Luton: How does this possible field of research continued?

JAAP De Roode: I started while working in Tanzania in the 1980s while observing an opportunity. Michael Hoffman of the University of Kyoto was working with Mohamed Seifu Kalondi, the national garden guard, to look at the role of chimpanzees in society. While tracking one called Chausiku, they noticed that she was pulled, she was taking a nap during the day and had diarrhea. They saw her go to a plant called VerniaAlso known as Leaf. I was stripped of the bark and started absorbing the young. This is usually part of their diet. Sivo, who was also a traditional therapist, told Hoffman that he used it as …