Author Biography | Interview | Books by this Author | Read-Alikes
Greg Bear was born in San Diego, California, on August 20th, 1951, to Wilma M. and
Dale F. Bear. His father was in the navy so as a child he had traveled
extensively to Japan, the Philippines and Alaska, as well as
touring various parts of the United States.
He completed his first short story at the age of 10 while living in
Alaska. At age thirteen or fourteen he began to submit
stories to magazines, and at fifteen he sold his first short short to Robert
Lowndes' Famous Science Fiction magazine, but it didn't appear in print
until he was sixteen years old. It took five
years to sell his next story, but by the time he was twenty-three he was selling
regularly. He completed his first novel when he was nineteen but it was not
published until 13 years later (having been completely rewritten). He sold
his first novel, Hegira, to Dell in 1979.
He is the author of more than thirty books of science fiction and
fantasy, including Blood Music, The Forge of God, Darwin's
Radio, and Quantico. He is married to Astrid Anderson Bear and is the
father of Erik and Alexandra. Awarded two Hugos and five Nebulas for his
fiction, one of two authors to win a Nebula in every category, Bear has been
called the Best working writer of hard science fiction by The Ultimate
Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. His stories have been collected into an
omnibus volume by Tor Books. Bear has served on political and scientific action
committees and has advised Microsoft Corporation, the U.S. Army, the CIA, Sandia
National Laboratories, Callison Architecture, Inc., Homeland Security, and
other groups and agencies.
Greg Bear's website
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Q: In Darwin's Radio, you wrote about the evolution of a new human
species that is triggered by an HERV, or Human Endogenous Retroviruswhich, if
I understand correctly, is a kind of ancient virus that has entered into human
DNA and persisted there in a dormant state for hundreds of thousands, if not
millions, of years. HERVs sound so much like pure science fiction that it's
rather shocking to discover they actually do exist inside us, although without
the evolutionary properties you ascribe to them . . . at least, so far. Can you
talk a little bit about HERVs, both in fact and in your fiction?
GB: Endogenous Retroviruses (ERV) are real and exist in various forms in
nearly all living things. ERVs appear to serve a number of functions; in humans,
a gene from an HERV (that is, a virus gene) helps human embryos implant in the
mothers womb. So, they are no longer solely disease-causing (though
expression of ERV may lead to some autoimmune disorders).
Within our genes are many "mobile" genes that can copy themselves and
transport other genes from one position to another. These are called transposons,
or retrotransposons, and they may play a huge role in organizing and regulating
our genome. ...
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