Cover of the Month: Harvard Magazine

At first glance, it doesn’t seem very special. Another holiday issue fronted by a delicious sugar cookie, sprinkling snow-like crystals onto a black ground and dusting the magazine’s crimson title. Is Harvard Magazine going Gourmet? Is this a teaser for a tribute to that late, great culinary Cantabrigian Julia Child? And is that a dollop of molasses in the center? No on all accounts. As suggested by the lone cover line (“Unseen Worlds: Exploring Microbial Life”), that’s no Christmas cookie. It’s Harvard Medical School Professor Roberto Kolter‘s photo of Bacillus subtilis, a wild strain of bacteria that forms elaborate, sand-dollar shaped colonies, and we think that it’s a mighty effective (and festive!) double-take-inducing teaser for the magazine’s feature on microbial science by Jonathan Shaw. Kudos to Harvard Magazine Art Director Jennifer Carling for finding a way to dress up bacteria for the holidays. She’s one smart cookie.

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