Gene Expression has a thoughtful interview with Armand Leroi, author of Mutants, a wonderful synthesis of history, human teratology, and developmental genetics. Leroi comments on the beauty of C. elegans, the best way for a science writer to land an agent, recent controversies over race and genetics, the scientific cultures on different sides of the Atlantic, and the relative roles of mutations of large and weak effect in evolution. He also discusses the concepts of hybrid vigor and ‘hybrid breakdown’ by way of commenting on the recent NG paper by Helgadottir et al., which identifies a haplotype conferring particularly high risk of myocardial infarction in African Americans. Speaking of which, wouldn’t it be interesting to consider the protective effect of a variant in MMP3 in Europeans in this context?