research that correlates life histories of symbiotic spirochetes to changes in the immune system of associated vertebrates is sorely needed", and urging the "reinvestigation of the natural history of mammalian, tick-borne, and venereal transmission of spirochetes in relation to impairment of the human immune system". The paper went on to suggest "that the possible direct causal involvement of spirochetes and their round bodies to symptoms of immune deficiency be carefully and vigorously investigated". In a Discover Magazine interview, which was published less than six months before her death, Margulis explained to writer Dick Teresi her reason for interest in the topic of 2009 "AIDS" paper: "I'm interested in spirochetes only because of our ancestry. I'm not interested in the diseases", and stated that she had called them "symbionts" because both the spirochete which causes syphilis (Treponema) and the spirochete which causes Lyme disease (Borrelia) only retain about 20% of the genes they would need to live freely, outside of their human hosts. However, in the Discover Magazine interview Margulis said that "the set of symptoms, or syndrome, presented by syphilitics overlaps completely with another syndrome: AIDS", and also noted that Kary Mullis said that "he went looking for a reference substantiating that HIV causes AIDS and discovered, 'There is no such document' ". This provoked a widespread supposition that Margulis had been an "AIDS denialist". Notably Jerry Coyne reacted on his Why Evolution is True blog against his interpretation that Margulis believed "that AIDS is really syphilis, not viral in origin at all." Seth Kalichman, a social psychologist who studies behavioral and social aspects of AIDS, cited her [Murgulis] 2009 paper as an example of AIDS denialism "flourishing", and asserted that her [Margulis] "endorsement of HIV/AIDS denialism defies understanding". 9/11 "Truth" Margulis argued that the September 11 attacks were a "false-flag operation, which has been used to justify the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as well as unprecedented assaults on [...] civil liberties." She claimed that there was "overwhelming evidence that the three buildings [of the World Trade Center] collapsed by controlled demolition." Awards and recognitions Elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1975. Guggenheim Fellowship in 1978. Elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1983. Guest Hagey Lecturer, University of Waterloo, 1985 Miescher-Ishida Prize in 1986. 1989, conferred the Commandeur de l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques de France. Has her papers permanently archived in