I previously blogged about real cases of zombies in nature. There's at least one I missed.
A parasitic fungus (Ophiocordyceps unilateralis) infects a carpenter ant and takes over its brain, leading the ant to bite into the vein that runs down the center of a leaf on the underside. The ant dies but the fungus takes the nutrients to grow a stalk out of the ant’s body and release spores to create the next generation. This cycle is at least 48 million years old.
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