Can Electron Microscopy Resolve The HIV Battle? An Exclusive
Interview with EM Pioneer Dr. Étienne de Harven  I have known
Belgian scientist (pathologist and electron microscopist) Dr. 
Étienne de Harven since 1993, when he introduced himself to me
at a conference, with characteristic graciousness and
enthusiasm, clasped my hands, and said he had translated my 1992
SPIN article Fatal Distraction into French.  I was of course
delighted. I was writing about this scientific battle for a rock
and roll magazine, and he was a very distinguished scientist–
one of the pioneers of Electron Microscopy. His utter lack of
snobbery, his warmth and openness,  set the tone for a
friendship spanning all the years since– rooted in exchanges
that are in no way sterile, not mere transfer of “information.”
I wanted to understand de Harven’s “poetic space–” that
something I knew he was seeing when he peered into this
abominable mess called HIV science.  Over the years, we’ve sat
in bistros in New York, or on the patio of his mar