U.S. Climate Report // Antarctics Sounds
Feb 13, 2013
Show notes
A drying Western U.S. Photo courtesy www.earthtimes.org.
Feature #1 (starts 05:25): A sweeping new report on the state of climate change and its current and future impacts in the United States was recently released in draft form. It’s called the National Climate Assessment. It comes at a time when major storms and wildfires are increasing in many areas. And last year the continental U.S. experienced its hottest year ever recorded. How On Earth co-host Susan Moran interviews one of the participating authors of the report, Dr. Dennis Ojima. He’s a professor at Colorado State University in the Ecosystem Science and Sustainability Department, and a senior research scientist in the Natural Resource Ecology Laboratory. Dr. Ojima co-wrote the chapter on the Great Plains.
DJ Spooky performs a composition based on the geometric structure of ice during a recent visit to CU Boulder’s ATLAS center, accompanied by CU student musicians. (Photo by Beth Bartel)
Feature #2 (starts 16:30): Paul D. Miller, a.k.a. DJ Spooky, says the pallet of a 21st-century artist is data. That’s certainly the approach he took after visiting Antarctica in 2007—Miller used scientific data from ice cores and other Antarctic sources to create musical motifs representing the southern continent, then blended them with live performers and his own hip-hop beats. Co-host Ted Burnham speaks with Miller about the process of “remixing” the frozen Antarctic landscape, and about how music and art offer new ways to make scientific topics such as climate change accessible and meaningful.
Producer: Susan Moran Co-Hosts: Ted Burnham, Susan Moran Engineer: Ted Burnham Additional Contributions: Shelley Schlender
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Dr. David Wineland
Feb 07, 2013
Show notes
Dr. David Wineland (photo courtesy of NIST)
Today on How On Earth, KGNU’s award-winning science show, we sit down with Boulder’s Dr. David Wineland and chat about his Nobel-prize-winning research. The NIST scientist shared the 2012 physics award with Frenchman Serge Haroche. They’ve developed experimental methods for trapping and holding particles so that weird quantum behaviors can be studied. The research is critical to developing extreme quantum computers that may someday break today’s best encryption algorithms…and make truly unbreakable ones.
Host: Jim Pullen Producer: Jim Pullen Engineer: Jim Pullen Executive Producer: Shelley Schlender
Visindi Circus//Life on Other Planets
Jan 29, 2013
Show notes
Headlines:
Ice Core Studies
How Flu Multiplies
Wednesday’s Mini-STEM school features Diana Tomback. Her topic will be: Evolution and the Origin of Life.
Features:
(5:20 into the show) Shelley Schlender visits the Visindi Circus to learn why some scientists by day become circus performers at night, and how science adds a whole new dimension to circus performances.
(13:00 into the show) Chip Grandits talks with Brian Hynek, for the CU Center for Astrobiology and makes this request: there are ~17 Billion Earth like planets in the Milky Way according to late-breaking estimates; so in this 10 minute segment, we can just go through the list – Mark will have about 35 ns for each planet to go over the prospects of finding life there.
Hosts: Chip Grandits and Jim Pullen Producer: Shelley Schlender Engineer: Shelley Schlender Executive Producer: Shelley Schlender
Additional Contributions: Rabah Kamal
Gut Microbes and Autoimmune Disease // What’s in YOUR Gut? The American Gut Project
Jan 22, 2013
Show notes
Headlines:
New CU Studies on GroundLevel Ozone, with NOAA’s Sam Oltmans, CU researcher Daven Henze and NASA’s Kevin Bowman
We look at a new study where researchers, led by Jayne Danska transferred gut microbes from male mice to young female mouse pups, and in the process, raised the testosterone level in the female mice and protected them from getting Type 1 Diabetes. Danska’s research team includes Daniel Frank at University of Colorado School of Medicine in Aurora, and Chuck Robertson at CU Boulder.
And we look at a new kind of science, offered in The American Gut project, featuring CU scientist Rob Knight.
Hosts: Joel Parker and Jim Pullen Producer: Shelley Schlender Engineer: Shelley Schlender Executive Producer: Shelley Schlender
Haitian Seismologists//Changing Antarctic Climate
Jan 15, 2013
Show notes
Roby Douilly and Steeve Symithe
Feature #1: (start time: 06:03) On January 12, 2010, just over three years ago, a magnitude 7 earthquake shook Haiti, taking more than 200,000 lives and displacing an estimated 2 million. Still today, the International Organization for Migration estimates hundreds of thousands of people are without permanent homes, and in many ways Haiti seems no closer to rebuilding than it did three years ago. Co-host Beth Bartel speaks to Haiti’s first seismologists — Roby Douilly and Steeve Symithe, both graduate students at Purdue University — about the future of Haiti and a career in seismology there
Feature #2: (start time: 15:42) You’ve probably heard by now that 2012 was the warmest ever in the U.S. We’re not the only ones overheating. At the bottom of the world, over the last 50 years, West Antarctica has warmed more than scientists had thought. The implications are huge; an enormous ice sheet there may be at risk of long-term collapse, which could cause sea levels to rise alarmingly. Co-host Susan Moran speaks with Andrew Monaghan, a climate scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, or NCAR, here in Boulder. Dr. Monaghan co-authored the study, which was recently published in the journal Nature Geoscience.
Hosts: Susan Moran and Beth Bartel Producer: Susan Moran Engineer: Jim Pullen Executive Producer: Shelley Schlender
Medical Marijuana and Traffic Accidents//Ron Rosedale Critiques Body Mass Index Study
Jan 09, 2013
Show notes
Apple Versus Pear Shape
HEADLINES:
Diabetes Drug Metformin – University of Pennsylvania Researcher Morris Birnbaum reports in Nature that Metformin blocks a hormone that tells the liver to melt muscle to make more blood sugar. (Go here for an extended interview with Morris Birnbaum)
Climate Change – Research shows that timely political action has a bigger impact than waiting.
Boulder Cafe Scientifique – Tonight’s Cafe Sci features CU Boulder researcher Monique LeBourgeois (who we interviewed in detail in previous broadcast)on the topic of kids and sleep.
Medical Marijuana States
MAIN FEATURES:
We talk with scientists who are part of two new University of Colorado – Denver studies about alcohol and marijuana – 1) Ben Crost presents a study of marijuana use versus alcohol use which concludes that the minimum drinking age of 21 increases marijuana use among teens (until age 21, alcohol use is lower and marijuana use is higher. After age 21, alcohol use goes up and marijuana use goes down). Daniel Rees and Mark Anderson are among the authors on a study of Medical Marijuana and Traffic Fatalities that view the question of who uses what from the other side. Their study looks at an exception to the rule – the 16 states and District of Columbia with some years now, have had medical marijuana laws. In these Medical Marijuana states, teen use of marijuana appears to rise at age 18 (that’s the age at which teens no longer need to have their parent’s permission to get a Medical Marijuana card. ) But even more interestingly, in these Medical Marijuana states, traffic fatalities go down. These authors look at why. (Go here for extended interviews with Crost and Anderson)
We also discuss the new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that analyzed the link between Body Mass Index (BMI) and death. BMI is calculated as weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared study. The study concluded that while very obese people were likely to die sooner than others, people who were moderately overweight, or even slightly obese, were less likely to die than were people of normal weight, or people who are thin. Medical doctor and researcher on aging, Ron Rosedale, puts this study in historical perspective, pointing out that the British Medical Journal the Lancet published a similar study in 2006 that concluded that BMI is not a very useful measure of health, and other measures, such as waist to hip ratio and certain hormone levels, might be better at predicting health and longevity. (Go here for an extended interview with Ron Rosedale)
Metformin Lowers Blood Sugars by Blocking the Hormone Glucagon – Extended Interview with Morris Birnbaum
Jan 09, 2013
Show notes
This is an extended version of the January 8th, 2013 interview with Morris Birnbaum, about how Metformin lowers blood sugars in diabetics by blocking the hormone glucagon.
New Study on BMI (Body Mass Index) and Longevity – Critique by Dr. Ron Rosedale – Extended Interview
Jan 09, 2013
Show notes
This is an extended version of the interview we broadcast on January 8th, 2013, featuring Ron Rosedale discussing the new study about BMI and Longevity.
Medical Marijuana and Reduced Traffic Fatalities – Extended Interview with Mark Anderson
Jan 09, 2013
Show notes
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Feature #2: (start time: 15:42) You’ve probably heard by now that 2012 was the warmest ever in the U.S. We’re not the only ones overheating. At the bottom of the world, over the last 50 years, West Antarctica has warmed more than scientists had thought. The implications are huge; an enormous ice sheet there may be at risk of long-term collapse, which could cause sea levels to rise alarmingly. Co-host Susan Moran speaks with 
