Science Friday

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How Gut Microbes Are Linked To Stress Resilience Oct 09, 2024

Show notes

The phrase “go with your gut” is often used to say one should follow their intuition in the face of a big decision. Recent research in the journal Nature Mental Health shows the gut really could have a big impact on mental health and decision-making.

This study shows a clear link between people who handle stressful situations well and certain biological signatures in their microbiomes. Certain metabolites and gene activity in study participants were associated with high emotional regulation and cognition. These more resilient participants also had reduced inflammation and improved gut barrier integrity.

The study builds on previous research that shows the brain and the gut are closely linked, and that a dysregulation in one can lead to a dysregulation in the other. Lead author Dr. Arpana Church, co-director of UCLA’s Microbiome Center and associate professor of medicine, joins Ira to talk about the study. They also discuss how probiotics could someday be a promising treatment for mental health conditions.

Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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How Magnetic Brain Stimulation Helps Relieve Depression Oct 08, 2024

Show notes

As the surgeon general has stated, we are in a mental health crisis. Depression is the leading cause of disability worldwide. And a major challenge is that depression can be difficult to treat, especially for people who don’t respond well to talk therapy or antidepressants.

But there’s a relatively new technique that seems to have a significant positive impact on people with treatment-resistant depression, even sending many of them into remission. It’s called transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) and it uses magnets to stimulate certain areas of the brain that play a role in depression.

A team at Stanford developed a protocol for TMS that received FDA clearance in 2022 and, as of this year, it’s covered by Medicare. In a study from 2021, it was shown to improve remission rates for depression by up to 80%, with one patient calling it “a game changer.”

So how does TMS work, and could it change the way we treat depression and other mental illnesses?

Ira Flatow is joined by Dr. Nolan Williams, associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University, where he’s also the director of the Stanford Brain Stimulation Lab. They talk about the advances that Williams’ team made with their SAINT protocol (Stanford Accelerated Intelligent Neuromodulation Therapy), patient experiences with the technology, and potential future applications of this technique.

Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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How The Origin Of Life On Earth Can Help Find Life In Space Oct 07, 2024

Show notes

The origin of life on Earth has been mulled over by scientists for centuries. We now know that life’s building blocks are RNA, amino acids, and cells. But if life originated from the primordial ooze of early Earth, could that process be unfolding elsewhere in the universe?

The search for life elsewhere in the universe is at the center of the book Is Earth Exceptional?: The Quest for Cosmic Life, by Mario Livio and Jack Szostak. Dr. Livio, an astrophysicist previously with the Space Telescope Science Institute, which operates the Hubble Space Telescope, joins Ira to talk about the possibilities of life beyond Earth, and where we would most likely find it.

Read an excerpt of Is Earth Exceptional?: The Quest for Cosmic Life.

Transcript for this segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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Hurricane Helene's Effect On The Global Tech Industry | A Stretchy Band-Aid For The Heart Oct 04, 2024

Show notes

The storm flooded mines in Spruce Pine, North Carolina, which supply the tech industry with some of the purest quartz in the world. Also, researchers developed a 3D-printable material, inspired by worms, that can act as a Band-Aid for damaged heart and cartilage tissue.

Hurricane Helene’s Damage Could Affect The Global Tech Industry

After making landfall on September 26, Hurricane Helene devastated regions in the southeastern US. Over 200 people are confirmed dead so far. About a million people are still without power, and many lack clean water.

As climate change intensifies, hurricanes like Helene are expected to occur more often and be more intense. What’s become very clear in the last few years is that due to the interconnectedness of the modern world, extreme weather in one place can have global implications.

For example, Spruce Pine, North Carolina, home to around 2,200 people, flooded during Hurricane Helene. The town is also home to several mines that produce some of the world’s purest quartz, an ingredient necessary to make solar panels, smartphones, semiconductors, and more.

Ira talks with Umair Irfan, senior correspondent at Vox, about this and other science news of the week, including a completed map of a fruit fly’s brain, how scientists in the United Kingdom are screening newborns for rare diseases, and how octopuses and fish are hunting as a team.

A Strong, Stretchy, And Sticky Band-Aid For The Heart

The heart is an impressive organ that has to beat constantly for years. But what happens when heart tissue is damaged? Or when cartilage in joints like our knees wears out? These constantly moving tissues don’t regenerate easily, and there aren’t a lot of great treatment options.

To address these kinds of problems, a team at University of Colorado Boulder invented a new strong, stretchy, and sticky hydrogel material that could act as a Band-Aid to heart or tissue lesions. They were inspired by masses of worms that tangle and untangle themselves, behaving almost as both a solid and liquid. The team was able to replicate that in a molecular structure with the help of a new 3D-printing technique. And it could have applications far beyond medicine, including for manufacturing and improving the 3D-printing process itself. Their research was published in the journal Science, and their lab has filed for a provisional patent for the material.

Dr. Jason Burdick, professor of chemical and biological engineering at CU Boulder’s BioFrontiers Institute, joins Ira Flatow to talk about the new material and how it could improve future tissue and cartilage treatment.

Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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Herbicides Approved For Public Land | Hidden Physics In Van Gogh’s ‘The Starry Night’ Oct 03, 2024

Show notes

This summer, the Bureau of Land Management approved seven herbicides to fight invasive plants in the West. Also, when scientists analyzed the swirls in the famous painting, they found Van Gogh depicted forces of nature with startling accuracy.

What Newly Approved Herbicides Could Mean For Federal Land

Invasive plants are a big problem across the western US.

Cunning interlopers like cheatgrass, leafy spurge and red brome can outcompete native vegetation, crowd habitats and steal water and other vital soil nutrients.

Of the 245 million acres controlled by the Bureau of Land Management, harmful non-native plants have already infested 79 million acres—an area larger than the states of Pennsylvania, Virginia and South Carolina combined. That’s why the federal agency felt the urgency to approve seven new herbicides to kill invasives on its land nationwide, said Seth Flanigan, a BLM senior invasive species specialist based in Idaho.

“If we don’t remove this now, what is it going to look like 10 years from now?” he said.

Read the rest of this article on sciencefriday.com.

The Hidden Physics In Van Gogh’s ‘The Starry Night’

One of Vincent Van Gogh’s most famous creations is “The Starry Night,” an oil painting of a quaint French village at night with a blue night sky that dramatically swirls around the yellow stars and moon.

It’s easy to admire this painting as a casual viewer, but if you research fluid dynamics, one thing in particular stands out: those iconic swirls in the sky. To a physicist, they look an awful lot like the swirls that atmospheric turbulence produces. And some researchers have been wondering if Van Gogh’s swirls actually match the mathematical models of turbulence theory.

Well, a team of researchers from China and France set out to analyze all the swirls in “The Starry Night,” and it turns out that Van Gogh had a knack for depicting the forces of nature. Their results were published in the journal Physics Of Fluid.

Guest host Anna Rothschild sits down with Dr. Francois Schmitt, research professor in physics at the French National Centre for Scientific Research and co-author of the recent study, to talk about the hidden physics in this famous painting.

Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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Improving Hospitals’ Support For Teens In Mental Health Crises Oct 02, 2024

Show notes

This conversation discusses suicide and suicidal ideation in young people. Please take care while listening. If you or a loved one is thinking about suicide or self-harm, text TALK to 741-741 or call 9-8-8 to reach the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.

In the United States, suicide is the second leading cause of death for young people aged 10 to 24. One in five high school students seriously considered attempting suicide in 2023, according to the latest data from the CDC.

Doctors, researchers, and mental health professionals have been looking for solutions to support our country’s struggling youth. One place to start is in hospital emergency departments.

How can emergency departments be better equipped to help struggling teens, and potentially save lives?

Guest host Anna Rothschild is joined by Dr. Samaa Kemal, an emergency medicine physician at the Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago to discuss her research on the subject.

The following resources are available if you or someone close to you is in need of mental health support:

Call 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Or text TALK to 741-741.
Call 1-800-662-HELP for the SAMHSA National Helpline; they can provide referral and information services for mental health and/or substance use disorder treatment.
Locate additional resources through the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.

Transcript for this segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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Greenhouse Gases From Anesthesia | Fighting Militarization In The Mariana Islands Oct 01, 2024

Show notes

Emissions from anesthesia are one of the largest sources of greenhouse gases from hospitals. This anesthesiologist wants to change that. And, a cultural anthropologist discusses the Mariana Islands’ long history of colonization and why demilitarization matters for climate progress.

A Major Source Of Greenhouse Gases In Hospitals? Anesthesia

Did you know that some of the gases used in anesthesia are strong greenhouse gases? A few years ago, Seattle Children’s Hospital analyzed its carbon footprint and found that the gases used in anesthesia made up about 7% of the hospital’s total emissions, right behind emissions from heating and power and those from commuting.

Faced with this problem, Dr. Elizabeth Hansen, a pediatric anesthesiologist at Seattle Children’s, took matters into her own hands and slashed the operating room’s emissions. She now helps other hospitals do the same with Project Spruce.

Guest host Anna Rothschild talks with Dr. Hansen about how and why she took on the problem.

Militarization And Environmental Injustice In The Mariana Islands

Let’s take a trip to the Northern Mariana Islands, a string of islands in the Pacific just north of Guam. The islands were sites of major battles during World War II and were captured by the United States in 1944. The US established a military presence across the territory—including building the world’s largest air force base at the time, on an island called Tinian.

The US military never left, and in the 1980s, the Northern Mariana Islands became a US territory. A few years ago, the Pentagon proposed building a bombing range on an island called Pagan, but residents of the islands pushed back.

Dr. Isa Arriola is a cultural anthropologist at Concordia University in Montreal and co-founder of the organization Our Common Wealth 670, based in Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands. She’s fought back against the militarization of her home islands, and she talks with guest host Anna Rothschild about how the military presence has affected the people and environment of the Marianas, and why demilitarization needs to be part of climate action.

Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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Empowering Older Adults To Step Up For The Climate Sep 30, 2024

Show notes

If you’re a baby boomer, you may remember the first Earth Day, the Civil Rights Movement, anti-war protests, and the first Pride parade. The list goes on, because the 1960s and 70s were packed with social revolutions. But the organization Third Act has a message for boomers: Your work isn’t done yet.

Third Act empowers folks over the age of 60 to get involved in the climate movement. It aims to leverage older generations’ access to power, money, and life experiences to create change.

Ira Flatow talks with Third Act founder Bill McKibben and lead advisor Akaya Windwood about the importance of including older adults in the climate movement.

Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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Microsoft Makes Deal To Restart Three Mile Island | Fish That Use Their Legs To Taste Sep 27, 2024

Show notes

The company is betting big on nuclear energy to meet increasing power needs of data centers and new technologies like AI. Also, new research into a strange fish known as the sea robin finds that leg-like appendages can “taste” prey buried in the sand.

Microsoft Makes Deal To Restart Three Mile Island

Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania has quite a reputation in the world of nuclear energy: One of its reactors suffered a catastrophic partial meltdown in 1979, earning the title of the largest nuclear accident in US history. The failed reactor has been inoperable since the accident, while the other reactor shuttered in 2019.

But now, tech giant Microsoft has made a deal with the nuclear site to reopen Three Mile Island, and purchase all of its generating capacity over the next 20 years. As Big Tech bets big on artificial intelligence, the need for electricity to power data centers is increasing tremendously. Former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates is a large investor in nuclear energy.

To help Science Friday celebrate Climate Week NYC, Casey Crownhart, climate reporter for MIT Technology Review joins guest host Anna Rothschild to discuss this and other top climate stories of the week.

These Fish Use Their Legs (Yes, Legs) To Taste

Your legs may help you get around, but what if they could also help you sniff out a snack? That’s a trick achieved by a fish called the sea robin. The fish, which lives on the seafloor, has an unusual appearance, with wing-like fins and leg-like appendages that it uses to walk along the ocean bottom. But in work published this week in the journal Current Biology, researchers report that those legs are also chemical sensing organs that can taste for prey buried under the sand.

Dr. Nicholas Bellono, a professor of molecular and cellular biology at Harvard, first learned of the unusual fish on a visit to the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, where he was planning to obtain squid and octopus for another research project. MBL workers showed Bellono and colleagues the sea robin, and explained that they have a reputation for being able to locate hidden prey—to the point that other organisms will follow the sea robin, hoping to get in on the meal. The intrigued researchers brought some sea robins back to the lab, and began a series of experiments to better understand their prey-sniffing abilities.

Bellono joins guest host Anna Rothschild to talk about the fish, the genetic adaptations that allow it to sense the world through its legs, and the value of serendipity and curiosity-driven research in the scientific world.

Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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Former NIH Director Reflects On Public Mistrust In Science Sep 26, 2024

Show notes

In 2021, Dr. Francis Collins stepped down after a dozen years leading the National Institutes of Health. He had just overseen the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic,in the early days of changing public health guidance as scientists learned more about this new virus. He was also involved in the quickest development of a vaccine in history.

Now, he’s had some time to reflect on how the US arrived at such a divisive place about COVID-19 and vaccines, how trust in science has dwindled, and what we can do about it.

Ira sits down with Dr. Collins to talk about the lessons from his new book, The Road to Wisdom: On Truth, Science, Faith and Trust, and why he decided to speak publicly about his prostate cancer diagnosis.

Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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