Science, Spoken

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MIT’s Crispr Guy Braves Enemy Territory at UC Berkeley Mar 06, 2017

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UC Berkeley undergraduate Megha Majumder was fired up. Just a few weeks after Feng Zhang, MIT, and the Broad Institute won the interference proceeding over Crispr/Cas9 patents against UC Berkeley’s Jennifer Doudna, solidifying Zhang’s patent claims and the vast rewards they promise, Majumder learned of Zhang’s upcoming public talk at her college.

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Italy’s Etna Volcano Throws Lava Bombs in Its First Big Eruption of 2017 Mar 03, 2017

Show notes

After one of the most quiet years in decades, Etna has decided to make 2017 a little more exciting. Early this week, the volcano had a moderate strombolian eruption, what the folks who monitor Etna call a “paroxysm,” that produced a lava fountain over the summit of the volcano. Strombolian eruptions(named after nearby Stromboli)are caused by gas-rich magma reaching the surface and erupting explosively.

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California Needs Atmospheric Rivers. But Like, Not This Many Mar 02, 2017

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California likes whiplash weather. The state’s greenery, rivers, and dams are used to dry summer and wet winters. But recently—as the land has gone from parched and on fire to a complete deluge—things have gotten out of hand. From the strained Oroville dam to the flooding in San Jose last weekend, all this water, water everywhere has a single meteorological source: atmospheric rivers.

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SpaceX Plans to Launch Humans Around the Moon in 2018 Mar 01, 2017

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SpaceX is planning to send two private individuals on a trip around the moon sometime next year. In a phone briefing today, CEO Elon Musk gave details of the mission, which would use two of SpaceX‘s long-awaited technologies: a crew-rated capsule, the Crew Dragon, and the high-powered Falcon Heavy rocket. The two mystery astronauts will be packed inside the capsule, stacked on top of a Falcon Heavy.

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Inside the Extreme Machine That Mimics Bombs and Black Holes Feb 28, 2017

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It's 5:15 a.m. and dark when I drive over Raton Pass, the 7,835-foot-high saddle right at the boundary between Colorado and New Mexico. Animal crossing signs whiz by my window: first a clip-art bear, then an elk, then a deer. "Watch out" is an apt way to enter the state, particularly on this trip: New Mexico is the birthplace of the nuclear bomb and the site of its first test. That initial blast occurred southeast of Socorro, under the auspices of Los Alamos National Lab-led Manhattan Project.

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7 Earth-Like Worlds Orbit a Star So Cool, You Didn’t Know It Existed Feb 27, 2017

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Forty light years away, a small, orange star called Trappist-1 sits unnoticed in the sky. You can’t see it with your bare eyes—it burns colder than the brightly shining stars that fill the night sky, the ones that have inspired millions of people to imagine life beyond Earth. But most stars in the galaxy are neither big nor bright. And it’s those abundant, dim dwarfs that might actually be the best place to look for worlds capable of supporting life.

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Forget Weather Apps: Measure the Wind Yourself With an Old Electric Motor Feb 24, 2017

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One of the best ways to measure wind speed is to usean anemometer. You could go out and buy one, but I find it much more fun to build my own. There areseveral types of anemometer tochoose from, but I am going to build one that uses electromagnetic induction. Normally, we think of electric potential as something you can get from a battery. But you also can get it from induction. It turns out that changing magnetic field also creates an electric potential.

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A Wet Winter Is Overwhelming California’s Ancient Infrastructure Feb 23, 2017

Show notes

Donna Harold isn’t worried about the river. “Some of our neighbors panicked and left,” she says, “but we stayed behind.” She turns and shushes the pair of toddlers squabbling in the red wagon behind her. Late Sunday night, state officials sent out an evacuation order saying that Lake Oroville—30 miles north, feeding into the Feather River that runs through Harold’s hometown of Marysville—was hemorrhaging water and in danger of bursting.

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Flying at Light Speed Is Pretty Much Impossible—Unless You’re Han Solo Feb 22, 2017

Show notes

SPOILER ALERT. I'm going to talk about Star Wars: The Force Awakens. If you haven't seen it by now, I have a feeling that you either don't really care about the movie or you don't care about spoilers. But don't worry, I'm not going to give away anything major. Still-you have been warned. In one scene in the movie, Han Solo and Finn (oh, and Chewbacca too) are trying to get on the surface of the Star Killer to disable the shields. Here is the important dialogue as they approach the planet.

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How to Avoid Getting Tricked into Assassinating Someone Feb 21, 2017

Show notes

Let's say you find yourself in the airport in Kuala Lumpur. A stranger approaches with a spray bottle and a fistful of money and points to a man who looks more than a bit like the half-brother of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un. Must be a coincidence, you think. The stranger explains that she'd like you to star in a hilarious prank TV show that asks ordinary citizens to spray random people with water for the lulz. What's the risk, right? Right? Wrong. Congratulations.

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