Science Signaling Podcast

Why it’s so hard to understand the tongue, a book on a revolutionary shift toward studying the female of the species, and using proteomics to find beer in a painting   First on the show this week, Staff Writer Elizabeth Pennisi joins host Sarah Crespi to talk tongues: Who has them, who doesn’t, and all their amazing elaborations.   We also have the first in a new six-part series on books exploring the science of sex and gender. For this month’s installment, host Angela Saini talks with evolutionary biologist Malin Ah-King about her book The Female Turn: How Evolutionary Science Shifted Perceptions About Females.   Finally, detecting beer in early 19th century Danish paintings. Heritage scientist Fabiana Di Gianvincenzo of the Heritage Science Laboratory at the University of Ljubljana talks about her Science Advances paper on using proteomics to dig out clues to artistic practices of the day and how they fit in with the local beer-loving culture.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy

Cloning vigorous crops, and finding the first romantic kiss   First up this week, building resilience into crops. Staff Writer Erik Stokstad joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss all the tricks farmers use now to make resilient hybrid crops of rice or wheat and how genetically engineering hybrid crop plants to clone themselves may be the next step.   After that we ask: When did we start kissing? Troels Pank Arbøll is an assistant professor of Assyriology in the department of cross-cultural and regional studies at the University of Copenhagen. He and Sarah chat about the earliest evidence for kissing—romantic style—and why it is unlikely that such kisses had a single place or time of origin.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi; Erik Stokstad   Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adi7436    

A new approach promises to increase organ transplants but some question whether they should proceed without revisiting the definition of death, and what happens to rural lands when people head to urban centers   First up this week, innovations in organ transplantation lead to ethical debates. Host Sarah Crespi talks with Staff Writer Jennifer Couzin-Frankel and several transplant surgeons and doctors about defining death, technically. Also in this segment: Anji Wall, abdominal transplant surgeon and bioethicist at Baylor University Medical Center Marat Slessarav, consultant intensivist and donation physician at the London Health Sciences Centre and assistant professor in the department of medicine at Western University Nader Moazami, surgical head of heart transplantation at New York University Langone Health   Next up, what happens to abandoned rural lands when people leave the countryside for cities? Producer Kevin McLean talks with Gergana Daskalova, a Schmidt Science Fellow in the Biodiversit

Builders of the largest scientific instruments, and how cracks can add resilience to an ecosystem   First up this week, a story on a builder of the biggest machines. Producer Kevin McLean talks with Staff Writer Adrian Cho about Adrian’s dad and his other baby: an x-ray synchrotron.   Next up on this episode, a look at self-organizing landscapes. Host Sarah Crespi and Chi Xu, a professor of ecology at Nanjing University, talk about a Science Advances paper on how resilience in an ecosystem can come from the interaction of a plant and cracks in the soil.   Finally, in a sponsored segment from the Science/AAAS Custom Publishing Office, Jackie Oberst, assistant editor for custom publishing, discusses challenges early-career researchers face and how targeted funding for this group can enable their future success. She talks with Gary Michelson, founder and co-chair of Michelson Philanthropies and Aleksandar Obradovic, this year’s grand prize winner of the annual Michelson Philanthropies and Science Prize for

Science’s editor-in-chief and an award-winning broadcast journalist discuss the struggles shared by journalism and science, and we learn about what makes something stand out in our memories   First up on the show this week: Science Editor-in-Chief Holden Thorp talks with Amna Nawaz, an award-winning broadcast journalist and host of the PBS NewsHour, about the value of new voices in science and journalism and other things the two fields have in common.   Next up, what makes something stand out in your memory? Is an object or word memorable because it is unique or expressive? Are there features of things that make them memorable, regardless of meaning? Wilma Bainbridge, an assistant professor in the department of psychology at the University of Chicago, joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss her Science Advances paper on teasing apart the features of memorability.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   [Image: madabandon/Flickr; Music: Jeffrey Cook]   [al

What does it mean that we have so many more seamounts than previously thought, and finding REM sleep in seals   First up on the show this week: so many seamounts. Staff News Writer Paul Voosen joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss a study that mapped about 17,000 never-before-seen underwater volcanoes. They talk about how these new submarine landforms will influence conservation efforts and our understanding of ocean circulation.    Next up, how do mammals that spend 90% of their time in the water, get any sleep? Jessica Kendall-Bar, the Schmidt AI in Science postdoctoral fellow at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, is here to talk about her work exploring the sleep of elephant seals by capturing their brain waves as they dive deep to slumber.   Finally, in a sponsored segment from Science/AAAS Custom Publishing Office, Jackie Oberst, assistant editor for the Custom Publishing office, interviews Friedman Brain Institute Director Eric Nestler and Director of

Anchoring radiocarbon dates to cosmic events, why hibernating bears don't get blood clots, and kicking off a book series on sex, gender, and science   First up this week, upping the precision of radiocarbon dating by linking cosmic rays to isotopes in wood. Producer Meagan Cantwell talks with Online News Editor Michael Price about how spikes in cosmic rays—called Miyake events—are helping archaeologists peg the age of wooden artifacts to a year rather than a decade or century.   Next on the show, we have a segment on why bears can safely sleep during hibernation without worrying about getting clots in their blood. Unlike bears, when people spend too much time immobilized, such as sitting for a long time on a flight, we risk getting deep vein thrombosis—or a blood clot. Johannes Müller-Reif of the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry talks with host Sarah Crespi about what we can learn from bears about how and why our bodies decide to make these clots and what we can do to prevent them.   Stay tuned for

Why some countries, such as China, vaccinate flocks against bird flu but others don’t, and male ants that are always chimeras   First up this week, highly pathogenic avian influenza is spreading to domestic flocks around the globe from migrating birds. Why don’t many countries vaccinate their bird herds when finding one case can mean massive culls? Staff News Writer Jon Cohen joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss the push and pull of economics, politics, and science at play in vaccinating poultry against bird flu.   Next up, a crazy method of reproduction in the yellow crazy ants (Anoplolepis gracilipes). Hugo Darras, an assistant professor in the Institute of Organismic and Molecular Evolution at Johannes Gutenberg University, talks about how males of this species are always chimeras—which means their body is composed of two different cell lines, one from each parent. Read a related perspective.    This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   [Image: The Wild M

On this week’s show: How people in the past thought about their own past, and a detailed look at how Braille is read   First up this week, what did people 1000 years ago think about 5000-year-old Stonehenge? Or about a disused Maya temple smack dab in the middle of the neighborhood? Contributing Correspondent Lizzie Wade joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss how Mesoamerican sites are revealing new ways that ruins were incorporated into past peoples’ lives.   Next up on this week’s show is a segment from the AAAS meeting on reading science and Braille. We hear from Robert Englebretson, an associate professor of linguistics at Rice University, about filling in a gap in reading science research when it comes to how Braille is read, written, and learned.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   [Image: S. Crespi/Science; Music: Jeffrey Cook]   [alt: Maya building with podcast overlay]   Authors: Sarah Crespi; Lizzie Wade   Episode page: https://www.scie

On this week’s show: Earth’s youngest impact craters could be vastly underestimated in size, and remaking a plant’s process for a creating a complex compound   First up this week, have we been measuring asteroid impact craters wrong? Staff Writer Paul Voosen talks with host Sarah Crespi about new approaches to measuring the diameter of impact craters. They discuss the new measurements which, if confirmed, might require us to rethink just how often Earth gets hit with large asteroids. Paul also shares more news from the recent Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Texas.   Next up, pulling together all the enzymes used by a plant to make a vaccine adjuvant—a compound used to boost the efficacy of vaccines—in the lab. Anne Osbourn, a group leader and professor of biology at the John Innes Centre in Norwich, England, talks about why plants are so much better at making complex molecules, and an approach that allows scientists to copy their methods.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podig

On this week’s show: Spotting volcanic activity on Venus in 30-year-old data, and giving context to increases in early onset colon cancer   First up this week, a researcher notices an active volcano on Venus in data from the Magellan mission—which ended in 1994. News Staff Writer Paul Voosen joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss how to find a “fresh” lava flow in 30-year-old readings.   Next up, a concerning increase in early onset colon cancer. Kimmie Ng, director of the Young-Onset Colorectal Cancer Center at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, is here to talk about how these early colon cancers—those diagnosed before age 50—are different from those diagnosed later in life. We also talk about what needs to be learned about diet, environment, and genetics to better understand this condition.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   [Image: NASA; Music: Jeffrey Cook]   [alt: Maat Mons volcano on

On this week’s show: Compassion fatigue will strike most who care for lab animals, but addressing it is challenging. Also, overturning ideas about ocean circulation   First up this week: uncovering compassion fatigue in those who work with research animals—from cage cleaners to heads of entire animal facilities. Host Sarah Crespi and Online News Editor David Grimm discuss how to recognize the anxiety and depression that can be associated with this work and what some institutions are doing to help.   Featured in this segment: Preston Van Hooser Megan LaFollette Anneke Keizer   Next up on the show, a segment from the annual meeting of AAAS (which publishes Science) on overturning assumptions in ocean circulation. Physical oceanographer Susan Lozier, dean of the College of Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology, talks with producer Kevin McLean about the limitations of the ocean conveyor belt model, and how new tools have been giving us a much more accurate view of how water moves around the

On this week’s show: Researchers are finding new ways to mitigate implicit bias in medical settings, and how toothed whales use distinct vocal registers for echolocation and communication First up this week: how to fight unconscious bias in the clinic. Staff Writer Rodrigo Pérez Ortega talks with host Sarah Crespi about how researchers are attempting to fight bias on many fronts—from online classes to machine learning to finding a biomarker for pain. Next up on the show: a close look at toothed whale vocalization. Though we have known for more than 50 years that toothed whales such as orcas, sperm whales, and dolphins make diverse and useful sounds, how these noises are produced by their bodies has not been well understood. Coen Elemans, a professor in biology and head of the sound communication and behavior group at the University of Southern Denmark, joins Sarah to talk about using endoscopy and high-speed cameras as well as tissue samples and tracking data to learn how they achieve such amazing feats of

On this week’s show: Portable MRI scanners could revolutionize medical imaging, and pheromones offer a way to control flies that spread disease First up this week: shrinking MRI machines. Staff Writer Adrian Cho talks with host Sarah Crespi about how engineers and physicists are teaming up to make MRI machines smaller and cheaper. Next up on the show, the smell of tsetse fly love. Producer Kevin McLean talks with Shimaa Ebrahim, a postdoctoral researcher in the department of molecular, cellular, and developmental biology at Yale University, about understanding how tsetse flies use odors to attract one another and how this can be used to prevent the flies from transmitting diseases such as African sleeping sickness.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy. About the Science Podcast [Image: GEOFFREY ATTARDO/UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS; Music: Jeffrey Cook] [alt: tsetse fly with podcast symbol overlay] Authors: Sarah Crespi; Kevin McLean; Adrian Cho Episode page: https://www.science.

On this week’s show: The hunt for natural hydrogen deposits heats up, and why we need a space mission to an ice giant First up this week: a gold rush for naturally occurring hydrogen. Deputy Editor Eric Hand joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss drilling for hidden pockets of hydrogen, which companies are just now starting to explore as a clean energy option. Next up, big plans for a mission to Uranus. Kathleen Mandt, a planetary scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, shares what a mission to Uranus could tell us about the formation of our Solar System and all these exoplanets we keep finding. This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy. About the Science Podcast [Image: Austin Fisher; Music: Jeffrey Cook] [alt: Uranus illustration with podcast symbol overlay] Authors: Sarah Crespi; Eric Hand Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adh1873 

On this week’s show: Shark tags to measure ocean deoxygenation, and zircons and the chemistry of early Earth First up this week: using sharks to measure ocean deoxygenation. Contributing Correspondent Warren Cornwall joins us to talk about a group of researchers putting data logging tags on sharks in order to study how climate change is affecting oxygen levels in some of the ocean’s darkest depths. Next up, what can 4-billion-year-old minerals teach us about chemistry on early Earth? Producer Meagan Cantwell talks to geochemist Dustin Trail about using minerals called zircons to deduce the chemical properties of the early hydrothermal pools where life began. This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy. About the Science Podcast [Image: David Salvatori/VWPICS/Alamy Stock Photo; Music: Jeffrey Cook] [alt: Underwater photo of mako shark with podcast symbol overlay] Authors: Sarah Crespi; Warren Cornwall; Meagan Cantwell

On this week’s show: New clues to the chemicals used for mummification, and the benefits and barriers to smart toilets First up this week: What can we learn from a mummy factory? Contributing Correspondent Andrew Curry talks with host Sarah Crespi about mummy chemistry and why we don’t know much about what was used to preserve these ancient bodies. Online News Editor Michael Price makes a special appearance. Next up, how having a smart toilet can contribute to your health. Seung-Min Park, an instructor in the Department of Urology at Stanford University School of Medicine, wrote this week in Science Translational Medicine about the powers of data-collecting toilets to improve health and the psychological and ethical barriers to adopting a smart toilet of your very own. This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy. [Image: Portugal2004/iStock; Music: Jeffrey Cook] [alt: toilet with podcast symbol overlay] Authors: Sarah Crespi; Andrew Curry; Michael Price Episode page: https://www.science.org/

On this week’s show: When deer are scarce these wolves turn to sea otters, and chemical weathering of silicates acts as a geological thermostat First up on this week’s show we have a story about a group of Alaskan wolves that has switched to eating sea otters as deer populations have dwindled. Science journalist Jack Tamisiea tells host Sarah Crespi about some of the recently published work on this diet shift, and wildlife biologist Gretchen Roffler weighs in on the conditions on the island where this is happening. Also on this week’s show: Chemical weathering and the global carbon cycle. Sarah speaks with Susan Brantley, Evan Pugh university professor in the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute and Department of Geosciences at Pennsylvania State University, about how weathering of silicates in rocks pulls carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. They talk about how this temperature-sensitive process could increase as Earth warms, as well as the potential and limitations of this effect on the global carbon

Statisticians fight bad numbers used in medical murder trials, and the state of allergy science First up on this week’s show, we have a piece on accusations of medical murder. Contributing Correspondent Cathleen O’Grady joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss her story on how statisticians are weighing in on cases where nurses and doctors are convicted of murdering patients based on bad statistics. This segment was produced by Kevin McLean with sound design by James Rowlands. Also on this week’s show: Allergies are on the rise and this increase is linked with climate change. Sarah speaks with Kari Nadeau, Naddisy Foundation endowed professor of medicine and pediatrics at Stanford University, about her review in Science Translational Medicine on the status of allergy science, and how recommendations have changed from when to give children peanuts to opting for sublingual exposure therapy. Take the podcast audience survey at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/TLKCHC8 This week’s episode was produced with help from

Data on hazes and clouds may be key to understanding exoplanets, and NextGen letter writers share the upside of failure Hazes and clouds could keep exoplanets’ secrets hidden, unless researchers can re-create them here on Earth. After celebrating JWST and its ability to look far back in time and help us look for habitable exoplanets as the 2022 Science Breakthrough of the Year, News Intern Zack Savitsky talks with host Sarah Crespi about an overlooked problem with using telescopes to examine exoplanets’ atmospheres.  What was your greatest mistake? In a chat with producer Kevin McLean, Letters Editor Jennifer Sills shares stories from NextGen Voices about failures that led them in unexpected directions in their science careers. Take the podcast audience survey at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/TLKCHC8 This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy. [Image: NASA/Ames/JPL-Caltech; Music: Jeffrey Cook] [alt: exoplanet with cloudy and hazy atmosphere with podcast symbol overlay] Authors: Sarah Cre