Happy birthday boy, I love that you have like birthdays right next to each other This is Twis this week in science episode 597 recorded on December 14th 2016 Save your science for later Hey everyone, I am dr. Kiki and tonight on this week in science. We are going to fill your heads with running penis bones and Lady Longevity, but first disclaimer disclaimer disclaimer The following our programming is part of a Chinese conspiracy to convince Americans that climate change is real We take marching orders from multiple left-wing cabals within the United Nations We use the EPA to undermine corporate freedom. We are professional agitators We are paid to protest paid by aliens in order to further the expansion of the Illuminati New World Order Yes, they pilot our black helicopters. We faked the moon landing.   We made them up You have been brainwashed by us to believe in science hypnotized into thinking that physics actually works Even now you are about to undergo another session of propaganda here on this week in science Coming up next In science He's distracted yeah, I got distracted by a cat It's the cutest. She was drinking my water. I couldn't have that. I need my water. She's a sweetheart Don't drink that water now Run away Stella run away. Oh Hello Justin good evening player and hello everyone out there Welcome to another episode of this week in science. We are back yet again To bring you the science, you know, we do it week in week out We love the science and we love sharing it with you We love chatting about all the things that we've learned about during the week things that are important the things that are just titillating You know sometimes that's just all you need, but this week we've got a little of everything Make sure you guys I want to remind you that we are you can find out about our calendar The twist calendar is currently available for 2017 if you go to twist org You'll be able to find out all about the wonderful twist calendar for 2017 So twist org is where you go if you're interested also We will be in San Francisco for SF sketch fest Cal Academy nightlife on January 19th And there is information about that as well So yeah on with the show. We've got lots science news. I have stories about the mammalian Baculum, which we've discussed before Yes, um gravity because we all love gravity and also The fears of science or is it just preparedness? We'll get to that in a few. Maybe it's both Justin, what would you like? I've got a reason to run no time for sleep and metaphorical feeling metaphorically speaking Sounds like fun Blair. What's in the animal corner? Oh, I have you know Males and females that they're a little different. So I have information about that And I also have a fishing wire made out of pee. Oh I hope you're very successful with that a test strength very good. Oh quite Quite yes All right I'm inspired to move along into the rest of the show. Okay Let's start off with the scary stuff so we can move down the line into the more enjoyable future or current day Reported in the Washington Post and also SF gate many places researchers are copying US climate data and copying the data is not necessarily a you know, a new thing we always want to back up of our data, right but the impetus for this mass backup effort is fear that it might disappear under a Trump administration that there have been enough commentary Uh comments by individuals that have been put forward as cabinet members who have been put forward as heads of departments who additionally people who are not who who are not Necessarily interested in seeing climate science move forward and may also have ties to the oil industry Are literally be the oil industry work for Exxon I'm gonna be secretary of state Yeah, so there's a lot going on that is coming January 20th 21st things may change and so researchers are concerned and now while we as I mentioned the for in the beginning Comment on is this fear or is this preparedness now? there is precedent for this actually this action of backing up Government data, which is publicly owned data. It's not like it's all Private data that it's confidential and nobody can look at it. These are publicly owned databases From NASA from the National Ocean Oceanic and atmosphere atmospheric administration from from the EPA from across the board But this this supposed paranoia Is not necessarily paranoia in in the Harper administration in Canada There were reams of fisheries data That were just thrown away. They physically threw away books In the Canadian During the Harper administration in the Canadian government. So this is it's and this has happened before and so It's not it it makes it easy to say We don't have evidence of this happening or we can't we you don't know when the data is not there, right? and so Why not back up all the data and put it places and so there is an effort by a group out of the University of Pennsylvania this is the PPEH lab and They are at Penn Arts and Sciences at this Pennsylvania Green Campus partnerships and Their story is that they started out wanting to tell stories about environmental sciences They're educate their scholars students artists scientists educators and they're working to generate local and global awareness and engagement in the emergent area of the environmental humanities, so how humankind interacts with the environment And so as part of this They have started what is called the data refuge and within the data refuge This is an effort Not only to To back up Specifically governmental climate data, but they're they're working to back up all sorts of environmental data from across the United States and so They are casting a net for collaborators and you can find them at PPEH lab dot org slash data refuge You can also just go to PPEH lab dot org for information All about this effort and hopefully we'll be able to speak with people about this at some point in the in the future I wasn't able to get them on the show at this point but they are working to put together Put together how to guides basically how to have hackathons So or how to have events where you can in your local area work to back up important data that that needs to have a place and This is they're working also with there they're additionally working with the The archive the internet archive to be able to finish their efforts for 2016 of backing up Information and the internet archive has been working to back up the internet for for over a decade now and they have collected data and Kept it through a number of presidential transitions So it's not just this one in particular But the internet archive has worked to back up data and make sure that important data is in place through different presidential presidential transitions because it's always a question of Transition will go yeah, and it's also it's just you know, it's good to archive stuff it's good to have Because there that's that is the fear that especially on this subject which incoming administration And through all its people it's posting our vocally hostile towards science And especially the science of climate change so so the idea that they could just get in and They're good. I mean we've got a person who's in charge of the Department of Energy now who Once vowed to get rid of that entire to get rid of his own job that he now has The entire department, you know, they've been similar threats against the EPA, you know, this is this is when you have people in in charge who have Have spoken against the entire institutions in which they're in charge Yeah, you should be concerned that they're going to destroy it and if they try to get rid of the information You know, yeah, and I could even see this as being Government become government policy because of the what's going on now that the entire issue Can become sort of illegal Right, like even mentioning it is you know if the government says that this is a hoax Then talking about it Legally might become one. I mean it's they were asking for the names of the researchers Who who've been involved in climate change? Yeah, and that's another and that's another point of You know the the agencies that have been where the names of researchers who have gone to particular climate science meetings and involved been involved in certain climate science data collection efforts the Offices that were from which those names were requested. They turned down the requests and they said no We're not going to hand over the names Because they don't really know why the names are needed But this is another part of why this data-saving effort is underway because there's a question as to The intentions of the next You know the Yeah, it sounds it sounds like an enemy's it's in charge. Yeah, it does sound like an enemy's and so right now I'm I've got a screen share online for climate mirror Then climate mirror is part of an ad hoc project to mirror public climate data sets before the Before Trump takes office in January and to make the data sets free and accessible It was started by a tweet from journalist Eric Holt house. He's also a meteorologist and This is hosting mirrors It will have external Links to external mirrors right now it hosts one mirror of its own to know as paleo climate data sets But there is a Google doc for this project And if you are interested in becoming a part of helping the mirroring effort to Saving to mirroring the data and saving the data down There you can go to this Google doc and basically sign up and you end up contacting the PPEH lab and say I want to be I want to help with this and Basically, you can help they're they're looking for help to save the data to mirror data sets on the web and Like like Fata said earlier in the chat room This is kind of like the climate change equivalent of the seed cave the seed seed vault that was built in Scandinavia To store the world seed varieties in the event of a catastrophe. So this is the data climate data equivalent at this point in time so This is basically to make so many different homes for this stuff That it can't all be tracked down and deleted. Is that right? Yes, and and Yeah, and there's another crucial reason for this Not only so that it can't be deleted, but so that the that it can't be altered So that the the research that's there can't be manipulated by putting in what we're gonna have our own new batch of quasi scientists Take another look at the data and see what conclusions they come from it and then some data is left out you get snippets you get Right and and one of the great things about having these data sets made publicly available public facing Datasets is that anyone can then sit down with the data, too I mean at this point you pretty much can but it takes some digging to find them but if these data sets are all in a in a Repository and they're put someplace where you can access the data super easily then it it opens up the the big data aspect of analyzing it all so Makes it easier to see what the scientists have been reporting If that is you know if that's your bent if you're into data that is It sucks that we potentially have to do this, but I'm so happy happy that it's being done Yeah, it may get seriously. I'm like I kind of want to do a Data mirroring event here in Portland. I mean that that would be great And I'm surprised that I haven't heard about someone jumping on that bandwagon in the San Francisco Bay Area yet I mean there is a UC Davis scientist who who I spoke with Nick Santos who's at UC Davis is an environmental researcher and He over the weekend started copying government climate data onto a non-government server for the public so Yeah, he is UC Davis scientist is part of that effort That's great part of the effort. Yeah, and you know whether or not and whether or not fears Come true whether or not fears are founded. This is a wonderful effort to Put this important data someplace so that it is not only in one location That it you know like Justin said can be Deleted damaged altered what have you that you always have more copies another idea? I mean I was talking to my husband tonight, and he was saying bit torrent. We need to bit torrent this stuff Get it out there into the wild and and the other the other yeah, that's right you know, this is not without president as you pointed out but also like we've had we've had a political appointee that was Putting a he was like a 20 or something girl kid who was who was editing NASA press releases Expunging the word climate change and the head of NASA Revolta against that and and that his press releases the way they were written to be published But we've seen these these attempts before So it's coming Coming this is what's going to happen Going to happen. We'll see we will see I am glad scientists You know, it's like the great Liam Lynch once said in the song There's nothing greater than cookies for later But in this case it's science Saving my science for later. There's nothing greater. We wouldn't have my science for later. We wouldn't have algebra Writings of Aristotle.  We've also got NASA collaborations and as well as University Colorado Boulder and Lawrence Berkeley lab National Laboratory got a lot of Organizations working on some very important work just out be reported at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco this week you US Department of Energy Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has been taking measurements in the field in the land in the lab to Quantify a scale of Greenhouse gas releases carbon dioxide and methane releases from the Arctic Tundra and they've actually explained the underlying mechanisms for What was seen first seen in around 2014 they documented it a spring pulse of greenhouse gas emissions from the Arctic and In 2014 what they documented it was co2 emissions equivalent to 46 percent of the net carbon dioxide That's absorbed in the summer months so 46 percent of what is absorbed was gassed out and then methane emissions added six percent to the summer fluxes and Climate trends might actually make these kinds of emissions from the tundra from these wet wet grounds even more common and Berkeley lab scientist Nama Razia see says we can see the effects of climate change happening more rapidly in the Arctic than any other part of The world so we really need to understand the processes that are occurring and what to expect in the future The amount of co2 and methane in the atmosphere determines the greenhouse effect So we need to know more about these sources this paper was published in the geophysical research letters was titled large co2 and methane emissions from polygonal tundra during spring thaw in northern Alaska so the soil is releasing gases actually as a Function of microbes so soils are full of microbes and their activity emits gas and so the ground freezes in the late fall and the permafrost goes from From the permafrost up and from the surface down and there's an active layer that gets trapped right in the middle and then About them for around a month you see for as you see says this middle layer between the permafrost and this area of the surface that's frozen Remains active and so there's microbial activity that's still ongoing producing carbon and methane But you've got a frozen surface above it So what's happening to that carbon dioxide and that they'd It's trapped and it's just stored there the microbes are just Active and doing stuff and it just stored there for the winter in the cap of ice thaws and then All those gases that the microbes built up over that month or so that they were active and not frozen they all gas out into the atmosphere and in that spring Period Makes sense. Yeah. Yeah, so they think that these they're these emission pulses are going to become more frequent maybe not annual necessarily it depends on On whether there's are repeated thaws and freezes whether or not there There are cracks that the gas can be admitted through in the ice They think in warmer years that the pulse spring pulses are going to be more frequent And then additionally we've got researchers looking at the atmosphere and looking at the ionosphere and how the atmosphere of the earth Interacts with With the solar Emissions the the spectrum so we've got the atmosphere that goes up and the ionosphere is like where Gases of the earth kind of get really diffused and it's like basically space, but it's all of our It's the ionosphere is where the auroras take place when particles get electrified from the solar winds that come out and what Boulder pre Boulder researchers University of Colorado Boulder and NASA researchers have Determined is that there's kind of this really neat effect when The the solar winds solar flares come through or solar winds come through they interact with the ionosphere and usually there's this lot of energy that starts building up and it leads to What you know what you would expect kind of an expansion of The upper atmosphere because of heating effects But then what they see actually looking at this is that there's a contraction of the upper atmosphere that happens and They didn't know exactly what was going on there But basically because of the ionic effects that happen in the ionosphere Nitric oxide gets produced in the upper atmosphere that allows a really rapid cooling effect so instead of the upper atmosphere getting really heated and kind of bulging outward and potentially running into satellites and causing drag on satellites that are out Past the upper out usually up out past the upper atmosphere It gets pulled back in huh, so this that's kind of a neat Neat thermostat effect their quality they say it's kind of like having a stuck thermostat thermostat It's a case of nature raining itself in But this is one of the things that we're a NASA's going to be looking at this more closely Because they're going to be they're going to need to They're going to be launching a couple of satellites to be able to track Changes in the upper atmosphere and the ionosphere so they're actually going to have one One craft that'll be fairly close to earth in the upper atmosphere than another one That'll be like 22,000 miles out that'll be taking a broader view of what's happening in the ionosphere to be able to really Determine this interaction between space and earth's atmosphere and how it all works together and then We've got some other really neat stuff from NASA that's going on that is super cool where they recently took data carbon dioxide data from a Satellite called OCO 2 and they merged it with software for high resolution weather forecasting and weather weather trends and what they've been able to model is a visualization of The Earth's carbon dioxide movement. So the weather software was able to give real Tracking of airflow around the globe and then they had the data of the carbon dioxide Levels and so they're able to get a three-dimensional view of carbon dioxide movement production and So it'll give us a better idea of where carbon dioxide is coming from and when Also, where the sinks are where is it going when it gets pulled back into the earth? Yeah, and and they're gonna they're gonna keep developing this model to be able to Give us a greater understanding of our carbon cycle. What is actually happening on the earth with the carbon cycle? I just feel like sorry southern hemisphere It's all us up here Apologies Wow, yeah, yeah, it's all us clear all that carbon dioxide Northern hemisphere. It's just shot.  So Yeah, and Australia just isn't enough to do it. I guess not enough Not enough it's tiny compared to all the other biomass that exists Anyway, all these things are so important and they are backed up or even these projects are even run by Governmental organizations. There's collaborations across universities institutions Organizations governmental bodies, I mean that all this this data is important. It's going to help us understand our planet. So Back it up people. Yeah. I'll just back it up a little. All right, Justin What you got so as we who cover climate change await the hammers To batter down our doors. We'd best be prepared to run and While life on the run may not be to everyone's liking It does have its benefits as MRI scans reveal that endurance runners brains have greater functional connectivity Than the brains of more sedentary individuals University of Arizona researchers compared brain scans of young adults Adult cross-country runners can adults who don't engage in regular physical activity at all the runners showed greater functional connectivity between distinct brain regions in several areas of the brain including The frontal cortex the brain matter region tasked with cognitive functions things like planning decision-making ability to multitask So this was published in the journal frontiers and Human Neuroscience University Arizona running expert David Ricklin and associate professor of anthropology whose and associate professor of anthropology co-designed this study with University Arizona psychology professor Gene Alexander who also studies brain aging and Alzheimer's disease So along with their colleagues they compared MRI scans of a group of male cross-country runners To those young adults who don't engage in the athletic activities When they were resting, right? So this is sort of resting brain They weren't putting them on a treadmill to do this. They just wanted to know What do you like?  So previous studies have shown that activities that require sort of Find motor control or audio involvement things like playing musical instruments or even things like playing golf have of the ability to alter the brain's structure and Function but this repetitive task had not been previously looked at Cody voice here these activities that people consider repetitive might actually involve many complex cognitive functions like planning and decision-making They may have effects on the brain one of the key questions That these results raises whether they're what we're seeing in young adults in terms of the connectivity differences In part some benefit later in life says Alexander who is also a Professor of neuroscience and psychological sciences, but these guys have a lot of degrees That the air is the brain where we saw more connectivity and runners are also the areas that are impacted as we age So it really raises the question whether being active as a young adult could potentially and beneficial and perhaps Ford some resilience against the effects of aging and disease which is what he Is focused on study so I don't like running Can't I just can't I just go for a stroll Move my legs while I watch TV I What I would assume like and it's in a study like this you could also find because it's the repetitive Thing what's going on, you know the decision-making you I bet you the bicyclists would also fare equally well in a study like this It's interesting though. I mean it is repetitive, but when you get into it's interesting that there is this effect in the brain particularly in connectivity between different regions because Walking and running when it gets down to it is a spinal cord reflex. You have top-down control, you know like Adjusting things so that you don't trip and fall if there's a crack in the road or there's you know a step that you have to go up So you do have the top-down Coordinated coordinating control, but it's a spinal cord reflex You'll just once you start it going it keeps going until you tell it to stop And so it's interesting that there is this Coordination that's happening In or maybe you know, maybe it just frees up your frontal cortex to like, you know I should start thinking about what I'm going to do tomorrow, right? The runners high the meditation that yeah, so that's my question. How do we know it's not just exercise Well, and in a way it is I mean so this is this is sort of what they're finding because there's been a lot of studies like this that I think we've reported on or that we've seen out there that exercise is is beneficial to cognitive Health, right and if you're doing something like Something like tennis or like you said or the I hand coordination or something that's exercise but takes Greater body control you would expect that you would have Maybe They did an investigation on NBA players and found that you know, they have incredible amount of Brain activity in the game because there's dribbling while there's passing and strategies all these things happening in real time real fast Yeah, but this is yeah, this is showing that you get those effects from something Like where you don't have to yeah, you don't have to be as perhaps or at least apparently You don't have to be as mentally engaged in all the different aspects of the activity All right, so maybe you could lie on your couch and move your legs around Blair Yeah, yeah, well, I think about like I hate to run but I love to swim and my brain Totally wanders when I swim so that's a repetitive physical motion that would allow my brain to exercise as well Yeah, I remember that from running when I did that a long time a long time ago Yeah, but just just that before you get up Get up early wake your teenager up and send them out running the tracks to improve their cognitive ability Consider this next study or view of the scientific literature by a work group composed of representatives the American Academy of Sleep Medicine Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Sleep Research Society and American Academy of Dental Sleep Medicine They found that the later high school start times are associated with positive outcomes among teens including longer weekday sleep Durations and reduced vehicular accidents. This is a result of a systematic review meta analysis of 18 peer reviewed studies Though it's a study of the studies that have been done They found that late starts Increased the sleep tonight by about 19 minutes and then when school started actually an hour later It would even be 53 more minutes of sleep at this So basically the teens are using up every bit of sleep. They can Before going to school and the further out you push it the further out they will sleep and And it was I guess there's a recommendation from the American Academy of Sleep Medicine That people between the ages of 13 and 18 Should be sleeping eight to ten hours a day And this study show that only about 69% of students Sleep less that 69% of high school students sleep less than eight hours. Yeah, I could believe that I Did not get an hour sleep in high school. Absolutely not And so here's the key to it in the teenage years There's it says here from the according to the American Academy of Sleep Medicine There's a natural shift in the tightening of the body's internal Circadian clock during puberty causing most teens to have a biological preference for a late bedtime Which is of course then a natural conflict for early school start times. Hmm. This quote is amazing Our nature's future is literally dependent upon the physical mental and educational excellence of our high school students This is from Morgan dollar Researcher involved The most recent national survey show that less than one third of high school students get enough sleep as recommended by the leading national authorities This is of concern since inadequate sleep has been leaked to worsen mental health decreased ability to learn Increased obesity rates increased motor vehicle accidents and even increased substance abuse So you can still take them out there running the Laps at the track to improve their cognitive ability, but do it after school Yeah, my high school started at 7 30 in the morning Yeah, most yeah, and my my first classes were always either math or French Nice two things very difficult to do at 7 30 in the morning. Yeah Yeah, I remember having to get up in the morning and get myself to school. I was always running late. I Barely was on time. I'm still always late See, but I wonder if your high school had started later and you had set a track of being on time Maybe you'd be an on-time person now About that all I know I just would have stayed up later and slept in longer But all I know all I know is my my I got in a car accident in my driveway Going to school. Oh, no In the morning. Yeah, and actually exactly the opposite of what I just said Is what they found from the study they found that those students who? Who were given later start times actually slept more they went to bed about the same time Yeah, so you think you go because of the circuit like you said the circadian rhythm change that happens around puberty They want to stay up later. So 10 11 12 maybe even later than that, right? And then you have to wake up in the morning 6 a.m. 6 30 a.m. However early to be able to get to your school at whatever time whether or not you're driving or taking the bus or However, you're getting there if the school starts later You go to bed at the same time because of that new late-night circadian rhythm yet. You're able to sleep until 8 a.m. And So you get the sleep that you need. Maybe you do better in your studies. You're happier You don't have as many fights at school. I don't know not as many car accidents But yeah lots we've reported before that the studies that have shown kids that get to sleep more Do better in school and have fewer car accidents and there's there's a whole bunch of benefits to more sleep And I think I think I mean Arianna Huffington is no scientist, but she's got a book out now on sleep touting the benefits of sleep and sleep science Maybe maybe we could get Arianna Huffington on on the show to talk about her new book I'd rather get a sleep scientist. That's what we'll do Yes All right, does that do it for your stories Justin? That's it for my first half. All right. Well, this is this week in science and Do you know what time it is? We missed it last week It's time for Blair's animal corner Except for giant What you got Blair? Oh, I'm so excited. I missed this last week. I have some amazing differences between males and females In particular brains Yes brains a study on deer on the Scottish Isle of Rum Has found evidence that larger brains and female red deer Lead to longer life spans and more offspring raised to adulthood So there's been a lot of research on Comparing brain sizes between species and we've talked about that a lot on the show And we've talked a little bit about when brain size actually means nothing We've talked about that a lot on the show too So brain size is kind of one of those things that I bring up because it has some very interesting implications I'll get which I'll get to in a minute, but Overall, I would say we haven't seen a whole lot That has come out of this whole brain-sized thing that people seem to be very focused on for whatever reason But in this study They actually wanted to look at not just brain size in between deer but specifically along Gender lines, which hasn't really been done a whole lot. So what they found was they actually looked at the Measurements from 40 years About seven generations of deer that there were specimens collected and so they had Brain-sized measurements on skulls of 1314 deer over those 40 years That's a pretty good start of a sample size And they found a 63 percent variation among the deer on the island overall in the brain size It's a pretty big difference It's a quite a range and they found that females with larger brains on the whole lived longer They also produced more offspring That managed to live to become adults themselves And their offspring on the whole had larger brains What was really interesting though is that there were no discernible differences between males with brains of different sizes So the brain size only really mattered for the females They were unable to find any downside to larger brains and deer of either gender Which usually there's some sort of trade-off. So that was particularly interesting and they They expected to see things like weaker immune systems fewer offspring because it takes more energy to make a bigger brain But they did not see that in this study and their hypothesis for why this wasn't the case for the males is that there's other factors that may be overpower the brain size factor and their suggestion would be physical strength agility something related to Competition between the male deer that would be more important than larger brain size So the larger brains on the females if correlated with Intelligence which again is fuzzy questionable. Yeah, that might mean that they were better able to find food More easily able to deal with stressful situations get babies away from predators, etc. etc So in deer, I mean the mother hangs out with the baby For a fairly long time And so if the mother has a larger brain and is involved in the survival of the offspring More than the male who comes in Delivers some seed and then takes off You know male male bucks the deer. They're they're not they're not hanging around taking care of the offspring No, and they're just fighting with each other for a lady Yeah doing what they need to do with that lady and heading out That's pretty much it. Yeah, so life of a young buck Right, and so it's potentially, you know the the genes for survival that the buck passes on Are definitely important, but I would imagine that the interaction the interplay between the ability of the mother to keep the offspring alive And the environment is going to be a huge huge impact. So that's actually makes sense to me Yeah, it makes your brain female a bit and also if you look at brain size bigger brain female means a bigger female who can be like Step off that is a great point that they did not mention in here at all Is they did I don't know if they controlled the brain size to the body size? Yeah, statistically, I don't know Yeah, because that would just be that a physical trait not a right not a mental trait right Yeah, if it is just brain size, I mean again, this goes back to like Basic morphology science where we're used to like yeah based on the size of your brain. You must be this smart Right, like it's I would like to I would like to see if it exists anywhere else other than with these deer Right, absolutely. And that's why this is in the first study of this type. It is potentially a Open door for other studies like it. I think that It's it's a good reminder that there are vastly different things that select for fitness between males and females of species that have different roles for those sexes and so Whenever you do a study amongst a species that's a factor that you need to control for And that's a factor that you need to look at So I think that that's a good reminder, which is directly related to my next story Which is about male and female stress responses and different responses to diseases Mm-hmm. So looking at fruit flies our favorite little laboratory animal, they're just like people with they're just like people Yeah, usc. We're looking at male and female fruit flies and how they respond to stress because by a common oxidant hydrogen peroxide And another oxidant paraquat So these two oxidants Are they're they're uh, they both occur naturally hydrogen peroxide more than paraquat And they have been implicated in human diseases like Alzheimer's Parkinson's and they Also are found often in in patients suffering from a stroke heart attack a lot of things that we personally have a vested interest in figuring out, right? and The paraquat is actually an environmental toxin that can damage neurons and it attacks the nervous system So all these oxidants, they're things that create stress in our bodies Knowing the way that we respond to that and how we can reduce certain response that are detrimental be a good thing And they found that fruit flies On the whole have Similar reactions to these oxidants and oxidative stress as humans as we would expect because they're just like humans But what they found was that they were sex-based differences in these biological responses the oxidative stress from the hydrogen peroxide and that actually Was reduced in female flies a female flies could adapt to hydrogen peroxide exposure Male flies could resist paraquat To control for the role of sex the researchers actually genetically manipulated male flies to develop into pseudo females with female body characteristics And the pseudo female flies adapted to hydrogen peroxide And not paraquat so they had the same resistance as natural female flies Their idea for why this happened would have to do with Um an extra version or an isoform of a protein that varied in size compared to the isoform shared between the sexes And so the sex-specific expression of that protein Is all has also been observed in mouse tissues. So it would relate directly back to this idea that Males and females express this protein differently One of their ideas about why this happens is because mitochondria inherited from our mother That is directly related to a person's response to hydrogen peroxide Um And so the idea is that females would evolve better response to hydrogen peroxide because it's a normal signaling molecule produced by the mitochondria which is pretty interesting so essentially Men and women they're different So this the reason I bring this up is It's very interesting, but the implications here are that in medicine And in medicinal trials There might be situations where we need to be be paying more particular attention to male patients and female patients because biologically we can respond differently to stressors in our body Yep Yeah, I mean we already know that There are many instances where women respond differently to drugs That pharmaceutical companies have put together and over the years women have not been well represented in the clinical trials For many drugs that we use to treat diseases or even just minor illnesses and so There I just had this conversation on twitter a couple of days ago and um the the fda and The science organizations in the united states are working very hard to try and increase the number of women in clinical trials because we And also the number of female mice that are used in the earlier trials to know Something off kilter before we get to the point of of testing Right mates. Yeah, why would you ruin a breeder mouse that could make you more lab mice on a trial? Why would you do that? Oh wait because you need to test females and males It's I think it's particularly interesting because people always want to blame hormones on the differences between men and women It's not just hormones, but this is important. It's an important part. It's a very important part It's very influential, but there are basic chemical differences in our proteins That's that and that's really interesting and this is a very interesting point. I'd love to find out how this does translate from the fruit flies to The human diseases that they're discussing in In this related to Alzheimer's disease in Parkinson's You know, I would love to see how that translates Yeah, okay. All right. Stay tuned flies, but let's move it. Let's move it forward and see This is this is a fantastic hint for some future studies. I look forward to the news that comes out of this Yeah Do you have one more study? I'm gonna save it for the end of the show All right my my pee fishing lines are gonna have to wait So stay tuned Oh, you know what? I'm so happy you're taking that science you're putting it in the little ziploc baggie zipping it up con Just be sure to listen to all the clicks You don't want those pee fishing lines getting out You know, there's nothing greater than science for later and we're gonna take a very quick break When we come back we will have that science that we've saved for you the special science and that's gonna be so good So this is as we can science stay tuned for more Hey everyone, thanks for listening to twist I do hope that you are having a wonderful december and I hope that the lead up to the holidays is Not stressing you out that you're breathing. You're enjoying. You're just having Wonderful time in this wonderful time of the year You know, we've got we have calendars we do we have lots and lots of calendars for you And if you're interested in finding out more about that you can go to twist dot Org and if you go to twist.org you'll be able to find a uh links to be able to purchase the 2017 twist Blair's animal corner calendar blairs art. It's amazing this calendar is wonderful People have already started getting their calendars sending pictures of themselves With their new calendar It's great. Send us a picture when you get your calendar. We'd love to see you and where where are you going to hang your calendar What are you going to do with the calendar? I love this one pretty All these wonderful this calendar. It's full of science holidays for you to observe throughout the year So you every month there's something new and exciting Sciencey for you to celebrate to to pay attention to and it also lets you know When twist is happening it's every wednesday but At 8 p.m. But we put it in the calendar. So it's there on your calendar as an appointment For every week of the year. Thank you. Blair. It's perfect design. I love it And Blair did want us to sell out by her birthday and we have not sold up sold out So let's let's get these calendars out of here. Come on.  You must be over 21 to attend. It's 15 dollars for the tickets And that'll get you access to the entire nightlife from 6 to 9 p.m On the 19th will be in there somewhere, but there's a lot of stuff going on It is a big lineup and i'm very excited to be a part of it It's I think where it's it's going to be so much fun But get your tickets because it's going to sell out and we want to see you there I don't want other people's fans there. I want twist fans there.  I'll sign it Yeah, bring your calendars if you have a calendar bring your calendar. We'll sign the calendars It's so great. Okay, awesome If you do want to support twist, uh, it is the season of giving you can do that by going to twist.org There are donate buttons on the website make it nice and easy to donate You can also click on our patreon link Which will take you to our patreon page where again, it's a nice big button Click on the button become a patron and support us in this wonderful season of giving if you are able if you are unable to Give financially and help produce this show financially help produce the marketing Help us get the word out about twist tell people About twist we really could use your help tweeting and facebooking and any other in instagramming Get us out there help help us tell the world about twist It really really does help, but whatever we're glad you're listening to the show We're glad you're watching the show if that's what you're doing Thank you for being a part of the show And thank you for supporting us. We really could not do this without you And we are back with more this week in science Yes, we are Justin tell me a story Metaphors are the legs of human language In the right hands they give ideas wings and help us fathom a sea of information And so I just got that was a little slow on the pickup there So may not be too surprising that metaphors act upon our brains in ways that actually put thoughts into action When participants in the study heard sentences that included phrases such as Shoulder responsibility foot the bill or twist my arm They tended to engage a region of the brain called the left extra straight body area or eba literally feeling metaphorical phrasey ology in the brain the finding recently published in Brain language is an example of grounded cognition the idea that comprehension of abstract concepts in the brain is built upon concrete experiences A proposal apparently that extends all the way back to Aristotle first came up with this concept Which we wouldn't have heard of if that information had Secreted away and saved for later the same level of activation was not seen in participants Who heard literal sentences containing phrases with a similar meaning such as take responsibility or pay the bill Uh, the study included 12 right-handed english-speaking people. It's not huge sample size But still significant enough to the study. Uh, they monitored the blood flow in their brains through mri magnetic resonance imaging The eba is part of an x the part is part of the extra straight visual cortex This is cody voice and it was known to be involved in identifying body parts says senior author chris sithian md phd professor of neurology rehabilitation medicine and psychology emory university We found that the metaphor selectivity of the eba matches its visual selectivity The eba was interestingly Not activated when study participants heard literal non metaphorical sentences describing body parts the phrase Uh, comfortable footwear does not act upon the brain the same way as getting Your foot in the door Your foot in the mouth We're putting your foot in your mouth putting your foot in your mouth. Yeah, yeah, but this suggests That deep Semantic processing is needed to recruit the eba over and above routine use of the words for body parts sithian says sathian's research team had previously observed the metaphors involving the sense of touch such as a rough day Activated region of the brain important for sensing texture In addition, other researchers have shown that motion related metaphors engage parts of the brain involved in the motor control When the perception of movement Relative to those previous findings researchers were surprised surprised to find that body part metaphors Did not tend to active eight areas of the brain linked to the motor control or sense of touch in this study It's a negative result But just because we didn't detect signals with these brain imaging methods doesn't mean that cellular connections still exists sithian says brain and language Paper includes analysis of resting state connectivity showing that the eba appears to communicate With language processing areas of the brain even while someone is not listening to a metaphor follow-up research could test whether magnetic stimulation of the eba interferes with processing of body part metaphors That would be interesting. Yeah mess it up use transcranial magnetic stimulation and Just mess it up and then have to see if people understand. Yeah Well because and it's and it's it's just because there are uh, there's one wonderful part of cases of damage in the brain Including the eba the affected person was impaired in using body part words to refer to inanimate objects. They couldn't really They couldn't conceive of the teeth of a comb the arm of a chair The leg of a table they they stopped being able to Comprehend that or utilize that language Not only making metaphors harder to swallow, but also understanding the meaning of hand gestures Uh becomes difficult and people who have impairments in this region research on metaphor comprehension is also being used to create rehabilitation approaches People who have had strokes or traumatic brain injury affecting their ability to process language so they sort of Literally walk them through or metaphorically walk them through exercises that engages parts of their body to metaphors when they're using language interesting One thing that this sort of story and I wish I had a lexus nexus uh because I listened to probably far too much of the political rhetoric that is used in language today, but I would love to search for the phrase uh shoved down our throat or rams down our throat And and run it through and see how many times and how often it's used in political rhetoric Because everything from they are trying to ram pc language down our throat to obama care down Like this is this is something that's a very common trope that's used over and over again And i'm like in light of this What if this what are they doing to their audience? What is it that they're evoking in their audience? Uh every time this phraseology is used But so fascinating to think that defensive mechanisms For sure How long is it, you know, and is that is that build that that sort of visceral throatal reaction In these people going forward, but it's really fascinating to think that the the that metaphors and the brain are so Uh, so uniquely linked that that our our language You know thinking back, you know, they're our origin of our language could have just started as Is a series of metaphors to describe things for it to be so ingrained in our For it to be so ingrained in our uh, our language and in our brain's reaction to language It makes me wonder if aliens Have different metaphors I mean Different languages have different metaphors like, you know, we say none of your beeswax, but in french you say none of your onions Right, right. Yeah, pull yourself up by your tentacle straps.  Um, well at the moment Oh boy Oh boy the baculum the baculum The baculum is a penis bone and it exists sporadically A lot of mammals in a lot of mammals and primates, but it's not consistent You know the the one the animals that have it it's kind of like it shows up some places and then it disappears and there's been a question of Why Why does it show up and then why did it go away?   Men do not have a penis bone Even though there are other primates that have very significant bacula I did not know that Yeah, so it's very it's very interesting question as to why humans don't have it so some research researchers at Matilda Brindle At the Matilda Brindle and Kit Opie at University College London Looked at the animals that had it and they did an analysis of all the animals mammals primates that have this this penis bone and they found that this Bone is Longer it's bigger in males that engage in Prolonged intro mission and i'm not saying intermission intro mission Pray tell what is that? It means that they have sex for longer than three minutes Copulation penetration lasting for more than three minutes this strategy of Prolonged intro mission is one that works in many species where there is a lot of male mate competition Because the male remains with the female and keeps physically keeps other males From being able to mate with the female and thus ensures his parentage of the offspring so It it helped it basically is they think that this This bone this baculum is related to mate competition in males So wait, i'm I don't mean to interrupt this Okay, but it's the threshold is three minutes Like who came up with three minutes Like it is being prolonged. I just like how to like based on what sex where were they considering Three minutes is prolonged. Is it just the researcher who coined this and was like the first researcher to look into this? Three minutes is fine. It's average No, no, no Justin Justin I would I would guess It's based on what like Ancient homo sapiens did We don't know that though well I don't believe sex was as pleasurable for women back then as it may be now or consensual as it may be now So I I think that Maybe has something to do with it, but let's let's hear the rest of the story by that even but okay But what the the interesting result that they came that that they came out with is um So like I said, this bone is longer. It's a bigger bone in males who have longer acts of copulation But they actually stay with stay in the female longer It's a lot of bone this bone helps them to maintain this Hornet graphic terminology for that is woodsman In chimpanzees this bone is very very short. It's like Like the length of my fingernail short. It's very tiny And they chimpanzees do not spend a long time mating and according to the guardian The chimpanzee groups females actually minimize the amount of time that they mate with any one male But they make sure that they mate with all the males to ensure the survival of their offspring because if Males can't figure out who the father is they're likely to assume that they have that they might be the father And so the males in a social group are therefore less likely to kill any offspring And so the females like all right, let's get this done quickly So it's suggested in this article that humans may have lost this bone as a result of monogamy that emerged as a dominant reproductive strategy during about 1.9 million years ago during the time of homo erectus and sorry humans We really haven't Required and at least in the social groups with monogamy that reduces mate competition And so the idea is that humans really haven't had to have a prolonged intro mission And so thus no need For but again, we're talking about three minutes. Maybe we just didn't need one Like nature finds a way right like and There's another interesting study though that just came up But although it doesn't it this doesn't Track with the 1.9 million years ago. It is very possible that maybe when we were Our ancestors the australopithecus afferensis ancestors of about 3.6 million years ago That they may have had a baculum Huh, it's very possible New footprints have been Have been found from an archaeological site in leitoli in northeastern tanzania They found 14 footprints that add to a set of 70 tracks that were originally uncovered by mary leaky in around 1978 and these prints Um are part of the evidence that humans walked on two legs, but Very impressive if you also had evidence of a baculum from the footsteps Not a baculum, but the The footprints themselves with the sizes of the footprints suggest that the individual and the suggest that One of the individuals was more than five and a half feet tall May have been a male And that the that the other individuals Were smaller and shorter and that the males and this is suggesting that males and females had different body types sexual dimorphism And that that there that there was a social structure more like that of gorillas with one or two males and a harem of females um, so Maybe we should be looking for a baculum in the afferensis I'll still wait until they I'll still wait until they yeah are going through the skeletal remains me like we've got an extra part here. Where does it go? Although if it's if it's a harem, he still wouldn't need a baculum true Not necessary, right. He would still not have uh, he wouldn't necessarily exactly it wouldn't be the mate competition. You're right Also, I think there's more people than there are apes Or things with baculums. Well, I don't know how I don't know what all lots of animals have baculums Bakula excuse me Yes, otters have bacula. I did a story years ago now about otter bacula shrinking Um, I did we bats have bacula. It happens It happens and they vary in size and shapes sea lions have bacula. Yeah, they they're They vary all over the place From the length of a finger to two feet long But humans don't have it at all Yeah, and so maybe we can look at this as you know reduce our social pressures I'm just gonna stop talking now, but Before I say something too incriminating But anyway, yeah, the disappearing baculum Now I want to know what it was if you had just left it at that but now now I'm like, well, what what is it? But I will Yes, anyway, this is some of the first uh, really good evidence, uh, that That actually gives a it's really good evidence supporting this prolonged intro mission hypothesis for the purpose of the baculum and again, I I have issues with the hypothesis that the hypothesis is based on because Just because somebody said three minutes is a long time and this is what I'm saying Maybe we don't need to like have all this social pressure Maybe if maybe two minutes, that's fine a minute. That's great Yeah, why do we laugh at this? Pressure. What do you talk? What are you talking about kiki? Is there a social pressure for this?  Sorry All right, I'm done with my stories here Justin do you have another story? No, I I saw that the abundance of stories that the two of you brought and I thought well I'm just gonna bring uh, a few because it looks like there's a lot to I saw a huge rundown at the end of this show Yeah, there are There's some awesome stories out there and I didn't even put all of them in the rundown Yeah, um, okay. Let me run into gravity. You guys want to hear about You want to hear about gravity story? So last week, um, I talked about the survey The deep sky survey the kids analysis and we were talking about how the the universe you weren't hear Blair, but there's a story Where the basic report that comes out of it is that the universe is not as clumpy as a result of dark matter that dark matter might be Spread out a little bit differently And so we have a smoother universe Yeah, we don't have as much of a it's not as clumpy of a universe um, well out of this, uh, the same A set of data these researchers, uh, there's a group of researchers from Where are they from they've published in the monthly notices of the royal astronomical society uh, some astrophysicists the university of sydney in, um And I'll we've got Australian astronomers. We've also got European astronomers that are working on this um But they actually Tested the idea that eric verland has come up with a new hypothesis his hypothesis on gravity that does not involve dark matter as a basic correction factor for The equations that are involved. He's come up with some some new equations in which gravity Acts through kind of a dark gravity force The dark force But this is the for the first time they've used this same data set this kids This kids analysis they looked at around 33,000 galaxies margo bruer at leiden university in the netherlands used weak route weak gravitational lensing very similar to the study that I talked about last week To look at the mass of the galaxies that were picked up in this kids survey And they ran the numbers For verland's theory and also the theory that involves the calculations using dark matter in the calculations And they both worked verland's theory solved everything and came out with the Basically matched the data so they measured the mass of these of these galaxies and then Plugged it into the theory and the theory worked and so they tested the theory against the data and this new kind of unproven idea of eric verland's that we've talked about before worked Dark matter was not necessary For for it to accurately estimate the distribution of Gravity in these galaxies That doesn't say that this is like whoo. This is it. This is the new thing. We don't need dark dark matter You know, there were lots of assumptions. They had to they there were fudge factors involved in The measuring and the distribution of the galaxies and all sorts of things But what it says is that this is This is evidence in the direction that we that suggests people might want to look a little bit more at this this theory Well, and I think part of it I don't know enough about this. I would love to have eric on this show to explain this to us But it seems like we're almost like F equals and it works You know, we under we understand mass equals gravity distribution things like I think that all anybody who's is in this realm can can Can make the galaxy turn out the way it should based on what we know about the interactions of Mass in the universe But the fudge factor there is what do you allow for for the mechanics of it? Like what do you allow To make it happen. Yeah, and you can have different theories on it because we don't know what it is Yeah, and so I don't know necessarily think that yeah, like you're saying like That that eric verlin's the fact that his worked Doesn't surprise me But what's the mechanism again? And and like that's the that's the thing that's still the puzzle like we've we've got correlations of gravity. We know how gravity Uh operates in a in a sense, you know, we can predict things with it But we don't have the mechanism. We don't know how it's doing Yeah, but I think with eric verlin's idea. Um, he uses gravity as more of an emergent phenomena Of spacetime as opposed to Um, what does that? Yeah, but the it's one of the same like if the force that emerges um as opposed to Uh, actually being a particle Right. So and what I like about Ideas about it. Yeah, the equations are different the equations are different but It's sort of like uh, how einstein back engineered Um the arc change the arc change was known from from gravitational lens. It had been witnessed. It had been recorded What he did was actually back engineer why that happens You know, so it wasn't like the big discovery is if if it's off by this many arcs when we see gravitational Lensing then the equations are correct. Actually, he Had access to this this this amount of arc change that was going to take place and built His equations based on that backwards. They're both building everybody's building on The universe as we see it backwards And so the universe as we see it will remain the same in every every take Uh that we every run that we make at this, uh, but but what's interesting I think in And this is that he may have eliminated the necessity of creating an extra factor And whenever you can eliminate the need for an extra factor in the way that you see things It's probably more correct When you don't have to have I mean dark I think dark matter dark Simplified it is that maybe the yeah the more the more simplified it is maybe the more correct it is We do not know this yet at all and I and like I said that the researchers in the abstract They even say all those performance is remarkable. This study is only a first step Further advancements on both the theoretical framework and observational tests Of emergent gravity are needed before it can be considered a fully developed and solid solidly tested theory and Because there are still things that this This idea Cannot predict that the conventional model does So there are still there's still things missing in it, but that doesn't mean it doesn't mean So it's exciting that this first test of an I what what I'm loving is this is going this is where physics Goes from theoretical physics to experimental And this is this is where it gets starts getting exciting So I hope there are more experiments like this That really try and test the metal of verlin's emergent gravity ideas All right blare tell me about some fishing line. Oh, um, so Have you guys heard of the glow worms in new zealand? No, I've heard of glow worms before but not Yes, I think you buy for your kids and it makes the glows. It's like a little teddy bear Yeah, so I hear glow worms and I think of This toy that I had as a child that I'm gonna screen share to you But glow worms are actually the larval stage of an insect that lives in new zealand and They have bioluminescent Properties and they live in these caves and so tourists go to the uh, they go to the these caves to Experience the glow worm caves because apparently it's supposed to be otherworldly I had a co-worker who went a few months ago and she was very impressed with it But one of the things you're supposed to do is you're supposed to Apparently you could float in the water in these caves and look up at the glow worms And she thought that was kind of gross. So she didn't do it and then Now I found out a little more about these little glow worms and I'm gonna have to tell her that that was a good call So arachnocampa luminosa the glowing maggot Is in an animal that they bioluminesce And they have these little fishing lines. They used to catch their prey Their prey are insects usually and Where spider webs have sticky sticky substances that have Animals get caught up in them. Um, they also are usually hydrophobic. Yeah, that's why you see the the dew kind of Beed up on the the web and the web doesn't soak up all the water and fall But the larva of these glow worms Actually have a special thread with the adhesive droplets that form a sticky curtain, which is how they catch their insects They're going to show a picture. Perfect Um, but they actually are absorbent So the adhesive droplets They they think that they actually pull up water to the glow worms so that they can stay wet in this Kind of damp air So that they avoid desiccation. But where this really gets interesting is that they Now they think that the glow worms secrete the fishing lines from their mouth parts Remember spider spin silk from abdominal grants. So they think they come out of their mouth And the lines adhesive droplets actually have mineralis crystals of urea Which means they're most likely produced in the mid gut And they that urea is primary urine So they're barfing up.  Yes And also catch food So This is a new kind of bio adhesive that we have not Uh previously observed That it contains water hydroscopic salts And biomolecules like proteins and lipids So this is an interesting finding and also I think Puts very interesting light on the tourist events that happen in glow worm caves If you do a google search on glow worm caves, you'll see people with their faces right up next to the glow worm strands and Um, they'll you'll see people getting married in the glow worm caves and their beautiful Fancy clothes or models in front of the glow worms in the caves. You're like, those are pea strands They are very pretty crystals though. They are the crystals in the strands that um They come out. They're they're very pretty Yeah, yeah, do you uh kiki do you want to quickly talk about talking monkeys? I would love to talk about talking monkeys But we know monkeys don't talk They they hoot and they holler, right and there's been this You know, it's a common wisdom that the reason that other primates don't talk is that they don't have the right mouth parts Their lips their jaws their larynx None of it is structured appropriately to allow them to make The sounds that we make to enunciate In the way that we do but you're about to tell me something completely different, aren't you? Yep Yes, I am uh researchers at the university of vienna and princeton university Used x-rays. Yeah, just x-rays to look inside the monkeys vocal tracks and they found that Yeah, vocal anatomy is not the limitation Wow anatomy is not the limiting factor this thing that we've thought forever. Oh monkeys can't talk because the The structure is wrong That was wrong It's the brains. It's monkey brains It's all in the brain Because the anatomy is flexible enough to allow these animals to make the sounds and the use their anatomy In a way that they could produce the sounds that we we do So I could genetically engineer the monkey with With more folds in its brain And that's it could start I could teach it to talk like I could actually have a conversation with the monkey My favorite is that they actually used a computer model to try to figure out what it would sound like And it was like this this is what it sounded like just like this No, but it's it is terrifying Kiki, can you play it? No, I can do Hold on. Yeah, let me see if I can find it. You go ahead and talk and uh, okay So of course of of all things to choose to have the computer simulation say What do you think? They always pick pick very odd Um odd things for monkeys to say Very human things Is the monkey asking for the banana?   I might be able to put up on my phone faster. I've got it. Okay. You got it excellent I don't even want to tell you I want you to hear it. Can you hear it? I heard it Oh, you just talked over it I can't Yeah, he's saying will you marry me? It's the creepiest Will you marry me proposal? Yeah It's it's i'm gonna hear that in my sleep now Will you marry me? here You can make it louder Oh, yeah, that's pretty throaty Actually a little bit lower register than I would have expected. Yeah Terrific the the big question is you know, we we've always said okay humans speech We can talk to each other, right? This is a big part of our evolution but we At what point Did speech begin because if monkeys could have started talking at any point with you know a little Click in the brain to start making the right vocalizations At what point did we start speaking was it at the baculum loss stage? Was it when we were still acting like Hey, look, I I know I haven't really mentioned anything but I was wanting to help me find something I I should have lost it I've been looking for a long time. I still can't see that I was thinking more than that. It was something along the lines of I'm sorry, baby. This never happens This never happens Oh dear well, yes, okay, so Speech could have started at any point. Well, when did it start? Let's talk about some of these other quick stories. I've got so many amazing stories that I wanted to talk about Researchers reporting in the proceedings of the royal society b I've been looking at the effects the biological impacts of atmospheric rivers california is very Very used to these atmospheric rivers. They're Conditions in which basically moisture is there's a river of moisture in the atmosphere and it's shunted very rapidly across Across the the coastal area the water dumps California and when these atmospheric rivers come through usually It can get up to half of the state's annual rainfall in about 10 to 15 days during these events They've been linked to flooding and all sorts of Problems for people, but what about other biological effects? They've found that the effects on reducing salinity of water in the In the coastal areas as the water comes out of the mountains down rivers through the estuaries That it has an impact on oysters basically oysters die off when there are Atmospheric rivers back to back because oysters are very sensitive to salinity levels and The water from the atmospheric rivers dilutes the estuary salinity and then the oysters die So atmospheric rivers great for water for the state not so good for oyster fisheries Kind of interesting. Um, that's something that happens in your local area. I think The in the portland area. There's so much rain That it's it can be hard to to have a a decent garden Because the nutrients are constantly getting washed out of the soil Right, exactly. You have to add a lot. You have to add Add fertilizers to be able to keep things growing Yeah Rain water, what a good the good in the bed um for the future of little tiny starships or even big starship computers One of the big effects that we worry about is the loss of data or damage to data from radiation effects on the On the circuitry of the computers, right? So it's this thought that as circuits get smaller and smaller even little tiny Subatomic particles that are cosmic rays and stuff that are flying through space that go right through the hull of a ship could smash into these little conductors Right our computer chips as they get smaller and smaller and just Mess them up, right? They won't work anymore computers won't work data won't be collected to be a mess How are the starships going to travel far at long distances if the computers are breaking down, right? So Researchers have come up with a way to address this and it is a self healing chip They use what they call a gate all around nanowire transistor and this uses nanoscale wires as a transistor channel instead of other fin-shaped channels and There's a gate this controls the flow of Charge the channel it's an electrode and it just goes on or off to control flow on your flow off you do not And it just surrounds the nanowire all the way around and so if you by adding an extra contact to this gate You can actually pass current through it this current heats the gate and the channel And this heating can actually fix any radiation induced effects and A member of the nasa team who worked on this jin muhan says on chip healing has been around for many many years But what they're hoping is that Heating can drive the recovery of radiation sensors We've got heat induced healing of flash men memory in a by a company out of taiwan and so so this Could actually allow tiny transistors on spacecraft to work and heal themselves And this this gate all-around device is expected to go into Really high production by about the 2020s When they'll when it will be starting to be preferred by chip producers and so it's As as chips get smaller and smaller, but anyway self healing silicon chips Yeah This is how it starts. Yeah might solve that problem which would be great. Um, that's what I want a self healing robot great And the silicon chip inside ahead was switched to overload All right, uh, the epa has rewritten their final fracking report and it's a little bit more cautious than their original report So they add a four-year effort to summarize environmental risks of fracking And the original summary the draft was kind of rosy and was like It's not really that bad there are instances of contamination and um Anyway, the final report has come through and it has been changed to address reviewers comments It's great and it's um, it's actually More conservative and it it's very positive Actually, and I think it's a document that will be used by the industry and by the regulatory agencies to move forward To allow fracking to continue to take place, but maybe in a better way Um, the report states in the longer term attention could be focused on reducing the data gaps and uncertainties Identified in this report though through these efforts current and future drinking water resources can be better protected In areas where hydraulic fracturing is occurring or being considered So it's it's it's nice. It's it's I think it's a good report conservative is good in this in this sense um Then something I wanted to note which last week I was talking about briefly uh, or this last week or two weeks ago Talking about Oklahoma and earthquakes in Oklahoma being caused by fracking It's not necessarily linked directly to fracking but to the pumping of wastewater from fracking So you have the wastewater that they pump back into uh into the ground below the level of the aquifers, right? Because it's dirty dirty water and they got want to get rid of it. And so that is the actual just wanted to clarify I think we were on that point Yeah I just love the idea of we'll just push it far down there Push it way far down. It's like it's like brushing the dirt under the carpet like no one will find it. It's fine It's like what I do with my feelings Oh It's still dumping of waste It is it's a the dumping of waste someplace where hopefully we'll never find it again Where they won't be responsible for it. Yeah, um, and finally some cool studies out in science this week about zebra finches I love zebra finches and bird song And researchers really still trying to figure out what's going on in learning song and what are the differences between Say species specificity of the song how do little birds know To sing their song a species song versus another species song if they're surrounded by other birds wherever they're growing up Why don't they sing any other songs, right? Also, what about the individual effects of you want to have a really good song so that you can let a potential mate Know that you're gonna be a really good mate, right? So there has to be some kind of individual variation in there So how does this all work and there are two studies that came out in science this week and One of them uh looked at A dopamine release in the ventral tegmental area area. So this neuron activity And in humans, this is the area where dopamine is associated with rewards and expectations And humans when you're say playing the piano If you strike a note that's not right dopamine release goes down and so it Try you realize there's an error Because your dopamine release has changed if your dopamine if If you get the right note or an expected note, then your dopamine release stays the same or increases and so they played audio recordings of zebra finch song With some errors to these little birdies while they were measuring neuron activity and when the songs were distorted or broken the neurons stopped releasing dopamine They stopped at being activated just like in the human brain and if they heard the song without any errors The neurons got activated again Like they were expecting I said so the when it was without the error They kind of went oh that was right and dopamine release went up as a more than it was predicted Because they were kind of expecting it to be an error again And then it was not an error and they went oh, I like that and so the dopamine started getting released So It's that Eighth brain. It's the it's the animal brain in charge of everything that we do Exactly and so it's neat to see it at work in zebra finches um And so their performance so individuals maybe while they're learning and trying to repeat a song back to That they've heard an older bird sing when they're trying to they hear an older bird go Diddly diddly and they try to go diddly diddly and they get this song a little bit wrong Maybe this is part of the system that gets them their performance to a higher standard or not But then the second study researchers raised these zebra finches with Bengalis finch parents. So they were raised with a different species of finch And then they paid attention to what was going on and basically they found that It's not the songs That the birds sing But the gaps between syllables in the songs so it's silence It's silence in the songs that That helps birds recognize their own species song And respond to it. There are neurons in the brain that respond to silent temporal gaps Between songs some some syllables There are specific neurons that register those gaps temporal gap neurons and these neurons are probably very Very important in this species specific song recognition part of the instinct Of what song a bird will learn this is part of the imprint That a bird is born with Specific neurons that respond to silence That doesn't even make sense to me. I love it Yeah, so it's not the notes themselves. It's the it's the space between. Yeah Yeah, that's and that's you know, whoa, man. It's almost like I'm seeing the lack of color in this painting, man It's like so far out, man Like if you look in between the letters and the words man, that's where the meaning is Where has apparently fallen into a San Francisco trope And and this just after just after I saw a tweet from genie from boing boing Somebody did a study and found that the holidays new year's eve is when people tend to want to take lsd So we're coming up to yeah coming up to it Oh, it's the empty spaces that are important in the world Maybe this is why silence and reflection is so important. I hope that You don't fill your week up with too much noise between now and next week Because we've come to the end of our show and I hope you enjoy the week gap that you get Between each episode of this week in science Don't forget you can go to twist.org and get your twist Calendar there's only a few left get them now Get them before they're gone Seriously, they're going away quickly And when we run out we run out so you got to get it now people twist.org 20 dollars there you go And additionally sf sketch fest don't forget january 19th We're gonna be at the california academy of science nightlife. Check it out It's time to give shout outs to all of our patreon sponsors Chris Clark Paul disney jibberton latimore john ratna swami richard onam aspiring lee eo jared lissette kevin parochan andy keith corsell jake jones glissie's adkins derrick nickle dav fridel james randall eric schwab bob calder mark miss aros a dire I know i can't jump in i don't have the list Trainer 84 brian hedrick lehler marshall clark charlene hedry don marish galera garcia randy mezuka tony steele jerald onyago steve debbel haroon sarang melissa mosley alec wilson jason schneiderman greg goofman dav neighbor jason dozier matthew lytwin eric nap jason roberts richard porter jaryl Lambert rodney david wiley robert astin darwin hannon ben rothig reedy garcia nick abasi felix alvarez cosmic gypsy brian hone orly radio brian kondren pixel fly marked nathan greco hexatour debbersmith rich knieves flying out john crocker christopher drier sylvan wesby rtm shawada dav wilkinson steve meshinsky rick ramus Gary swinsburg phil nadeau braxton howard salgad sam matt setter emigrenier philip shane james stodson hurt curt larson stefin insom michael george wrestle jensen mountain sloth jim drapo john maloney jason olds james paul west alec dodie luma lama joe wheeler dugle cambell craig porter adam mishkron erin luthan marjorie paul statin david simerly tyler harrison and colombo amen thank you for all your support on patreon and if you're interested in supporting us you can find information at patreon.com slash this week in science remember you can help us out just by telling your friends about twists tell two friends about twists this week they will thank you and on next week's show we're going to be back broadcasting live online again at 8 p.m pacific time on twist.org slash live where you can watch and join our chat room and we're going to have a Karen Cooper talking about citizen science yes she's written a book all about really neat citizen science stories and i figured with the holidays coming up let's have some good news about good things people are doing for science and so i can't it's gonna be up to us from now on all about it it's all about it yes but if you can't make it don't worry you can find that episode in all our past episodes at twist.org slash youtube or just twist.org thank you for enjoying the show twist is of course also available as a podcast just google this week in science in your iTunes directory or you can find it on your mobile type device twist the number four droid in the android marketplace or simply this week in science in anything apple market placey for more information on anything you've heard here today show notes will be available on our website which i believe you can access from your mobile device at www.twist.org there you can also make comments and start conversations with the hosts as well as other listeners who may also be on a mobile device you can also contact us on your mobile device directly by emailing kirsten at thisweekinscience.com or kirsten at thisweekinscience.com just in at twist meaning at gmail.com or player at playerbaz at twist.org just be sure to put twis into the subject line of your mobile device or your email will be spam filtered into oblivion you can also ping us on the twitter where we are at twist science at dr kiki at jackson fly and at players menagerie your feedback if there's a topic you would like us to cover address a suggestion for an interview a haiku that showed up on your mobile device tonight please let us know we will be back here next week and we hope you'll join us again for more great science news and if you've learned anything from the show remember just like john glenn it's all in your head this week in science this week in science this week in science it's the end of the world so i'm setting up a shop got my banner unfurled it says the scientist is in i'm gonna sell my advice show them how to stop the robots with a simple device i'll reverse the overwhelming with a wave of my hand and all it'll cost you is a couple of grand this week science is coming your way so everybody listen to what i say i use the scientific word and i'll broadcast my opinion all over the earth it's this week in science this week in science this week in science science science this week in science this week in science this week in science science science i've got one disclaimer and it shouldn't be news that what i say may not represent your views but i've done the calculations and i've got a plan if you listen to the science you may just get understand that we're not trying to threaten your philosophy we're just trying to save the world from jeopardy this week in science is coming away so everybody listen to everything we say and if you use our methods that are rolling and die we may rid the world of toxoplasma got the eyes this week in science this week in science this week in science science this week in science this week in science science science i've got a laundry list of items i want to address from stopping global hunger to dredging Loch Ness i'm trying to promote more rational thought and i'll try to answer any question you've got the help can i ever see the changes i seek when i can only set up shop while science is coming your way through what we say this week in science this week we have done this here yes another show bites the dust another show bites the dust another one done another one down another one down another one does would do it again. Boxes. Who's got boxes? Do we have boxes? I have lots of boxes. My office is getting more and more filled with boxes. One box in particular because I didn't want to carry it up another flight of stairs into the attic to store it. So it's sitting there. It's heavy. I was tired. Yeah, we are getting close to 600. Then, Rothig! We're almost 600. We had a really great, really great 500 celebration. For 600, we will be, I think it's going to be our prediction show. Ooh. Which, which, which, which, I need. Hold on a moment. Not 600 monies. Sorry, 600 episodes. If we were close to 600 monies, that would make me happy also. We're at 597 shows as of this show. Yeah. Wow. I know. It's been like two years since. Yeah, we've been doing it longer than two years, Kiki. The time does fly. Since our 500 episode celebration. It's been, I can't believe it's been two years. Oh, it has Blair and a blonde wig. How did that happen? Blair did it. Oh my God. This is what Blair would look like with a lot of hydrogen peroxide. Oh my God. Don't my roots look fantastic? Oh no. I can't even see our roots, Blair. Oh my God. It's like, it looks totally natural. So natural, especially with those eyebrows. Oh my God. I was born with this hair color. Can you believe it? No. Oh my God. I'm just, I just can't stop touching it. It's just the funnest. Blondes have more fun. I totally do. No. Oh my God. Oh my God. No, Karen. No, Brandon. Karen is the worst. The worst. Oh my God. Oh my God. Yeah. I've got to watch out for Karen. That's a populous. What? All the people in San Francisco are blonde? That's not true at all. Yeah. That actually almost couldn't be further from. No. The blondes hang out in the marina. That's true.  They're all wearing workout gear all the time and they're either walking dogs or maybe sipping a coffee and pushing a stroller. Do you guys like my birthday snail? I love it. Join it.  That's like that. That's pretty cool. Happy birthday. Is it a racing snail? No. It's a normal snail. I like racing snails. What is that? Are you kidding? I don't know what a race is. Oh yeah. I think they're much better. The never ending story. All right. The racing snails running and racing. The guy on the back of the racing snail. I was just saying this one. I haven't seen that movie since I was a child. I have many, many times. Oh my gosh. I've seen it so many times. Blonde Blair has just gone viral on Facebook. Oh yeah. I love it.  Just so you know. What are you talking about? On Facebook? G.A.T. Base. I don't see Blonde Blair on Facebook. I don't either. What are you talking about, Justin? Yeah. I got this note for the show that apparently the screen capture of Blonde Blair capture for the show. At least that's what it looks like in the feed. Oh, in the feed. Got her in a moment. What? Okay. Now, it's okay. You got plenty of likes. It's okay. You'll be fine. Everything under control. But I base my self-worth on my social media presence. Yeah. Now, there's a great. Oh, what is that? Is it Dark Mirror? Is that this? Now, I got to go to Netflix and find out. Dark Mirror. That's a dystopian program. It is. And there's one, there's one where people's like ability, their credit score has been replaced, basically, by their social media score. So dark and hilarious. And you should, if you haven't seen that, it's the first episode of the third season of Black Mirror. Yeah, that's a Black Mirror. Yeah, that's pretty dang good. It looks like we're heading. Keep replaying this little sound that Identity 4 found. Justin, it's good. It's good. What is it? It's a little sound of you. I don't know if I can make it loud enough through my headphones. Doing what? Did you hear it? It wasn't quite loud enough. A little too quiet. What was it from today's show? What was it? It's you going, okay, like my inter-music leg. We got experiencing technical difficulties. Now, yeah, if I can, I can use it and just put it on repeat for every time we have technical difficulties. Oh, look at this. Schools canceled tomorrow. Everything canceled. Schools out for Thursday. Why, raining? Snow everywhere. At 9.30 p.m., roads are still solid red. There's like, I think it was like a two and a half hour drive between Clackamas and Vancouver, which is ridiculous. It's ridiculous. It's a great new rink. Identity 4 put it in the chat room. I mean, yes, he did. You can listen to the new Justin ringtone. Oh no. Download it and have the fun. Yeah, we got how many inches of snow today? We got several inches. It's white. The streets are white outside. It's covered, blanketed in snow. I don't know if it's still snowing. Yeah, there's boom. It's a lot of snow. And Portland is just not set up for snow. We don't have... I'm sorry, just listening to Justin over and over over here. I know, right? I got totally distracted for a second. You're not set up for snow. Not set up for snow. There's no snow plows, really. I mean, we've got a few that can handle major roads, but they're not out yet. And yeah, the roads in Salem are white. Yeah, a lot more snow in Salem than here, I think, too. Rob the Strange. What, what for Salem? What, what? Yeah, and then nothing in Seattle. It's such an interesting storm, too, because it was a low pressure. I was watching a... I love watching weather reports. Love it. There's a low pressure system that was kind of south off of the coast of California, and it started coming through and pushing its way north, where normally storms come down from the north out of like the northern Pacific area and kind of come down along the coast. That's the normal weather pattern. This one was coming up from further down south. It's still really cold because of this kind of polar vortex offshoot that's come down over most of the United States. And we had... And so there's like, I think Portland basically was kind of this area is like the cutoff of the, of the storm and the snow range. Not too much further north. It's fascinating. Changes in weather systems in between seasons and why things are moving different places. And then there was this whole thing where like, normally I think of winds coming from the west and going to the east, you know, from the coast and moving inland, but because it was really cold inland, all of a sudden this cold air pushed through. And so yesterday it was kind of nice. And then it just like, cold wind pushed in from the Columbia Gorge region. And we've got just this 50 mile an hour freezing winds. Now we've got 20 degree temperatures and snow weather. It's really cold here too. It's 56 degrees. Really? It's really cold Blair. It's really cold. I was like, I'm so cold. I do wear a sweater and a coat.  Oh, blonde Blair. Oh, blonde Blair. You're so cute. I know, right? Right? Like, oh my God. I should def go block for real. Oh, death. Oh, totes death. Most death. He's a really good rapper. I don't get it. Why guy? Oh my God. It's minus four degrees with the wind chill of minus 22. Stay indoors. I don't even understand winter. I'm just going to stay inside and look at the white stuff outside and shake my fist at old man winter. What are you going to do with your son tomorrow? Yeah, that's it means I'm not getting any work done. He can stuff some more envelopes, right? He'll help me mail calendars. We'll do we'll do a twist. We'll do a twist mailing run tomorrow because he likes doing that. Okay. He puts on his Christmas hat and we go to the he pretends that he's a Santa helper. That's so cute. Very cute. Very cute. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. colder than minus 22 wind chill. I can't even it's so serene tomorrow like I done it before. Oh my God. It's so cold out. I had to wear pants and my eye patch. Yeah. I'm I'm there's going to be water falling from the sky tomorrow. Yeah. And Brandon, Brandon, he's down in Southern California, right? You needed a jacket in the morning. Yeah. I was in Disneyland. It was it was jacket weather. Weird. Yeah, jacket weather. It is December. Yeah. Des Bomes. That's 19 inches in La Pine, 30 miles south of Bend.  Oi. Oi, that's the snowy place. I think we got three inches. Maybe we got four. Portland.  We're going to keep our nasty weather here. Blair is going to maybe have to deal with rain. Yeah. You know, rain makes it super humid. So you're going to have to watch out for those frizzies on your hair. Oh, no. No. I can't have frizzies in my new cloth. Yeah. Oh, Fada is saying I could oh, I could go to the that coffee place that is a great coffee place. Yes. Play. My child needs attention. He's an attention-needy child. High of three. Ben Rothig. My goodness. White Rabbit Project. No, no White Rabbit Project. What's White Rabbit Project? Is that a show I should be watching? I just finished. What was the name of the show that I just recently started? What stopped watching Penny Dreadful? I've heard good things about that. I just ran through the whole thing myself. I heard it's scary, so I'm not watching it. It's okay. Not that. I mean, it's all right. It's not it's not. I thought Stranger Things was scarier. Yeah, that was scary. Stranger Things is too scary for me. It gave me nightmares. This one was actually just, I thought it was just fun as much as like, you know, there's like overly religious themes as there are sometimes too often are and it's like but I love the fact that they tied in together or have thus far. Dracula, the Wolfman, Frankenstein, Dorian Gray, Mr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyatt, like brought them all into a plotline together and it's not cartoonish. It's not cartoonish and it actually works. Yeah, well done. It's a little it's it but it is well done. It is it is really well done. Worth watching. I think so and it's beautiful too. Absolutely beautiful. Yeah. Yeah, I kind of want to go back and watch it again. I keep having like, I think I have I think I have a little little crush on Vanessa Ives. Yeah. She was fantastic. Miss Ives. She's great. And an incredible acting job. Seriously, so the actress who plays Vanessa Ives can be so beautiful in some so beautiful in some scenes and so haggard and terrible looking animal. Yeah, and you're like, whoa. Who did they get the player for that scene because that was wild. Yeah. Yeah. Very cool. Yeah. I mean, it's one of those things that you've seen like good actors do between roles is transform themselves.  But to be doing it within the same character. Very impressive. Yeah. Another another actress who did that was it was it's another one that was only like three seasons and hasn't gone any further.  Black mirror. Black mirror. It's the one about the genetics genetic genetic. Orphan black. Orphan black. So genetic modification of humans. Great series and the actress in that one also real ability to play different characters. That's good. The IT crowd. Even though the IT crowd works is cracking up at your hair. It's seeping into my brain, you guys. I know you're going to take it off and there's still going to be some left. Should I take an insta photo? Why is that? Are we being in any way stereotyping or derogatory? Not at all. I feel like there's absolutely a little bit of discrimination. It's a stereotype for sure. But coming from California, it's kind of I don't know. I think of it as a very California stereotype. I don't know. I mean, should the two women on the show be active? Don't you try to police my fun? Thank you for asking that question. Fair enough. I'm just saying there's two. I don't want to say post feminist women. I would say two feminist women on the show who are stereotyping a segment of women as having lower IQs. I just want to be the one to point that out. Thank you. Well, but it doesn't have to be all blondes. I just became a character when I put on this wig. Just like I wasn't saying that all English safari men were nearsighted and got attacked by spiders. I'm just teasing.  But you have to remain in vocal fry the whole time. Okay. Okay. All right. If I have to. Have you guys seen? Because we're costumed up for it. Is there a possibility that I could get a little vocal fry Shakespeare from you?  In the meantime, while you're looking something up. So along the vein of asking the tough questions about whether we should stereotype and all that other stuff. Have you guys seen the video of the recent rewrite that's politically correct for current social of sexual standards of baby it's cold outside? No. Is that even possible with that song? Yeah, it seems like one of those songs like I recently called it the cutest song about date rape ever written. Exactly. And so it is it is just it is a little bit. Yes. And so a couple of artists have redone it and done a video where they the woman sings basically the the same. I can't stay I've got to go all that kind of stuff. But the guy in the whole time is like, okay, I understand it was a really nice date. Okay. I understand if you've got to go all that sidewear jacket. So there's the the say what's in this drink line and he's like, oh, yeah, that's like that's like a grapefruit. What's the what's the sparkly water that everyone's drinking these days? La Croix. La Croix. It's a grapefruit La Croix. It's pretty funny. Oh, that's great. Why are you still here? I've got to get.  Exactly. Do you have an Uber or a Lyft account? It's pretty funny. I'll call you one instead. You guys can act to it. All right. Yeah. I found my favorite Shakespeare monologue. Are you ready for this? It's from a midsummer night's dream. I believe let's see. I don't know what part of it it's from. This is, this is Helena and she's real mad because like the love potion went awry. And so Hermia is like crushing on her man. And she's like, oh no. So she says, hello, hello. She is one of this Confederacy. Now I perceive they have conjoined all three to fashion this false sport in spite of me. Injurious, Hermia, most ungrateful made. Have you conspired?  What is a derision? Is all this counsel that we too have shared, the sisters vows, the hours we've spent when we have chied the hasty footed time. What is chied? What is that word? When we have chied hasty footed time. I guess that's because like they spent too much time again. She's really being redundant. For parting us. Oh, is that all I forgot. All school dates, friendship. Oh, I guess they used to be close. Childhood innocence. We, Hermia, like two artificial gods have with our needles created both one flower, both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion. That is one flower that is well taken care of. Both warbling of one song, both in one key. As if our hands, our sides, our voices, our minds had been in corporate. Oh, wow, they were really close. So we grow together like to a double cherry seeming parted, but yet a union in partition, two lovely berries, the cherries again, now they're berries, I'm confused, molded on one stem. So with two seeming bodies by one heart, two of the first like coats and heraldry. Oh, like they were soldiers in the field. But to one and crowned with one crest. And will you rent our ancient love asunder to join with men in scorning your poor friend? Now, see now the boy is involved. Is it not friendly? It is not maidenly. Our sex as well as I may chide you for it, though I alone do feel the injury. Oh, my God. This we have to produce this. Forget the calendar. Audio. Vocal fry Blair reads Shakespeare. Oh, we know a lot of lozenges. Yeah, but we'll start working earlier. We'll start working in spring. We'll provide you with lozenges and create this could be like we can. The wig helps, I think. The wig really gets the character. Vocal fry Cliff notes.  It's this character. She's more sassy and less fry-ish.  You need to slow it down a little. Also, my throat hurts. I have a cold. You can read. I agree with Ben Rothig. That was the best thing ever, Blair. That was. Okay. You do the blonde twas the night before Christmas. Oh, yes. All through the house. Not a creature was stirring. Not even a mouse. I want to do that one again. We did a night before Christmas one and a disclaimer one. I need to go find that. Oh, yeah. I mean, it's like redundant if you're doing it again, but it might change the words up a bunch. Let's see. Stockings were hung by the chimney with terror in the hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there, but seriously, why would I put my stockings there by the fire? There's such a chance they'd get a run. Seriously. Oh, 12th night. That's not a really good one. Oh, that was the 12th night of Hanukkah. Without the house, everybody's like, it's over. What are you doing? My computer's freezing on this Shakespeare monologue site. Can't handle the Shakespeare. I experienced a Hanukkah miracle already this year. Oh, yeah? Your oil lasted for longer than expected? Much longer. In fact, the fact that it was there at all was impressive. I got this idea in my head, it would be so great to have a machine that could do one-off little batches of deep fry. I wanted a deep fryer, but I don't have a lot of space. I'm looking for a little tiny deep fryer. I'm going up and down the aisles of a store that should have it. I just don't see it anywhere. It's like gave up on the mission. I'm walking down a different aisle, and there one is. It's in between pillows. Somebody picked it up, the last one from wherever it was that I was looking for it, and it wasn't there. They put it in this aisle of pillows while I had just given up on looking for it. There it was. It's the size of a toaster, and it's a little deep fryer. I got this thing. The oil has lasted for so far 11 meals. I've done everything. I started out like, oh, we'll make french fries. Okay, french fries. That's cool. I got to learn how to batter things. I battered stuff. I bought like asparagus. I battered asparagus. Put that in. Now I find you can throw everything. I put a casserole. I had some leftover casserole. I threw that in. You can throw anything into a deep fryer, and it comes out like the fried food version of that. It's really incredible, although I have to warn.  You need Justin's poop pills? Get a little gassy. It's on. It might not be. It might not be long-term- Regular mac-a-vee. Yeah, might not be long-term sustainable there, but yeah, been eating a lot of fried everything that you could throw into a fryer. So apparently on the YouTube comments, there's like a chat on the YouTube live broadcast. There's a Kiki K who's just popped in to say, if anyone has a second, please check out my channel, twerking, naked talk, trying food, story time, and other fun stuff. Kiki, I had no idea. Oh, no science? Does that fit into the fun stuff category? You've been scammed, sweetheart. What? I had no idea, Kiki. I don't think I would go to the Kiki K channel. By the way, frying potato chips? Oh, Starz Nova went to bed already. Starz Nova, hey, frying potato chips? End of deep fry. The one thing I haven't tried yet, because I have a popcorn making machine, I haven't tried to deep fry popcorn yet. I think that's going to be tomorrow's challenge. I feel like that one was going to end badly because that one seems like it should already be regular fair food, and I don't know that I've ever seen deep fried popcorn. I'm going into it already thinking people who own fryers have tried this, and there's a reason we don't have deep fried popcorn for sale. I'm going to try it, just see what happens. I'm going to pop it first. Maybe that's the mistake the others made is they just put the current popcorn curls in the deep fryer and had an exploding deep fryer of oil going everywhere and never tried it again, but yeah, I'm going to pop, yes, this hot rod. I will pre-pop the corn and then put it into the fryer. That is the plan. It does bump. What a healthy venture. You have no idea. None of us know what healthy food is. None of us know what healthy food is. It has nothing to do with what you eat. It has to do with what exists already in your gut and how it handles it. I'm going to go on record and say that I don't think twinkies are healthy. It depends on your gut microbe. Some of them handle gluten better than those. Look, I don't think Alestra is healthy. I don't think with Alestra, nope. Again, if you haven't yet ordered Dr. Justin's Not A Real Dr. Poop Pills, you should put that on the Christmas list for all of those you love because I've been proving almost to you an amazing degree that you can eat anything with the right gut microbes and not gain weight and have health issues and go about your normal business, except for the flatulence thing. This also comes with being healthy. Dr. Justin's Poop Pills disclaimer, Dr., may increase flatulence when eating the fried food apparently. I haven't tried cauliflower yet. I will though, although I have put quite a bit of, which might actually be the real cause for the flatulence. I've put quite a bit of broccoli flour. So far. Broccoli, lots of onions. I did this batter and I put cheese, like chopped up shredded cheese in it and then wrapped it up in more batter and had onions. Oh, cheesy balls. Let me tell you, this is a new, a new thing. It's like tempura. It's basically the same sort of thing. Only you also can put cheese in it. Thank you for the files identity for, I got files. I got files. They're multiplying. Deep fried. Yeah, deep fried some mushrooms. I want to, I want to make fried chicken. I could just deep fried mushrooms all day, every day. Deep fried one of those little cutie oranges. Oh my gosh. Deep fried the cuties? Yeah. Well, I took the peel off first, but then it dropped in there. Oh my God. It made them really gooey, but like 10 times as sweet. It was like candy. Oh, I also battered and deep fried a, a, what do you call it? A shoe. Dehydrated pineapple. Oh, that was good. Like, at the store, we were like, how do I go home? We're going up and down the aisle. Like, what can we put into the fryer? Like, let's just pick everything. Like, let's, we'll find everything. Like, what would this new fry? Can you deep fry a potato chip? Like, I don't know. Will it come out of a potato chip or something new, something better? Ah, let's deep fry it and find out. Like, this is, Justin's going to put on an extra 25 pounds before Christmas. All right. This is what I'm saying with Dr. Justin is not a real Dr. Poop Pills. It just doesn't happen. They're in control. They've got a system. It's like a good football team system. It's not the individual players. It's not the food that I put in. It's the system that puts it out that is in control. Okay. All right. Bedtime? What? Bedtime? Why? Did somebody just get real tired all of a sudden? Me? Bedtime? I started listening to a music video. It's really good. I'll share it with everybody. We can end the show if you like. It is bedtime. It's time for me to go read more of my Change Agent book. I'm reading Daniel Suarez's upcoming novel, Change Agent. It's going to be released in April and it's all about the basis of the story is synthetic biology. There's a lot of neat ideas in it. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of cool ideas. But I got an advanced reading copy and I'm like deep in the thrillerness of it. It's really, it's good so far. I'm enjoying it. Might read it a couple of times. I don't know. Oh, hey, I might also have a guest for our, I guess it's show 600, our prediction show. She's written a book on actually making real predictions. What do you mean actual real predictions? Yeah. She's written a whole book on the whole future is like future prediction, you know, like not predicting but actually looking at trends and trying to decode what's going on with trends and her name's Amy Webb. And so might be getting her on as a guest for, I guess it'll be show 600 for our prediction show. That'll be fun. We can do our predictions and then talk with her about making predictions. Yeah. That'll be a perfect. That's awesome. All right. Let's do a good show. I think it'll be super fun. Rob the strange. Rob the strange in the chatroom says I fry everything in extra virgin olive oil. I never use vegetable oil. You know, Rob the strange I've used I've been using vegetable oil just because I didn't realize how long it would actually last and how much stuff I could fry through it. I thought I was going to go through it too quick and vegetable oil, which I made sure was palm oil free. I use that because it was cheaper. Soy bean oil I think is what I'm using. But yeah, actually I think I'll go with olive oil next time knowing that I can use it longer than I could. And I understand olive oil has a lower smoking point, but actually as we've discussed on the show in the past, molecularly stays more stable longer than other oils. So the smoking point is sort of a misnomer. It's actually molecularly breaking down before it gets to the smoking point in other oils where it's closer in relationship with the olive oil, which means it's a better indication that the oil needs to not be used at that point on and therefore is actually probably a better oil to fry stuff in. Well, you did.   I'm sorry about that, but I hope you have a good sleep. Get some good sleep. I'm still trying to make up for sleep I didn't get as a teenager. All right, I think my whole life is about that, but I don't know. I still act like a teenager sometimes or a college student. I don't know. I never do. Every once in a while I'm like, I can stay up all night. Totally. The more you, I think you're actually turning into somebody else. Like, I could like, I'm starting to not recognize you. I'm starting to, I'm starting to actually not recognize you looking at the screen. It's so weird. Oh, stop flattering me. I don't know, I was flattering you. But it's okay. Yeah, you can take it that way. Why not? You should make a deep fried pizza. That sounds like a lot of carbs, you guys. So many carbs. Leftover pizza would totally, if I had any like cold pizza, it would have been in the fryer by now. I'd have to go to so many Pilates classes to make up for some pizza. There is. You know, because, yeah. I might even do a couple of bar classes. The hotties and the room full of bodies. Oh, those are awesome. I'm only quoting Madonna. Bar classes are great. They're really expensive. Do you have the pole dancing? No. Is that a different? What is that? No, it's like ballet. No, there's one where they do like pole dancing. Yeah, that's called stripperobics. It is.  And it's like pretty intense stuff because there's like thing upside down where you're gripping and slowly move down the pole. That's fun. It's fun, actually. Yeah. Yeah. And apparently it's a pretty awesome workout. It is an awesome workout. Yeah. Yeah, bar classes are a little too expensive for me. So I get them on YouTube. I might not have an instructor with me telling me what to do, but I get my like, I can do this. Let's do play ice. There we go. On the toes. You know, when you put the question out there, I wonder if you could deep fry a blank. There's not a whole lot that you can. Can you, can you deep fry water? No, it's probably one of the few. Actually, you probably could if it was ice, right? But, well, no, but that's the thing. Like you can freeze stuff and coat it with something else, like a batter and then like you could deep fry butter. You can deep fry a stick of butter. If you freeze it first, batter it. You can deep fry it, but it's actually apparently, you know, I haven't had a chance at it because it's only, my stick of butter has been only freezer for a couple of hours. But I'll find out soon, but apparently it's not that, you know, as amazing as you would think it would be. Like people would. Yeah, you can deep fry ice cream, I've heard, also. Yeah, deep fry ice cream. Any, yeah, any, any state fair. So why couldn't you deep fry ice, you guys? It would splatter a lot. Ah, that's the problem. Yeah. Not a splattering. Hot sizzling, splattering. But how come I've never, this is, this is what I'm going to answer for myself tomorrow. How come I've never heard of deep fried popcorn? That seems like such a natural hit. You're going to put the popcorn in the fryer after it's popped. It probably gets soggy. Yeah. I bet out of this get too oily and soggy. But isn't that what the fryer does is that it usually makes that thing, like you would just think it's. Are you going to put it in batter first? Or you're just going to throw it straight in? Well, I'm going to have to run a couple of runs. I'm going to have to do one run where I just put it in. See what happens. Okay, frita. The next time it's going to be like bread and ham. Just say, did you watch?  And then I'll do it right. Did you watch Arrested Development? No, and I know a lot of people told me that was a great show. And I just couldn't ever get through. Okay. There's a whole running plot line with the, I think it's called the, Oh gosh, what's it called? The corn baller or something like that. It's a bluth product that's a deep fryer and everyone burns their hands on it. I, which I almost did already the deep fryer I got is actually pretty smart. Like you can put stuff in with the lid sort of closing as you put it in. And as you lift it up, the lid sort of opens. You can sort of rest it on top so you can sort of drain. It's like very cleverly designed. But I did as I was tongue, using tongues to get something out of the fryer, which was raised up out of the oil already. Did touch the cage a little bit. But yeah, so it's always possible. You're working with, in this thing, I mean, a lot of people have been hurt by this machine. A lot of people have been hurt. Just horror stories in the past. The plug on the back of it is magnetically adhered. So that with very little resistance, the, the separation of the unit and the plug just separates. You could just, it just separates. Right. So it doesn't, yeah. So you don't like trip on the wire and have spilling oil go everywhere. Right. Also, also the wire itself is like a foot long. They make you put it right next to because it can't, it won't drape down. It's not long enough to go from the unit. It goes from unit to the wall and it's not long enough to drape down because that's happened. Like it, you know, like, and it has like, if it gets over a certain temperature, the thing shuts off. You have to cool the oil, pour it out, go into the screwdriver, pop the bottom, hit a reset button, plug everything back in again to get it to operating it. Like obviously deep friars have, have maimed lots of people because I've never owned any appliance that had so many safety devices and protocols built into it. And in fact, the entire, the entire book that comes with it is one long disclaimer. I mean, it's all safeguards.  Don't use.   Yeah. The only thing it doesn't have is pictures of people who been burned grievously by these things. So, and I don't even understand quite the magnetic connection for the plug because it's not, the back, the base of the power cord, when you, you don't plug it in, literally there's a magnet that keeps it in contact, right? Crazy, right? But at the point where the thing's been plugged in and on and gets like knocked off of a shelf and you know, covers your leg and burning oil, does it really matter that it's not plugged in anymore? I don't, like that part I didn't understand but there's some scenario where maybe a house burned down is, who knows, but I don't know why that one's there. Doesn't quite mean, oh, I think I do know the reason. Now I get it.  That's what I just said. But now, now it just disconnects when you trip over the cord. Yeah, now I'm up to speed though. I have to actually get there through the voice of reason. I have to actually work things out. I'm one of those annoying people. It's like, okay, why are we doing this? No, I literally need to know why I'm doing this. It's not enough to say that's why, how we do it. I need to know why I do things. Like that helps me do these things when I know why I do these things. Like I need to be explained why. So I get it. So it was for accidentally tripping on the cord or pulling the cord or snagging the cord. Now it's a quick release on the cord. Plus the cord is like four inches long. Like you actually have to hold the deep fryer in both hands because the cord isn't long enough to be on the kitchen counter to where the plug is. It's like, if we could get away with no cord, we would do it because this is how people hurt themselves with this machine. But I'm really loving it. I mean, next to my Neanderthal skull, which is my other new acquisition. Are you going to deep fry that? Nothing. No, but if I could. Deep fried Neanderthal skull. No, but if somebody sends me, or if I could get my hands on a bit of frozen mammoth flesh, exactly where it's going straight into the deep fryer. And yes, I will try. And then straight into a vomit bag. Deep fryer, deep fryer cures everything. Kills everything, cures everything. Deep fryer. Rancid flesh, no problem. Okay. Put it in the deep fryer. Dead coughing person has to go to bed. Yeah. And they all like, good night, everyone. Good night, Blair. Like, oh my gosh, it's time for us to go. And I know this moment's been coming for a while, but you know, it's got to happen eventually. So I hope y'all have a really good night. Yeah. All right. I'll try ditzy Justin too. Good night, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for attending our show. Oh my God, are you like from Australia or something? I'm not sure where this accent's from, but oh yeah, now that you said that, now it obviously is from Detroit city. It's the only place where people talk like this.  Is that like, is that like Germany? Where is that? Your timing of this question is, is very, it's totally impeccable. Okay, I'm sorry, sorry. Good night, everyone. No, no, actually it's very impeccable, but I would let it go because it, you know, it's good to see you again, okay? Okay, goodbye. Good night, sweethearts. Well, it's time to go. Good night, sweethearts. I really must say. Good night, sweethearts. Good night. Thanks for watching, everyone. Hope you have a wonderful week. We'll be back next week. Stop broadcast. That's the button.