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The BRAIN, Seeing The Tangles, Charting Antibiotic Resistance, Bugs In The Water, Toxo Forever, Eavesdropping Birds, Underwater Monogamy, Touch The Plants, The Air Is Alive, Lengthen Your Life, And Much More…
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This Week in Science… coming up next
The BRAIN!!!
News on how NIH plans to spend its share of money from Obama’s BRAIN Initiative for research on the brain.
Seeing The Tangles
Using a special molecule for binding, scientists were able to image the extent of Tau protein tangling in the brains of individuals with Alzheimer’s disease. This techniques has the potential for aiding in early diagnosis of the disease.
Charting Antibiotic Resistance
Bad news for people. While MRSA is now more under control than in years past, other bacterial species continue to pose problems for public health as they gain antibiotic resistance.
Blood test for respiratory infection?
A new, rapid blood test successfully discerned whether individuals were infected by a virus or bacterium.
Blair’s Animal Corner
Eavesdropping birds
Loner Birds eavesdrop to stay alive.
Get a free audiobook at Audible.com!
Coelacanths are monogamous!
These ancient fishes are loyal to their lover.
Water Plus Heat Equals Biology
The building blocks for life are everywhere. Important amino acids might form when comets hit our atmosphere, according to a recent study.
Alien life?
Or, hoping too much? We think this study might be a stretch.
Lengthen Your Telomeres Naturally?
Don’t read too much into this study, but researchers found a healthy lifestyle led to an increase in telomere length in a small study of men.
Touchy-Feely Plants
Touching plants helps keep them healthy! So go ahead, grope your plants…
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I'm the host of this little science show. 
Hi, Blair. Let’s talk about the Coelacanths and Economics – because laying lots of eggs is NOT wasteful.
…before we go any further, let me be clear that I’m no economist. I’ve done a lot of reading about behavioural economics (should be called ‘evidence-based economics’) and economics (should be called ‘cray-cray nut-bar Ism-ism’) and a lot of other science.
I also wondered why so many acorns fall in my yard. Clearly there are (at least) two ways to approach sexual reproduction. The one most of us are familiar with is to heavily invest in a small number of offspring. This strategy focuses intense effort in maximising the success of a severely limited number of children. The other option is to dump huge numbers of cheap children into the world – and move on.
In terms of risk analysis, these are two strategies for addressing a high probability of progeny failure. Probabilistically having 10 children with 10% chance of surviving to reproduce is the same as having 100 children with a 1% chance of surviving to reproduce – or 1 child with a 100% chance. (No child is guaranteed to reproduce, of course, but we’re dealing with the big round numbers here.)
As a starting point in assessing any reproductive strategy, we should assume that the approach is as efficient as is practical for the environment that the organism evolved in (as far as it’s parent’s generation, in any case). If the strategy wasn’t efficient, the species would be extinct. The exception is found in ‘the parent’s generation’ – if conditions change faster than the rate of reproduction there’s no way to adapt.
This brings up an advantage of the profligate species that don’t care for their young (including all branches of life). A diverse and huge ‘progeny-dump’ will have a large number of dead children as part of the deal. It is also likely to have a small number of children that can survive – or even thrive – in conditions that did not exist when the children were conceived. When the asteroid hits there may be some wild apples that make it due to their diversity. Bananas will have a harder time.
TL;DR: Coelacanths are not wasteful in their reproductive strategy. They are efficient, given their conditions and that natural selection works on a statistically valid scale – not on an individual child.
Great show this week – and by the way, Justin, where can I buy the Book Of Rants? You have some great ones, and this week was especially fun. I’ll pay you for an ebook – or even an Audible reading.
re: the air is alive. So there is life thousands of feet in the air. The author thought that was too high for wind to blow earth based life, so it must have traveled millions of miles though the vacuum and radiation of space? Holy cow, I can’t believe anyone thought this was credible.