24 April, 2014 – This Week in Science – Episode 461

Share

Mann’s Email Protected, Stem Cell Clones, All In The Brain, Monkeys Do Math, It’s A Lifestyle, Reversed And Long, Brains On Space, Microbes On Money, Microbiome Diversity, Cow Poop Dangers, Rural Dirt Good, Yawning As Cooling, Calorie Restriction Efficiency, Quacks, Drops, Impacts, And Much More…

Disclaimer disclaimer disclaimer
The world is nuts…
You’ve seen it, I’ve seen it, we’ve all seen it…
We’ve all been there…
Reading the news, looking at images of what goes on and thinking
to ourselves…
This makes no sense, the world has gone mad…
While research into the madness of the world is on going
The main reason for it is clear enough at this point…
It’s the people, people…
If you take an average of sanity across the animal kingdom
it becomes obvious that we humans are the most insane thing this world has ever
seen…
And with great insanity comes great responsibility
How we utilize the unbridled insanity of a sentient mind
will determine the fate of the future for our planet… and one day, maybe, if we
are insane enough to try… other planets as well…
But in the meantime we can focus our attention to a crazy
little thing called
This week in Science…
Coming up next…

Mann’s Email Protected
Virginia’s Supreme Court ruled that climate researcher, Michael Mann’s, university emails are proprietary and therefore not subject to the Freedom of Information Act.

Stem Cell Clones
Researchers at American research institutions in an experiment funded by the government of South Korea produced stem cell clones from the skin cells of 35 and 75 year-old men. While not a breakthrough, the report shows that it is possible to create stem cells from adult cells for therapeutic purposes.

It’s all in the brain
Bigger brains have better self control

Reversed sex organs in cave insects
Insects found in a cave in Brazil have the opposite sex organs, or gynosomes. But why?

Monkeys do math!
Rhesus monkeys in Harvard have been trained to do simple addition. Yes, that monkey is smarter than you…

It’s a lifestyle…
Female tarantulas are born to cannibalise males, not pushed to do it due to environmental factors. You’re either into it, or not!

Get a free audiobook at Audible.com!

Support us on Patreon!

space is bad for brains
A subset of rats dosed with simulated space radiation suffered dysfunction in their dopamine transport system. Some recovered while others did not. The results have implications for astronauts traveling beyond our planet.

Microbes On My Money
New York money is filled up with over 3000 species of bacteria!

Microbiome Diversity
Your bacteria as an adult are determined by factors you would never expect, like education level.

Cow Poop Dangers
A review of 5 cow manure samples found a surprising diversity of genes for antibiotic resistance. At this point, the genes are only distantly related to the genes for resistance in humans, but there are concerns that resistance could jump via gene transfer. Future studies will investigate this possibility.

rural dirt is good for you
More research suggests that exposure to country dirt is good for your health.

Yawning as Brain Cooling
Researchers observed more yawning during the summer than in winter suggesting that maybe yawning is a mechanism for brain cooling.

Calorie Restriction Efficiency
A biologist suggests that perhaps caloric resitriction works in order to maximize metabolic efficiency and continued reproduction during famine.

Deep Sea Whale Quacks
A sound from the deep sea that has been unidentified since the 1960’s was finally identified by whale researchers as emanating from Minke whales.

Longest-Running Experiment
An experiment that has been running for 114 years just saw its first success, a drop of pitch was finally observed falling. Each of the other 8 drops were missed.

LADEE’s Impact
NASA’s LADEE mission to the moon finished in an unobserved impact on the far-side of the moon last week. The mission functioned to study the lunar atmosphere, and did not have enough fuel to continue to orbit the moon indefinitely.

If You love TWIS, please consider making a donation below. Don’t forget to tell a friend about TWIS, and to check out our Patreon page!

Share

About the Author

I'm the host of this little science show.