Dotted across the Great Basin of the American West are salty, smelly lakes. The largest of these, by far, is the Great Salt Lake in Utah.
But a recent report found that water diversions for farming, climate change and population growth could mean the lake essentially disappears within five years. Less water going in means higher concentrations of salt and minerals, which threatens the crucial ecological role saline lakes play across the West, as well as the health of the people who live nearby.
On today's episode, Kirk takes Short Wave co-host Aaron Scott on an audio field trip to the endangered Great Salt Lake, and explains why losing the lake could be devastating for everyone from brine flies to the humans that live next door.
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Short Wave - Venus And Earth: A Tale Of Two ‘Twins’
Planetary scientists announced some big news this week about our next-door neighbor, Venus. For the first time, they had found direct evidence that Venus has active, ongoing volcanic activity.
"It's a big deal," says Dr. Martha Gilmore, a planetary geologist at Wesleyan University. "It's a big deal in that there are no other planets, actually, where we've seen active volcanism." (Moons don't count - sorry Io!)
What makes that fact so striking is how inhospitable a place Venus is now – crushing pressure, a toxic atmosphere and a surface temperature around 850 degrees Fahrenheit. So, what happened? How did Earth and its closest sibling diverge so sharply?
On today's episode, Martha talks with scientist in residence Regina G. Barber about what studying Venus can tell us about the past and the future of our own planet.
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"It's a big deal," says Dr. Martha Gilmore, a planetary geologist at Wesleyan University. "It's a big deal in that there are no other planets, actually, where we've seen active volcanism." (Moons don't count - sorry Io!)
What makes that fact so striking is how inhospitable a place Venus is now – crushing pressure, a toxic atmosphere and a surface temperature around 850 degrees Fahrenheit. So, what happened? How did Earth and its closest sibling diverge so sharply?
On today's episode, Martha talks with scientist in residence Regina G. Barber about what studying Venus can tell us about the past and the future of our own planet.
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Unexpected Elements - Return of Cyclone Freddy
34 days after it first formed at the far end of the Indian Ocean, record-breaking Cyclone Freddy made a repeat landfall on Mozambique as well as passing over Malawi, causing extensive damage and loss of life. Climate scientists Liz Stephens and Izidine Pinto join Roland to give an update on the destruction and explain how Cyclone Freddy kept going for an exceptionally long time.
At the Third International Human Genome Summit in London last week, Professor Katsuhiko Hayashi announced he had created baby mice from eggs formed by male mouse cells. Dr Nitzan Gonen explains the underlying science, whilst Professor Hank Greely discusses the ethics and future prospects.
And from one rodent story to another, SARS-CoV-2 has been detected in brown rats scurrying around New York sewers. Dr Thomas DeLiberto from the US Department of Agriculture gives Roland the details.
When imagining a robot, a hard-edged, boxy, humanoid figure may spring to mind. But that is about to change.
CrowdScience presenter Alex Lathbridge is on a mission to meet the robots that bend the rules of conventionality. Inspired by how creatures like us have evolved to move, some roboticists are looking to nature to design the next generation of machines. And that means making them softer. But just how soft can a robot really be?
Join Alex as he goes on a wild adventure to answer this question from listener Sarah. He begins his quest at the ‘Hello, Robot’ Exhibition at the Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein, Germany to define what a robot actually is. Amelie Klein, the exhibition curator, states anything can be a robot as long as three specific criteria are met (including a cute cuddly baby seal). With this in mind, Alex meets Professor Andrew Conn from the Bristol Robotics Lab who demonstrates how soft materials like rubber are perfect contenders for machine design as they are tough to break and - importantly for our listener’s question - bendy.
Alex is then thrown into a world of robots that completely change his idea of what machines are. He is shown how conventionally ‘hard’ machines are being modified with touches of softness to totally upgrade what they can do, including flexible ‘muscles’ for robot skeletons and silicon-joined human-like hands at the Soft Robotics Lab run by Professor Robert Katzschmann at ETH Zurich. He is then introduced to robots that are completely soft. Based on natural structures like elephant trunks and slithering snakes, these designs give robots completely new functions, such as the ability to delicately pick fruit and assist with search and rescue operations after earthquakes. Finally, Alex is presented with the idea that, in the future, a robot could be made of materials that are so soft, no trace of machine would remain after its use...
Image credit: Jack McBrams/Getty Images
Producer: Roland Pease Assistant Producer: Sophie Ormiston
Short Wave - Tweeting Directly From Your Brain (And What’s Next)
Our friends at NPR's TED Radio Hour podcast have been pondering some BIG things — specifically, the connection between our physical, mental, and spiritual health. In this special excerpt, what if you could control a device, not with your hand, but with your mind? Host Manoush Zomorodi talks to physician and entrepreneur Tom Oxley about the implantable brain-computer interface that can change the way we think.
Keep an eye on NPR's TED Radio Hour podcast feed the next few weeks, as they unveil the series.
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Keep an eye on NPR's TED Radio Hour podcast feed the next few weeks, as they unveil the series.
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CrowdScience - Can robots be soft?
When imagining a robot, a hard-edged, boxy, humanoid figure may spring to mind. But that is about to change.
CrowdScience presenter Alex Lathbridge is on a mission to meet the robots that bend the rules of conventionality. Inspired by how creatures like us have evolved to move, some roboticists are looking to nature to design the next generation of machines. And that means making them softer. But just how soft can a robot really be?
Join Alex as he goes on a wild adventure to answer this question from listener Sarah. He begins his quest at the ‘Hello, Robot’ Exhibition at the Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein, Germany to define what a robot actually is. Amelie Klein, the exhibition curator, states anything can be a robot as long as three specific criteria are met (including a cute cuddly baby seal). With this in mind, Alex meets Professor Andrew Conn from the Bristol Robotics Lab who demonstrates how soft materials like rubber are perfect contenders for machine design as they are tough to break and - importantly for our listener’s question - bendy.
Alex is then thrown into a world of robots that completely change his idea of what machines are. He is shown how conventionally ‘hard’ machines are being modified with touches of softness to totally upgrade what they can do, including flexible ‘muscles’ for robot skeletons and silicon-joined human-like hands at the Soft Robotics Lab run by Professor Robert Katzschmann at ETH Zurich. He is then introduced to robots that are completely soft. Based on natural structures like elephant trunks and slithering snakes, these designs give robots completely new functions, such as the ability to delicately pick fruit and assist with search and rescue operations after earthquakes. Finally, Alex is presented with the idea that, in the future, a robot could be made of materials that are so soft, no trace of machine would remain after its use...
Presenter: Alex Lathbridge Producer: Julia Ravey
(Image: RoBoa in action on a rooftop in Zurich. Credit: Julia Ravey)
Short Wave - Flying Into Snowstorms … For Science!
For the past few winters, researchers have been intentionally flying into snowstorms. And high in those icy clouds, the team collected all the information they could to understand—how exactly do winter storms work?
With more accurate data could come more accurate predictions about whether a storm would cause treacherous conditions that shut down schools, close roads and cancel flights. NPR science correspondent Nell Greenfieldboyce recently took to the skies for one of these flights and shares her reporting with us today.
Read more of Nell's reporting on this NASA effort: https://n.pr/3lk9utH
Want to hear about other storm chasing happening in the name of science? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
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With more accurate data could come more accurate predictions about whether a storm would cause treacherous conditions that shut down schools, close roads and cancel flights. NPR science correspondent Nell Greenfieldboyce recently took to the skies for one of these flights and shares her reporting with us today.
Read more of Nell's reporting on this NASA effort: https://n.pr/3lk9utH
Want to hear about other storm chasing happening in the name of science? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
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Science In Action - Return of Cyclone Freddy
34 days after it first formed at the far end of the Indian Ocean, record-breaking Cyclone Freddy made a repeat landfall on Mozambique as well as passing over Malawi, causing extensive damage and loss of life. Climate scientists Liz Stephens and Izidine Pinto join Roland to give an update on the destruction and explain how Cyclone Freddy kept going for an exceptionally long time.
At the Third International Human Genome Summit in London last week, Professor Katsuhiko Hayashi announced he had created baby mice from eggs formed by male mouse cells. Dr Nitzan Gonen explains the underlying science, whilst Professor Hank Greely discusses the ethics and future prospects.
And from one rodent story to another, SARS-CoV-2 has been detected in brown rats scurrying around New York sewers. Dr Thomas DeLiberto from the US Department of Agriculture gives Roland the details.
Image credit: Jack McBrams/Getty Images
Producer: Roland Pease Assistant Producer: Sophie Ormiston
Short Wave - Could de-extincting the dodo help struggling species?
As a leading expert on paleogenomics, Beth Shapiro has been hearing the same question ever since she started working on ancient DNA: "The only question that we consistently were asked was, how close are we to bringing a mammoth back to life?"
In the second part of our conversation (listen to yesterday's episode), Beth tells Short Wave co-host Aaron Scott that actually cloning a mammoth is probably not going to happen.
"But there are technologies that will allow us to resurrect extinct traits, to move bits and pieces of genes that might be adapted to a large animal like an elephant living in the Arctic."
That is what companies like Colossal Biosciences and Revive and Restore are trying to do, with Beth's help. And she is leading the effort on another iconic extinct species, the dodo.
In today's episode, how Beth Shapiro's initial work mapping the dodo genome laid the groundwork to bring back a version of it from extinction, and how the knowledge scientists gain from de-extinction could help protect species under threat now.
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In the second part of our conversation (listen to yesterday's episode), Beth tells Short Wave co-host Aaron Scott that actually cloning a mammoth is probably not going to happen.
"But there are technologies that will allow us to resurrect extinct traits, to move bits and pieces of genes that might be adapted to a large animal like an elephant living in the Arctic."
That is what companies like Colossal Biosciences and Revive and Restore are trying to do, with Beth's help. And she is leading the effort on another iconic extinct species, the dodo.
In today's episode, how Beth Shapiro's initial work mapping the dodo genome laid the groundwork to bring back a version of it from extinction, and how the knowledge scientists gain from de-extinction could help protect species under threat now.
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Short Wave - It’s Boom Times In Ancient DNA
Research into very, very old DNA has made huge leaps forward over the last two decades. That has allowed scientists like Beth Shapiro to push the frontier further and further.
"For a long time, we thought, you know, maybe the limit is going to be around 100,000 years [old]. Or, maybe the limit is going to be around 300,000 years," says Shapiro, Professor of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at UC Santa Cruz. "Well, now we've been working with a horse fossil in Alaska that's about 800,000 years old."
Beth's career has spanned the heyday of ancient DNA research, beginning in the late 1990s when rapid genetic sequencing technology was in its early days. She talked with Short Wave co-host Aaron Scott about the expanding range of scientific puzzles the young field is tackling — from new insights into our Neanderthal inheritance to deep questions about ecology and evolution.
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"For a long time, we thought, you know, maybe the limit is going to be around 100,000 years [old]. Or, maybe the limit is going to be around 300,000 years," says Shapiro, Professor of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at UC Santa Cruz. "Well, now we've been working with a horse fossil in Alaska that's about 800,000 years old."
Beth's career has spanned the heyday of ancient DNA research, beginning in the late 1990s when rapid genetic sequencing technology was in its early days. She talked with Short Wave co-host Aaron Scott about the expanding range of scientific puzzles the young field is tackling — from new insights into our Neanderthal inheritance to deep questions about ecology and evolution.
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Short Wave - How To Bake Pi, Mathematically (And Deliciously)
This March 14, Short Wave is celebrating pi ... and pie! We do that with the help of mathematician Eugenia Cheng, Scientist In Residence at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and author of the book How to Bake Pi. We start with a recipe for clotted cream and end, deliciously, at how math is so much more expansive than grade school tests.
Click through to our episode page for the recipes mentioned in this episode.
Plus, Eugenia's been on Short Wave before! To hear more, check out our episode, A Mathematician's Manifesto For Rethinking Gender.
Curious about other math magic? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
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Click through to our episode page for the recipes mentioned in this episode.
Plus, Eugenia's been on Short Wave before! To hear more, check out our episode, A Mathematician's Manifesto For Rethinking Gender.
Curious about other math magic? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
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