Category: ScienceNews

Indian authorities have approved the world’s first DNA-based Covid vaccine for emergency use. Not all the data that has led to the opening of the phase 3 trials is yet publicly available, but as public health policy expert Chandrakant Lahariya explains to Roland, it could be a real help in India’s, and the world’s, fight to get things under control.

The origins of the Covid virus were investigated last winter by a WHO team sent to Wuhan – where the first cases were discovered – earlier this year. Their work has since become the subject of intense political scrutiny and some criticism. This week, members of the team including Marian Koopmans have written a rebuttal, setting out the original terms of the investigation and urging the continuation of the process, as she explains to Victoria Gill.

Most of the science written by people from or about the African continent is written in English. Many local African languages do not currently have a meaningful vocabulary for many of the scientific terms and concepts researchers use. This week a team of scientists, journalists, and translators are completing the launch of a project called Decolonise Science, which will take 180 nominated papers posted on the website AfricaArxiv, translate them into 6 African languages including isiZulu, Sothu, and Hausa, and then use Machine Learning methods to build resources for science communication and education in people’s home languages. Project partner Sibusiso Byela explains the thinking.

This week the UK’s Royal Society announced its annual awards. Kenya’s George Warimwe has taken the Africa Award for his work creating vaccines for a virus that creates disease in livestock and humans – Rift Valley Fever. His promising approach stems from years of working with adenovirus technology akin to the AstraZeneca covid virus. But as he explains, his One Health approach is to learn from the immune response in humans and apply it to animals, and vice-versa. The grant associated with the award should also help him and his team pick- up on research left-off before the coronavirus pandemic.

Presenter: Roland Pease Producer: Alex Mansfield

(Image: Getty Images)

Sunflower sea stars play a key role in ocean ecosystems on the West Coast - and they are disappearing in record numbers. Science correspondent Nell Greenfieldboyce tells us about the plight of the Sunflower sea star and one biologist's unique fight to save them.

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Medical transition-related treatments like hormone replacement therapy are associated with overwhelmingly positive outcomes in terms of both physical and mental health for transgender people. But, it can be hard to know exactly how to get started. Reporter James Factora explains where to start, common misconceptions about HRT, and the importance of finding community through the process.

Read James' full reporting for VICE here: "A Beginner's Guide to Hormone Replacement Therapy."

(www.vice.com/en/article/dyv33x/how-to-start-hrt-hormone-replacement-therapy)

If you're just learning about hormone replacement therapy for the first time, welcome! We're so glad you're here. You might want to read about the basics before listening to this episode. We'll be here when you get back!

● "Overview of Feminizing Hormone Therapy," UCSF Transgender Care"

(https://transcare.ucsf.edu/guidelines/feminizing-hormone-therapy)

● "Overview of Masculinizing Hormone Therapy," UCSF Transgender Care

(https://transcare.ucsf.edu/guidelines/masculinizing-therapy)

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(Encore episode) Class is back in session. We're going "back to school" to dig a little deeper on a concept you were taught in school: states of matter. Today, Emily and Maddie explore OTHER states of matter — beyond solid, liquid, gas, and plasma. Martin Zwierlein, professor of physics at Massachusetts Institute for Technology (MIT), discusses his work with ultracold quantum gases and observing superfluid states of matter.

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NPR climate correspondent Lauren Sommer talks with Emily about a dilemma facing many local governments now. Should they develop in areas vulnerable to rising sea levels?

On today's episode, we look at Sunnyvale, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. It's a situation complicated by a landowner that really wants to continue expanding there, Google.

In an episode last week, we asked who should be paying for climate change — taxpayers or private landowners with waterfront property?

For more on this story, including pictures and videos, click here.

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If you’ve ever fallen over and grazed your skin, maybe you wished it were made of stronger stuff. The tough hide of a rhinoceros or the protective armour of a stag beetle would do a better job. It’s a thought that’s been bothering CrowdScience listener Paul, who points out that our skin also suffers from acne, eczema and hives; it dries out; it bruises. In fact, human hide is so vulnerable that we cover our feet in other animals’ skin and our bodies in clothes just to make life more comfortable. Is this really the pinnacle of evolution?

Marnie Chesterton makes the case for the largest, fastest-growing organ, hiding in plain site on our body. Tissue Engineer Professor Sheila MacNeil from Sheffield University explains how skin manages to be breathable yet waterproof; flexible yet stronger than steel; sensitive to touch but protective against pollution and damaging UV. Skin biologist Dr Christina Philippeos from King’s College London explains how our bodies make a scar. Professor Muzlifah Haniffa has developed an atlas of the human skin – a tool to help researchers unravel the mysteries of how different skin cells interact. This atlas should help treat skin diseases in the future. Over in Tanzania’s Regional Dermatology Training Centre in Moshi, Dr Daudi Mavura talks us through a rare but devastating skin disorder called Xeroderma Pigmentosum, or XP. For children with XP, sunlight is dangerous because a mutation in the skin’s DNA repair mechanism means that UV rays can cause lesions and tumours.

Our epidermis is already multifunctional but over at Ben May Department of Cancer Research at the University of Chicago, Professor Xaioyang Wu and colleagues are looking at how much more skin could do. Personalised skin grafts may provide living drug patches to help people manage their disease, addiction or even weight.

With thanks to Dr Lynne MacTavish from Mankwe Wildlife Reserve in South Africa for describing a rhino’s skin.

Produced and presented by Marnie Chesterton.

[Image: Young and Old, dry skin Credit: Eric A. Nelson/Getty Images]

It's summer, which for some means spare time at the beach, splashing in the waves and...building sandcastles. On today's episode, Emily Kwong asks: Scientifically, what is the best way to make a sandcastle? What's the right mix of water and sand to create grand staircases and towers? Sedimentologist Matthew Bennett shares his research — and personal — insights. Happy building!

Wondering what science and engineering are behind other summertime activities? Or just want to share your greatest sandcastle creations? Shoot us an email at shortwave@npr.org.

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The epicentre of the tragic earthquake in Haiti last week was just 100km from that of the even more deadly 2010 one. Unlike then, a network of small cheap seismic detectors run by volunteers is currently monitoring the aftershocks. As Eric Calais says, the suspicion is that this could be the latest in a sequence of quakes, echoing previous clusters over the last few hundred years.

Hydrogen is being much touted as an alternative to natural gas as a source of fuel for homes in a low-carbon world. In particular, “blue” hydrogen – hydrogen made from fossil fuels but with the carbon dioxide being captured at the point of production – is said to be some sort of transitional fuel that could be introduced into current infrastructure with little stress. But Robert Howarth is less optimistic. He is co-author on a paper published last week analysing the net carbon impact of blue hydrogen production. He argues that not only are there hidden greenhouse gas emissions in production, but that in fact burning blue Hydrogen at home could have a worse impact than burning the natural gas from which it is made.

Meanwhile, physicists at the US National Ignition Facility are rumoured to have made a huge stride in the quest for controlled, sustained nuclear fusion. Using a barrage of powerful lasers to heat indirectly a tiny hydrogen isotope target, on the 8th of august, they briefly got 70% of the energy back from one of their runs. It is a huge leap in returns, and tantalisingly suggests some sort of runaway fusion reaction occurred. Around the world, hopes of laser-driven fusion energy generation are soaring, but as an ecstatic Kate Lancaster of the University of York cautions, even if it does represent ignition, we are still a long way from “plug socket efficiency” or net energy gain.

Meanwhile, scientists of the Leibniz Institute evolution and Biodiversity have been eavesdropping on bats in Panama. Human babies babble when they are learning how to talk. It’s been shown before that songbirds do something similar, but according to Ahana Fernandez, it now it seems another mammal joins the babbling ranks – the younglings of the Greater Sac-Winged bat of South America. Ahana tells Roland about her analysis.

(Photo by Reginald Loiussaint/JR/AFP via Getty Images)

Presenter: Roland Pease Producer: Alex Mansfield

Facebook's campus on the shoreline of San Francisco Bay is at risk from rising sea levels. So is a nearby low-income community. That's raising questions about who should be paying for climate change. Taxpayers or private landowners (in this case, some of the world's largest tech companies) with waterfront property? NPR climate correspondent Lauren Sommer explains in the first of two episodes.

For more on this story, including pictures and videos, click here.

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(Encore episode) We chat with National Geographic Explorer and paleontologist Nizar Ibrahim about his team's discovery of the Spinosaurus, the first known swimming dinosaur. The discovery and subsequent modeling showing the effectiveness of the Spinosaurus's tail underwater were detailed in Nature.

And you can check out National Geographic's coverage here.

Our team would love to hear your dinosaur-themed episode ideas. Email us at shortwave@npr.org.

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