Following anti-tourism protests across popular Spanish cities and towns, we are looking for the world's most unwelcome visitor. Our panellists (and producers) are pitching their terrible tourists to see who really is the worst of them all. Some of our contenders include...
The wild boars who's unanticipated vacay to Rome has gone on for so long and caused so much carnage that researchers are putting them on birth control.
The microbes potentially hitching a ride to the moon via space probes and astronauts' poo
The multi-destination parasite who wreaks havoc as it interrails through snails (castrating them on the way), frogs (making them spout multiple limbs) and birds.
But there are some instances when tourists can be a good thing - and this is especially the case in the human body when we want to grow a baby. How is in that we are able to protect what should be an 'unwelcome visitor' from a hyperalert, hostile immune system? Our expert Edward Chuong explains.
Plus, we uncover the DNA origins of the world's most popular coffee bean, hear the freeloading activities of the male angular fish, and read out a selection of your wonderful emails.
Presenter: Caroline Steel
Panellists: Phillys Mwatee & Christine Yohannes
Producer: Julia Ravey
Production team: Emily Knight, Noa Dowling
Studio manager: Emma Harth
From Indonesia to Wisconsin, farmers all over the world struggle with a huge problem: pests. On top of that, it's tough for farmers to identify where exactly they have the pests and when. Reporter Lina Tran from NPR member station WUWM in Milwaukee joins host Emily Kwong to tell the story of how researchers in the Midwest are inventing new forms of pest detection that involve eavesdropping on the world of insects. Plus, hear what aphid slurping sounds like.
If you liked this episode, check out behind-the-scenes photos of Insect Eavesdropper experiments in Lina's digital story!
Interested in hearing more insect news? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
In 1977 astronomers recorded a brief and strange radio transmission that looked like it perhaps had even come from an alien civilization. It was named the Wow! signal – because that’s what astronomer Jerry Ehman wrote on the computer printout upon its discovery. But now a team including Abel Méndez of the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo have come up with an astrophysical hypothesis.
An oil tanker which was attacked by Yemen's Houthi rebels in the Red Sea last week is still on fire and may be leaking oil, the US Pentagon says. The talk now is of an agreement to salvage the tanker so a crisis may be avoided, but marine ecologist Carlos Duarte of the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia explains how precious ecosystems are at risk.
A meta-analysis of Mediterranean Sea marine species reveals the profound impact of the Messinian Salinity Crisis. Konstantina Agiadi of the University of Vienna tells us how this drastic environmental event resulted in the almost complete evaporation of the Mediterranean Sea roughly 5.5 million years ago and how the resulting changes still influence ecosystems today.
Wildfires that swept across Canada last year are still burning in some parts. A new study has confirmed that they put into the atmosphere a vast amount of burned carbon, over half a billion tonnes. Only China, India and the USA emitted more fossil-fuel based carbon in that period. Brendan Byrne of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory has been using satellite-based observations to track the carbon release.
Presenter: Roland Pease
Producer: Jonathan Blackwell
Production Coordinator: Andrew Rhys Lewis
(Image: The Wow! signal represented as "6EQUJ5". Credit: NAAPO)
At first glance, the whole narrative of aquatic invasive species may seem straightforward: A bad non-native species comes into a new ecosystem and overruns good native species. But the truth? It's a little more complicated. To tear down everything we thought we knew about invasive species and construct a more nuanced picture, host Emily Kwong talks to experts Ian Pfingsten, who works on the United States Geological Survey's Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database, and Nicholas Reo, a Canada Excellence Research Chair in Coastal Relationalities and Regeneration.
Check out episode where we get into the annual python challenge we referenced in this episode.
Have a favorite invasive species or one you really can't stand? Email us at shortwave@npr.org — we'd love to hear your take!
Human beings are hardwired for social connection – so much so that we think of even the most basic objects as having feelings or experiences. (Yup, we're talking to you, Roomba owners!) Social robots add a layer to this. They're designed to make us feel like they're our friends. They can do things like care for children, the elderly or act as partners. But there's a darker side to them, too. They may encourage us to opt out of authentic, real-life connections, making us feel more isolated. Today on the show, host Regina G. Barber explores the duality of social robots with Eve Herold, author of the bookRobots and the People Who Love Them.
Curious about other innovations in technology? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
New York: The city that never sleeps, the concrete jungle where dreams are made of and more recently ... home to a mysterious ant spreading across the city — before continuing across metropolitan and even state lines. NPR science correspondent Nell Greenfieldboyce joins host Regina G. Barber to trace the MahattAnts' takeover, explain why they're an interesting invasive species case study. Plus, how everyday people can get involved in research efforts to learn more about these critters.
Read more of Nell's ManhattAnt story here.And if you like this story, check out our story on ant amputation! Interested in hearing more animal news? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
Why do we have two eyes? Two ears? Two arms and two legs? Why is one side of the human body – externally at least – pretty much a mirror image of the other side?
CrowdScience listener Kevin from Trinidad and Tobago is intrigued. He wants to know why human beings – and indeed most animals - have a line of symmetry in their bodies. Yet, beyond their flowers and fruits, plants don’t seem to have any obvious symmetry. It seems that they can branch in any direction.
Anand Jagatia sets out to find out why the animal kingdom settled on bilateral symmetry as the ideal body plan. And it takes him into the deep oceans of 570 million years ago. Paleobiologist Dr. Frankie Dunn is his guide to a time when animal life was experimenting with all sorts of different body plans and symmetries.
Frankie shows Anand a fossil of the animals which changed everything. When creatures with bilateral symmetry emerged they began to re-engineer their environment, outcompeting everything else and dooming them to extinction.
Well... nearly everything else. One very successful group of animals which have an utterly different symmetry are the echinoderms. That includes animals with pentaradial - or five-fold - symmetry like starfish and sea urchins. And that body shape poses some intriguing questions... like “where’s a starfish’s head?” Dr. Imran Rahman introduces us to the extraordinary, weird world of echinoderms.
To answer the second part of Kevin’s question - why plants don’t seem to have symmetry – Anand turns to botanist Prof. Sophie Nadot. She tells him that there is symmetry in plants... you just have to know where to look! Beyond flowers and fruits, there’s also symmetry in a plants leaves and stem. The overall shape of a plant might start out symmetrical but environmental factors like wind, the direction of the sun and grazing by animals throws it off-kilter.
And, while the human body may be symmetrical on the outside, when you look inside, it’s a very different story. As listener Kevin says, “our internal organs are a bit all over the place!” Prof. Mike Levin studies the mechanisms which control biological asymmetry. He tells Anand why asymmetry is so important... and also why it’s so difficult to achieve consistently.
Contributors:
Dr. Frankie Dunn, Oxford University Museum of Natural History, UK
Dr. Imran Rahman, Natural History Museum, London, UK
Prof. Sophie Nadot, Université Paris-Saclay, France
Prof. Mike Levin, Tufts University, Massachusetts, USA
Presenter: Anand Jagatia
Producer: Jeremy Grange
Editor: Cathy Edwards
Production Co-ordinator: Ishmael Soriano
Studio Manager: Andrew Garratt
(Image: Orange oakleaf butterfly (Kallima inachus) on tropical flower, Credit: Darrell Gulin/The Image Bank via Getty Images)
The US astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are currently stranded on the ISS. They arrived on the Boeing Starliner, which was meant to bring them home after eight days. Unfortunately, it has run into tech issues, meaning that the astronauts may be stuck up there for up to eight months.
We started to ponder, what could an extended period of being stuck in space do to your body?
Next we look to the world of psychedelics research, which has currently got itself a little bit stuck.
We also find out more about the Haraldskær Woman, discovered preserved in a Danish bog in the 1800s. Mads Ravn, head of archaeology, research and collections at the Vejle Museums in Denmark, reveals the stories behind the bog bodies and explains how they ended up stuck in the mud.
And staying with the theme of stickiness, we find out what Neanderthals used as glue.
That, plus many more Unexpected Elements.
Presenter: Marnie Chesterton, with Camilla Mota and Kai Kupferschmidt
Producer: Harrison Lewis, with Alice Lipscombe-Southwell and Noa Dowling.
Sound engineer: Mike Mallen
Have you ever scrolled through a TikTok without finishing it? Switched between YouTube videos halfway through one or the other? Pressed "fast forward" on a Netflix episode that just wasn't holding your interest? That habit is called "digital switching" — and it might be causing the exact thing you're trying to avoid: boredom. Emily and Regina break that and more of the week's news down with the help of All Things Considered's Ailsa Chang.
Fishery assessment models – the “backbone” of fisheries management – overestimate the sustainability of the world’s fisheries, according to a study of 230 fisheries worldwide, and populations of many overfished species are in far worse condition than has been reported. We hear from Rainer Froese of GEOMAR - Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel.
The lunar south pole contains evidence of ancient magma ocean. An analysis of lunar soil in the Moon’s southern high-latitude regions, performed using data from India’s Chandrayaan-3 mission, suggests the presence of remnants of a former ocean of magma. Roland speaks to Santosh Vadawale of India’s Physical Research Laboratory.
Stefanie Haustein of the School of Information Studies at Ottawa University discusses the article processing costs for open access of the journal publishing giants in science.
The risk of a banana apocalypse could be near, but biologists, including Li-Jun Ma of the University of Massachusetts, might have found a key to their survival. Bananas are facing functional extinction due to the disease Fusarium wilt of banana caused by a fungal pathogen. Discovery of molecular mechanisms used by the banana-destroying microbe brings hope.
Presenter: Roland Pease
Producer: Jonathan Blackwell
Production Coordinator: Andrew Rhys Lewis
(Image: Fisherman emptying net full of fish into hold on trawler. Credit: Monty Rakusen via Getty Images)
