Transcript: TWIS.org Jan 19, 2010

Kirsten: This show is brought to you by listeners like you and your contributions. We couldn’t do it without you. Thanks!

Justin: Disclaimer! Disclaimer! Disclaimer!

The following hour of programming does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the University of California at Davis, KDVS or its sponsors.

Despite this, we have come to know much about the world that we live on – how it was formed, how it was changed and how best we might live upon it. But despite all of our understanding, the earth still holds much of its workings as mystery.

We can predict with great certainty the arrival of a storm front, can foresee how this will affect us, can prepare ourselves for the severity of such an event. Yet, we have no notice in the event of a major tectonic event and are at the mercy of our ability to respond after the fact.

While we witness once again the powerful force of nature and the devastation that she can impart on Haiti, we also remember that this sort of destruction is prevented daily by the work of scientists around the world to foresee the storm, to resist the pandemic, to maximize our production of food and energy.

And though we cannot yet predict tectonic events, we can build structures that withstand their fury. As our hearts go out to the people of Haiti, we recognize the hard work that is being done by the rescue workers there. And let us also acknowledge that without dedication to scientific study of nature, an earthquake is but one devastation we would be heir to here on This Week in Science, coming up next.

Good morning, Kirsten!

Kirsten: Good morning, Justin. Welcome to This Week in Science everyone. It is Tuesday. And we are here at KDVS to bring you the science-y goodness.

Justin just left the room. He’s like, “I’m out of here.” You do the show by yourself. No.

Justin: I’m back.

Kirsten: You’re back. All right.

Justin: I wasn’t going far.

Kirsten: I just – I’d looked up and suddenly there you went out the door.

Yeah, we have lots of science news today, I’m always excited to be here. I brought stories about rainbows and space, alligator breath and smart oil.

Justin: Smart oil. Oh, I heard the smart oil story and it confused me. That’s why I didn’t bring it. I’m like…

Kirsten: What’s going on with that?

Justin: How can that happen?

Kirsten: Yeah, Gradients, Gradients, Gradients.

Justin: What have I got? I’ve got health tips. But you should consult your doctor before listening too.

Kirsten: Great, good disclaimer.

Justin: I’ve got an amazing – something I – one of those – I had no idea that something pretty interesting – a new way of looking at the brain without looking at the brain.

Kirsten: Oh, cool.

Justin: Yeah.

Kirsten: I like that.

Justin: And you brought smart oil?

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: I brought the thinking man’s bacteria.

Kirsten: All right then, oil versus bacteria.

Justin: Well, we’ll have it though.

Kirsten: One and two’s. Two enter, one shall win. I don’t know, just making things up.

Justin: Oh, and a little bit of future space news.

Kirsten: Future space?

Justin: Future space.

Kirsten: Yeah, well, I just want to – I would like to say to everyone out there, I don’t know where you are right now. But here in California, it’s awfully stormy and rainy. And just be careful if you’re listening to this in your car while driving.

Justin: Beware of trees.

Kirsten: Beware of trees.

Justin: Trees are not your friend today. I watched some…

Kirsten: And other cars and just general distractions on the road because it’s a dangerous world out there.

Justin: Yeah, I’d – walking in here, I witnessed a student an inch away from death. Inch away. This is like branches came crumbling out of a tree. Tumbling down, crashed on the sidewalk right next to him. It kind of got him to just kind of like a, “Oh. Really,” kind of look and just kept walking. And…

Kirsten: He’s in touch with this own mortality. It’s fine.

Justin: I think he was probably heading to the coffee shop and hadn’t like, you know, fully realized…

Kirsten: He didn’t realized.

Justin: …the pile that is…

Kirsten: Yes.

Justin: But, you know, a couple of more seconds of sleeping in or maybe, you know, if he’d gotten up a little earlier, either way. He might have been done for.

Kirsten: Man.

Justin: That close.

Kirsten: That close. And he’s probably, you know, not until after the coffee was consumed thinking about the actual peril.

Justin: Yeah.

Kirsten: Maybe, “Oh, gee, maybe that wasn’t so great.”

Justin: What can you do though, it’s a tree. You have to walk around the trees today. And then there was a driveway that it was told there was a branch that had fallen in front of this driveway. And I saw the branch and it’s a tree. It’s like, it’s coming off of like, you know, 50-year old tree, it’s a giant limb.

Kirsten: It’s all perspective, people.

Justin: Yeah.

Kirsten: It’s all perspective.

Justin: So be careful out there.

Kirsten: Be careful out there.

And let’s get down to it. The big news for the week is Haiti. Haiti is really the big news of the week in talking about perils and danger. There are a lot of people who are really in trouble there.

And in thinking about what’s happening in Haiti and the disaster response teams that are headed there. And are there currently trying to help other people. I just – I was doing some thinking and have a little bit of a rant.

Justin: All right.

Kirsten: I know, yeah. I mean this is This Week in Science and we could discuss the science of the earthquakes but we won’t because really there is nothing that we can do to stop earthquakes from occurring. And, you know, we could discuss the political issues at play because we do discuss that occasionally.

For instance, Popular Mechanics reported that geologists warned the Haitian government that they were at extreme risk of an imminent earthquake of – they estimated 7.2 – I think was the…

Justin: Wow!

Kirsten: …earthquake.

Justin: That’s pretty close.

Kirsten: Yeah, very close. And should – and they warned that the government should take measures to reinforce response-critical buildings like hospitals. That didn’t happen. Some of the first buildings that went down were hospital – the first one was a hospital to be destroyed.

You know, and so we’re seeing the aftermath of not making the appropriate preventive – taking the appropriate preventive measures.

Justin: Not listening to your scientists.

Kirsten: Yeah, but really what I’d like to talk about right now is an interesting battle that I’ve noticed taking place. And I don’t know how widely this battle is taking place but that I’ve noticed through Twitter and the blogosphere that’s on the field of disaster response medicine that is based in science.

So, Doctors Without Borders, UNICEF, the Red Cross and several other organizations are sending people by the hundreds, by the thousands to Haiti to help respond to their – some people’s medical needs.

And they’re going to be bringing with them scientifically proven treatments and supplies, right?

Justin: Mm hmm.

Kirsten: Yeah.

And so, they’re going need lots of supplies to treat all the wounded and sick. Interestingly and I just don’t – sometimes I don’t see where people are coming from. It’s usually people in the rich western world who can come up with things like this.

But there are people who – from the homeopathy camp that are suggesting that emergency homeopathy kits and homeopaths should be sent to the front lines to help out.

And I think this is a pretty dangerous suggestion. And it’s actually very irresponsible. Maybe not in the minds of the people who are suggesting it because they truly believe in what homeopathy is suppose to offer.

But the successes that homeopathy is supposed to boast are based on the placebo effect. They don’t actually treat anything. They don’t actually protect from disease.

So, suggesting that something based on the placebo effect is going to help the hundreds of thousands who are sick and wounded or in peril of becoming sick with the imminent infectious diseases that are going to be popping up is very irresponsible.

I mean, it’s a situation where, you know, are you going to accept these remedies as part of a disaster response regime when people’s lives are on the line, is that acceptable?

Justin: Well, the first thing I’ve thought of over that is like, who are you sending, what are you sending and how much of the actual aid are you jamming up if you’re trying to land an airplane or trying to dock a ship? I mean…

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: It can only have a negative effect there regardless of the actual treatments that you’re bringing. Another for instance which, well, I probably shouldn’t say it but if instead of a homeopathy, if you have large prayer groups who are trying to get to the scene to immediately begin praying at the sight of the earthquakes.

And using up the resources and the, you know, the ability – I mean the biggest problem they have right now isn’t in that they don’t have the resources there to help at this point, the medications, the food. It’s actually the logistics.

Kirsten: Yeah.

Justin: It’s the biggest log jam. It’s getting stuff in to a broken airport through a broken city to places that they might not be able to reach by vehicle or even, you know.

Kirsten: Yeah, so when proven – when result-proven treatments, result-proven medical personnel are being hindered from accessing this location by people who have the best of intentions but might not necessarily be having the best of results.

It’s, you know, it’s a very…

Justin: Yeah.

Kirsten: …interesting conundrum.

Justin: I don’t know if that makes it the best of intentions.

Kirsten: No, they do have the best of intentions but they’re not – it’s just not considering all the after effects.

Justin: My intention is to make money by gambling heavily. I don’t know if you can say, “Well, you know, Justin intended to make a living for himself by going broke at gambling.”

Yeah, I don’t know if you can really – nobody says that.

Kirsten: You would have the best of intentions.

Justin: Oh, it’s not the best of intentions. It’s just wrong thinking.

Kirsten: Yeah. So scientifically, what is the support for homeopathy? The support for homeopathy is that it works in terms of a placebo effect. And that is the only – every review that’s taken place has shown that the placebo effect is really how it works.

We have somebody calling in. I wonder what they have to say.

Justin: Good morning TWIS minion. You are on the air with This Week in Science.

Bradley: Hi, good morning guys. This is TWIS minion Bradley from the Midwest.

Justin: Good morning, Bradley.

Bradley: How are you guys this morning?

Justin: Doing good.

Kirsten: Great.

Bradley: Hey, I just wanted to chime in and, you know, I fully agree with your stance on homeopathy and the, you know, and obviously some of these groups may have great intentions.

I just wanted to give a shout out if nothing else to the pharmaceutical companies both generic, you know, and major brands that have stepped up to donate life-saving drugs. And I think that those, like you said, are the most important supplies that…

Justin: Right.

Bradley: …proven techniques, the proven medications and cures. And there needs to be a distinction drawn. And you’re right, there needs to be strategy on the ground. So it’s unfortunate that they’re clogging those things up but if – I think you make a very valid point.

Justin: Thank you.

Kirsten: Thank you.

Justin: That’s a good shout out because yeah, there’s not a lot of credit being given to pharmaceutical companies on a lot of fronts this days. And that is…

Kirsten: Great.

Justin: …that is a huge, good-spirited undertaking there.

Kirsten: Yup. Thank you very much for calling, Bradley.

Justin: Yeah, thanks for checking in.

Kirsten: Yeah. And on another front there, in terms of the medications, vaccination is a huge issue. And it’s a tetanus from the science-based medicine blog, sciencebasedmedicine.org.

There is a blog entry that reports that tetanus vaccination rates in Haiti are only about 50% of children. Tetanus caused by Clostridium tetani is, you know, it’s endemic. It’s normally not much of an issue.

But when you have a situation where people have wounds and there’s not a lot of medical care to clean them out, this can be easily infected by the Clostridium bacteria.

And so, tetanus usually becomes a problem and it’s been shown to be a problem after other damaging earthquakes in Chile and Cashmere and the tsunami in Indonesia.

It becomes a problem. And so, vaccination is something that can actually prevent tetanus from becoming an issue. It causes death in nearly 100% of untreated cases. And even those who are treated, it’s still very high in its mortality rates.

So, in order – in these areas that have less available medical facilities, treatments, medications, you know, vaccination is one of the things that can actually help to prevent the incidence of stuff like tetanus when these disasters occur.

You know, so it’s – the last statement from the science-based medicine blog is if anti-vaccination activists succeed in influencing the policies of the US and other governments as other fringe health activists have done, they may become morally complicit in the deaths of thousands of Haitians.

So, not necessarily in these particular incidents but maybe, you know…

Justin: There’s a big general, all right. Yeah. For me the lowest moment of my appreciation of Barack Obama…

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: …was some statement he was talking about vaccinations and they’re asking him his stance on it. And he said something about having reservations himself about vaccinating.

And I was just like, oh, geez.

Kirsten: Yeah.

Justin: You know, that’s uh. I mean, it’s a – I need to hire whoever is doing this campaign to like promote our show…

Kirsten: It’s a good…

Justin: …because they got all the way to the top. I mean…

Kirsten: Yup, yup. All the way to the top.

So, the bottom line is, you know, if you’re not going to accept homeopathic remedies as part of medical disaster response regimes in these – in situations like what’s happening in Haiti, why accept them at all? So, it’s something that you – that people should really think about.

Justin: Mm hmm.

Kirsten: And in the meantime, consider donating or offering support to the relief response organizations that are out there in some way. Doctors Without Borders is one organization that can definitely use some assistance.

And money isn’t necessarily the only thing that you can offer. If you have spare air miles that you’ve amassed from flying for business trips or whatever it has to be, you can transfer those to other people.

And there’s an organization actually, the National Nurses United is trying to send a bunch of nurses to Haiti. I have a friend who’s actually working on that. He said that, “You can transfer your air miles from person to person.” So, you can actually help somebody get down to Haiti who has medical training and can actually start running when they get their feet on the ground.

Justin: And if you’re an airline, consider letting the nurses fly free.

Kirsten: Consider it, consider it. Yeah. So, anyway that was my little rant on responsibility and medicine and science for the morning. I’m done.

Justin: That’s it, you’re done?

Kirsten: For now.

Justin: Kirsten has left the room.

Kirsten: For now. No – yeah, I’m leaving. It’s time. I’m gone.

Justin: All right, well, from homeopathy to a new remedy.

Kirsten: We like new remedies.

Justin: This one’s – that’s a remedy, yes. Here it is, taking both calcium and the vitamin D supplements on a daily basis will reduce the risk of bone fractures regardless of whether a person is young, old, male, female, has had fractures in the past or not.

“Large study which has included some 70,000 patients from throughout the United States and Europe – what is important about this very large study is that it goes a long way towards resolving conflicting evidence about the role of vitamin D either alone or in combination with calcium in reducing fractures,” says John Robbins, professor of internal medicine at UC Davis. He is a co-author of the journal’s article.

“Our research included more than 1000 healthy” – this is the local research – “included more than 1000 healthy post menopausal women and concluded taking calcium and vitamin D together, helped them preserve bone health and prevent fractures. The latest analysis, because it incorporates so many more people, really confirms our previous earlier conclusions.”

So, this was led by researchers at Copenhagen University, Denmark. An international team analyzed results of seven large clinical studies from around the world to assess this effectiveness of either Vitamin D alone or with calcium in reducing fractures amongst people averaging 70 years or older.

And it could not – the research could not identify any significant effects for people who only took vitamin D. This is very important because vitamin D is getting a lot of buzz.

Kirsten: Yeah, yeah, take vitamin D.

Justin: It’s the wonder vitamin.

Kirsten: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Everyone who is deficient in vitamin D, you need to take it. It’s going to solve everything.

Justin: You got it because you don’t go out into the sun anymore.

Kirsten: Yeah.

Justin: To spend the day out there to get it all, right? And so, yeah, but this is really interesting part. The researchers could not identify any significant effects for people who only took the vitamin D supplements.

So, it was the combination then that was the trick. Those trials were primarily designed to study the effect of calcium and vitamin D supplements in preventing hip fractures. And one of the – it was like a 15-year study in one of these. The secondary objective of testing supplements on spine and other types of fractures is well on colorectal cancer.

So anyway, this is some interesting statistics. Eighty percent of people who get osteoporosis are women. And that’s four out of ten women over the age of 50 will experience a fracture of the hip.

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: Four out of ten women will…

Kirsten: It’s a lot.

Justin: …hip fracture? Geez.

Kirsten: Yay, I’m looking forward to getting old.

Justin: Well it’s hip – oh, I’m sorry. It’s hip, spine or wrist…

Kirsten: Yeah, awesome.

Justin: …in their lifetime, which you may have already broken a few bones doing the hi-ya karate chops on blocks of cement there.

The osteoporosis-related fractures are responsible…

Kirsten: Yeah, back rib.

Justin: …for approximately $19 billion in health-related costs in 2005 alone. Wooh.

Kirsten: Significant part of the healthcare industry. So vitamin D and what is the…

Justin: Calcium, you cannot…

Kirsten: Vitamin D and calcium…

Justin: Right.

Kirsten: …must be taken in conjunction.

Justin: Right, vitamin D alone? Not so much.

Kirsten: Alright.

Justin: Not so much of a difference.

Kirsten: All right, good to know. Thanks, science.

Justin: Thank you science.

Good to have Kirsten here watching my manners, huh? All the time.

Kirsten: That’s great. That’s right. Remember to say please and thank you.

Justin: Now?

Kirsten: No, it’s okay. It’s a rainbow of planets out there.

Justin: A rainbow of planets?

Kirsten: It’s a rainbow of planets, that’s right.

Yes, researchers looking at exoplanets. They’ve looked at a particular star, HR 8799, it’s about 1 1/2 times the mass of the sun. And it has a planetary system that’s like our solar system but just bigger, you know, scaled-up – a little bigger. It has three very large gas planets, gas giants that have masses between seven and ten times that of Jupiter.

So, everything is just a little bigger. It’s like – if we were hanging out there we would be the little people in the land of the giants.

Yes. And these planets according to this article from the European Space Agency are between 20 and 70 times as far from their host star as the earth is from the sun.

So – and they also have interesting belts of objects. So, kind of like our Oort cloud and our Kuiper belt in our solar system. It also has very similar belts of smaller objects.

So, it’s kind of interesting to take a look at this kind of a solar system as a model for solar system formation. You know, is this something that’s common between many solar systems?

One of the team members, Carolina Bergfors says, “Our target was the middle planet of the three – it’s kind of like the three bears – was the middle planet of the three which is roughly ten times more massive than Jupiter and it has a temperature of about 800 degree celcius.

Justin: I’m not going there.

Kirsten: Great to melt a marshmallow.

After more than five hours of exposure time, we were able to tease out the planet’s spectrum from the host star’s much brighter light. And the researchers has this wonderful analogy. They say, it’s like trying to figure out the composition of a candle flame or see what a candle is made of by observing it from a distance of 2 kms. when it’s next to a blindingly bright 300 Watt lamp.

Justin: Wow!

Kirsten: Yeah, so imagine trying to do that. And – but they’re doing that with this planet on a solar system.

So, what they were trying to do is figure out, okay what – with different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, we have the visible light spectrum. And then the visible light spectrum – we can actually figure out what chemicals might be reflecting light or emitting light as we look at what color we can see.

And so, with the different sensors and devices that we have, we are able to get – researchers are actually able to figure out – to be able to distinguish between thousands of different wavelengths of light and thus thousands of different possible chemicals to be able to figure out the composition of these spectra.

And so using this, they used NaCo on the VLT which is an infrared instrument which is on the ESOs – European Space Organization’s Very Large Telescope – they obtained an image in a spectrum of this object, of this planet. And they were able to figure out what it’s made up of. And in looking at it, they are finding that it is making them ask a bunch of questions now because it wasn’t exactly what they expected.

And so, of course this is what always happens, researchers have an idea of how solar systems form, what planets are made up of and how things work. And then they do a little bit deeper research. And suddenly, “Oh, it’s a little different than we thought. We’re going to have to change our models. Go back to the drawing board, try it again and then we figure things out.”

So anyway, it’s back to the drawing board. Back to the drawing board. But they’re going to be figuring out more and more about how the planet formed and what they’re looking forward to in the future is being able to find telltale signs of the presence of life.

So now, with this chemical composition they can start looking at all sorts of other planets and figuring out, distinguishing what’s actually in the gaseous components. What is in the atmospheres of these exoplanets. And whether or not they are very similar to our own.

Justin: Super cool.

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: There’s a great – this is somewhat sideways but there’s a great website they stumbled on a while back. Not a website, it’s a YouTube video where somebody’s done a computer generated look of the rings of Saturn as though the earth had Saturn’s rings.

Kirsten: Oh yeah, I’ve seen that.

Justin: Right. So if – right…

Kirsten: That’s interesting.

Justin: If earth had Saturn’s rings, it’s actually visible during the day even. So, lots of great shots from different latitudes and longitudes where there’s like, you know, you can see the – how big it is if you go – the further north you go, the sort of larger and more visible it is.

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: So, you can see it quite disappear.

Kirsten: And if you’re at the equator, it’s this really thin strip.

Justin: Really a couple of line across the sky.

Kirsten: Yeah, across your sky.

Justin: They did a really good job. I’ve convince – for a moment I had my son convinced I’d taken these photos from Saturn. Until he saw the Eiffel Tower and was like, “Papa, there’s not a France on Saturn.” “Well, Maybe not.”

Kirsten: You have a very observant child.

Justin: Are we about to go to the…

Kirsten: Yeah, tell me a story.

Justin: Okay, I’m going to tease her out before we go to the break then.

Kirsten: Okay.

Justin: Could a simple, inexpensive eye test detect and diagnose major neurological diseases such as Alzheimer’s in earlier stage than is currently possible? Can it? You’ll have to wait until after the break to find out.

Kirsten: That’s right. And we’ll be right back with more This Week in Science in just a few moments, stay tuned.

Justin: Thank you for listening to TWIS. If you rely on this show for weekly science-y updates, please understand that we rely on your support to keep bringing those to you.

Donate. Keep the science-y goodness on the air. We’ve made it very easy for you. Go to our website, www.twis.org. Click on the button that will allow you to donate $2, $5, $10. Or if you like you can donate any amount of money you choose as many times as you like.

Again, just go to www.twis.org and donate today. We need your support and we thank you in advance for it.

Kirsten: I’d like to remind everyone that the TWIS Book Club is reading The Canon by Natalie Angier this month. Yeah, so if you want to get involved in reading some science-y books in a community kind of way, you can head over to twisbookclub.ning.com.

Kirsten: Roundy round. I can’t help but sing along with Monty’s song, Roundy Round.

Justin: Monty Harper.

Kirsten: Monty Harper.

Justin: He has a bunch of great songs.

Kirsten: He does. And this is off of the 2009 TWIS science music compilation as was our earlier theme, the TWIS theme by Unbalanced Wheel. And we are going to be making a 2010 science music compilation full of your music.

Justin: Cool!

Kirsten: Yes, your music and not other people’s music. Your music.

So, if you’re a musician or you know somebody who is and is interested and/or you are interested in, you know, coming up with a science-y song for our fund-raiser CD, then send me an email, kirsten@thisweekinscience.com because the more science-y music, the better.

Justin: I think to get Monty to dedicate another song. He’s got this Take Me to Your Library song.

Kirsten: Take Me to Your Library…

Justin: It rocks. That’s awesome.

Kirsten: I love it. I also like to give a quick shout out to those of you that are out there on Twitter, there’s (Davis GA) – I don’t know if I got that right and (Janoodle) who are both listening to TWIS live right now from the UK.

Hi there, yeah, you’re listening. Keep on listening.

Justin: Did you just American it up a little bit more, “Hi there, over there across the town.”

Kirsten: I totally did. I absolutely did.

Justin: All right. At the end of the last half of the first part of the show, I teasered out a headline. Could a simple and inexpensive eye test detect and diagnose major neurological diseases such as Alzheimer’s at a much earlier stage than is currently possible?

The answer, no.

Kirsten: No. Ooopps, okay.

Justin: Next story. Wait, no.

That was until researchers – research led by professor Francesca Cordeiro and Stephen Moss published their paper in cell death and disease. Demonstrating a new technique that will enable retinal and therefore brain cell death to be directly measured in real time.

Just opening up. This is opening up a whole thing – one of those like, “I didn’t, I had no idea.” But apparently, the way they’re presenting this is that the retina is basically – can show you what’s going on in the whole brain. It’s connected.

Kirsten: That I find – it is connected. I mean, retinal cells do directly connect to, you know, into the visual cortex. It’s the visual area of the brain. The retinal cells – light hits and bam you’re in the brain.

So, yeah I can see that. But at the same time it’s also very externally located. So, I don’t know. I think that’s – I think I would have to wait for more evidence that the retinal cells are really indicative of what’s happening internally in the brain to other – to areas the brain that get damaged by things like Alzheimer’s.

And, yeah, anyway, yeah.

We have a caller. Let’s see what they have to – they went away. Okay never mind.

Justin: I hit the wrong button perhaps.

Kirsten: They hung up on you.

Justin: Yeah, the shame of it – let’s see – where is the thing where they say that, okay.

Here it is. This is Francesca, I believe saying, “Few people realize that the retina is a direct albeit thin extension of the brain.”

Kirsten: Yeah.

Justin: That’s a very interesting way of putting it – an extension of the brain. “It is entirely possible that in the future a visit to a high-street optician to check on your eyesight will also check the state of your brain.”

What they’re doing is they’re using this laser to actually – to track cells and I guess the degenerations – so if you have retinals cells that are degenerating at a certain rate…

Kirsten: Yeah.

Justin: …that may indicate that it is taking place all the way back.

Kirsten: It may indicate.

Justin: Mm hmm.

Kirsten: But yeah, I’m questioning this.

Justin: This is Professor Cordeiro, “The death of nerve cells is the key event in all neuro-degenerative disorders”. Until now, it has not been possible to study cell death in real time. This technique means we should be able to directly observe retinal nerve cell death in patients.

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: Which has a number of advantages in terms of making an effective diagnosis. So it could be – this could be critically important since identification of the early stages could lead to successful reversal of the disease progression with treatment.

And apparently it’s been working in rats and mice.

Kirsten: All right.

Justin: So far.

Kirsten: I don’t know. Yeah, I’d…

Justin: I don’t know it all. So…

Kirsten: Yeah. I think right now, what they can probably say is with these lasers they can track the degeneration of retinal nerve cells.

Justin: You think that’s it?

Kirsten: End of story so far. I think stretching it to include other neuro-degenerative disorders is stretching it. So, anyway that’s all I’m saying.

Justin: I believe you.

Kirsten: I’m thinking more research is necessary.

Justin: It always is.

Kirsten: I know always. More, more. Well, what about smart oil?

Justin: That sounds like an advertising campaign.

Kirsten: But it’s not, it’s not. It’s actually a really interesting study that – so using chemical gradients, the basis of a lot of our world, this researcher in University of Evanston Illinois, he looked at this special oil droplet in which was contained a hexyldecanoic acid. So, it’s mineral oil containing hexyldecanoic acid.

He put the oil in a labyrinth. So, a pretty complex maze actually which people sometimes and rats sometimes have problems navigating. But this oil droplet actually found out the shortest path from the entrance to the exit of the maze.

And how did it do this? Well, at the exit of the maze was another drop of a different acid. So, the diffusion of the acid at the exit through the maze and then also diffusion of the acid – the hexyldecanoic acid – as it moved through from the oil droplet, it created a gradient. So that this gradient of pH differences, hydrogen ion differences from the front to the back of the droplet of mineral oil, actually propelled the droplet forward through the maze.

And because there are going to be certain dead ends through which probably the other acid is not really getting into because that’s not the flow through the maze. The little oil droplet would kind of sniff down paths that arms of the maze that were going to be dead ends and turn around and go back the other way. And it eventually found its way through the maze, just based on these differences in pH.

Justin: Wow! That’s pretty cool.

Kirsten: Yeah, it’s really interesting.

But what it demonstrates is what appears to be from the outside, a primitive intelligence. So, just observing this oil droplet, moving through the maze, you’d say, “Oh, my gosh, it’s sniffing one direction…”

Justin: That’s some kind of crazy alien nano blob.

Kirsten: Right. That there’s something behind it. You know, it’s – there’s some kind of intelligence because it’s obviously making choices, right? Looking from the outside, that’s what you would think. But really these choices are just driven by simple chemical differences in the path of the oil droplet.

So the researcher says that he thinks, you know, he would say the droplet is self-propellant. And what they’re interested in doing, they’d like to develop molecules, these balls of lipids that could navigate pH gradients in the body to be able to deliver drugs to particular areas.

So say, you have a cancer tumor in a place that’s hard to reach and you want to have targeted drug delivery, maybe you could develop specialized lipid cells – lipid molecules that would be able to make it all the way to the cancer and then deliver a drug based on these pH gradients.

Justin: See. That’s why these scientists are brilliant in really doing things in our best interest because all I could think was, “Wow!” If we could kind of scale that up to like some kind of a good bar bet trick. You know, when I put this drop of oil over…

Kirsten: Bar bet.

Justin: …here, it’s going to make it through the maze. Who’s got money on it? I mean that’s – but yeah, you know, solving cancer also might do some good.

Kirsten: Yeah and this does tie into also bacterial “intelligence” in that researchers looking at slime mould, the Physarum polycephalum have been showing – and goes a study out of Hokkaido in Japan. They’ve been showing this physarum to have the ability to solve mazes in a very similar way.

And so, this kind of chemical behavior could be just a very simple mechanism by which simple organisms are able to navigate through their world.

Justin: Mm hmm.

Kirsten: Mm hmm. Yes.

Justin: So this is my counter to oil being smarter than people. No that wasn’t the story. University of Tennessee – this is out of University of Tennessee. They were looking at the ability for bacteria to make sort of complex decision making. They were looking…

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: … at it and they found it. There were some actually complex decision making going on.

Biology typically looks at the common bacteria E. coli as the model for a bacteria’s ability to move actively, independently to do really cool stuff. But Gladys Alexandre, an associate professor at a biochemistry cellular molecular – my tongue has stopped working.

Kirsten: I know. Today is my day.

Justin: At the University of Nashville decided to look at more complex soil bacterium azospirillum brasilense.

Kirsten: Can I see that? You’re just…

Justin: I have no idea. It’s not aspirin – it’s azospirillum brasilense, can’t even find that on that page.

Kirsten: I know. Oh, here. Yeah, azospirillum brasilense.

Justin: Brasilense.

Kirsten: Brasilense.

Justin: Okay.

Kirsten: Yes.

Justin: Can I have my paper back now?

Kirsten: Yes.

Justin: Okay. You smeared my crayon.

Kirsten: Sorry.

Justin: I can’t even read it.

Kirsten: Then take it.

Justin: But, the bacteria is – they decided – what did she do? She decided to look at something else because she said E. coli overall is kind of dominant. There are bacteria that have more complicated systems.

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: They’re usually not studied as heavily as E. coli because we understand E. coli pretty well. It’s kind of obvious to us what E coli is doing in a lot of instances. So it makes it really good to study as well.

But it – what did they do? They used the azospirillum instead and – but they have not been able to study until now is how an individual receptor by – consents its environment. How one little bit of…

Kirsten: Yeah.

Justin: …bacteria knows to do XY or Z because, you know, it’s what the community needs overall.

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: So, one of the things they tried to in the study is isolate and study a receptor. And they focused on the receptors, they suspected a related way a bacteria can convert nitrogen gas from the atmosphere into a form of ammonium that they can then use.

The ability called the nitrogen fixation and while uniquely found in bacteria is critically important to all of us. We all need this system at some point for our cell health. It’s the only way nitrogen actually gets incorporated into our building blocks, our mini cell LEGOs.

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: So, the process is carried out by an enzyme which is damaged by the presence of high concentrations of oxygen which presents a dilemma for the bacterium as energy needed for the process is usually required in the presence of oxygen.

When Alexandre and her team created mutant versions of the bacteria without the receptor, the mutant bacteria were unable to detect where the right position in oxygen concentration was, thereby affecting the nitrogen fixation reaction.

In other words, they were somewhat blind and could not figure out how to get a hold – how to start this process without getting – having it destroyed by oxygen.

Kirsten: Right.

Justin: So, the curiosity expanded then because they were able to uncover receptor’s purpose. Will they then be able to figure out exactly how it functioned? For that they enlisted the help of Oak Ridge National Laboratory distinguished scientist Igor Jouline, an expert in carrying out complex computations of biological systems.

Working with Alexandre’s data, Jouline was able to generate a model of the receptor’s structure, compare it to the structures of others – compare it to other structures on a nearly atom-for-atom basis. Just really to be able to analyze this down to the nth degree.

And this enabled them to predict which one of more than 100 amino acids in the sensory part of the receptor is responsible for sensing the precise oxygen concentration that the bacterium needed for nitrogen fixation. It’s a process that normal genetic techniques would have been – would probably not work.

This has a good long-term potential for the nature – the nature knowledge gained. The knowledge of the nature gained in the study – we see now that bacteria are in their way big thinkers. And by knowing how they feel out their environment, how they sense their environment, we can look at new and different ways to work with them.

What it sort of appears as – what’s the difference between that and a neuron? What is the difference between a bacterium sensing how…

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: …a tactic basically. Having a sensor out there that tells it when it’s the precise right moment to do a function versus having a sense of when to throw the spear or when to, you know, when to do something on our macro level which we feels much more complicated because we have many more neurons dedicated…

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: …to many more specific tasks.

Kirsten: Yeah, that’s what I think is really interesting about looking at things like this so-called smart oil. Looking at how a single receptor affects the behavior of a bacterium.

It’s learning about these very simple mechanisms and how they work that will allow us to understand how our much more complex – just because it’s on orders of scale larger and more complicated that are our systems work.

I mean, when it comes down to it, our cells function in the exact same way. We have receptors that respond to chemical gradients. We have receptors that bind to a certain neuro transmitters or hormones.

And that elicits a particular cellular response. You know, there are cascades of activity within a cell that happen when, you know, some kind of a chemical is bound. And those cascades of activity, they end up in a human being being summed over a huge number of cells acting at the same time either in an inhibitory or in a stimulatory manner.

And so we have what we call behavior. But…

Justin: Right.

Kirsten: …behaviors are possible at a very simple level.

Justin: Right. And behavior can be so – I mean, there is so many – so much of human behavior that can be triggered as easily as…

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: …an on/off, as a receptor there. As an opportunity there, an opportunity not there. It’s just – it’s amazing to me that all of human behavior can be very similar to this chemical reaction.

Kirsten: Mm hmm. Yeah.

But there are, you know, very simple behaviors like the light turns on in the morning and I really just want to roll over and put the pillow over my head, you know. There are cockroaches that do the same thing. “Ah! Light! Run away.” Scurry into the corner.

These behaviors, you know, lots of behaviors have very similar basic mechanisms. And so I think studies like these are really important to just understanding how certain mechanisms and responses have been conserved or changed over time, over evolutionary history with the increasing complexity as evolution has moved forward. Totally.

Justin: And yet we are so, so similar.

Kirsten: Yeah, and yet we are. In the – along the vein of evolution, there’s a new study out. We kind of reported on this before. From the Puget Sound area but this is a study that’s out of the UK looking at killer whales. So, two, two, two species in one.

Justin: Mm hmm.

Kirsten: Maybe.

Justin: Mm hmm.

Kirsten: We don’t know. Scientists think that there is a possibility that killer whales are in the process of splitting into two separate species.

Justin: Wow.

Kirsten: Yeah. Researchers looking at the killer whales in the waters of – around Denmark and the UK and also looking at museum specimens, they looked at the size of specimens and they looked at the behavior of the whales in particular areas of the North Atlantic and the Antarctic – not the Antarctic – the Arctic, sorry.

And they also – they looked at the teeth and the wear pattern on the teeth of killer whales. And what they’ve determined is that there are two types of killer whales. And this is something that we’ve reported on off and on, but I don’t know if it’s actually been supported in this manner from the North Pacific near Washington – Seattle, Washington in the Puget Sound area.

So, Dr. Andy Foote took a look at these whales and their specimens. And he’s found that there’s type 1 – a type 1 form that they found – all had really worn teeth, the adults’ teeth were incredibly worn down.

And type 2 had almost no tooth wear in the adults. And they looked at the behavior of these different whales and they find that type 2 are specialist feeders that feed on marine mammals like dolphins and whales.

And type 1 suck up a vacuum, they like hoover up fish. So their diet is basically herring and mackerel and these fish that they suck up out of the water.

They also found that the type 2 adult males were almost two meters larger than type 1 males. So these meat-eating, mammal-eating type 2 whales were bigger than the fish-loving-sucking type 1 killer whales.

And so, what he is suggesting is that this possibly could be a speciation event that we’re watching, that we’re seeing happen, that where this whales are specializing into the aquatic niches of being able to specialize on feeding on mammals in certain areas or feeding on fish in other areas.

And they’re finding that genetic analysis, these two types actually belong to two completely different populations. The researchers say type 1 specimens were from closely related populations. But the type 2 whales were most closely related to a group of Antarctic killer whales.

Justin: Mm hmm. Interesting.

Kirsten: Yeah, I think it’s really fascinating. There’s – he’s comparing this finding to Galapagos finches and the finding of the finches being able to occupy different ecological niches and diverging in their body traits, their morphology.

Yeah. So, who knows? I mean this is something like in Puget Sound, this has been observed where there are two completely different populations of whales. And there is a response to the calls of the different populations of whales where when seals in the bay actually hear the meat-eaters coming, they get out of the area.

And so, there’s actually a – like the whales are actually causing a predator-prey divergence as well whereas the fish eaters are not feared by the dolphins and seals in the Puget Sound area.

So, it’s kind of interesting that they’re finding this in different areas of the world.

Justin: And what does that say about the memory or the communication where it becomes learned by entire group ongoing that one…

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: …whale sound is dangerous and one is not.

Kirsten: Mm hmm.

Justin: I mean, how do you – I mean how do seals talk about that?

Kirsten: That’s just, you know, “Run away! Ah!”

Justin: And it’s like, “Oh no, we know these ones. They’re cool. These are the good Orca.”

Kirsten: Yeah. We’re almost done with our show. The show always goes way, way, way too quickly.

One of my favorite stories from this week was a finding that alligators breathe like birds. And an analysis of alligator specimens by a researcher has paleontological implications for the evolution of unidirectional bird-like breathing patterns.

Justin: Huh? You mean, air sac thingy in the lungs?

Kirsten: Yeah. But no air sacs in the alligators…

Justin: Nice.

Kirsten: …which is really interesting, which implies that maybe the air sacs in birds don’t have anything to do with the actual unidirectional breathing which is completely different from what many ornithologists have believed for years.

So this is a neat finding. But maybe I’ll – I don’t know maybe we’ll talk about it a little bit next week. And another story that chimps and – in chimps and humans, the Y chromosome is evolving faster than expected. Why is that? What’s going on?

Justin: Mm hmm. Rosetta, the European Space Agency spacecraft just did its gravity slingshot out there into space. It’s going to go out and rendezvous with a – I’m going to learn how to pronounce this next week – with a comet.

Kirsten: Cool.

Justin: Yeah, and it’s going to study it. So we’re going to get an update there mid-2014.

Kirsten: Great. Have some minion mailbag stuff but unfortunately we don’t have the time to get into it. So, I’ll save it for next week.

And in the meantime, remember that the TWIS Book Club is reading Natalie Angier’s “The Canon” this month and you’ve got a couple more weeks to get into it; twisbookclub.ning.com if you want to have a nice community reading experience.

Justin: Thank you for tuning in and listening. We are available via podcast, www.twis.org. For all the subscription needs there, you can just look for us on the iTunes directory under Podcasts under This Week in Science.

Kirsten: That’s right.

And for more information on anything you’ve heard here today, show notes are going to be available on our website, www.twis.org. And we want to hear from you. So email us at kirsten@thisweekinscience.com or justin@thisweekinscience.com.

Justin: And put the TWIS somewhere in the subject or you will be spam filtered into oblivion.

Kirsten: Yeah and we’ll be back here on KDVS next Tuesday at 8:30 am Pacific Time. And we’ll hope you’ll join us for more great science news.

Justin: But if you learned anything from today’s show, remember…

Kirsten: It’s all in your head.

Podcast:http://www.twis.org/audio/2010/01/19/422/