Absolute Science Blog

Hiatus

2006-12-11T08:47:00.000-08:00

As many of you have probably gathered by now, Absolute Science is on hiatus.

Each show takes at least 10 hours to produce (and often much more). Between Adam's new job and my unexpected success with the Grammar Girl podcast, we just aren't able to keep up with Absolute Science right now.

I can't express how much we have both enjoyed working on the show and receiving your feedback, questions, and support. We do hope to produce new episodes in the future, but I can't say when (and it's possible that we're delusional).

In the meantime, I'll probably post interesting science stories here on the blog.

Mignon

Sex in Space Update

2006-10-21T22:20:00.000-07:00

There's an interesting story out today that relates to the "Sex in Space" podcast we did recently:

NASA has announced a time-table for building a permanent base on the moon. They hope to have a fully functional moon base by 2024. Of course, this means people will spend time there, and some of those people will be women. Let's hope that as more and more people live in space, NASA will lose the puritanical notions and plan for the idea that humans will engage in normal behavior and that pregnancies could result.

Also of note, the Space Tourism Society will be holding a big space tourism conference in April 2007 in Los Angeles.

Episode 11: Update

2006-10-08T11:28:00.000-07:00

Glen wrote in with this clarification about Episode 11: Deconstructing Scientific Fraud:

You and Adam's podcast regarding Deconstructing Scientific Fraud
inspired me to write about this on my assigned topic English research
paper, "What is Academic Integrity?"

While doing heavy research into many articles, I noticed a
discrepancy with something that you and Adam had mentioned. It's a
small point, but I thought I'd point it out. It is true that Dr. Jon
Sudbo created data consisting of 250 out of 908 patients with the same
birthday. However, the reason he was caught was actually because he
claimed he had gathered information from a National Database that
wasn't yet available at the time he was doing his research.

Thanks for the info Glen!

Sulfur, Ice Cores, Conservation, Death

2006-09-18T10:59:00.000-07:00

BACK TO HOME

Listen Now

Thank you to our sponsor for this episode. Showtime's new series: Dexter

Science Magazine: Stuart Wills
From the Science Now section of Science Magazine, Wills discusses research that could slow down global warming long enough to give humans a chance to reduce carbon emissions enough to make a difference in climate. Courtesy the the Science Magazine Podcast.

Professor Richard Alley
Dr. Alley talks about how scientists use ice cores to read climate, and comments on the previous news story about slowing down global warming.

Book Review
Phillip Manning of Scibooks reviews Why Conservation is Failing and How It Can Regain Ground, by Eric Freyfogle.

Get Involved
Take action to help save the so-called "Tripoli Six" medical workers facing the death penalty in Libya for accidentally infecting children with dirty needles carrying HIV. Thank you to the Nature Podcast, September 21, 2006, for providing the audio clip.

Shout Outs
Rhyse
PowerPoint Samauri (who both liked the music last week)
James (who I swear to that one day I will remember to include his great sweating info)

Diversions

Ultra Deep Field images from the Hubble Telescope "The deepest view into the sky by humankind to date."
A brain cell versus the universe

UPDATE: A listener (Greg) sent in this link to a nearly complete transcript of Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth.

%^$@% Liars (aka The Disgruntled Episode)

2006-09-02T10:41:00.000-07:00

Biotech CEO Hypes His Research

Boy am I ticked! It turns out that Robert Lanza, the CEO of Advanced Cell Technologies pretty much lied in the clip I played for you in the last episode. Here's what he said: "What we have done, for the first time, is to actually create human embryonic stem cells without destroying the embryo itself." Yeah, well, that's pretty much just a straight out lie.

Very quickly it became apparent that the company had destroyed the embryos during the experiment. The good news was that as a registered member of the press, I received the correction from Nature Magazine almost immediately, and Nature also published an article on their website describing the discrepancy. Still, I was really surprised that Nature didn't mention it in their next podcast. Their podcast was my source for the audio clip, and given that the podcast is where Lanza made his bogus statement, I would have expected them to make a correction in the podcast.

Here's the bottom line. The paper itself appears to be accurate, showing that they took cells from blastocysts that were destroyed and used single cells to make stem cell lines. In theory, this implies that it should be possible to take single cells from blastocysts and make stem cell lines without destroying embryos, but they haven't actually proved that yet. They haven't done it. They've just shown that it should be able to be done. The problem is that in every communication other than the paper itself -- in the abstract, the press release, and the interviews that Lanza gave -- they misled the public.

It's a really stupid, annoying move on the part of the company that just contributes to the erosion of public trust in scientists, and casts a shadow of suspicion on all stem cell research that comes out in the future. So, way to go Robert Lanza and Advanced Cell Technologies, you've done a big disservice to your entire field.

Interview/Listener Question

John in Helendale asked, "How can researchers really know what the climate was like so far into the past?" With thanks to Bruce at ORNL, we hooked up with Dr. Reid Bryson, a Senior Scientist, Center for Climatic Research at the University of Wisconsin, to answer that question.

News

Cervical Cancer Vaccine

Remember Merck's cervical cancer vaccine, Gardasil, was hailed as a major breakthrough? Supposedly doctors in the U.S. are waiting for insurance companies to start covering the vaccine before recommending it to patients. Way to put money ahead of health people. Article (sub. req.) - Source Fierce Biotech

Stem Cells

Here's another stem cell story. Honestly, I'm getting tired of stem cells. OK, the BBC reported that British authorities have had to warn people against going to other countries, supposedly especially the Netherlands, where companies are making extravagant claims about miracle stem cell cures. They warned that the treatments for conditions like multiple sclerosis were dangerous and unproven. But here's what really gets me: The final quote in the article quotes a Professor Colin Blakemore, as saying that patients who seek these treatments are endangering the field of stem cell research because if they get cancer or something from the treatment, it could set the whole field back. Yeah Blakemore, it's the patients who believe the false promises who are going to hurt the field, not the scoundrels who make the claims in the first place. God, let's just hope he was quoted out of context, because if not that's really ridiculous.

Shout Outs & Administrative

I apologize, I don't have any shout outs this week. My computer crashed and I lost the file where I had been saving everyone's names. But do know that we really appreciate it when you write in and I do still have any questions and topic ideas that you submitted because I keep those in a separate file.

Also, we're not podfading, but I just can't tell you what kind of schedule the show is going to be on for a while. It could be one a week or it could be once a month, it kind of depends on Adam's availability and our both of our work schedules. So thanks for sticking with us, while we get back on track.

Calendar Contest

Here's a happier thing to end this disgruntled episode! We've gotten a couple of great submissions to the 2007 calendar contest, but we still need more. Remember to send your cool science pictures to absolutescience [at] welltopia.com, and the deadline is November 15. Also, I want to get the word out on this so we have the very best pictures to choose from. If there's an email list at your university that goes out to graduate students or postdocs, could you drop me and email and let me know who to contact to put an announcement on the list?

Also, Absolute Science got reviewed by a couple of different podcast reviewers, and they all seem to agree that we're great, but that well, I'm not terribly funny.

Podcast Fanatic
Upon Further Review

They encouraged me to keep trying, but for this week I'm going to combine our comedy section with our music section and leave you with a funny science song called Hooray for NRM Spectroscopy by Science Groove. I've had this in my playlist for a long time and it has really grown on me.

The Language of God, & More

2006-08-19T08:56:00.000-07:00

BACK TO HOME

Listen Now

Adam is on vacation this week, but don't worry because I have a great guest and I'm also going to bring in some interview clips to round out the news.

My guest is science book reviewer Phillip Manning, and we'll be talking about the new book by the esteemed scientist Francis Collins called The Language of God. And, I'll also have another funny science sketch from our friends at the Teknikal Difficulties podcast, we'll update our planet mnemonic, and announce a new contest, but first let's hear some science news. The first story is about antidepressants and the second story is about stem cells. Here we go.

Science News

Ketamine for Depression (Transcript)
Courtesy of the Science Magazine Podcast

New Method of Creating Embryonic Stem Cell Lines
Courtesy of the Nature Magazine Podcast

Book Review

Phillip Manning of SciBooks joined us to discuss the new science book The Language of God by Francis Collins, the director of the Human Genome project. We also briefly discussed the book Our Inner Ape.

Funny Stuff

"Beyond the Known" clip, courtesy of the funniest guy on earth, Cayenne Chris Conroy of Teknikal Difficulties.

Also, Jake from the CTLcast sent a link to a video of a really cool robot that can navigate a lot of different types of terrain.

Memonics

We already need to update the mnemonic we introduced in Episode 26 about the planets because the ninth planet, Pluto, has just been demoted!

The International Astronomical Union just voted to classify Pluto as a dwarf planet rather than a full planet, mostly because new research has identified lot and lots of objects that are just like Pluto. I've heard that there could have been literally hundreds of new planets if they allowed the newly discovered bodies like Pluto to be called planets. If you're interested in learning more about this, the August 17th episode of the Point of Inquiry podcast just had a really great guest who talked about the controversy surrounding Pluto. But for us, the important this is to update that mnemoic to help you remember the planet names. Will From Smart Bomb Radio recommended this sentence:

My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nachos.

My - Mercury
Very - Venus
Educated- Earth
Mother - Mars
Just - Jupiter
Served - Saturn
Us - Uranus
Nachos - Neptune

Show News
Podcast Awards - We didn't win, but a big THANK YOU to everyone who votes
Podcast Peer Awards - We're still in the running!
New player so you can now listen while you surf - Pupa player at the homepage
Science calendar, call for submissions - Send science images to absolutescience@welltopia.com

Rollercoaster Science

2006-07-28T13:44:00.000-07:00

BACK TO HOME

Listen Now

Please Vote

Thank you so much for nominating us in the Technology/Science category of the Podcast Awards. Please, now help us bring it home by casting your vote in the finals.

You can vote once every day between now and August 11th. While you're there, we also recommend:

The Word Nerds
The Big Show
Podcast Pickle
Comedy4Cast

Roller coaster physics

Jake and Erin from the Choose the Left podcast asked whether the front car or the back car offer a better ride on a roller coaster. We did a lot of investigation, but here are our primary sources:

Yahoo Answers
How Stuff Works
Glenco Online

Here's our answer about roller coaster physics.

We always take email questions, but if you'd like to call in a question our call in line is 206-338-4475.

Cat Brain Parasites

Here's the press release on the amazing story about cat brain parasites from the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Bird Flu Update

There was a big paper in PNAS this week and the findings were widely misrepresented in the media, particularily in the headlines, which implied the bird flu risk was greatly diminished. Basically, what the paper showed is that when the researchers combined the current bird flu strain with a common form of the normal human flu, the combinations weren't easiy transmitted between ferrets (which are considered a good model), but that doesn't say anything about how transmisisble it would be after one or ten mutations, and viruses mutate really quickly, so the virus today is probably already different than the one they did the experiments with. The scientists themselves cautioned that "the genetics of flu viruses are unpredictable, and this study was based on one combination of viruses, when more than 50 possible combinations exist."

Funny Stuff

In a protein lab, it is common for people to set up their proteins as a
fusion with other domains which are easily purified through their affinity
to ligands attached to resin beads.  One of the most common of these
domains is the glutathione S-transferase protein or GST.  Typically, there
is a small linker region between the protein of interest and the fusion
parner and this amino acid sequence contains recognition sequences for
proteases.  After months in the lab, having limited success with her
proteolysis reactions, a young female grad student finally had her patience
and perseverence pay off when she destained yet another gel and saw that
her protein had indeed been cut by the protease.  In her joy, the young
woman ran out into the hallway, proclaiming proudly to all:
"I've got cleavage.  I've got cleavage.  Come over here.  Look at my
cleavage."

From Science Jokes, courtesy of what looks like a newsletter
Aliquotes Volume V Number xiii August/97

Shout Outs:

Joe from East Rochester, NY who listens while inline skating. He wrote in with some great questions and suggestions.
Robert from Hong Kong (adam)
PowerPoint Samauri (adam)
All the students in Psych 101 at the University of South Dakota!

People seem to be using the Google Gadget we created that lets you play our show right from your personal Google Home page, so just a reminder that is easy to install using the (this link) "add to Google" button at welltopia.com

Song of the Week

In honor of our roller coaster question, our song of the week is "Upside Down" by ATOMICTOM, courtesy of Podshow.

It's hot blooded; check and see.

2006-07-14T13:02:00.000-07:00

Absolute Science Podcast Home

Click play to listen now

Today we're going to answer some listener questions about exploding soda, and genetic tests, and also talk about the science of sweat, but first we wanted to tell you how excited we are to have been nominated in the Science and Technology category of the Podcast Awards. This is really a big honor and we want to thank everyone who must have voted for us.

The final voting begins July 28th at podcastawards.com and we would really appreciate it if you enjoy the show if you would head over and cast a vote for us each day in this final round. We're in a really tough category and we're going to need your help!

Also, a bunch of great shows from the Trypod Network were nominated, including The Big Show, Comedy4Cast, Manic Mommies, and The Podcast Pickle so if you haven't heard those shows already they're great and you might want to check them out and throw them a vote too if you agree. Thanks again.

Thar she blows

Will from SmartBombRadio asks: "I've seen videos on the Internet and on YouTube of people dropping containers of mentos into warm diet coke bottles. The resulting geyser of coke reaches 10-12 feet in the air. I've repeated this, and it works. My question, why does this happen?"

Our Sources:

Steve Spangler Science
Delaware Online
Physics at St. Lawrence University
General Chemistry Online
Scientific American Blog
Chemistry How To Guide
WikiHow
Wikipedia: Surface Tension

What do you call it? Soda or pop?

Our transcript for this section.

Hot enough for 'ya?

We cover the science of sweat! This story was inspired by a post at one of my favorite blogs: Effect Measure. Other references include: How Stuff Works and Wikipedia and eMedicine and the Mayo Clinic and the FDA and FamilyDoctor.org

Genetic Tests. What do we recommend?

Fun Section: Teknikal Difficulties

Clip from my new favorite comedy podcast. They're not all about science, but they do a lot of science-oriented skits and Chris over there said it was OK if we played this one.

Shout Out

Will from SmartBomb Radio
Chad from Podcast Review
Scott from the Alaska Podshow who has been listening since Episode 8
Kate in Vancouver (I'd like to hear from other people in Canada, we get the second most downloads from Canada and have very few of you on our listener map. Make yourself known! Also from Mexico, we get quite a few downloads from Mexico and don't have even one representative o our map. Write in and tell us what you like about the show, and where you're at. )
Haseeb in Pakistan (Here's a guy who'se representing his country. Our first listener writing in from Pakistan!)
Owen who is a physiology student at Michigan State
Luke from Oklahoma
Mike who wrote in with a question about multiple sclerosis that we are going to get to in a future episode.
Travis who is a biotechnology student at Monash Uni in Victoria Australia
Rich from Cincinati, who suggested the sign off "metabolize well"
Adrien in Melbourne Australia who wrote in with an interesting question about alternative medicine that we are going to get to in the future.
Wesley at Planet Retcon, we're going to be on the show again.
All our new listeners from Instant Media.

You know people, we don't get paid for doing this show, so listener feedback is really all we've got. So send us some love.

We still are looking for science mnemonics. Write us at absolutescience@welltopia.com

Google Gadget

Use this button to add our Google Gadget to your personalized Google page. You'll have our player right on your page, and when a new episode comes out it will magically appear.

Song of the Week

That's Hot, by The Brew.

And we've added a page on our website where you can find all of the music we've played.

How to be a cheap drunk, and much, much more

2006-07-05T17:35:00.000-07:00

Absolute Science Podcast Home

Click play to listen now

News

Mignon's an aunt! Welcome Ryan and Hannah!

They came into the world the old-fashioned way, but over three million babies ha ve now started life in a test tube.

What's better than drugs for insomnia?

Australian researchers find that: Diet Drinks = Drunkeness
Story from MedPageToday, Story from AOL.
Also, mixing alcohol with energy drinks doesn't reduce drunkeness. And what's the deal with Vodka and Redbull?

What's New in the Journals?
Science magazine reports that global warming leads to an increase in wildfires, which then adds more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, potentially increasing global warming. (That's what's known as a positive feedback loop.)

Better Biodiesel
Hydroelectric power in the San Francisco Bay
Three cheers for UPS, which is investigating hydraulic hybrid trucks for their fleet.
An Inconvenient Truth
Al Gore's presentation at the TED conference (It gets serious around 6:10, but Al Gore was pretty funny for the first 6 minutes.)

My Taxes Paid for What?

Football Hives

Disclaimer: We don't really know that your tax dollars paid for this, it's just a hunch.

Cool Website/Science Jokes

Courtesy of Michael Wrigglesworth via Science Jokes

There was this biologist who was doing some experiments with frogs.  He
was measuring just how far frogs could jump.  So he puts a frog on a line
and says "Jump frog, jump!".  The frog jumps 2 feet.  He writes in his
lab book: 'Frog with 4 legs - jumps 2 feet'.

Next he chops off one of the legs and repeats the experiment.  "Jump frog
jump!" he says.  The frog manages to jump 1.5 feet.  So he writes in his
lab book: 'Frog with 3 legs - jumps 1.5 feet'.

He chops off another and the frog only jumps 1 foot.  He writes in his
book: 'Frog with 2 legs jumps 1 foot'.

He continues and removes yet another leg.  " Jump frog jump!" and the
frog somehow jumps a half of a foot.  So he writes in his lab book again:
'Frog with one leg - jumps 0.5 feet'.

Finally he chops off the last leg.  He puts the frog on the line and
teels it to jump. "Jump frog, jump!".  The frog doesn't move.  "Jump
frog, jump!!!".  Again the frog stays on the line.  "Come on frog,
jump!".  But to no avail.

The biologist finally writes in his book:  'Frog with no legs - goes deaf'

Shout Outs
Hi to Jonathan in Japan.

Why we can't Live Well anymore...
It's all GNC's fault.

Song of the Week
In the News by Motion Soundtrack

Hypnosis: You're not just getting sleepy anymore

2006-06-29T17:45:00.000-07:00

Absolute Science Podcast Home

Click play to listen now

So hypnosis is real. How do I find a good hypnotist?

Dr. David Patterson recommended finding a hypnotist who is also specialized in whatever medical condition you are seeing help with. A good referral source is the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis.

Stanford or Swarthmore...Which path is better for a career in research?

2006-06-15T14:00:00.000-07:00

Click play to listen now

Global Warming? Been There, Done That. It's bad.

Last week researchers announced new results showing that it was once balmy at the North Pole. Yes, 55 million years ago, it was as warm as 24 degrees Celsius in the Arctic. The cause? Greenhouse gases.

Adam Felt An Earthquake!

Check out the USGS web site to see if there are earthquakes in your area.

So You Wanna Be A Researcher...?

Tyler from Kentucky asks, "I am in the middle of the grand college hunt and I was wondering if you guys could talk a bit about some of the institutions that particularly shine in the area of health research. Also, what advice do you have for someone like me who is interested in doing research and is just starting out on that career path?"

We'll tackle that question, but also wanted to open it up to listeners. So leave a comment here (at the end of the post) for Tyler with your advice.

More Good Sex

What does your tattoo tell the world about your sexual behavior? Researchers at Texas Tech University in Lubbock did the study.

Memory Tricks

Thanks to Jeremy in Sydney, Australia AND Dan and CJ from the Love Long & Prosper podcast for writing in with a great mnemonic for remembering stalactites and stalagmites. Hint: It has to do with ballerinas.

Show News

You

Go Mobile. If you have an moblie phone that can play MP3s, you can now listen to Absolute Science on your phone! Just click the Mobilize button on the left hand bar of the main home page.

Disclose. Thanks to everyone who took the listener survey! If you want to help us understand our demographics and listener preferences, you can take the survey too!

Stay Current. We saw from the survey results that half of you are not subscribed to our feed. So while subscribing at somewhere like iTunes is really the best way to always get the newest episode. We've also created an Absolute Science Google Group. This is an announcement only list, and we will use it to ping you when the new episodes come out. (And maybe for contests and prizes.)

We're Networked. We've joined the wonderful Trypod Network.

We're Awarded. We're honored to have been nominated in the Best Science Podcast category for the Podcast Peer Awards.

Shout Out

Big shout out to Bruce in Montana who sent in a great listener question we are going to get to in the next week or two!

Cheers to Luke in Perth, Australia who wrote in to suggest a song for us to play in our song of the week section.

Hey to Jordan in England who heard my listener rant on American Cliche about trying to get solar panels installed at my house, and is now working on his parents to get some. Good luck!

Hello to Garard in Switzerland who wrote in about last week's longitude and latitude mnemoic.

Song of the Week

Future Memory, by New York's Heth & Jed.

Episode 26: Links

2006-06-01T20:11:00.000-07:00

Click play to listen now

This is our very first episode that I had to label "explicit." But we're going to talk about sex later, and we also have a bit a the end with a few mild swear words, so never fear, we're not going to get down and dirty, I just didn't want anyone to be shocked. We're thinking it's PG-13.

Is There Any Science Behind Acupuncture?

Listener question...

Dealing with the placebo effect for something like acupuncture is a total pain, so it's been really hard to do good studies.
Sham acupuncture versus placebo pill
Acupuncture in random spots as good as traditional targets
What about that NIH concensus statement?
Other concensus statements say it's unknown whether acupuncture is effective or not, but that is is relatively safe.
What are the dangers of acupuncture (and other forms of alternative medicine)? Not getting properly diagosed, and losing time with traditional medical care that has proven efficacy.

Why Sex is Good

In February, researchers at the University of Paisley in the UK, reported in the Journal of Biological Psychology that both men and women who had engaged in full-on sexual intercourse had a much lower increase in blood pressure when stressed than people who had engaged in any other type of sexual activity. So there you go...sex is good for keeping your blood pressure under control. (Of course it was a very small study, and there are probably lots of possible things they didn't consider, but it still seemed like a fun story.)

Scientists can even make sex sound boring: "These findings add to the research corpus on the benefits of PVI (differentiated from other sexual activities)."

Shout Out

Big shout out to Jon who is our first listener from Kentucky. Welcome!
Watch for us at Planet Retcon (but don't blink). Adam & Mignon both have bit voice parts in the upcoming Rendezvous episode!

Memory Tricks

Thanks to Jeremy in Sydney, Australia for writing in with a great mnemonic for remembering the names of the planets:

My Very Easy Method: Just Say 'Universe, Nine Planets'.

Mercury
Venus
Earth
Mars
Jupiter
Saturn
Uranus
Neptune
Pluto

But what about Sedna?? Oh Dear!

Sedna is the new 10th planet discovered in 2004 that lies even farther out than Pluto, named after the Inuit goddess of the ocean.

Song of the Week

Code Monkey, by the brilliant Jonathan Coulton.

Episode 25: Links

2006-05-25T23:45:00.000-07:00

Click play to listen now

Uranium Enrichment

PBMR (Pebble Bed Modular Reactor) -- Encases
the uranium inside a graphite moderator shell which is difficult to remove and thus difficult to extract uranium for enrichment.

Mixed Oxide Reactors -- Don't require enrichment to operate because they burn the U-238 and all actinydes in the fuel (amercium, thorium, uranium, etc.) (This is the reactor type President Bush was referring to when he spoke of "nuclear recycling".)

Thorium Reactors – Development stage technology that uses thorium instead of
uranium. According to our listener, this type of reactor inherently difficult to use to make a bomb and is meltdown proof because it is not fissile itself, but becomes fissile and reacts when it absorbs a neutron and becomes U233.

Thanks to “PowerPointSamauri” for this information.

Troublesome Bird Flu Developments

Likely human-to-human transmission in a family cluster of bird flu cases in Indonesia.
Bird flu victim fled authorities.
Effect Measure Blog
UPDATE (1:05 a.m. ET, 5/26): Indonesia reports two more human bird flu cases in siblings. Findings still to be confirmed by WHO.

Note: It is currently unclear to me whether 8 people fell ill and 7 died, or 7 people fell ill and 6 people died in this recent Indonesian bird flu cluster. I will try to update this when I find some definitive information. (But regardless of the exact numbers, the fact that this looks like a human-to-human-to-human transmission makes this an important development.)

UPDATE: According to Forbes, six people in the family are known to have died of the bird flu, and a seventh is presumed to have died of the bird flu, but was buried before tests could be done. But, according to Medical News Today, seven people in the family died of the bird flu and an eighth was presumed to have died of the bird flu. So I'm still trying to sort out the actual numbers. (Also, neither of these new sources mention the one family member I read about earlier who was infected but lived, so I'm on the lookout for new info about that person too.)

Cervical Cancer Vaccine

Final say from FDA expected in early June.

Would you give your sons the vaccine? Write and tell us your opinion at absolutescience@welltopia.com

Smoking Cessation Drug Approved

FDA Approves Chantix
It's a partial agonist for the alpha4beta2 nicotinic acteylcholine receptor subtypes
It blocks the nicotine from entering relevant parts of the brain, thus eliminating the reward a smoker feels when he/she smokes.
It also partially activates the nicotinic receptor and reduce the severity of the smoker's craving and the withdrawal symptoms from nicotine.

Stem Cell Fraud Update

South Korean stem cell scientist and associates indicted.

FEATURE: THANK YOU FOR SMOKING: The story of scientists who work in controversial fields.

Memory Tricks

A listener's fun secret for remembering that lines of longitude run up and down on the globe.

Thanks for listening

Feedback to absolutescience@welltopia.com

Episode 24: Links

2006-05-17T17:20:00.000-07:00

Click play to listen now

Listener Question: Antibody Therapy for Cancer

Malea asked us about how antibody therapy for cancer works, specifically Rituxan.

Reviews/Other Podcasts

ADAM: Thanks to Barry from Barely Podcasting for his excellent review of Absolute Science. We're thrilled to be helping people understand CSI.

MIGNON: Thanks to Erika from the GROW podcast. She answered Mignon's question on her show about relating to kids who are far away, and it was really insightful. We also understand that Erika is going to play an excerpt from one of our shows on her next episode, and we're really looking forward to that.

ADAM: Thanks to Tim who wrote in that he liked our show and played our promo on his podcast, PageantCast.

ADAM: Thanks to Dr. Pete, the scientist/comedian we interviewed in Episode 22 for talking about Absolute Science on his radio show "Inside the Black Box."

MIGNON: Achilles from the ROFLcast (top 10 music lists, and the like) wins the award for Our Most Insane Listener :-) He emailed at about 4:00 a.m. after discovering our podcast and then listening to every single episode. Thanks for the enthusiasm dude.

ADAM: Thanks to Talie who put us up on her House fan site. (Love the colors on this site.)

Pickle Promo

We hadn't shared this promo with our listeners, but it is actually pretty funny and it just occurred to us that you might like it. It's kind of an inside joke. The story is that Gary who runs the PodcastPickle works in the sports industry and was at some trade show where you can buy mascot costumes, and ended up buying a big pickle suit. We thought that was hysterical and put together a fake science interview about the discovery of a new pickle-man beast.

Listener Question: Calorie Restriction

Tia wanted to know the difference between the calorie restriction diet we've been hearing about that slows down aging, and a regular diet you go on to lose weight.

We'll have more on this in a future episode.

MySpace Buzz

Thanks to Philip W. Wise, King of Pirates at the MySpace group Nerd Sanctuary for Closet Nerds for posting a HUGE banner for Absolute Science at the groups landing page! He even made the banner for us. Wow.

Mignon is just getting into MySpace, learning her way around, etc. And there is a lot of fun stuff. We talked about some really funny posts from the Nerd Sancuary and elsewhere. Here's our MySpace page.

Kids With Cancer

After our episode about the video game for cancer called Remission, another podcaster told us about a great book for kids with cancer called "Too Pooped to Pop" by Steve and Samantha Pinder. Samantha is teenage childhood leukemia survivor who wrote the book with her dad who is cartoonist. It's a self-published book available for $15, and they have some great reviews and the artwork looks really cute. (Hint: This is a really long page, so to find it faster click on the link and then search the page for "pooped".)

"Too Pooped to Pop" is also available as an audiobook, and they have a second book that they just finished and that is going to be recorded as an audiobook soon.

Listener Question: Uranium Enrichment

Patrick Fogarty (Mignon's husband and a UC Santa Cruz alum) joined us to explain to our listener Patricia from UCSC how uranium becomes enriched, and the difference between uranium that is used in nuclear power plants and uranium that is used in bombs. Patrick has just launched his own podcast/website about political topics called the Armchair President, and he had happened to be investigating the uranium question himself when Patricia's question came in.

The bottom line: Only a tiny fraction of the uranium that gets mined is radioactive, and enriching it means separating the radioactive part from the non-radioactive part. The traditional method uses a centrifuge to separate out the different isotopes. (Definition of an isotope) Uranium used to power nuclear power plants is only enriched a little bit, whereas uranium used for bombs is enriched to the point it is about 90% radioactive, or more. (For obvious reasons, exact details on bomb-making are hard to find.)

Mignon's Memory

Jack from Australia said he really liked the part in the osteoporosis episode where Mignon explained the silly way she remembers the difference between osteoblasts and osteoclasts (it involved video game imagery). So we're going to make this a regular part of the show.

This week, how to remember stalactites and stalagmites.

If you can think of a better title for this section, definitely let us know!

Lorne Conferences in Australia

Lorne Genome Conference

Lorne Conference on Protein Structure and Function

Lorne Cancer Conference

Episode 21: Links

2006-05-04T22:09:00.000-07:00

Absolute Science Podcast, Episode 21

Video game helps kids with cancer

Click play to listen now

HopeLab
Remission, The Game

MySpace page for Remission
MySpace page for Roxxi

Episode 22: Links

2006-05-04T21:59:00.000-07:00

Absolute Science Podcast, Episode 22

Vince Vaughn meets Albert Einstein...kind of

Click play to listen now

Dr. Pete Ludovice combines a serious science career as a professor at Georgia Tech with a second life as a stand-up comedian. We'll talk about how he keeps up appearances, and what makes science funny.

Dr. Pete's Radio Show: Inside the Black Box

Other "science-friendly" comedians mentioned during the show:

Cobb County School Textbook Evolution Stickers

Love Long & Prosper Podcast

Dr. Pete's all-in-one website. Includes show times, clips, upcoming events, etc.

Episode 20: Links

2006-04-20T19:17:00.000-07:00

Absolute Science Podcast, Episode 20
Click play to listen now

How One Drug Could Prevent Both Osteoporosis and Breast Cancer

(0:20) A new study showed that Evista, a drug that is currently used to treat and prevent osteoporosis, can also prevent breast cancer.
(2:05) Evista is also called raloxifene.
(3:09) Evista has fewer side effects than tamoxifen.
(3:35) But these drugs are only for women who are at high risk of developing breast cancer.

Aside!
(4:04) An aside about a town with water polluted by aluminum sulfate where people may have an increased risk of getting Alzheimer's disease.

Back on Topic
(4:31) What does the estrogen receptor have to do with all of this?
(5:23) Breast cancer is often stimulated by estrogen. Cancer cells can have estrogen receptors on their membranes, and if so, they are called ER+.
(5:51) Weren't we talking about osteoporosis?
(6:05) Bone is constantly in flux, getting built up and broken down.
(6:47) Osteoblasts versus osteoclasts.
(7:29) Estrogen keeps osteoclasts under control.
(8:00) How can Evista have both estrogenic and anti-estrogenic effects? (This is a great article that goes into more depth than we were able to in the podcast.)

Off Topic!
(9:50) The human genome project revealed amazing complexity in humans.

Back on Topic
(10:35) Evista isn't for men, but bisphosphonates are for men and women. How do bisphosphonates work?
(11:06) Calcium and vitamin D alone don't seem to help increase bone mineral density. (But you don't want to be deficient.)
(11:30) Strength training can build bone mineral density.
(12:35) Balance exercises are important too to prevent fractures from falls.
(13:19) Weight-bearing exercise versus strength training.
(14:49) Avoid smoking and heavy drinking to prevent osteoporosis.
(14:59) Osteoporosis in men.

Break
Bumper from TWiG from Audio Pandemic Show

SEX and dieting!
(16:08) Redbook magazine article "Not in the mood for sex?"
(16:25) Exercising to the point of exhaustion decreases your desire for sex.
(17:00) The article is completely wrong in saying that you don't want to run a calorie deficit even if you are trying to lose weight. This is completely wrong!!! You can't lose weight without eating fewer calories than you burn.
(17:42) Regular, moderate exercise can increase your libido.

Closing
(18:44) Get the word out about Absolute Science, and tell all your friends. Email us at absolutescience@welltopia.com

Episode 18: Links

2006-04-06T20:31:00.000-07:00

Absolute Science Podcast, Episode 18
Click play to listen now

Promo from TWiG from the Audio Pandemic Podcast

Adam's Interview with Dr. Mitch Katz, Director of the San Francisco Department of Public Health

(1:15) Local preparations for the bird flu?
(1:32) What is the risk to humans?
(1:40) What does it mean that the virus has been around for many years in Asia, where people live in close quarters with chickens?
(2:22) What does it mean that it has spread so quickly and broadly through bird populations?
(2:50) What fuels the concern about this particular virus?
(3:02) What is the health director's role in preparing for a bird flu pandemic?
(3:35) How do preparations apply to other health risks?
(4:21) Isolation versus quarantine.
(5:35) How would isolation and quarantine be enforced?
(6:43) Past experiences with isolation and quarantine.
(7:18) Is there concern about the past cases of bird-to-human transmission?
(9:10) What can we expect from mutations in the bird flu virus?
(10:22) Why would it be bad if the flu oinfects humans and becomes less severe?
(11:32) What can people do in their homes to prepare? (Should you stockpile Tamiflu?)
(12:42) Could the use of Tamiflu lead to drug resistant bird flu strains?
(13:12) Have there been changes in the funding for avian flu preparedness...are there good things coming out of the greater awareness?
(13:46) Is funding being diverted away from other important health issues?
(15:04) How much of this is hype and how much is real?
(16:25) Which is more likely, a bird flu pandemic or an earthquake in San Francisco?

Promo from the Evolution 101 Podcast

News Section

British Journal of Medicine story on the unnecessary panic over the bird flu.

Bird Flu Exposes Insurers to Risks. (Wall Street Journal, April 4, 2006. Available to subscribers only)

U.N. expert warns bird flu moving fast (Dr. Roger Glass on the inevitability of a human flu pandemic.)

A Scottish swan is infected with the H5N1 flu virus.

Home Office prepares for 'mass burials' if Avian flu mutates

Bird Flu Vaccine: Long Way To Go

Even Without A Vaccine, Existing Drugs Show Promise in Treating Bird Flu (Wall Street Journal, April 4, 2006. Available to subscribers only)

Subscribe at iTunes or Odeo

Episode 17: Links

2006-03-30T19:05:00.000-08:00

Absolute Science Podcast, Episode 17
Click play to listen now

Adam Lowe interviews Dr. Mitch Katz, the director of the San Francisco Department of Public Health, about the new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), showing that the combination of drugs usually used to treat HIV/AIDS (tenofovir with emtricitabine - under the trade name Truvada) - can protect monkeys from getting the AIDS virus. Ongoing studies now may be testing the same drug combination in humans.

Here are some of the more clear and informative news stories that we found about the new data:

Interview Timeline

(1:20) Pre-exposure prophylaxis
(1:59) Post-exposure prophylaxis
(2:40) Why does it make sense from a scientific point of view?
(3:15) If you're preventing HIV before people are exposed, why can't people just keep from getting infected in some other way like practicing safe sex or safe drug use?
(4:23) What if the prevention isn't 100%
(5:15) Are prevention studies being done in a blinded way?
(5:38) Are these studies ethical?
(6:20) Is it a placebo trial?
(6:40) What types of patients are being recruited?
(7:27) How safe are the drugs?
(7:40) Would prevention be cost effective?
(8:09) Will the drugs be put into broad use if they are found to be effective?
(8:32) How did the idea of pre-exposure prophylaxis come into play?
(9:08) What do the animal studies show?
(10:03) How does this compare to other retrovirals?
(11:03) When will human study results be available?
(11:23) What effects will the new once-a-day HIV treatments have on people's lives and on transmission rates?
(12:24) Will single pill treatments become available soon?
(13:13) What effect will the lessening of fear of HIV/AIDS have on disease rates?
(15:30) Could the new therapies and prevention methods mean that we could now erradicate HIV/AIDS in the United States?
(16:57) Shout outs and wrap up.

Episode 16: Links

2006-03-23T10:28:00.000-08:00

Absolute Science Podcast
Episode 16 timepoints and links
Listen to the podcast

Segment 1

(0:22) The sleep aid Ambien has been linked to strange behavior: Sleep eating, sleep driving, and -- in Adam's case (5:40) -- sleep emailing.

(2:47) Some insomnia linked to disruptions in circadian rhythms.

(4:00) The Feldman lab, where Mignon studied circadian rhythms in Neurspora crassa (with pictures of race tubes).

Segment 2

(7:30) Genetic penetrance: Wikipedia entry

(7:40) Alzheimer's genetic testing

(8:10) Genetic testing for hemochromatosis

The most common genetic condition in the U.S.
Often undiagnosed
Easy to treat by blood draws
Puts you at risk of developing heart disease, liver problems, and more
Two mutations account for the majority of cases of this disease
It's recessive, so even if you have hemochromatosis, you might not have an obvious family history of the disease

(10:05) Genetic testing for breast cancer

Testing is usually done by resequencing the gene
A change in the gene isn't enough to tell you if you are at risk
Family context is a must
Multiple people, including affected people, must have the same change for it to mean anything
You can't go in by yourself and get a genetic test for breast cancer
Even if you have the change, you might not get breast cancer. Different changes in the gene confer different levels of risk.
A new article that came out after we did the podcast, about false negatives in genetic testing for breast cancer.

(13:10) Recreational genetic testing

Cellf (A company that provides nutritional genetic testing)
Mignon's article about genetic testing

Disclosure

(13:45)

DNA Direct (A genetic testing company that occasionally hires Mignon to write content.)
Genetic Health (The company where Mignon & Adam first worked together.)

Eleven patients die in Aricept trial

2006-03-16T22:41:00.000-08:00

Reuters.com: "Eleven patients have died while taking Alzheimer's disease drug Aricept during a clinical trial, Japan's Eisai Co., which makes the medicine, said on Thursday..."

"The drug, which treats mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease, was being tested in patients with vascular dementia...."

"The deaths were among 648 patients who received Aricept once daily for 24 weeks. That compared with no deaths in the 326 patients receiving placebos, Eisai said in a release."

Episode 15: Links

2006-03-16T10:36:00.000-08:00

Listen to the Absolute Science podcast: Do TV writers get the science right?

(00:30) Bird flu update:

“The revived [1918] killer was lethal to mice initially infected with as few as 1,000 virus particles, whereas some H5N1 virus isolates have killed mice infected with just 10 to 15 particles.” —Christine Soares, "Killer Ressurected" Scientific American December 2005, p. 34.

(02:50) Bird flu virus gaining resistance to Tamiflu

News from the Blogs:

(01:34) HEALTH'Sass highlights the best tidbits from a new DIY bird flu care book by Dr. Gratton Woodson.
Oral rehydration therapy
(04:15) SilverJacket comments on funny examples of "unintelligent design."

(06:07) Interview with Dr. David Foster, staff writer for the TV show House.

(15:11) Thanks to Scott Parent from American Cliche who aired our rant on his podcast last week.

(15:26) Correcting an error from last week:

In our discussion on evolution (Episode 14), Patrick noted that although Catholicism had recently come out with a major change -- saying that purgatory didn't exist -- he hadn't heard of a lot of Catholics renouncing their faith...making the point that accepting the concept of evolution shouldn't be a major faith-shaker for people either. But, oops! Mary from Minnesota wrote in to let us know it was limbo that was abolished, not purgatory. The underlying point remains the same, but we regret the error. Here's more info on limbo versus purgatory:
Wikipedia entry: Limbo
Wikipedia entry: Purgatory

(16:27) Email us at absolutescience[at]welltopia.com.

(16:41) Please take our Listener Survey. Really. We'd appreciate it so much! It will help us get advertisers, and then we can devote more time to the podcast.

Episode 14: Links

2006-03-07T23:11:00.000-08:00

BACK TO THE ABSOLUTE SCIENCE PODCAST

Listen to the Absolute Science podcast: Evolution Science Chat

Dr. Colin Purrington's Evolution page at Swarthmore.

Evolution 101 podcast

Patrick Fogarty, host of the Armchair President podcast.

Episode 2: Links and Notes

2006-03-02T08:50:00.000-08:00

SMOKING QUIT LINES

1-800-QUIT-NOW
1-877-YES-QUIT

Episode 5: Links & Notes

2006-03-02T08:49:00.000-08:00