We Have Concerns

According to a new study in the journal PeerJ, the interior surfaces of the 17-year-old, 250-mile-high, airtight International Space Station harbor at least 1,000 and perhaps more than 4,000 microbe species. Jeff and Anthony discuss germs in space, and the very real society of Cheerleader Scientists.

In a study published in Geophysical Research Letters earlier this year, Roger Bilham of the University of Colorado and Rebecca Bendick of the University of Montana predict that, because of Earth’s slowing rotation, the world will see a significant spike in large earthquakes in 2018. Jeff and Anthony take a look at their findings to decide whether they should start to panic.

Rather than go with realistic methods of death, many films contain unbelievable movie death scenes that viewers accept as possible because they have been shown so many times. These movie death myths have become tropes that are used throughout the industry but that no one questions. Time to question them! Jeff and Anthony run down 11 movie deaths that don't hold up to science.

Ten of the 12 water companies in the UK have admitted they are still using the practice of water dowsing despite the lack of scientific evidence for its effectiveness. Jeff and Anthony discuss why a public utility would use such a debunked and decidedly unscientific method.

A small cluster of stem cells in the brain seems to help mice stay young, and injecting extra stem cells helps them live longer. The hypothalamus, which releases hormones that affect other organs, seems to affect how mice age. By interfering with a molecular pathway in the hypothalamus, a team pf scientists has extended the lifespan of mice by 20 per cent. Anthony and Jeff discuss this event, and wonder if they can be forever young.

According to new linguistic analysis published in the journal Public Understanding of Science, even scientists who write about public comprehension of scientific ideas overwhelmingly conflate the terms “knowledge” and “understanding.” The researchers argue that this linguistic imprecision is problematic—not just for scientists, but for all of us. Jeff and Anthony discuss the distinction, and try to understand what they know.

We’ve known about zombie ants for some time. These are ants infected with the parasitic fungus, O. unilateralis, which takes over their bodies amd moved them around like a zombie. This fungus is often referred to as a “brain parasite,” but new research published this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that the brains of these zombie ants are left intact by the parasite, and that O. unilateralis is able to control the actions of its host by infiltrating and surrounding muscle fibers throughout the ant’s body. Jeff and Anthony wonder if these new revelations are better or worse for the ants... or us.

Scientists can grow miniature versions of human brains — called organoids — in the lab, but during the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience two teams of scientists presented previously unpublished research on how these human mini-brains can grow inside other animals. Namely, rats. Jeff and Anthony discuss the idea of rats with human brains and what that might mean for the ethics of science.

Swallowed by a sinkhole. Washed away by a mudflow. Drowned after falling through thin ice. These are the fates that many unlucky mammoths suffered in Siberia thousands of years ago. Their well-preserved fossils have provided paleobiologists with insight into their prehistoric lives. Now, after performing a genetic analysis on the remains from the furry victims of natural traps, a team of scientists made a striking discovery: Most were male. Jeff and Anthony discuss whether this strange statistical anomaly tells us something about the male version of the species.

Nathaniel Hoyle of the Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, UK, and his team have been investigating how the time of day affects wound healing, after they discovered that cuts and burns seem to heal twice as fast if sustained during daytime hours rather than at night. Jeff and Anthony discuss this phenomenon and try to decide if it is even worth being Wild Boyz anymore.

Egypt’s Great Pyramid of Giza—one of the wonders of the ancient world, and a dazzling feat of architectural genius—contains a hidden void at least a hundred feet long. The void is the first large inner structure discovered within the 4,500-year-old pyramid since the 1800s—a find made possible by recent advances in high-energy particle physics. Anthony and Jeff discuss the mysteries of Egypt and if this discovery is worth getting excited about.

Brain scans have revealed that when your mind wanders, it switches into “autopilot” mode, enabling you to carry on doing tasks quickly, accurately and without conscious thought. Jeff and Anthony discuss this internal autopilot mode and how they can harness it to be better at stuff.

Marine biologists from the Institute of Marine Sciences at the University of Portsmouth in the UK published a study on the feeding preferences of nudibranches, a kind of sea slug that might be targeting prey with full bellies. They coined the term “kleptopredation” to describe the behavior, but there is some uncertainty about it. Anthony and Jeff dive into the details to see if eating a animal that has just eaten is better.

Behold! It is the 500th episode of We Have Concerns! Since that is a nice, round number, Anthony and Jeff take an episode to answer some listener questions and reflect on how the hell they got here.

According to researchers in New York, a person’s brain is still active after death, meaning in many cases they can be aware that they’ve passed away. Anthony is, of course fascinated with this, and forces Jeff to once again deal with his own mortality.