Science On Top

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall, Dr Cameron Webb 00:00:58 A review study published in the journal Biological Conservation has found that over 40% of insect species are threatened with extinction. 00:29:06 Queensland has seen record-breaking floods this year, and everyone knows that mosquitoes love water. But what do floods mean for mosquito-borne diseases? 00:36:10 By studying sleepless flies, scientists have identified a gene that puts them to sleep when they need it the most. And interestingly, it doubles as part of their immune system. 00:42:32 From our immune system to taste and even our emotions - our guts have a big influence on our brains. And now new research shows that gut bacteria can affect our our mental health. Dr. Cameron Webb is a medical entomologist from the University of Sydney and NSW Health Pathology primarily interested in mosquitoes, mosquito-borne disease management, insect repellents and wetland rehabilitation. This episode contains traces of Abigail Fraeman, Mars E

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall 00:01:48 When researchers from the Max Planck Institute were looking at the teeth of an 11th or 12th century German woman they found tiny bright blue specks. This was a clue that illuminated the role women may have played in the history of book production. 00:09:19 What if plants could be trained just like pet dogs? Spoiler alert: they can! Sort of. 00:12:12 Also, plants can hear you with their ear-flowers. 00:21:29 For spiders, their webs are also sensory organs. And depending on their body position, they can tune their webs to specific vibrations. 00:28:29 No longer aimlessly drifting, the Earth's magnetic North Pole seems to be moving determinedly towards Siberia.   This episode contains traces of Harrison Ford addressing the 2018 Global Climate Action Summit.

2018 was a big year for science. Is saw the launch of the largest privately built reuseable rocket, the discovery a new organ, and understanding of the wombat's cubic poops. And we talked about all these stories and more on Science on Top. But not everything goes to plan, and this year was no exception! We had all sorts of Skype troubles, we forgot things, we were interrupted by dogs and phones… lots went wrong! But instead of losing the hilarious moments of chaos, we’ve saved them all for our traditional end of year bloopers episode. All the rants, the tangents, the swearing and the brain farts all put together for one long blooper reel! You must download or play the bloopers episode from our site: https://scienceontop.com/bloopers18 or on YouTube or Soundcloud!

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Peter Miller 00:01:10 There's a planet orbiting star HD26965, exactly where Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry said Spock's homeworld Vulcan would be. 00:04:16 A fresh analysis of 10 year old data finds the best evidence yet of water vapor venting from Jupiter's fourth largest moon, Europa. 00:05:17 Watch Peter Miller's artistic imagining of life on Europa here. 00:06:11 The oldest example of abstract art, from 73,000 years ago, resembles a hashtag. 00:10:14 Scientific debate has erupted over what could possibly be the world's oldest fossils ever found - or they could be just rocks. 00:14:09 Eating a California Reaper is probably a bad idea, as one man found out when he tried what was then the world's hottest chili. 00:18:06 Hurricanes Irma and Maria devastated the Caribbean, but they also provided a unique glimpse at evolution. The research involved a lot of measurements, some lizards, and a leaf blower. 00:21:16 This year, we found out how wombats make cubed poops. 00:2

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall 00:01:24 The giant tortoise Lonesome George, the last of his species, was possibly as old as 102 when he died in 2012. Now sequencing of his DNA has revealed a number of genes that could give us clues about human life expectancy and particularly cancer. 00:08:10 Research into epilepsy has accidentally led to some exciting new developments in the treatment of depression and mood disorders. This is a serendipitous line of inquiry that came from observations of electrical stimulation of areas of the brain. 00:16:01 When it comes to hormonal birth control, it's pretty much a ladies-only club. But for decades researchers have been trying to develop a male pill, and now a reasonably large-scale trial is about to get underway looking at a contraceptive gel. 00:23:39 It's one of the greatest cosmological mysteries of our time - what makes up 95% of the universe. But the "Dark Fluid" theory could potentially solve the questions of both dark matter and dark energy. Perh

Our latest episode, 319 - Number Five Is Alive, had a pretty major glitch in that Lucas' track wasn't there at all. I realised the mistake shortly after posting it, and thought I had replaced it with the correct version, but obviously it didn't replace the file. I've re-uploaded it and tested it now, it definitely works! So if you had any trouble playing that episode - specifically if it sounds like Lucas is being rude and not talking - then you may have to re-download that file again. Or, you can listen on our website, YouTube, Stitcher or SoundCloud.   This is what happens when you upload the podcast late on a Friday night after a few drinks... :-(

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall, Jo Benhamu 00:02:27 NASA's InSight probe lands on Mars, with a slew of instruments to analyse what the red planet is made of. 00:17:43 Against all conventional knowledge, mitochondrial DNA is sometimes inherited from the father. 00:28:01 Professor He Jiankui announced he's created the world's first ever gene edited babies using the CRISPR-Cas9 technique. His claims of HIV immune babies are extraordinary, but mired in contention amongst ethical and procedural controversy.   Jo Benhamu is a Clinical Research Nurse with a Masters in Bioethics.   This episode contains traces of Sir David Attenborough speaking at the COP24 UN conference in Katowice, Poland.

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall 00:01:10 Wombats - the cute, pudgy marsupials in Australia, have cubic poops. Square, angular blocks of poop. But how and why? We may now have a better understanding. 00:08:25 HD186302 is a star 184 light-years from Earth. And it's so similar to our sun, it could be long lost twin. 00:16:49 A team of researchers have studied the genomes of a group of microbes called Hemimastigotes and found that they are so bizarre, they deserve their very own kingdom in the tree of life. 00:26:02 Using the Keck observatory telescopes in Hawaii, astronomers have detected water in the atmosphere of a planet 179 light years away.   This episode contains traces of WNYC's On The Media looking at CNN's coverage of the U.S. Global Change Research Program's National Climate Assessment.

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall 00:02:00 There's a stream of stars hurtling through our region of the Milky Way galaxy, and they're bringing with them a "dark matter hurricane". It's probably nothing to worry about, though. 00:12:16 For the first time since 1889, the kilogram has been redefined according to a natural constant, instead of a lump of metal in a vault in Paris. The actual mass, for all intents and purposes, remains the same. 00:23:51 Previous studies of Neanderthal skulls found high rates of head injuries leading experts to believe they were a violent, savage people. But a new study finds that our human ancestors had a similar injuries and might not have been much different.   This episode contains traces of Professor Brian Greene explaining Dark Matter to CNN's Fareed Zakaria.

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Mick Vagg 00:02:13 How serious is the opioid crisis in Australia? What's being done about it, and what new painkillers are on the horizon? Pain Specialist Professor Mick Vagg gives us the run down. 00:22:15 20 million years ago, dolphins had really long snouts - the question is why? What evolutionary pressures led to their evolution, and what caused them to become extinct? 00:28:11 Are chimpanzees selfish? Do they readily cooperate? A study on chimpanzees in the Republic of Congo found they often make decisions that benefit others faster than ones that help themselves.   Associate Professor Mick Vagg is Clinical Senior Lecturer at Deakin University School of Medicine, and Pain Specialist at Barwon Health.   This episode contains traces of John Oliver talking shady business practices which have contributed to the US Opioids Crisis.  

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall 00:01:10 When a newborn baby smiles, there's always some spoilsport ready to tell you it's not a genuine smile, it's just a reflex. But new research finds that infant smiles are a lot more complex than that. 00:07:34 For the first time, astronomers have observed the clumps of gas orbiting the supermassive black hole in the center of our galaxy using four large telescopes linked together. The observations are in extremely high detail and reveal super hot flares or "magnetic thunderstorms" orbiting the black hole at nearly a third of the speed of light. 00:16:31 Scientific debate has erupted over a set of cone-like formations in Greenland. One popular school of thought is that they're the oldest fossils ever found, and the other is that they're just rocks.   To help us make the show, please consider donating on Patreon.   This episode contains traces of CBC News Now host Heather Hiscox talking with Dominic Valitis about a big science auction.

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall 00:01:11 It's an old computer trick, but a gyroscope on the Hubble Space Telescope has been fixed - with a shake and a reboot. 00:08:22 The tiny worms in dung beetle brood sacks - which are sexually transmitted - are beneficial for the beetle larvae. 00:14:33 Polychlorinated biphenyls - better known as PCBs - are industrial chemicals that have been banned in most countries for decades. But their legacy remains and has dramatic consequences for orcas and other marine mammals. 00:23:38 Humpback whales go quiet, and sometimes even silent, when large boats are around. 00:24:37 Why do male gorillas seem to enjoy babysitting so much? One possibility is that females choose good carers to mate with.   To help us make the show, please consider donating on Patreon.   This episode contains traces of Michael J. Fox talking to Alan Alda on the Clear and Vivid podcast.

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall, Dr. Pamela Gay 00:00:58 What happens when octopuses are given ecstasy? They get... cuddly. 00:07:23 Gene Roddenberry got it right, there IS a planet orbiting the star 40 Eridani. That's where the Star Trek creator said the planet Vulcan would be, homeworld of the pointy-eared logicians. 00:10:23 The Japanese space agency, JAXA, has had a spacecraft orbiting the asteroid Ryugu since the end of June this year. It has now deployed three of its four rovers onto the 1km wide near Earth object. 00:17:00 The failure of a gyroscope onboard the Hubble Space Telescope was a concern for NASA engineers, who scrambled to resurrect a backup gyro. It also raised questions about the future of the telescope, and the its ever-postponed successor the James Webb Space Telescope. 00:33:09 Questions from the audience.   This episode was recorded in front of a live audience at the Kathleen Syme Library and Community Centre in Carlton, Melbourne. Dr. Pamela Gay is astronomer, podcast

Hosts: Ed Brown, Jo Benhamu, Kirsten Banks. 00:03:03 Wiradjuri astronomer Kirsten Banks tells us all about Aboriginal astronomy - from emu eggs to moon halos. 00:13:20 The conventional wisdom that taking a low dose of aspirin every day can improve health and delay dementia in the elderly is unfounded for most people, according to the largest and most comprehensive clinical trial conducted in Australia. 00:25:44 Many infections in humans of antibiotic-resistant bacteria have been traced to the unnecessary use of antibiotics in puppies as 'preventatives'.   Become a Patreon and help us out! Come see Dr. Pamela Gay and the Science on Top team in Melbourne on 10 October 2018! Get your tickets to the Australian Skeptics National Convention!   This episode contains traces of an adorable caller to Dr. Karl's Triple J radio show.

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Peter Miller, Ross Balch. The Ig Nobel Prizes honour achievements that first make us laugh, then make us think. We take a look at this year’s winners: from rollercoaster medicine to Voodoo in the workplace! You can watch the award ceremony here. 00:03:13 MEDICINE PRIZE went to two Americans, Marc Mitchell and David Wartinger, for using roller coaster rides to try to hasten the passage of kidney stones. 00:09:41 ANTHROPOLOGY PRIZE went to an international team for collecting evidence, in a zoo, that chimpanzees imitate humans about as often, and about as well, as humans imitate chimpanzees. 00:15:14 BIOLOGY PRIZE was awarded to an international team of eight scientists for demonstrating that wine experts can reliably identify, by smell, the presence of a single fly in a glass of wine. 00:21:07 CHEMISTRY PRIZE was given to three researchers from Portugal for measuring the degree to which human saliva is a good cleaning agent for dirty surfaces. 00:25:04 MEDICAL EDUCATION PRIZE

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall 00:02:34 Archaeologists working in the Blombos Cave in South Africa have discovered what could be the world's oldest drawing - from 73,000 years ago. 00:10:40 Surfers have long believed that nearby dolphins are a good sign that there are no sharks around. But new research suggests that's not the case, as attacks on dolphins have increased in line with rising ocean temperatures. 00:19:33 The mirror test is an attempt to measure self-awareness in non-human animals. Now the Cleaner Wrasse has become the first fish ever to pass.   Become a Patreon and help us out! Come see Dr. Pamela Gay and the Science on Top team in Melbourne on 10 October 2018! Get your tickets to the Australian Skeptics National Convention!   This episode contains traces of Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson commenting on the dangers of smoking weed in space.

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall 00:02:22 The exciting family of planets less than 40 light years from Earth could each have 250 times more water than Earth, according to a new study. 00:11:09 Not just a meat-eater, the bonnethead shark is the first species of shark to be determined omnivorous. 00:17:49 Someone drilled a hole on the International Space Station. Was it sabotage? Space madness? We don't yet know. 00:26:35 As the planet-wide dust storm settles, the Opportunity rover has just 45 days to phone home before NASA gives up on it.   Become a Patreon and help us out! Come see Dr. Pamela Gay and the Science on Top team in Melbourne on 10 October 2018! Get your tickets to the Australian Skeptics National Convention!   This episode contains traces of Harrison Ford addressing the Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco.

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall, Dr. Carolyn de Graaf 00:03:09 A large study has identified 35 genes that can influence you take up marijuana use. The study also also found links between those genes and other drug dependencies, as well as ADHD, autism and depression. 00:13:31 Scientists at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health has found that microorganisms in colder climates darken themselves to capture more heat and improve their chances for survival. 00:18:45 String Theory, the theoretical framework of cosmology, could permit trillions of trillions different universes. But one problem with it, according to a controversial new paper, is that it doesn't allow a universe like ours. 00:29:09 Archaeologists found a few broken jars in a 3,500 year old Egyptian tomb. Their contents were analysed, revealing an ancient love affair with one of life's true miracles: cheese.   Become a Patreon and help us out! Come see Dr. Pamela Gay and the Science on Top team in Melbourne on 10 October 2018

Dr Morgan Cable is a planetary scientist and astrobiologist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Her work is primarily focussed on developing technologies and instruments for spacecraft searching for organic molecules and biomarkers in our solar system. She was the Assistant Project Science Systems Engineer for the Cassini Mission, and is currently working on numerous projects to Europa and Enceladus. Ed and Lucas caught up with Dr. Cable to discuss the exploration of the Saturn system, the Jupiter system, Mars, Iceland and the search for life. Dr. Cable's Twitter handle is @starsarecalling. For more information about the projects we talked about, see NASA's pages for Cassini, Europa Lander, Mars 2020, and Wikipedia's Enceladus Life Finder page.

Hosts: Ed Brown, Penny Dumsday, Lucas Randall 00:00:56 We're hosting Dr. Pamela Gay for a talk, Q&A session and live show in Melbourne on Wednesday 10 October! Tickets $20 from scienceontop.com/live All proceeds go to the non-profit Astronomical Society of the Pacific. 00:02:06 A study finds that smaller dogs lift their legs higher when they pee. Could they be lying, and trying to fool other dogs? 00:09:30 After a delayed first attempt, NASA's Parker Solar Probe has been successfully launched on a course for the Sun. This will be the fastest spacecraft ever made, and will get up close and personal with our nearest star. For more on solar research, listen to our interview from last year with Professor Lucie Green. 00:20:21 Geologists have been studying tiny grains found in a Russian meteorite. They've found a new mineral, that they call uakitite, which has never before been found on Earth.   This episode contains traces of National Party of Australia deputy leader Bridget McKenzie daring to say "the C-w