Here’s episode 480 of Kiki Sanford’s kickass science podcast, TWIS.
A solar flare erupted from the sun that was aimed directly toward Earth. Thankfully, it wasn’t an extremely large flare, but northern latitudes should expect more intense aurora activity.
Researchers published evidence that nerve impulses might travel as a physical wave rather than the well accepted electrical action potential. Dr. Kiki thinks it’s fringe science, and warns people not to be taken in by new age scams involving our sound transmitting nerves.
Blair goes to watery depths in the Animal Corner with a story about baby frogs rushing their development in order to hatch earlier when their siblings get eaten. Her second story involved jumping mosquito fish leading researchers to think our sense of balance was with us before we stepped on land. And, finally, she found a fascinating story about a conversation between a trout and eel… fishy friends for sure.
Birds and migration come into focus with two stories introduced by Dr. Kiki. First, migratory insectivorous birds follow green vegetation in the spring rather than the migratory path they followed in the fall. This behavior leads to a looped migratory path. Second, neo-tropical birds most likely diversified as a result of traveling over geological features that influenced isolation and speciation. Justin, however, brings up the good point that no one really needs to migrate in the tropics since the weather is the same all the time.
Justin brought up a study about how hard working our brains are, even after we fall asleep. Then talked about the importance of vitamin B1 to avoid brain damage, and how the bacteria on and in our bodies could someday be used to produce drugs for us.
The end of the show brought a lot of fun with a story about how scientists discovered the whale pelvis is really purposeful (porpoiseful?) after all, and not vestigial as previously believed. And, we closed with a story about Mick Jagger-loving scientists who named a fossilized swamp-dwelling hippo-pig-horse after the famous rock star.