(Whole Show) Longer “healthspan” might be why the most popular Non-COVID story in Science Magazine last year involved the body-building supplement alpha-ketoglutarate (AKG), fed to middle-aged mice. Buck Institute of Research on Aging Scientist Gordon Lithgow explains.
Executive Producer: Beth Bennett
Producer: Shelley Schlender
Additional Music: Stop This Train – by John Mayer.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 26:55 — 24.7MB)
The Case for Keto
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 29:19 — 26.8MB)
Figure from Xu et al. 2020, Joule, vol. 4, p. 2609
Our lives have been changed by lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries which are everywhere: in our cell phones, cars, toys, power tools and grid energy storage. Indeed, the 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to the three scientists who invented and developed them. As the world manufactures more and more Li-ion batteries, what are the challenges and opportunities for recycling them? How can we prevent the batteries from ending up in landfills where the toxic metals inside can leak out? In this episode, we talk with Dr. Zheng Chen, a professor of nanoengineering at the University of California, San Diego, and co-author on the paper “Efficient Direct Recycling of Lithium-Ion Battery Cathodes by Targeted Healing” published a few weeks ago in the journal Joule.
Hosts: Jill Sjong, Joel Parker
Feature: Shelley Schlender
Executive Producer: Beth Bennett
Show Producer: Joel Parker
Engineer: Sam Fuqua
Listen to the show:
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:14 — 37.4MB)
TheNoseKnows2Much, from WikiCommons
Scratch & Sniff COVID Test (starts 1:00) CU Scientist Dan Larremore explains how a smell test app might offer an affordable COVID screening that’s way more accurate than a temperature check.
Ice Age BONE Fire (starts 6:00) Archeologist John Hoffecker and local volunteers recreate a Paleolithic “campfire” that used bones as the primary fuel. Volunteers who helped with this project — Josh Steinsiek, Dustin Goodew of Arapahoe Meat Company, Outdoorspeople Lin and Henry Ballard, Amber O’Hearn and Siobhan Huggins.
Engineer Sam Fuqua
Host/Producer: Shelley Schlender
Additional Contributions: Edie Hill, Composer
Executive Producer: Beth Bennett
Listen to the show:
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:09 — 24.9MB)
Covid19 Vaccine
This week on How on Earth, Beth gives an update on the efficacy, safety, and availability of the mRNA vaccines for the corona virus. You hear from Drs Tony Fauci, Michael Diamond, and Roger Seheult.
Host: Beth Bennett
Producer: Beth Bennett
Engineer: Sam Fuqua
Executive Producer: Beth Bennett
Listen to the show:
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 25:15 — 23.1MB)
Craig Foster with his octopus teacher
This week we review the hit movie “My Octopus Teacher,” the story about a man who goes diving in a kelp forest off the Western Cape of South Africa, and becomes acquainted with an octopus. We review the movie with Roger Hanlon, a diving biologist, cephalopod expert and senior scientist at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA. We discuss the octopus’ elaborate camouflage and complex behavior. We’ll get some answers to our octopus questions: Do they dream? Do they play? Use tools? Are octopuses a second form of intelligent life on earth?
You can learn more about the South African sea forest at the Sea Change Project. You can learn more about octopuses at Roger Hanlon’s research.
Host & Producer: Jill Sjong
Executive Producer: Beth Bennett
Engineer: Sam Fuqua
Listen to the show:
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:30 — 37.8MB)
Inside a Manhole – photo credit BIOBOT
CU COVID TESTING UPDATE (starts 1:00) We join CU Engineering Professor Cresten Mansfeldt as he and his students open a sewer manhole and do maintenance on their wastewater COVID early warning system. We also get an update on COVID status at CU Boulder.
Brown Dog Ticks
ROCKY MOUNTAIN SPOTTED FEVER & CLIMATE CHANGE (starts 11:15) Brown dog ticks that carry Rocky Mountain Spotted fever usually bite dogs. But they prefer to bite people over dogs when temperature rise to 100 degrees. UC-Davis scientist Laura Backus explains her new study and its implications in a time of climate change.
Host: Shelley Schlender
Producer:Shelley Schlender
Engineer:Sam Fuqua
Additional contribution: Music from Lynn Patrick
Executive Producer:Beth Bennett
Listen to the show:
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:37 — 25.3MB)
This week on How on Earth, Beth interviews author Judith Schwartz. In her new book, the Reindeer Chronicles, she takes the reader on a tour of some of the most wounded places on earth, and stories of how a passionate group of eco-restorers is leading the way to their revitalization. This optimistic book describes solutions to seemingly intractable problems that can restore local water, carbon, nutrient, and energy cycles.
Host: Beth Bennett
Producer: Beth Bennett
Engineer: Sam Fuqua
Additional contribution: Joel Parker
Executive Producer: Beth Bennett
Listen to the show:
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 28:27 — 26.0MB)
Holistic Dentistry
Host: Beth Bennett
Producer: Beth Bennett
Engineer: Maeve Conran
Additional Contributions: Joel Parker
Executive Producer: Beth Bennett
Listen to the Show:
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 30:54 — 28.3MB)
CU-Boulder Sociologist Andrea Tilstra discusses how this decade’s reduction of lifespan in the US ties closely with two factors 1) easier access to painkillers and opioids, and 2) the obesity epidemic and the related health problems that come with it. Tilstra also explains the quesitons a social scientist/demographer asks when examining the COVID-19 pandemic, the COVID-19 Boulder County local tracking of the pandemic, and the human factors to consider as people face the stresses of social distancing and trying to stay connected.
Producer and Host: Shelley Schlender
Engineer: Maeve Conran
Executive Producer: Jill Sjong
Additional Contributions: Music from Lynn Patrick
Listen to the show:
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:11 — 24.9MB)
