Brain Junk

Napkins! While recording this episode, we discovered that economic class influences what you use to wipe your face way more than we thought. You might use paper or cloth or maybe no napkin at all, but whatever you use, the history behind the napkin is fascinating. image: pixabay Show Notes: Atlas Obscura: A Brief History of Napkins, From Soft Dough to Paper Wikipedia on napkins Culinaria: The Orig...

An oak gall might look like an apple growing on the bottom of a leaf, but it's really a snug home for baby oak gall wasps. Turns out, a gall is more than just a baby-bug playpen. Oak galls have been used for thousands of years to make ink. And, these teeny wasps are part of the reason why Alfred Kinsey had the chops to create his Kinsey scale of human sexuality . image by: manfredrichter on pixaba...

If you thought a person always has only one male parent and one female parent, well...you'd be wrong. Most of the time the two parent thing is the rule, but occasionally it is possible, mostly in a lab, to have a child with three genetic contributors. Show Notes: (It's a good thing this isn't on paper 'cause there are tons of notes this time) 228: Why Don't We Lay Eggs? We talk about how viruses c...

The Sandbox tree, Water Hemlock, and Giant Hogweed are the mean girls of the plant world. They don't care about your feelings. If you get too close you might experience rashes, blindness, third degree burns, and/or death. These plants say, touch me, I DARE YOU. Show Notes: Sandbox Tree info on Britannica Animalogic YouTube with exploding Sandbox tree seedpods Water Hemlock is terrible New York Sta...

Turns out, in less than 20 years of pumping underground water sources for agriculture and drinking water, we've changed the tilt of the Earth. Yikes! Need some cheering up? Listen to the Quahog Wild episode! Show Notes: 258: Quahog Wild Advanced Earth and Space Sciences paper (Geophysical Research Letters): Drift of Earth's Pole Confirms Groundwater Depletion as a Significant Contributor to Global...

Known locally as a valtoare, this bowl built into a river has been used to wash clothes for hundreds of years. Click the links, it's something to see! This week we start in a river washing clothes and dive into the history of washing machines. It's so much clean fun. (Get it? CLEAN 'cause its about washing clothes? Hehehe we'll see ourselves out). Show Notes: TikTok video of a Romanian Whirlpool i...

In Northern Europe, up to 30% of men over the age of 60 can be affected by Dupuytren's Disease. Hand and finger tendons thicken and contract causing permanent loss of mobility. Turns out this disease is a leftover from Neanderthal genes. Show notes: Molecular Biology and Evolution article: Major Genetic Risk Factors for Dupuytren's Disease Are Inherited From Neandertals June 2023 Dupuytren Contrac...

Okay this title is a reach, but it was too good to not use. Turns out coastal critters are hitching rides around the world on our floating trash. From dramatic events like Japan's 2011 tsunami, to the stuff we toss into the garbage, we are changing the world and it's ecology in unexpected ways. Show Notes: Science.org : Tsunami-driven rafting: Transoceanic species dispersal and implications for ma...

Welcome to the wonderful "ology" created when bored and curious scientists were trapped in their apartments by the pandemic. It's Oreology! Is the creamy filling a liquid or a solid? Grab a bag of Oreos and help us answer burning questions surrounding this tasty snack. image Mooss from Pixabay Show Notes: Youtube of How It's Made: Oreo (go to 3:30 for cream being placed on the cookies!) Physics of...

We're circling back to the African Giant Pouched Rat! Turns out, in addition to being super great at detecting land mines, these rats also have very interesting vaginas. Show Notes: Step into the way back machine and give our 100th episode a listen(we talk about bomb sniffing rats)! Cornell Ed article on vaginal plasticity Phys Org article by Laura Gallup: Bomb-sniffing rodents undergo 'weird' vag...

Amy protecting all those precious brain wrinkles (special appearance by her husband, Chris). Turns out more isn't always better-- for optimal brain function, at least for people, we need just the right amount of brain folds. Kind of like Goldilocks. To avoid things like epilepsy we need not too many, and not too little, just right. image of brain coral just for comparison to the human brain (credi...

Amy asked for zombies. Next to Cordyceps (and the Last of Us), Toxoplasma gondii comes pretty close to taking over mammal brains. A 2022 study in Yellowstone showed wolves are affected by toxoplasmosis in unexpected ways. Show Notes: Communication Biology: Parasitic infection increases risk-taking in a social, intermediate host carnivore Scientific American: Are Cats responsible for "Cat Ladies"?...

While there are lots of other animals that feel wetness; buckle up, friends, humans can't. When you spill a glass of water on yourself, you are feeling something, but it's not the water. We don't like it either, but it seems to be true. Show Notes: 257: Pruney Fingers 2014 NIH reprint of Journal of Neurophysiology Why wet feels wet? A neurophysiological model of human cutaneous wetness sensitivity...

Some Anoles have the most awesome "in case of emergency" trick! Anoles living near bodies of water can jump in, sink to the bottom, and rebreathe their breath long enough to stay under for over 10 minutes. The science is remarkable (and we learn some cool vocab words). Show Notes: What is an Anole? Britannica Harvard University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Blog Aug 19, 202: Air bubbles all...

We LOVE the delightful and sometimes confounding process of scientific discovery. What makes science even better is when kids get to ask big questions and have access to ways to find answers. Show Notes: We mention The Muppet Show: if you don't know, here's a clip of Statler & Waldorf Kids discover how EpiPens work in space from The Smithsonian Cubes in Space : The Only Global STEM Program for...

Who knew that attempts to discover ways for humans to regrow organs or limbs might send a group of scientists in the direction of trying to grow sitka deer antlers on naked mice? Not us that's for sure. Buckle up, today science gets weird. image: Jackalopes at Wall Drug Show Notes: Trace on Instagram Amy on Instagram Brain Junk Instagram Nature March 2023 Mice grow ‘mini-antlers’ thanks to deers’...

Turns out the old school calculation for dogs aging seven years to every one of our human years isn't quite accurate. There are better ways to calculate aging with epigenetics (FYI epigenetics is the study of how your behaviors and environment can cause changes that affect the way your genes work). image of young puppy and adult dog from Pixabay Show Notes: Correction Corner! We got things wrong l...

From the 1960s to the early 2000s, if you needed to make sensitive equipment like a Geiger counter or even sensing equipment for hospital tests, you needed low-background steel. BUT WHAT IS IT? Listen and find out! Show Notes: Need some low background lead ? Let us know if they tell you a price. The Wiki for more...as if you'd need more after our episode (wink). We talked about the RAADS-R test fo...

Maybe you know Monty Python from their 1975 movie Holy Grail . They didn't just make movies! From 1969 to 1974 they also did a comedy tv show. A classic sketch was Ministry of Silly Walks. Turns out, it might've been good for more than just a few laughs. Try that Silly Walk workout. Show Notes: British Medical Journal article You must check out diagrams in the paper!!!! Ars Technica link to video...

Creepy trigger warning! We talk a bit about spiders. I don't like them either (TK) but it's worth it. We swear! If you google cranberry harvesting you'll quickly run into posts about spiders in the bogs. Turns out, they aren't as much of a creepy problem as Tumblr would have you believe! image: b. minnick from pixabay Show Notes : DownieLive visit to a cranberry bog . Let us know if YOU see any sp...

Aber-clam Lincoln is a 214 year old quahog clam (look, we don't make the dad jokes, we just share them). Did you know you can count shell ridges like tree rings to determine age? Clams pictured are not quahogs, but you get the idea of how the ridges look. Show Notes: Aber-clam Lincoln article Ming the Clam --the oldest we've found so far. Dr. Bruce Liberman commenting on survival of the sluggish J...

Are you Team Amy, who adores getting wrinkled fingers or are you on Team Trace, who can't STAND having pruney fingers because they're gross (there's no right answer here, except Trace is right). We were surprised to learn the science of wrinkled-in-water fingers. It's not from absorbing water like we were told as kids. Show Notes: A blast from the past Episode 194: Iris Sphincters The TikTok that...

A fear of clowns is called coulrophobia. If you're like us, maybe you don't find clowns bone-chillingly scary but they still give you a case of the ick. This week we're looking into clowns and fears. Stick around to the end, Amy takes a left turn with weird body horror involving an octopus. Show Notes: Amy references this study HARD Fear of clowns: An investigation into the prevalence of coulropho...

Art isn't just in museums! Sometimes it's hidden behind walls, inside a piece of furniture, or sadly, in a dumpster. Today we explore the remarkable circumstances that come together to find lost or forgotten art. Show Notes: Francis Mattson Hines and his art in the dumpster and the wrapped Washington Square Arch Recycled art in an airport Art in a couch Art hidden from an ex-wife Stewart Little su...

We've talked wombats and binturongs before but we've learned MORE and had to share! Past episodes: 244: Stinky Critters for binturong and 34: Wombat Poop Wombat mama and baby! image by budgme on pixabay Binturongs hanging out in the sun. image by Kevinsphotos on pixabay Show Notes: Australian Geographic Nov. 2020 interview with Alyce Swinbourne about Wombat Bums ⬇⬇⬇⬇⬇ Content warning below: wombat...