Science Friday

We go inside the scientifically accurate ER world created for the TV show with one of its medical consultants. What is it actually like to work in an emergency room? To deal with overcrowded waiting rooms, a shortage of hospital beds, and a constant flow of life-and-death health conditions—while trying to maintain your sanity at the same time? That’s the focus of “The Pitt,” a new medical drama on Max from the creators of “ER,” starring one of that show’s key actors, all grown up: Noah Wyle. The first season takes place over a single shift, and each episode is one hour of that shift in real time. And medical professionals are praising the show for its accuracy. Joining Host Ira Flatow to talk about the accuracy of the show is one of its medical consultants, Dr. Sylvia Owusu-Ansah, associate professor of pediatrics and emergency medicine at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Transcript for this segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

NASA is planning to decommission the International Space Station by the end of 2030. The ISS, which began operations in 2000, is reaching the end of its lifespan and has become costly to maintain. NASA selected SpaceX to construct a vehicle that would “de-orbit” the football field-sized station, pushing it down into the atmosphere where it’ll burn up safely over the Pacific ocean. So what comes next? So far, NASA has awarded contracts to private companies including Axiom Space, Blue Origin, Northrup Grumman, and Starlab to support the research and development for commercial space stations which would help facilitate future research in orbit, among their own space tourism offerings. Next year, NASA will certify one or more of these companies to build at least one space station, where it’ll then become one of many customers to purchase services from the new facilities. Loren Grush, space reporter at Bloomberg News, joins Host Ira Flatow to discuss who’s in the running and how future space stations could differ from the one we know today. She also talks about her recent trip to the headquarters of Vast, one of the companies competing for this contract, to learn more about its cryptocurrency origins and its high-level recruitments from NASA and Apple. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

What happens when AI moves beyond convincing chatbots and custom image generators to something that matches—or outperforms—humans? Each week, tech companies trumpet yet another advance in artificial intelligence, from better chat services to image and video generators that spend less time in the uncanny valley. But the holy grail for AI companies is known as AGI, or artificial general intelligence—a technology that can meet or outperform human capabilities on any number of tasks, not just chat or images. The roadmap and schedule for getting to AGI depends on who you talk to and their precise definition of AGI. Some say it’s just around the corner, while other experts point a few years down the road. In fact, it’s not entirely clear whether current approaches to AI tech will be the ones that yield a true artificial general intelligence. Hosts Ira Flatow and Flora Lichtman talk with Will Douglas Heaven, who reports on AI for MIT Technology Review; and Dr. Rumman Chowdhury, who specializes in ethical, explainable and transparent AI, about the path to AGI and its potential impacts on society. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

In many parts of the United States, spring has sprung. There’s nothing quite like those first few beautiful days of spring. They’re delightful—until the sneezing starts. According to the CDC, a quarter of US adults deal with seasonal allergies. And if you think they’re getting worse, it’s not just in your head. Previous research has shown that climate change is making pollen seasons start earlier and become more intense, a problem that’s expected to get worse. Joining Host Ira Flatow to discuss the science behind seasonal allergies, and the best methods for treating them, is Dr. Neeta Ogden, director of the Allergy, Asthma and Sinus Center in Edison, New Jersey. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Over the past two decades, rates of peanut allergies in children have more than tripled. A variety of theories has been proposed to explain this, from a rise in industrialization keeping kids away from the germs that develop the immune system, to the previous pediatric guidelines that urged parents to restrict access to peanuts early in life. Whatever the cause, higher rates of peanut allergies means effective treatments are in higher demand. New research published in NEJM Evidence shows that a simple treatment could be effective for kids who can tolerate half a peanut or more before an overwhelming reaction: eating a small amount of store-bought peanut butter, gradually increasing the amount over 18 months. In the study, 100% of participating kids increased their tolerance to three tablespoons of peanut butter without an allergic reaction. Joining Host Flora Lichtman to discuss this study and other food allergy treatments on the horizon is Dr. Scott Sicherer, Director of the Jaffe Food Allergy Institute at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

The cuts hit multiple agencies, affecting work on HIV, gun violence prevention, vaccines, minority health research, and more. On April 1, thousands of federal health workers woke up to find that they had been laid off. Scientists and civil servants at the Food and Drug Administration, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and National Institutes of Health were let go as part of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s pledge to cut jobs at the country’s top disease-fighting agencies. Host Ira Flatow talks with Umair Irfan, senior correspondent at Vox in Washington, D.C., about the repercussions of these cuts. They also discuss other science news of the week, including a pacemaker the size of a grain of rice, how air pollution affects the climate, and miso made on board the International Space Station. Transcript for this segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Emergency response experts say that funding and staff cuts at the National Weather Service could mean less reliable weather forecast. And, babies like music, but they generally have preferences. A music therapist reveals the best kinds of music to soothe a baby. Forecasting Cuts Leave Some Worried For Hurricane Season Many in Georgia are still recovering from the devastation of Hurricane Helene last fall. Now, firings and funding cuts at the National Weather Service and other agencies have some experts worried about accurate forecasts heading into the next hurricane season, which begins June 1. Hundreds of workers have been fired from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, including meteorologists at the Weather Service. More cuts by the Trump administration are reportedly on the way. “The forecast is not going to be as accurate because it won’t have as much information in it,” said Chuck Watson of ENKI research in Savannah, who studies disaster preparedness and response. Read the whole story at sciencefriday.com. Tips For Soothing Your Baby With Music, From A Music Therapist If you’re a parent, you’ve probably heard that playing music is good for your baby’s brain development. But that’s where many people’s knowledge about the subject ends. What about music is good for a baby’s development? Will queuing up a lullaby playlist get the job done? And how can you tell if it’s all just too much for them? Sarah Nolan, a board-certified music therapist and neonatal intensive care unit music therapist in Children’s Hospital Los Angeles’ Mark Taper and Johnny Mercer Artists Program recently published recommendations on the best ways to play music around your baby. Host Ira Flatow talks to Nolan about the ideal length of time to play music, what kinds of music are best, and the benefits of music therapy to babies and adults alike. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

In January, an iceberg the size of Chicago splintered off from the Antarctic Peninsula and drifted away in the Bellingshausen Sea. As luck would have it, a team of scientists was nearby on a research vessel, and they seized the chance to see what was lurking on the seafloor beneath that iceberg—a place that had long been covered, and nearly impossible to get to. They found a stunning array of life, like octopuses, sea spiders, and crustaceans, as well as possible clues to the dynamics of ice sheets. Host Ira Flatow talks with the expedition’s two chief scientists: Dr. Patricia Esquete, marine biologist at the University of Aveiro in Portugal, and Dr. Sasha Montelli, glaciologist and geophysicist at University College London. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Mental health information on social media can be both revelatory and misleading. How do clinicians and their patients make sense of it? TikTok and other social media sites are full of mental health content—often short, grabby, first-person videos detailing symptoms for conditions like ADHD and autism. But what does this mean for teens and young adults who spend hours a day scrolling? A new study published in PLOS One analyzes the 100 most viewed TikTok videos about ADHD to assess both how accurate they are and how young people respond to them. Researchers found that about half of the videos were inaccurate or missing key context, and that the more TikToks young adults watched, the less critical they were of the content. For some, watching social videos about mental health conditions led them to better understand themselves and eventually get a proper diagnosis and treatment. For others it made them consider if they have conditions they don’t meet the diagnostic criteria for. Host Flora Lichtman talks with the lead author of the ADHD TikTok study, Vasileia Karasavva, a PhD Student in clinical psychology at the University of British Columbia; and Dr. Jennifer Katzenstein, director of psychology, neuropsychology, and social work at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg, Florida. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Engineers take an in-depth look at why the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore collapsed and how to prevent future tragedies. In the early morning of March 26, 2024, the container ship Dali struck the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore. Within 30 seconds, the bridge collapsed into the river below. Six construction workers lost their lives. On the one-year anniversary of the accident, we talk about what went wrong, and how to improve the safety of our nation’s bridges and prevent another tragic crash. Host Ira Flatow is joined by Dr. Abi Aghayere, professor of civil engineering at Drexel University; and Dr. Thomas McKenney, associate professor of engineering practice in the naval architecture and marine engineering department at the University of Michigan. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

The company has genetic data of 15 million people, which could be shared with a future buyer. Here’s how to delete it. Plus, an experimental coating could make golf balls roll more reliably on greens with different conditions. After 23andMe Bankruptcy, Customers Urged To Delete Their Data If you’re one of roughly 15 million people who used 23andMe to unlock information from their DNA, consumer advocates have a message for you: Delete your data. On Sunday, the company, which has customers send saliva samples for DNA analysis, filed for bankruptcy. While many customers submitted their saliva for the purpose of ancestral analysis, 85% of customers also consent to their data used for genetic disease research. As the company searches for a buyer, consumer advocates, including California Attorney General Rob Bonta, have urged customers to delete their data from 23andMe’s website. 23andMe and other genetic testing companies are not subject to HIPAA, meaning health and medical records kept by 23andMe could be shared with a future buyer. Producer Kathleen Davis joins Host Flora Lichtman to discuss this and other top science stories of the week. Chemists Make A Coating That Can Slow A Golf Ball’s Roll With spring here, the days are getting warmer and longer, meaning conditions are perfect for a trip to the golf course. And while golf is certainly a game of physics—force, angles, parabolas—this week researchers presented work showing that chemistry could play an important role on the golf course as well. Speaking at the meeting of the American Chemical Society in San Diego, researchers described a high performance coating that could be incorporated into the polyurethane shell of a golf ball. The hydrophilic (water-loving) coating would make tiny bits of water stick to the surface of the golf ball and sheet off, modifying the way the ball interacts with the grass of the green. That interaction, says Tom Kennedy, owner of Chemical Innovative Solutions Inc., would lead to the ball rolling more slowly and reliably, especially on “fast,” closely-cut greens in dry and windy conditions. Kennedy joins Host Ira Flatow to discuss the technology, and how hydrophilic coatings could find a home in other applications, including solar cells. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Certain words are overrepresented in text written by AI language models. A study investigates why such patterns develop. Also, the ends of chromosomes, called telomeres, typically shorten as an organism ages. But when some fat-tail dwarf lemurs hibernate, they lengthen. ‘Delving’ Into The ‘Realm’ Of AI Word Choice Several years ago, some eagle-eyed readers of scientific papers noticed an unusual trend—an increase in the number of abstracts using certain words. The terms, including “delve,” “realm,” “evolving landscape,” and more, were suddenly appearing more often than they used to. Researchers analyzed the abstracts and compared them to abstracts written just a few years earlier, before the widespread availability of artificial intelligence large language model chatbots. They came to the conclusion that abstracts written by AI were more likely to use words from a list of around 20 favorites than regular human speech. The question was, why? If the models were trained on conventional writing, how did a preference for words such as “delve” creep in? Host Flora Lichtman talks with Dr. Tom Juzek and Dr. Zina Ward of Florida State University, who set out to try to understand the origins of some of AI’s favorite words. When Dwarf Lemurs Hibernate, Their Chromosomes Do Something Odd The fat-tail dwarf lemur is one of the only primates that hibernate for the winter. A new study published in the journal Biology Letters takes a closer look at what’s going on inside lemur cells when they are in this extended phase of suspended animation. It turns out that their telomeres, the ends of the chromosomes, actually grow longer when the dwarf lemurs hibernate. Typically telomeres shorten as we age, as cells continuously divide. So, what exactly does this finding mean for lemurs and other primates, like humans? Host Flora Lichtman talks with the co-authors of this study, Dr. Marina Blanco and Dr. Lydia Greene, research scientists at Duke University. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

TB kills more than a million people each year. Dr. Mireille Kamariza has spent her career developing better detection and treatment tools. As the United States retreats from global health leadership—withdrawing from the World Health Organization, dismantling USAID—public health experts warn that there will be implications for the spread of certain diseases around the globe. One such disease is tuberculosis (TB), which is the deadliest infectious disease in the world. If you live in the United States, it’s likely that TB is not on your radar: It’s rare, and if someone is infected, there are effective treatments. But elsewhere in the world, more than a million people die of the bacterium each year, mostly in low-resource, high population regions. Tuberculosis isn’t a straightforward bug to treat. It has a unique armor, which helps it evade treatment like antibiotics. The current treatment regimen involves taking 16 pills a day for six months, which for people in regions with limited access to medicine, can be a massive barrier. Joining Host Flora Lichtman to discuss the science behind this deadly bacterium, and new tools to test for and treat it, is Dr. Mireille Kamariza, a chemical biologist at the University of California, Los Angeles. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

In a new book, author John Green traces how the disease has impacted culture, geography, and even fashion over the centuries. Tuberculosis (TB) has had an incredibly large impact on human history. One staggering statistic? It’s been estimated that by the start of the 1800s, the disease had killed one in seven people who had ever lived. Because of this, tuberculosis affected human culture, geography, and fashion—and even killed off some of literature and media’s most famous heroines. While TB incidence has gone down tremendously in the United States, it remains a massive issue in low-resource nations. About 1.25 million people die of TB each year, making it still the deadliest infectious disease in the world. Author John Green explores humankind’s relationship with TB in the new book Everything is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection. Green speaks with Host Flora Lichtman about how TB’s path reflects our society and culture. He joins us from Indianapolis, Indiana. Transcript for this segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Researchers built the largest 3D map of our universe yet. What they found supports the idea that dark energy could have evolved over time. One of the mysteries of the universe is why it expands at the rate that it does. Back in 1998, two teams of researchers observed that not only was the universe expanding, but that the rate of expansion was increasing. That observation was the basis for a concept now known as dark energy. In the years since, cosmologists have been trying to get a handle on better measurements of that effect, and hoping to figure out what dark energy actually might be. This week, researchers on a project called DESI, the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument, released results based on their first three years of data at an international physics conference. They found that it appears possible that dark energy—whatever it is—has changed over the lifetime of the universe. In other words, the so-called cosmological constant may not, in fact, be a constant. The data is not quite statistically significant yet, so researchers can’t definitively say that this is true, which leaves many questions about the nature of dark energy still unresolved. Dr. Andrei Cuceu of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Dr. Adam Riess of Johns Hopkins University and the Space Telescope Science Institute join Host Flora Lichtman to talk about the new research, and what remains to be discovered in dark energy. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

After nine months aboard the International Space Station, astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams have finally landed back on Earth. Also, a German physicist and homebrewer discovered brief, intense physical reactions that happen when you uncork a bubbly swing-top bottle. NASA Astronauts Return To Earth After Extended Stay On The ISS After 286 days aboard the International Space Station—278 days longer than their initial planned mission—NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams landed safely back on Earth on Tuesday, off the coast of Florida. Their mission turned into a nine-month stay on the station after their Boeing Starliner capsule had issues with its thrusters and NASA deemed it unsafe to carry the astronauts back. SpaceX’s Dragon capsule instead ferried them to Earth earlier this week. And they had a splashdown surprise: A pod of curious dolphins greeted them after they landed. Host Flora Lichtman is joined by Casey Crownhart, senior climate reporter at MIT Technology Review, to catch us up on that and other big science stories from this week, including why a company is trying to “refreeze” a massive glacier, why the 10 hottest years on record are the last 10, and how the London Zoo is trying to conserve a unique frog that incubates its young in its vocal sacs. The Physics That Makes Swing-Top Bottles ‘Pop’ For a lot of us, uncorking a bottle is the sound of celebration. It’s also a sound that we may not think too much about—until we open our next bottle. But Dr. Max Koch, a physicist at the University of Göttingen who does home brewing on the side, got to wondering what actually makes that popping sound. What’s happening inside that bottle, physics-wise? To find out more, he recorded the uncorking of an unsuccessful batch of his ginger beer using microphones and a high-speed camera, and analyzed the bubbly results with a physicist’s rigor. His team’s findings were published in the journal Physics of Fluids. Dr. Koch sits down with Host Flora Lichtman to talk about the brief but intense changes to temperature, sound, and speed that happen when you uncork a swing-top glass bottle. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

The framework of Adverse Childhood Experiences started with an unexpected finding over 30 years ago. How is our approach changing? We know that experiences from our childhood, both good and bad, shape who we become as adults. But, understanding what kinds of early experiences have staying power into adulthood and the wide range of impacts they can have is an emerging science. In the 1980s, Dr. Vincent Felitti ran a weight loss clinic in San Diego, California. He noticed that some patients who regained weight were more likely to have experienced sexual abuse in childhood.This eventually led him to conduct research on a larger scale to better understand the correlation between what he and his colleagues dubbed adverse childhood experiences, or ACES, and mental and physical health challenges later in life. This same 10-question survey Dr. Felitti gave participants in the 1990s is still used by researchers and clinicians to assess childhood trauma. But recently, some psychology experts have begun to question how accurately the ACES framework identifies trauma in diverse populations, since it was originally developed for a mostly white and affluent study population. Host Flora Lichtman talks with Preeti Simran Sethi, science writer and Rosalyn Carter Mental Health Journalism fellow, about her reporting for Science Friday about adverse childhood experiences. Also, to see more butterfly stories from our listeners, visit our story from last week. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Former NIH director Dr. Harold Varmus speaks out about what recent budget cuts and policy changes could mean for science. One of the areas targeted by President Trump’s administration for cuts has been the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Cost-cutting actions have included the layoffs of some 1,200 NIH employees, the termination of research grants, a pause in the “study sections” that evaluate and award grant funding, and a cap on indirect costs included in research grants. Some of those moves have been paused following court cases. Dr. Harold Varmus, a former director of the National Institutes of Health, joins Host Ira Flatow to talk about the actions, and the impact he fears they could have on the future of biomedical research in the United States. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Fungal networks in the ground ferry crucial nutrients to plants. But how do brainless organisms form complex supply chain networks? Also, in this year’s baseball spring training, the new Automated Ball-Strike System is helping settle challenges to home plate pitch calls. Scientists Observe Fungi Creating Complex Supply Chains As the leaves start to pop out, it’s natural to look up and admire the trees. But actually, there’s a lot of action happening underneath your feet. Beneath you is a complex network of fungal trade routes carrying essential nutrients to the roots of plants, mined from the soil by fungus. It’s a subterranean supply chain. But how exactly do these complex networks form? How does the fungus decide where to ship which resources, or where to build roads? Basically, how does a brainless thread make decisions? Host Flora Lichtman is joined by Dr. Toby Kiers, an author on a recent study of those networks, and professor of evolutionary biology at Vrije University in Amsterdam. She’s also the executive director of the Society for the Protection of Underground Networks (SPUN). A Rookie Robot Umpire Takes The Field Baseball fans are eagerly awaiting opening day. And while spring training is a time for teams to test out new players and strategies, it’s also a time for Major League Baseball to trial new rules and procedures. One of the things that the league has been testing this year is a robotic system to call balls and strikes. The Automated Ball-Strike System, which is based on the same technology used for line judging in tennis, isn’t calling every pitch, but is used to back up a challenge system at the plate. The tech is already in use in Triple-A games, and could make it to the major leagues in the years ahead. Baseball writer Davy Andrews joins Host Ira Flatow to talk about the technology, and how it could subtly change the rules of the game. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Layoffs at the agency, which releases weather forecasts and monitors extreme weather, could have serious implications. Also, funds for climate and sustainability-focused farming projects have been indefinitely frozen, even though the USDA has already signed contracts. 10% Of NOAA Staff Laid Off, With More Cuts Possible The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, better known as NOAA, impacts and provides services for Americans every day. The agency releases daily weather forecasts and monitors extreme weather, and it also conducts research into global weather and climate change. Along with many other federal science agencies, NOAA is being subjected to layoffs in the name of cost-cutting: 10% of the agency’s workforce has been laid off, with 1,000 more cuts potentially to come. According to Dr. Timothy Gallaudet, acting NOAA administrator during Trump’s first term, this is likely to lead to declines in quality of service and access to information about weather events. Host Flora Lichtman speaks to Umair Irfan, science correspondent at Vox, who has been covering the turmoil at NOAA. They also discuss other science stories of the week, including the death of prolific blood donor James Harrison. Frozen Climate And Conservation Funds Leave Farmers In Limbo Around the country, farmers are planning and planting this year’s crops. It can be uncertain work, made even more tenuous by some of the Trump administration’s changes to climate and conservation policies. The administration has frozen billions of dollars in grants to farmers for sustainable agriculture, conservation, and “climate smart” projects. In some cases, farmers had already signed contracts with the government and begun work on these projects. While some funding from the Inflation Reduction Act was recently released, many farmers across the country are still in limbo. Host Flora Lichtman talks with Patrick Brown, a farmer in Warren County, North Carolina; and Dr. Kitty O’Neil, an agricultural climate resiliency specialist at Cornell University’s Cooperative Extension about the future of farming in a changing climate. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.