Kgnu - How On Earth

This is our 2012 Fall Pledge Drive Show and our subject is Genes Gone Bad, or do you have to be a genetic-mutant superhuman to play Paganini? Helping us answer that question is Boulder's own and world-renowned Dr. Gregory Walker. And in a very special treat, Gregory plays the magnificent Paganini Caprice No. 24, live in KGNU's Kabaret studio. And we hear a bit of an interview with Sam Kean, author of the book, The Violinist's Thumb, which inspired our show. Hosts: Jim Pullen and Joel Parker Producer: Jim Pullen Engineers: Jim Pullen, George Figgs, and Dafe Hughes Executive Producer: Jim Pullen

We talk with Travis Metcalfe, of Boulder's Space Science Institute, where he is searching for Sister Earth and also part of the Blue Dot Project.  As for why, the past two decades have witnessed accelerating progress on one of the most fundamental questions in astronomy: Are we alone in the Universe? Astronomers have already discovered hundreds of planets around distant stars. Some of them are nearly as small as the Earth, and orbit in the "Goldilocks zone" of their parent star where liquid water can exist.   We congratulate Boulder’s David J. Wineland for winning the 2012 Nobel Prize in physics.     Wineland, a physicist at the National Institute of Standards and Technology and CU-Boulder, shares the prize with and Serge Haroche of France.  They are credited with making breakthroughs in quantum physics by showing how to observe individual quantum particles without destroying them.  These, in turn, are the first steps toward building superfast computers based on quantum physics. Hosts: Joel Parker, Beth Ba

Feature #1: Neanderthals (start time: 6:01) Our Neanderthal ancestors have long been maligned as rather dim-witted cave-dwellers. But they may have been brighter -- and more colorful -- more like us, shall we say.  We turn to the BBC's Science in Action for a look at new research into who these ancestors really were. Here's BBC's Jon Stewart. Feature #2: Antarctica (start time: 11:03) It may be hard for people living in Colorado and other land-locked states to grasp that our daily lifestyles – burning fossil fuels every time we turn on the lights or drive our car, for instance – affects the delicate marine ecosystems of the Southern Ocean, from the ice algae to the penguins and whales. And in turn, the health of the plants and animals, and indeed the ice they depend on, in Antarctica, affects our own health.  Cohost Susan Moran interviews Dr. James McClintock, a marine biologist at the University of Alabama in Birmingham, about his new book, “Lost Antarctica: Adventures in a Disappearing Land.” He shares his

Big Waves (start time 4:39):  When does one plus one not equal two? When waves behave non-linearly, according to CU researchers Mark Ablowitz and Douglas Baldwin.  The two have been researching how multiple water waves can add together to form a wave with a height much greater than twice the height of either wave. The mathematicians refer to these as X and Y waves, which sounds mathematical but actually just refers to the shape of the wave front as seen looking down on the wave from above. Rather than being rare, these waves are readily observable and may be the reason that some tsunamis are much larger than anticipated.  We spoke yesterday with the pair to find out more about these interesting waves. Omega 3 Fatty Acids (start time 14:49): It’s widely accepted that Omega 3 supplements are good for many things, especially your heart, and that fish oil is high in Omega 3. But earlier this month, Greek researchers made a splash with a meta-analysis that concluded that fish oil supplements do not help your he

Colorado Drought Conference (start time 4:35): Experts are meeting at a conference in Denver this week to discuss the implications of prolonged drought conditions here in Colorado. How On Earth’ Susan Moran speaks with biologist Dr. Chad McNutt of the NOAA's National Integrated Drought Information Center about wthe drought means for the ecosystem, and for Western cities -- and how we can start to address the problem. A More Perfect Heaven (start time 11:50): Joel Parker speaks with Dava Sobel, a science journalist and author who tells the stories of the science and the scientists from the past and how they connect to the present. Those stories reveal that the course of scientific progress is far from orderly — it often takes unplanned twists, has failures that require going back and starting over, and can be driven by the quirks of the personalities of individual scientists. Today we hear about Sobel's most recent book, A More Perfect Heaven: How Copernicus Revolutionized the Cosmos.  This book also contain

We’ll talk about the World of a tiny particle called the Higgs-Boson, with CU Physicist Uriel Nauenberg.  Nauenberg also speaks tonight at the Boulder Cafe Scientifique. Hosts: Joel Parker and Ted Burnham Producer: Shelley Schlender Engineer: Jim Pullen Executive Producer: Susan Moran

Bell Labs thrived from the 1920s to the 1980s, when it was most innovative and productive institution of the twentieth century. Long before America's brightest scientific minds began migrating west to Silicon Valley, they flocked to the Bell Labs campus in the New Jersey suburbs. At its peak, Bell Labs employed nearly fifteen thousand people, twelve hundred had PhDs. Thirteen eventually won Nobel prizes. How did they do it?  How can we learn from their successes, so we can do it here in Colorado?  New Your Times journalist Jon Gertner has written a book that provides some answers.  He calls it:  The Idea Factory - Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation.  Inside that book, you can learn how radar came to be, and lasers, transistors, satellites, mobile phones, and much more.   How on Earth's Shelley Schlender spoke with Mr. Gertner about his new book. Hosts: Tom McKinnon and Jim Pullen Producer: Tom McKinnon Engineer: Jim Pullen Executive Producer: Susan Moran

(start time: 5:50). We Coloradoans pride ourselves on our healthy habits -- eating right, exercising, and paying attention to what’s in the food we eat. Yet many of the things we use everyday, like water bottles, sunscreens, makeup, and – OK, soda cans -- are full of toxic chemicals. Many of them are untested, and may be insidiously making us sick. One of the more controversial compounds is BPA, which is used to make some hard plastic bottles and other food packaging. Today we have with us public health expert Dr. David Dausey to talk about BPA –bisphenol A -- and other environmental toxins. He directs the Mercyhurst Institute for Public Health in Pennsylvania. Hosts: Jim Pullen and Susan Moran Producer: Jim Pullen Engineer: Maeve Conran Executive Producer: Susan Moran

Curiosity's RAD (start time 7:14). To design a successful manned mission to Mars, we'll have to know a lot about the radiation environment between the Earth and Mars and on the planet's surface. The Radiation Assessment Detector (RAD) instrument on Curiosity is designed to make those measurements. We talk with Southwest Research Institute's Dr. Donald Hassler, the RAD instrument Principle Investigator, about RAD's purpose, how the instrument works, and the joys and scary moments that come with working on Mars. Planetary science budget (start time: 15:49). Despite the successes of the Mars missions and voyages to our other planetary neighbors, the White House decided that NASA's planetary science budget should be drawn down. The hit would be substantial, a twenty percent reduction from 2012. 300 million dollars would be removed from a baseline one and a half billion dollars. We ask Dr. Alan Stern, who has served as the chief of the Science Mission Directorate at NASA, about why the planetary science budget sh

Beer Can Science (start time 6:50) If you’re a beer drinker, you’ve probably noticed that there are a lot of cans on liquor store shelves these days. Here in Colorado, and elsewhere, more and more breweries are choosing to put their beer in cans. There are some good reasons for that, as you'll hear in this segment. But for the smallest of small breweries, canning can still be a real challenge. It’s expensive, and it takes up a lot of space. Enter Mobile Canning, a Longmont-based company that offers brewers a solution to both of those problems: put the canning line on a truck, and take it to any brewery that needs it. We speak with co-owner Pat Hartman in our Boulder studio. Of course, designing a fully-automated canning line is no small feat - to say nothing of designing one that can be packed into a delivery truck. For that, we turn to Boulder firm Wild Goose Engineering. Chief Technology Officer Alexis Foreman also joins the conversation. Hosts: Ted Burnham, Joel Parker Producer: Ted Burnham Engineer: Ji

Volcanoes & the Atmosphere (start time 6:17): We’ve known for a long time that volcanic particles and gases can travel around the world, often affecting climate.  The 1815 eruption of the Indonesian volcano Tambora chilled New England and Europe, resulting in what came to be known as “the year without a summer.”  More recently, the 1991 eruption of Pinatubo in the Philippines cooled temperatures throughout the Northern Hemisphere by up to 0.6 degrees Celsius. Those were both sizable eruptions.  Co-host Beth Bartel talks with Bill Randel, division director of the Atmospheric Chemistry Division at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, about what a mid-sized eruption in the horn of Africa can tell us about atmospheric circulation. Traffic in Beijing (start time 15:13): A new study shows that China gets a gold medal for dramatically reducing carbon dioxide emissions during the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. Yes, that’s Beijing, one of the most polluted cities in the world. The new study shows that China sev

We feel it when we step into the heat outside; something weird is up with the climate. . Not only is it hot, we’re weathering a drought of historic proportions. That drought has set the stage for crop losses and for wildfires that are burning up the homes of people who live in the mountains here in Colorado. And the strangeness continues across the globe. We learn on the internet that ice at the poles is melting feverishly. And we’ve just lost another huge chunk. Last week scientists announced that in Greenland, a mass of glacial ice twice the size of Manhattan Island is slipping away. To help us make sense of the strangeness, we talk with Michael Lemonick, coauthor of the new book: Global Weirdness, Severe Storms, Deadly Heat Waves, Relentless Drought, Rising Seas, and the Weather of the Future. We next turn to new ideas about how humans can adapt to global weirdness, by undoing what we've always done. Marcus Moench, the Director of Boulder's Institute for Social and Environmental Transition, joins u

We talk with CU-Boulder's Tom Johnson and NYT Bestselling author, James Rollins about Rollins' new book, Bloodline.  We also look at immortality, longevity, and aging, comparing the science and the sci fi.  And we offer extended versions of the interviews with James Rollins and Tom Johnson. Hosts: Joel Parker and Beth Bartel Producer: Shelley Schlender Engineer: Shelley Schlender Additional contributions: Jim Pullen Executive Producer: Susan Moran

This is an extended version of the radio broadcast of the interview with James Rollins about his new book, Bloodline.  In it, we look at the issues of science versus fiction, and technologies that might lead to life extension through robotics, artificial intelligence, and triple-stranded DNA . . . IF the good guys don't defeat the bad guys who want to use these technologies for evil purposes.

This is an extended version of the broadcast interview with CU-Boulder's Tom Johnson.  In this interview, Johnson talks about his pioneering work discovering the first "longevity gene" known as AGE-1.  He explains the various functions of this remarkable gene and others like it, and he reviews the science . . . and the fiction . . . of sci fi books such as James Rollins new high-octane thriller, Bloodline.

Geologic Carbon Sequestration (Start time 4:53): As carbon dioxide emissions continue to skyrocket, researchers are scrambling to find reliable ways to curb emissions of the most persistent greenhouse gas. One of the experimental approaches is geologic carbon sequestration – trapping CO2 from power plants and other sources and pumping it thousands of feet underground in rock formations. The technology looks promising, but it also had drawn controversy. One of the more unusual research projects is in Decatur, Illinois, where CO2 used in the fermentation process for producing ethanol at Archer Daniel Midland's corn-processing plant is being injected deep into the Illinois Basin. Co-host Susan Moran talks with Dr. Robert Finley, a geologist with the Illinois State Geological Survey and principal investigator of the Decatur project. Colorado Clean-tech Industry (Start time 16:14): It’s not news that we are in an economic downturn.  Nor is it news that the world is facing monumental environmental problems.  How a

With record high temperatures along with record low snowpack, the Colorado Front Range has been ravaged by increasingly expensive wildfires.  For today's show, How on Earth brings in two fire experts for a panel discussion.  John Daily is a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Colorado and the director of the Center for Combustion and Environmental Research.  Michael Kodas is a journalist and principal at Narrative Light.  He has been reporting on fire for over a decade and is currently working on a book on megafires. Hosts: Beth Bartel and Jim Pullen Producer: Tom McKinnon Engineer: Jim Pullen Additional contributions: Shelley Shlender Executive Producer: Susan Moran

In this special summer pledge drive show, the How On Earth science team shares reasons why they volunteer to bring you science.  And we share a conversation with Florence Williams, a local author and scientist who has an extensive history of breast and uterine cancer in her family.  She decided to do research into the topics of breasts, and discovered all kinds of surprises - such as the poor track record of detection through mammograms, and the amount of research into whether breasts evolved as eye candy for men, or as ways to help babies survive.  And why, if women eat nothing but organic food, do they still have lots of toxins in their breast tissue . . . and breast milk? Hosts: Tom McKinnon and Chip Grandits Producer: Shelley Schlender Engineer: Shelley Schlender Additional contributions: Beth Bartel, Breanna Draxler, Ted Burnham, Maeve Conran, Susan Moran, Jim Pullen Executive Producer: Joel Parker

Engineering Happiness (start time 05:09): You may think the key to happiness lies in money, or love, or more vacation days.  But what it really comes down to is math -- a mathematical formula, actually. At least that’s according to a recently published book, called “Engineering Happiness: A New Approach for Building a Joyful Life.” It's co-authored by two business and economics professors: Manel Baucells and Rakesh Sarin. How On Earth co-host Susan Moran interviews Dr. Sarin, a professor at UCLA. The Effects of Black Holes (start time 14:33): Active Galactic Nuclei, or AGNs for short, are vast black holes at the centers of galaxies. But as big as the AGNs are, galaxies are much, much bigger. Regardless, the AGNs do seem to hold some sway. CU-Boulder astronomer Jason Glenn is part of an international team that is beginning to sort out why, and talks with How On Earth's Jim Pullen. Hosts: Beth Bartel and Susan Moran Producer: Beth Bartel Engineer: Jim Pullen Additional contributions: Jim Pullen Executive Pr

Dr. Paul Lightsey and JWST (start time: 5:55). Paul Lightsey, mission system engineer for the James Webb Space Telescope, joins us to share his intimate knowledge of the telescope's optical element. JWST is the replacement for the Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes. The telescope will stare back so far in time and space that it will be able to see the first stars and galaxies in the universe being formed. Hosts: Jim Pullen and Beth Bartel Producer: Jim Pullen Engineer: Jim Pullen Executive Producer: Joel Parker Listen to the show: