There are a lot of venomous creatures on Earth, way more species than most of us realize, and they’ve invented an amazing and vast array of venoms and technique for injecting it into their enemies, and their dinners. Still, scientists are learning interesting and wondrous things from venomous animals, and also using their knowledge to create new drugs that work in marvelous ways.
In this episode we talked about all these things with Christie Wilcox, author of Venomous : How Earth’s Deadliest Creatures Mastered Biochemistry and enthusiastic scientist who studies venomous creatures. We even learned what “sodium channels” are, what they have to do with nerve cells and pain, and how they can be blocked. It was another fascinating hour that went by much too quickly.
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There are a lot of venomous creatures on Earth, way more species than most of us realize, and they’ve invented an amazing and vast array of venoms and technique for injecting it into their enemies, and their dinners. Still, scientists are learning interesting and wondrous things from venomous animals, and also using their knowledge to create new drugs that work in marvelous ways.
In this episode we talked about all these things with Christie Wilcox, author of Venomous : How Earth’s Deadliest Creatures Mastered Biochemistry and enthusiastic scientist who studies venomous creatures. We even learned what “sodium channels” are, what they have to do with nerve cells and pain, and how they can be blocked. It was another fascinating hour that went by much too quickly.
Like “Read Science!” on Facebook to hear about upcoming programs, easy links to the archive, and news about RS! guests: https://www.facebook.com/ReadScience/.
Sex! Sex! Sex! That’s all we talked about with Carin Bondar, author of Wild Sex: The Science Behind Mating in the Animal Kingdom. Topics included sexual selection among blue-footed boobies (i.e., the birds), the human preoccupation with NOT talking about sex while thinking about it all the time, and the bizarre sexual practices of some slugs kept coming up, too. Natural selection gave Carin a great deal to write about in her book, and we did our best to fit it all in to one suddenly short episode.
Like “Read Science!” on Facebook to hear about upcoming programs, easy links to the archive, and news about RS! guests: https://www.facebook.com/ReadScience/.
Sex! Sex! Sex! That’s all we talked about with Carin Bondar, author of Wild Sex: The Science Behind Mating in the Animal Kingdom. Topics included sexual selection among blue-footed boobies (i.e., the birds), the human preoccupation with NOT talking about sex while thinking about it all the time, and the bizarre sexual practices of some slugs kept coming up, too. Natural selection gave Carin a great deal to write about in her book, and we did our best to fit it all in to one suddenly short episode.
Like “Read Science!” on Facebook to hear about upcoming programs, easy links to the archive, and news about RS! guests: https://www.facebook.com/ReadScience/.
Our guest for today’s program about all the tiniest creatures in the world was Ed Yong, with whom we talk about his highly praised new book, I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life. The multitudes within gave us a multitude of things to talk about, from bad microbes to good microbes and everything in between, but our hour was just too short to cover it all, so reading Ed’s book is a must. We guarantee that you will come away with a “grander view of life”.
Like “Read Science!” on Facebook to hear about upcoming programs, easy links to the archive, and news about RS! guests: https://www.facebook.com/ReadScience/.
Our guest for today’s program about all the tiniest creatures in the world was Ed Yong, with whom we talk about his highly praised new book, I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life. The multitudes within gave us a multitude of things to talk about, from bad microbes to good microbes and everything in between, but our hour was just too short to cover it all, so reading Ed’s book is a must. We guarantee that you will come away with a “grander view of life”.
Like “Read Science!” on Facebook to hear about upcoming programs, easy links to the archive, and news about RS! guests: https://www.facebook.com/ReadScience/.