 We are live. We are live. Oh, I'm not even in our chat room. Oh, yeah, I'm not either So this is the live quiz broadcast Weekly podcast week off last week just had a party. It was pretty fun But now we have a real episode that we're working on here I Will do an episode as soon as we could pull ourselves together Let me get into my chat room so I can say hello to the people's People in the chat room. Oh, yeah, welcome minions of twist Welcome twist. I see you. I've finally joined. Hi. Yeah identity for we're live We're doing it and the things that you Hear and see during this particular broadcast may not be all the things that Or all completely included in the podcast Because I may chop it up tomorrow or depending on how timely and able we are to get the show done and Good time. I may just you know Let the whole thing go What is shoots? I didn't put any of the honorable mentions in the sheet Honorable mentions. Oh, well, let me just do that real quick We're just everything in the gray or purple or whatever you want to call it Or was it specific one? Okay There's some of it is specific to you and others is just honorably funny Right, right, right You know what happens when you take a week off you really take a week off and it's hard to come back to work again Oh my goodness Let me make sure I'm getting all my things in here you're watching the very last minutes of the run down This is what Justin's on different costumes Seriously working hard to make sure that we have it Justin while we're getting the last two minutes of the show together Why don't you explain? Why you're dressed the way that you are aren't you? I'm over here in central European time So the New Year's Eve festivities actually been going on for days now. There's fireworks everywhere Parties are already going on even though it's five o'clock in the morning That's how that's how early the parties start here in the Europe That's amazing so they're they're just as soon as it's ready to go. It's like time to start parties Actually been going on for a couple days. There's fireworks every night and what's amazing about them is they're not being put on by like a professional fireworks crew Those fireworks go up into the air and explode You can just buy and have and go out in your front yard and launch them into the sky Denmark is thankfully wet enough Hmm that I don't think there's a big worry about fire. It's it's very wet and Here in Copenhagen most things are made out of concrete Anywhere, this is like driving around launching fireworks out of the car Off roofs out in the park out in the driveway is out in the street. It's just everywhere Don't lose your head hard. I'm already got stars falling off Yeah, John going for it Covenhound is already partying Which is kind of tough during covid so nobody's That was my next question. Isn't this very Cova D. I mean come on I So Cova D Look at me not having put I gotta get these links in here. Why why can't I copy fate paste faster world? I Bet you all are so curious what I'm copying pasting and what the stories are going to be What did we choose this year? What is it? You know we know the stories Okay, Blair you got your gray things in there. I got my gray purple stuff in there great. All right great Great, okay, I think we are actually ready to do the show now I did I wanted to start going so you didn't think that we were not gonna be going and The fireworks being launched out of the driver's side or passenger side. Yes, they're launched out of the passenger side safety first You just said so much time getting situated We have a whole show to go here. Oh, I love this I keep who keeps getting reminded that adobe flash player isn't gonna be working anymore after December 31st Remind me later dude. I'm so not interested at the moment. Let me make sure I got my attunes open Get my tunes. I can't I feel like I'm forgetting something You have stories you have a Runsheet you have a Beverage a bubbly beverage Beverage my music's plugged in. What have you tweeted? Tweetered Way too What we doing is gross now this beverage it was from the back of my fridge and it tastes like pineapple Grabbing random things for you from your fridge I told you I don't have champagne so I defined the lightest colored Bubbly beverage I had in my fridge and it was a mistake. I Have water. I also have wine And Alright, are we ready? I'm ready Justin is looking amazing with multiple hats and glasses. Wow This is a balancing act. Okay Now I'm ready Now you're ready. I'm ready also So we will begin this show in a three in a two I Didn't say one Three two This is Twist episode number 805 recorded on Wednesday December 30th 2020 2020 science in review I'm dr. Kiki and tonight we will fill your head with memories laughs and science but first Disclaimer disclaimer disclaimer 2020 as we end the year the planet has lost 1.8 million humans to a virus Over 82 million have been infected and we are at the peak of Transmissions and deaths just as a new variant threatens a more contagious acceleration of the infection 2020 so contagious was this year That even as it leaves it is passing along the virus to the following year because we failed to mitigate our behavior with any concerted effort 2020 the year that showed how poorly wishful thinking political posturing and good old-fashioned ignore it Maybe it'll go away Strategies fair when dealing with actual threats And so when the future looks back upon this present the real threat will be less about a virus acting out its nature But the failure of humans to take reality seriously 2020 was also the year that challenged science to save us from ourselves Around the world researchers went to work Searching for treatments developing and testing vaccines and the efforts have succeeded It's extremely important to note and I cannot stress this enough I might even need further disclaimering these solutions are not new not fast nor are they easy to arrive at these Vaccines are based on technology. There's been developed over decades of dedication By scientists who encountered failure suffered setbacks lack of funding and yet persisted in their work Pursued the scientific method where it led them and while they Persevered and have prevailed in creating a vaccine that is capable of saving 160 million more lives over the next few years roughly the number that would die if we were trying that herd immunity nonsense globally They prevailed because they were dedicated and they had dedicated their lives to the pursuit of science these studies that That happened they could have been on a fungi. They could have been on a bacteria They could have taken place with a fruit fly or whatever the viable model might have been And to the untrained mind might have seemed frivolous But the end result of all that hard work and dedication and searching for answers is what led us To the potential vaccines that are going to save so many lives So before we say so long goodbye good riddance to 2020 We pause for a moment to look back at some of the knowledge that dedicated scientists have brought to light In their efforts to take on the next challenge on this weekend science Coming up next I've got the kind of mind that can't get enough. I want to learn every to happen every day of the week There's only one place to go to find the knowledge I seek I want to know science science to you kiki and blair And a good science to you too. Justin blair and everyone out there. Welcome to our last episode for 2020 the year That we just can't wait to say goodbye to The year that lasted five minutes and 200 years at the exact same time. That is so true So true I have to say before we get started that I was so worried at the start of the pandemic that there would be kind of a stoppage or a drought of science this year And yeah, it didn't happen. It really didn't happen. It never happened. It the science We talked about it and it was a real possibility a real threat like what if everybody can't go to the lab I think that's still coming though because we're I think what we're experiencing in the lack of a lack of science Was all these researchers being able to drop a lot of other things and work on their papers That's true. Yeah, and so and so we there may be some sort of hidden deficit of Research that didn't get done expeditions that didn't take place fieldwork that was canceled things like this that Are going to sort of trickle in over the next year or two or three But I do think we got a plethora of science because so many researchers just It's time to finish that paper that we were working on and now we have all of the time Just keep publishing a veritable cornucopia of science. Can you give us a lab publisher review? Exactly, there were very valuable science. Yeah Yeah, so we thank the scientists for continuing to work and endeavor in science throughout this year so that we could keep doing this show because Yeah, science is awesome. It's amazing. It gives us gives us hope for the future At least that's the way I think about it Every single week. Okay, so this week This show is our Top 11 of 2020 Countdown now. What does that mean? Justin Well, uh typical show will give you a top 10 of what has occurred in the past year Leaving you wondering. Well, what's that 11th thing? What did they leave out? Just really not that important because there's a lot of things that happened. The 11th thing Is still a really important thing. So we provide that 11th thing Here on this weekend science. You don't have to wonder You can just wonder about the 12th instead, right? Well, we're the other things and And in fact our list went to like 14 And we have honorable mentions and weird science that we have to mention at the end of the show too But we're just counting down from 11. We're not necessarily going to tell you about 12 13 14 We're going to get to the weird stuff because that is always fun also And it's also important to remember too that like I sort of tease this in uh in the disclaimer a little bit But the research that led to the vaccine that's going to save hundreds millions of people When it when it first is getting published Uh eight years ago some of the some of the ability to to use the messenger RNA Uh in this way It probably did so without much fanfare Right, probably. Yeah may not have been on the show It might not have seemed as crucial or as important as it is So within all of the stories that we try to cover and all the ones that we miss the many many many thousands of stories that we miss every year There are stories out there that are going to dramatically impact the future of humanity So all of it is important. We're just going to focus on some of the stuff that uh tickled us and we uh, and we we liked Hey, yeah, it tickled us throughout the year And we hope it tickled your science bone as well. Are we all ready to jump in? Let's do it Okay, fantastic as we get in I want to remind you that if you are not yet subscribed to this week in science You can find us on youtube on facebook on twitch as twist science And we are on just about every podcast directory that's out there look for this week in science You can also find our website at twist twis Dot org not at org twist.org That's easy twist.org go there for show notes and stuff We also have a very very small number of calendars left if you really want to have something To look forward to in 2021 make it Blair's animal corner art Because there are a few calendars left not many just at the end of the stack right now So get it while the getting's good and you know get your order in before the end of the year You got what like 24 hours you can do that Okay We are starting the countdown at number 11 number 11 11 Um, so I'm really glad that we went all the way to 11 this year because Something that I think both kiki and I noticed when we were going through this year's stories Was that there was an amazing arc Over the year, especially in the animal corner relating to bioluminescence So I think pretty late in the game in 2019 There was a story about squirrels fluorescing pink and I think then just all year scientists are taking Uh black lights to specimens in museums and things like this Yeah, so we found out most amphibians fluoresce We found out tardigrades fluoresce. We found out scorpions fluorescer. We knew that they did but we got a good idea of why and how and crazy ones speaking of mammals fluorescing we found out that platypuses fluoresce just to add to the craziness that is platypuses, so Uh lots of glowing animals out there, which uh begs the question Where's my ability to see fluoresce because Clearly most animals I guess can't see it Yeah, we get we can see We can see that ultraviolet glow at the uh, you know at the in the evening And in the morning when the sun is just right and the flowers start to have that more purpley color to them, but Yeah I mean we years ago we found out or three four years ago now that people may Emit a bit of light as well Yeah, they were so slightly but so Can we Detect it? Why don't we detect all this bioluminescent fluorescence of these animals? It's not for us. They're not they're not in our communication realm, right? No, so I think there's with all of these stories, too There were two schools of thought so one is that it's somehow related to communication and that it's intentional And another is that it is a weird byproduct of the protein structure of these animals And so With all these different stories could be some of column a some of column b Could be all one or all the other we don't really know So I think that's something to look forward to in the future trying to figure that out finding a way like Can you block? Bioluminescence Gene expression and then can you see if that impacts an animal and their behavior and the Behavior of animals around them that's something that we could do to see if you know do squirrels and platypuses really benefit But yeah, yeah, I mean it turns out a lot of animals out there glow so You got that look you got that glow that's right all the animals I love the tardigrade because it isn't all tardigrades. It's one species of tardigrade That glows and it which was kind of exciting I remember that one that was kind of neat and it glow it bioluminesces. It pink Is it like it's a different color? Yeah, and they think that the fluorescent shields itself from lethal radiation, right Which why uh because it's I think it's mostly radiation levels you'd get from being in space Which is part of my whole like tardigrades or aliens thing Right Have they taken over the surface of the moon? Yeah, we'll find out Yeah, and then uh, what was the with the platypus? That was another exciting one because we've been looking at the platypus like you're a weird animal Just anyway, and suddenly you're fluorescent and bioluminous also and that's you're a venomous mammal You lay eggs and you're a mammal Let's throw in glowing on top of that Also, you're so weird looking that people thought you were a practical joke when you were first brought back I don't know not a practical joke. Just ecologically practical I'm gonna put it out there. Do you have anything else to say about bioluminescence? I mean they would all fit in really well in my bedroom in middle school with my UV light and my lava lamp And my curtain I can tell you that Yeah, the glow in the dark animals Not just for scientists for the kid in you as well The thing that fascinates me too about this is is bioluminescing is one piece of it Can they see bioluminescence is another part of it because then Hey, we've got this weird thing now. We can use it for communication to know where our friends are or Maybe they can't see it but the predator can And then that predator happens to go after them because they can just find them Over time and that beats how they become their their main predator. So there's like this whole Amazing interconnection every time we find one of these weird things that animals are are doing that that it tracks or the protects them Attracts their predators or protects them from from being predated upon Uh, that's a that's how that's how a niche is found in a biome You throw all this out there and see what it attracts and repels But yeah, it's hard to great That's hard to great being space worthy Yeah, that's sort of make you think that either yeah either they came from outer space No, but uh, yeah, maybe, you know, they can handle a very extreme environment They're prepared for like turn a good spare on a while. Maybe they're just like, yeah, your mammals are doing okay But you know Earth goes through some changes. You gotta be ready for everything. You don't know what it's gonna throw at you next So be ready To changes i'm changing the topic to number 10 Asteroid sampling Asteroid sampling is our number 10 topic for 2020 this year included the benu boop In which the little craft benu Uh decided that it was going to take a bite out of asteroid yugu And send some stuff home. It's on its way home now. Hopefully to arrive at earth in 2023 Three which is a few years away before we get to see what comes of it that said hayabusa two Also landed well not landed hayabusa two amazingly put some rovers on It's asteroid and then went down sampled a little bit of that regolith Brought it back and then shot a canister at earth Hayabusa two is still traveling in space. It's off to see other asteroids. Its job is not done yet Hayabusa two is still going but it shot a little canister back to earth It landed in australia and japanese scientists at jacksa have gotten their sample. They've opened the canister. It was not tarnished By earth's atmosphere and they're good. They're starting to look at stuff to see what is on the surface nasa is going to get about 10 percent of the regolith from uh from hayabusa two's sampling mission in trade for a little bit of regolith from the benu mission little asteroid sampling tit for tat going on there between global scientific organizations space organizations, which is very cool I love international collaboration But this year it's amazing. I mean we had 2005 Was the last time that an asteroid was sampled hayabusa one That was a crash and burn It was a plucky probe it crashed and burned The sample was contaminated, but they got some stuff out of it. It was it was okay But hayabusa two Knocked it out of a park and now we've got the benu mission coming up behind And we are learning more about our solar system about how our solar system formed What are these objects that are out there? Or but and we learned we learned a tremendous amount about that From meteorites that had landed this year. We took a meteorite that landed. I think it was in the 70s And was in a collection somewhere and on upon closer evaluation with some new techniques that and I think 17 other meteorite fragments that were have been collected over the years We discovered that asteroid formation takes place differently than we had We had estimated to take place as well as we had discovered in fragments of meteorites Dust particles that were Older than our solar system Yeah It was very cool. Yeah dust from before the solar system even formed Ah Collecting in meteorite and asteroids and then meteorites and then landing on earth and then get analyzed getting analyzed by scientists here Gonna tell us the story of our solar system and our universe But this leads us in to I believe our next topic Number nine Number nine number nine physics There was some pretty cool stuff discovered through the telescopes and what have you this this past year Yep Keck Keck looked at a speck and that speck turned out to be the furthest away and Perhaps therefore oldest galaxy ever spotted and not in the known universe Uh, 13.5 billion ish Uh How do you even say this? 13.5 billion years old, but that's also how many light years distance away it is Yes, at the same time because we're looking at the so so that's also, you know This is this is pushing that edge of how far how old the the universe is this is a fully formed galaxy that is Right there at the beginning or close to what we thought was the beginning So maybe the beginning is a little bit before that but it's it's really close to and we found also, uh A solar system that was sort of Milky Way ish That was also very very ancient Yeah, about 12 billion years old, right? It was just a little younger But still the same kind of idea like oh, this is like the Milky Way this nice formed spiral galaxy But it's so old it shouldn't have been there And and one of the things too is and I don't know how the time scales of these things work still but Yeah, we have a quasar a black hole at the center of our our galaxy that keeps things spinning around And I think we're on the smaller side of galaxies really anyway But that means black hole formation Which you could think of is just taking in all this aggregate matter over time very slowly Although in a denser early universe, maybe these things happen quicker Yeah And then and then we also had The geodes perhaps these things being responsible for the dark energy That was a fun interview. That was really interesting. Yeah Uh We have and then the mond is looking at gravity out there and got a confirmation on the mond theory, which You know, we've talked about mond is the sort of modified Uh modified Newtonian gravity thing for how gravity works and it's not been The most popularized version of it. I guess people have been skeptical and they made a prediction A while back An observation has been made that confirms that prediction Uh, and then now you have to say oh More testing Oh, go ahead Oh, just just when you have uh a theory on paper, this is how we found the Higgs This is how many of the things that Einstein discovered Uh started on paper started an equation said hey Based on the on the math, I think right this there should be this phenomenon that can be observed Somewhere in the physical actual universe When when you when you make the observation and you find that signal Whether it's a uh Higgs boson or a gravity wave or whatever you're talking about It leads great credence to the rest of that work or at least it lets you know that the it's on the right path And and can find actual solutions for you Very very exciting. Yeah, what about the fast radio burst? Also, that was a big one for this year Uh at the beginning of the year like for years, it's been like what are these fast radio bursts? We don't know what they are, right? Intelligence it's not aliens No It's a magnetar. Yeah, so it was uh last I think january early february there was a report of Uh localization of where a fast radio burst was coming from that was very predictable and it was like, okay We got that and then observations were made and then in the summer There was that the northern hemisphere summer there was an observation of a magnetar death star magnetar as you called it Justin and it was weird and it took until november of this year, but at the end of november It was announced that they had They had identified that this magnetar from a galaxy had exploded with Radio energy and had this magnetar had sent out this fast radio burst which we detected So they were able to correlate the light and the radio signals at the same time To be able to determine that oh my gosh magnetars at this point in time This is the one thing that we know we've seen it happen It was predicted Like you were talking about predictions and then observations you have to go out and do it They predicted magnetars might be one of those things. They saw it happen they made that correlation between the light and the radio and energy and magnetars The source of fast radio bursts, and i'm sorry. It's not aliens as far as we know Targeted some comments But the good news is that this means we're still the top alien in the universe as far as we know In our neighborhood As far as we know And yes, oh the driver was pointing out uh, we uh rscbo was lost this year I didn't want to talk about that because it's sad But it is a very uh stark reminder to the international community How important it is to maintain our Our equipment that looks at the universe If we if we let that equipment go unmaintained Unretrofitted on Without bringing it up to new standards Things are gonna get old. We're gonna miss things We aren't going to be able to do the science that we want to do and I think that's really I think of everything the loss of rscbo is is It's terrible, but it I do hope that it leads to more um More investment in astronomical equipment for us to look at the universe Yeah, so we can find our Our life cousins who are the other aliens who are the aliens in our neighborhood in our neighborhood I like snuggle in the chat room is saying that magnetars aren't real So the aliens are just making it look like it's magnetars But you know could be I mean, I don't know who makes the magnetars go boom. I didn't make it happen Oh My goodness for a quick moment here. I just want to remind everyone this is this week in science. Thank you for watching Thank you for listening. We are in our 2020 review show counting down our top 11 If you don't have a calendar yet, they are still available for a very short time We have a limited quantity remaining go to twist.org to get your calendar today for 2021 but Blair's art. It's amazing Okay, moving on moving on up To number Who's in charge of this one? Number eight. Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't see you from around this calendar. That's still available. Um, anyway Nicely done number eight is all about animal cognition As I feel like this is one there's certain things that show up on the countdown Pretty consistently from year to year and this is definitely one That shows up. It's not the first time. It's all about animals are smarter than we thought shock and horror For example, we learned that bee or wasps can actually tell faces apart That's terrifying. Yeah, uh, we also found that um bees they actually They somehow become more efficient the more nectar they're carrying So and it also appears that they actually can decide Um, whether to be better at flying or not in a specific moment based on how much they're Anyway, it's Yeah, the bumbling bumbling bumble bee is not so bumbling. It's it can They can bumble or it can fly efficiently And it's not even on our list but that reminded me also really recently There was a story where there were bubble bees that were figuring out how to orient themselves differently to be able to fit through different shaped Holes so like they're very self-aware of their own shape in relation to their environment. Um New Zealand songbirds were able to remember food related memory tasks for up to two years Also not on this list, but also off of the top of my head Finches can remember other finches chirps For 42 different individuals they can keep in their head and recognize the voices of 42 different finches I think my favorite one Yeah I think my favorite one was the the mice being able to smell cooperative nature of another The rats it was a rat Yeah, the rats that could smell could smell if another rat was in a cooperative behavior mode You smell like a cooperator We'll hang out with you. You're cool. Yeah, not even are you nice or not? But like what kind of mood are you into? Yeah, it was like That same rat could have me in a different mood and it's like I'll forget you But they could smell they could smell if they were like in a good mood. It'd help a mood Yep Yep, and uh speaking of kind of a similar smell taste vane Worms can tell their babies What food is good and what food is food is not good through their dna So a specific RNA sequence in bacteria tells worms not to eat them and then children and grandchildren of those worms are born knowing To avoid that specific RNA sequence crazy Uh hummingbird, that's like it's like cognition plus a genetic under a genetic understanding It's like i'm hungry and this is Instinct but also okay how I go about searching for my food and it's mRNA powered mRNA hello, that's the stuff that's making the vaccine right? Hey, um, also hummingbirds can count I guess crazy And uh crows have have consciousness despite lacking a cerebral cortex So, you know bottom line as always animals are smarter than we thought they're more self aware than we thought Um and humans aren't special Humans aren't special and in fact looking at these Animals or animals also by the way looking at these animals who have smaller brains That than we have who have these abilities crows with consciousness hummingbirds able to count Or have number Numeracy the number awareness like Come on everybody My favorite is this giant mass of neurons if tinier masses of neurons work just as well Come on. Yeah It's just have like a lump of nerves. They don't even really have an organized brain. It's just like a glob Yeah, let's watch in the chat. I could never get over the fascination And shock scientists have been living creatures display having intelligence. It's it's it's not I kind of almost disagree with that Statement a little bit. I think it's more the general public to a degree that has that It's usually the scientists in the field who are observing animals who are life scientists or nature who are observing animals in the field Who are seeing firsthand cognitive behavior? Uh a sort of theory of mind behavior of knowing friend and foe and other and and watching these interactions Who then publish these papers showing but they have to not to say here's what I saw because seeing something isn't scientific evidence They have to go and create an experiment that's attempts to recreate what they're observing in nature So that it can be published a lot under the scientific method because people seeing stuff and reporting on it is like the worst way to know anything And I think this gets at you know, one of the issues in between what we see anecdotally as people observing animals versus scientists working on working with animals is that We have to be able to test a question and if you can't figure out how to test a question properly like How do you test for consciousness? In an animal that cannot talk about it How do you test for the ability to count? In an animal who can't count to you? So These are really you have to think like the animal you have to you have to figure out how to make tests that the Animals are going to want to do you have to make to figure out the intelligence quotient of an animal You have to make it context appropriate the same way that you would do it with for a human So the way that scientists look at things Is it in order to be unbiased and to create something? That actually is evidence Uh that even though they might go yes birds are smart. Yes crocodiles are ridiculous, you know Pack hunting alligators, isn't that a yeah, that was like five years ago But I think you know the other piece of this and this is something that kiki can directly speak to is i'm sure She knew going into studying zebra finches that uh birds are smart and that finches are smart But it's it's also about studying the brain, right? So this whole thing about crows not having a cerebral cortex but having consciousness The question isn't necessarily whether crows of consciousness. We probably anecdotally have a good idea of that But it's a question of mechanically what's going on in a brain from species to species Is there something that makes our brain different from other brains because our brain is Not just talking about humans, you know being superior or anything like that because obviously I don't fully believe that but Talking about just objectively what a human brain looks like it looks Very different from a lot of the animal kingdom And so that's really what I think a lot of these studies are trying to get to kind of in the underneath is trying to figure out what Is there something that makes our consciousness different from other animals considering there is a pretty big Structural difference in the way our brains work Structure defines function There's a pretty big intelligence or at least cognitive ability gap too. I mean an animal doctor Is a human that will treat an animal Not the other way around It's true that is a very good point, but you know, they've never had the opportunity to go to school and never mind I'm not even But actually no, no, that's a great point there because there's the bonobos who have been able to do symbolic writing Uh, so there is I there is something to what you're saying. There's well Kiki if we took an orca and and took it It might work for all of them No, it doesn't work for all of them. But yeah, there's a somewhere between training and education is the same thing Somewhere in there. It is the same thing at some level Thank you for the animal cognition Blair. We're gonna move to the next number Number seven Oh, it's me. Oh, yeah, this is the uh, uh metal organic frameworks. So Metal organic frameworks have been showing up more and more. This is tiny ionized metal particles With some organic material. They're getting shaped into doing they're they're being used now As a potential next semiconductor They're being utilized as drug delivery They're being talked about in new new forms of batteries one of the stories that we covered They managed to collect a bit of energy in there and release it months later Uh, something sort of unprecedented for a solar cell itself to hold heat and release it Months later without loss So there's there this is just the beginning of this tiny what's also been described sort of as LEGO block technology They've managed to get these things to self organize because they are designed and engineered such that they will only connect to each other in a certain way it's not quite the There's those nanomaterials self replicating robots that we've been talking about some years back And that's kind of good I don't need nanos self replicating robot gray goo taken over the world, but some useful stuff here But but being able to throw all of your LEGO blocks into a flask and stir it around with a catalyst And then have your your millennium falcon already made with its 2000 pieces. That's not a bad deal It's not a bad deal at all. I mean, I really love the I love the story though That you brought up of the battery where it was it's not just a battery It's able to take energy from the sun so photosynthesis photosynthesis type solar energy Store it for months Like not like i'm just going to take it in for a second and be a capacitor and then have to give it out But months later, so they're talking about being able to use it Be able to collect energy during the summer months and to use it in the winter months so someplace like antarctica or greenland or You know northern countries that have really diminished solar energy during the winter months This might help to supplement some of that it could be used to help us wean ourselves off of Carbon off of off of the gases. I mean if we can get you it's batteries and storage devices that are the biggest stumbling block For us being able to uptake globally sustainable and alternative forms of energy so That was moff's or the the abbreviation is moff's moff Uh, that I think it's like, you know, this is to me. This is like the we're this is the first year We're really starting to talk about this technology It's gonna be the next round though It's gonna but it's gonna be the next thing like crisper was sort of a thing and it was around But then it became put into functions and it became the thing that was in every third story for a while And continues to be but there's so many of them that it's not That's exciting just because it's crisper anymore Even though that's like a lot of pretty much all of biotechnology is running off of some sort of crisper type to editing technology Uh, but moff's is gonna be that next uh that next big thing The next big thing for uh that we're gonna be talking about I think for some years to come I think I think you're right. I remember, uh, we've we've talked with other researchers, uh, about Um, not just moff's but other these these framework molecules organic frameworks that proteins type things Yeah, and other ways that One of the other aspects of of these moff's that's really cool and not just moff's but uh, organic frameworks is that you are They are they have empty space So the spaces between the atoms Can be used for storage So you can stick other stuff in there and that's one of the coolest parts It's like, okay, so maybe we can use it like a sponge Maybe we can use some of these things for environmental cleanup for cleaning up oil spills or You know, who knows A sponge that can have a mechanism of release of the sponge So these sort of pictures sponging something up and then it's locked in there like a brick And then you then you can put it where you want and you hit the switch and you can release everything that was in the sponge Uh, why that's why it has potentials for drug delivery. That's yeah and absolutely Uh, environmental cleanup or wastewater treatment all of these things that have have been Increasingly important issues that we've had to come up against orders. Yeah might be options there as well and for our Our our chat room over off our website twist.org Dick tell who's been in the chat room many times He works not so much with these metal organic frameworks But he works with organic frameworks generally and has done some really interesting work on it So if he shows up in the chat say hey Tell me about those frameworks Pick his brain a little bit Are we ready to move to another number? It's time for number Six Feel like I'm getting older, but I don't have to anymore Um, yes, please. Yes, please number six is aging because there was some amazing research this year related to Basically reversing problems of aging reversing Alzheimer's nuclear reprogramming erasing aging in old cells Uh, what was another one resetting the epigenome in uh in human eye not in human eyes, but in mouse eyes We all this stuff, of course, it's in mice so far. We're doing a great job of Resetting the clock for mice, but maybe one day it will lead to us Which that's the next big question. Can we reset the epigenome in our eyes and allow aging eyes to see better to get rid of problems of like glaucoma or macular degeneration could we reprogram the the nucleus of our cells so that it the nucleus doesn't think it's so old anymore and doesn't have those epigenetic marks that come after a lifetime And the cells themselves instead of acting like old cells might start acting like younger cells We saw that they were able to reverse Alzheimer's a drug candidate that was developed by salk researchers was shown to slow aging in brain cells and actually clean things up in the brain so that cognitive decline was reversed in mice Really, uh, some ground groundbreaking research and I don't say groundbreaking lightly because it is such a sensationalist word And uh, ucsf had a drug that within days reset mental decline in older mice But within days and it was That's the really important one We supposedly lose many of our greatest mathematicians and physicists once they get into their 50s. Absolutely not true Yeah, but to an extent they tend to do their best to work when they're younger So if you could have you know, are you a greatest mine? I don't think that's true, but okay That's very much true, but um, it's unfortunately, well, you know, it's also it's because if you get successful young Then you can stop really working Publish your parish is a thing. Did you say what? It's sexiness in the uh In the chat room says wrinkling question mark Uh, so here's the thing Who cares anything for wrinkly wrinkling let just sleep so that you can be good to your cellulose Here's the thing here's the thing if we all live to 250 years old at some point But we still start getting those wrinkles, you know when we do now Wrinkly will be the new sexy It will be the norm and you'll have young people going to get wrinkle cream You say that justin, but there was a study on uh, circadian rhythms and how they affect the degradation of cellulose in your in our skin and Uh, so maintaining your circadian rhythms. So sleep people always talk about sleep being so important Maintaining those circadian rhythms actually helps to maintain your cellulose There was a story this year also about what causes gray hair, which we didn't really fully understand until this year stress and sleep and Yeah, there was yeah, but it's I think like they found out chemically what's happening in your body from those experiences that caused gray hair Which we didn't know before so I guess also that could kind of fit into this category We will get there we will I I see this the day coming not five to ten years much further down the road Where people live Longer better It's going to happen. But how are we going to live longer Blair? There was another there was the story related to families They were looking at a dutch family and their telomeres and cancer Yeah, and they discovered that the shorter telomeres are better Yeah, that was really I I feel like That had to be mentioned because we've been talking about I want longer telomeres Uh, like give me those aglets those uh shoelace covers Um that everyone needs in order to stay live longer like why why you die of old age is because you lose your telomeres We've been talking this way for so long But now there's this study that says that you was that they were less likely to get cancer If they had shorter telomeres, so it's kind of Very counter productive to our previous understanding about what telomeres do and how they help you and yeah So we always want to have the longer telomeres, but the longest telomeres. There's a it's probably a three bears scenario where You know one's too long Some are too short, but in the middle is just right It'll keep you aging healthily and also not getting cancer There's a combination of the two and it kind of all makes sense because cancer is all based on like overgrowth of cells And and so if too too much telomere You could see it kind of all makes sense in my brain now that you you think about it, but It's yeah goldilocks scenario for sure I Don't know. I love the idea of being old longer if being old is not quote-unquote old if it's what I mean is being It's a better old where you're not you don't feel old because all your cells have been refreshed every brain works You're not having those senior moments. You're not aching as much. Everything's working. I mean I can hold back at the deli for the next hundred years and be completely happy. I'm fine with I I've said it once I'll say it a thousand times if my brain works and my mouth works and my ears work and my eyes work Throw me in a jar. I don't care throw my head in a jar. I want to live I want to put you in a row Wait a second. Wait a second. How is your mouth gonna work your ears gonna work guys? If you're a brain in the jar, have you thought this through? The head the whole head Haven't thought it through. Oh, oh my oh my oh my Oh my goodness. I'm going to take a moment right now. I'm gonna take another moment because we just finished number six you're listening to this week in science and We're here running down the top 11 of 2020 if you want to know more keep on Watching or listening if you're interested in a twist shirt or mug or other item of our merchandise head over to twist.org And click on the zazzle link and you will be able to browse our store and get really really some pretty cool merchandise the whole twist team for Christmas just got a dark navy blue twist blue-footed booby sweatshirt and it's it's a pretty great It is pretty great. Yes blairs holding her up hers up. It's good. It fits well. It's nice. We like it. It's good, but It's time to move on to number five What's number five the gut brain connection A little bit of microbiome a little bit of how the brain works Nice another year of discovering that our stomach and our brain Might as well be right next to each other They seem like they're far away from each other just both minding their own business Uh, but really they could be organs right next to each other with the amount that we discovered that they have been interacting all this time Uh, this is uh, one of the stories is a bacterial species found more often and feces of older individuals was linked to a loss of cognitive or a cause of cognitive impairment Uh, when transferred into healthy mice So you could actually create cognitive problems just by taking the Poo from one mouse and putting it into another We also found that the the micro microbes influence the development of brains while the young are in utero It's according to another study looking at mice Yeah, I thought I thought that one was pretty amazing that there was this this connection between the gut microbial community and The developing embryonic brain like that I thought was pretty pretty fascinating Yeah So and and I wondered like too, you know, how much of the again, how much of this is Has been nutrition how much is nutrition based? Now on what you can absorb. Thanks to your microbiome And how much of it is your microbiome actually it's self-creating things that are separate from the nutrients that are in there still Metabolites produced by microbes are a very important pathway Yep, and we've known about that for how long A long time Well, I mean comparatively like not really not that long I mean really we haven't been focused on how influential the gut microbiome is we've been talking about it now I would say a decade a decade. Yes Yeah, it takes time for conventional medicine to shift on some of these big topics, right where like There you under the whole idea of a 2000 calorie diet and this is good for you and that is bad for you sort of thing It takes a long time to completely shift That whole ideology to like hey before we look at your diet and stuff like that We should do a panel of your microbiome and analyze that and then we can tailor a diet specifically to you and what your body needs Yeah, and so and so we've been talking about this 10 years the research has been coming out for 10 years There's a delay before there's actual actionable stuff that can be in front of a medical practitioner I really feel like we're not there yet still Uh, and yet we have like and then that amazing story that the the gut has able to send immune cells to the brain During relapses multiple sclerosis To help the body function normally You know, we're we're talking about a big part of our immune system is existing within this gut with in existing within This community and there's you know countless other stories that we've touched on over the years and over this past year but it more and more sounds like there are Direct connections to human health that aren't aren't at the aren't tools In the little side satchel of things the doctor can take out and treat patients with yet And and yet we know how crucial they are to human health at the same time So another one of these things that we talk about that you're Sort of getting all the information now as the researchers make these discoveries and then the next thing is how Soon can we get these implemented into our human health and how and you know How long will it take before we know enough about what we're doing there to make those implementations? safe I think for the prediction show That'll be good prediction. But yeah, I think that's the big as we're learning more I mean, yes, there are still so many outstanding questions, but there's the question of application Because at this point from all the microbiome researchers we've talked to they're like probiotics me I don't know Eh, it's not really the big thing. You could take them. It's fine. They're not going to hurt you But there isn't that much evidence the probiotics or any particular Mix of things Helps and so that is that the application is still we're learning how the systems work But we haven't learned how to really fix them or work with them or or or You know boost them On a very, uh Barbaric level we can use probiotics But I was saying yeah, it's like I all you could think it but it's just we don't know exactly what's happening. It's fine You should take it scenario. I mean if somebody has been has been taking Uh antibiotics yes over a course and has been knocking out Um, a lot of actually maybe the ill effects that people experience from antibiotic use Is just knocking out the microbiome as well So so there's scenarios where you can yeah Throw the big rock and hope it fails the beast In accoling this problem Uh, we're still at that level of stone age technology when it comes to microbiome However, there's already things that you you know, if you have an irritable bowel There's there's probably A bacteria in there that you were wanting to knock out and replace with something that won't do that to you We've actually seen uh, this might have been last year, but there was you know cases where there was a correlation between people with ips Of bacteria that they that people without it didn't have and so they were sort of identified as bad actors Somehow within that scenario now whether that's because their natural predator with inner microbiome is knocked out Or that they were taking advantage of something else going on Those are the questions that we still need to have Yeah, it's an ecosystem in there. It is an ecosystem ecosystems are complicated Yeah, you can't just throw kink toads in there to eat the locusts You might end up with a giant invasive Problem, and then you have to have the rats that'll eat the guts. Yeah Oh my god, all the thing Which is no it ends badly Let's try and make it end well. We are moving on down our list. We're on number four four Number four is room temperatures superconductivity This year. It's just a single story Superconductivity we've been talking for Decades like and I can say that because this show has been on for a couple of decades We've been talking for decades about the goal of Achieving room temperature superconductivity Engineers and physicists have been searching for this achievement and this year They got there in a sense. So the the discovery was Achieved under incredible pressures. It wasn't Atmospheric pressures for sure it was Massive pressures like the bottom of the ocean kind of pressures. We're talking about pressures that are We would not be able to survive under these pressures But laser beams and other forces being used to take a little tiny atom Smash it in the space and you know, you know how they build these things in In physics labs to try and do extreme experiments But it wasn't room temperature About 50 degrees or so. It wasn't You know comfortable, but you could put on a sweater and be comfortable. It's so room temperature We're not talking about super low kelvins. We're not which has been historically the case for superconductivity experiments where it's had to be really cold To slow everything down enough slow the movement of the molecules the atoms down enough to be able to get to the point where they could Make something super conductive But this experiment achieved superconductivity Within a fairly normal range of temperatures The next step now that they've got this there is to start letting up on the pressure a bit, right? But they have a workable model and this is the first time in decades that I can remember This this is a big achievement. It's huge It just got to meet in the middle, you know, put it in a freezer at like, you know, half an oceans temperature or pressure or something Like, you know, get it somewhere Somewhere in the middle, maybe we can find something that'll work Maybe they can find something that will work. I mean, this is just uh, it's not the first because Like I said, this is a process and it's one experiment leading to another experiment leading to another experiment making it Aggressively better and better, but this was an incredible achievement and In the years to come I have no doubt that that pressure will Get more normalized and we're going to see some room temperature almost normal pressure Superconductivity which would make for some very interesting technology advancement Can I also say carol and benoit in the chat room says this is the paper I wrote this year Oh Fantastic Yeah, this is very cool Amazing Well, thanks carolan for your contribution to science and our top 11 this year Top 11. Yeah, and you're pretty high up number four Okay, should we keep moving up the list? Let's go Number Three Three three three three Three What's number three? Oh number three artificial intelligence and alpha fold This was a latecomer in the year back in november and alpha fold is a google deep mind endeavor For protein folding It was reported that this ai was able to reach about 90 accuracy With machine learning and predict the structure of proteins based on basic amino acid sequences During a contest that has been attempted to by by many groups and many different Protein sequencers through the years. This has been huge fold protein folding knowing how a protein folds from its Original amino acid sequence to that final tertiary structure is if there's so many complexities so many Minor forces involved Pushing away attraction, you know, like lots of stuff happening at these very very tiny molecular scales and alpha fold For the first time really, I mean we've had good advancements with people powered protein folding And we've talked about that on the show a lot, but that People powered pattern recognition May at this point Not be a match for alpha fold what took has taken people Weeks to months to be able to sequence alpha fold was able to do it in days so based on processing power based on The algorithm that's being used based on this I don't know. It's beyond brute force. It's moving on to something more nuanced and the interesting thing is because this is artificial intelligence it's going to be solving things that and giving us information That in the future we won't know how we got it We like how do we know that this protein is going to look like this or will the computer told us But what what do you mean? Like how does it actually work? We don't really know the computer tells us And that's that's really going to be a lot of biotechnology and protein synthesis and the development of drugs for For medical uses for therapeutic uses moving forward It's really going to be based on these technologies and if ai is involved There's a black box that we don't really have access to which is really fascinating in my mind I'm just thinking about how this is going to revolutionize Learning about microbiology Yes, it's just going to be such a cool tool even just outside of recent general research and stuff like that about just The way computers have gotten so much better just in general in in their use in in Universities in school. I just I now picture every microbiology college class undergrad to graduate level having access eventually to this ai That can predict protein structures It's going to be part of your exams. They're going to say like, okay Here's this protein Figure out what it's going to look like it just yes, it's it's very exciting to me to imagine how it's going to revolutionize Our knowledge of proteins. It's very cool a tremendous amount of time I've Is spent I've seen by microbiologists working in biotech coding and coming up with with scripts to help do analysis or to dig into the All of the genomic information To to find the signals as well as to do the development of trying to figure out What's the best way to to even attempt to engineer Something or or nudge it in a direction of being more efficient or doing a specific catalyst activity or whatever it is If this technology gets to the point where it can do that predictively That is an entirely different future than the today looks like completely different uh, and it's there's not a There's not a drug fuel source textile cleaning product Food thing you can imagine that can't be affected and improved and utterly changed by this Yep It's huge. It's huge It's it's like I said similar to the superconductivity It's at this stage where there are still advances that are going to be made. It's going to be Integrated into processes similar similarly to the way that crisper has been integrated into lab processes and become a tool and we we are going to see AI Maybe alpha fold maybe something related to it over the next five years. It's going to revolutionize the way we look at at everything Keep an eye on this one everybody because it's going to be a big one faux show Maybe in ways that we can't even uh understand until we see them yet Yeah, and it's sort of like, okay You know, we've always that picture of the benevolent aliens coming down and being like here's how you cure cancer You can quadruple your crop yield. I don't need to have an ai to be benevolent like that Intelligence if you have an artificial one that works just as well And also it isn't going to hit you with ray guns if you don't know what they say or whatever like Yeah, I like that. It's good. It looks good. The other side is the artificial intelligence generally can be weaponized so it must be uh That's that next thing that we haven't We're not talking about that right now I think we're gonna have we're gonna have arguments about it like we have with nuclear power Like we have with a lot of technologies where we have to say We want this this bad. It's this important for society. Yeah, they have scales that need to be To keep it out of the bad categories and that's that's going to be an important thing So if you hear negative things about artificial intelligence Understand there's a reason for that over there. If you hear positive things, it's because there's a real need for that over here so It's a very fair point We can move on. Uh, what's the next number are we at number two? This is this weekend science. I would like to take this moment to thank you for listening for watching and For supporting us for so long. We have been around because of you and your support what we do every week has to do with you Bringing you up to date down to earth views on science technology new discoveries We can do more of that with more of your help So please consider if you are not yet supporting twist heading to twist.org clicking on the patreon link and supporting us And choosing the level of your support you can support monthly $10 or more a month and you will be thanked by name at the end of the show or in a yearly fashion There are annual memberships now and you can choose that level of support and know that you are a part of bringing sanity that the world needs science Which definitely we need more of because that's more hope to more people Thank you for your support. We really can't do it without you And now we're coming back to number Two Oh, I'm sorry. I was just looking at my uh calendar here that's still available for sale online. Anyway, um Number two, we have to talk about it. We talked about it Literally, I think every single week in 2020 even before it got crazy We're gonna talk about covid but just for this one item Now we can talk about all sorts of things like how we didn't know what it was at first how we didn't know where it came from At first how we didn't know How communicable it was at first how some people were saying maybe it's not so bad Maybe it's just kind of a worse flu and then things got out of control and all of that but really What we wanted to focus on is number two is the amazing Research effort that went into everything. Yes What's happening? Oh, you're excited. I thought kiki was like going time out What did I do? Did I do something wrong? No, she's just excited because the research happened so, um, it was such a good kind of like organized effort and everything happened I'm gonna say quickly but quickly in the right way because also, you know, that's all a whole extra bag of beans. I don't know what the phrase is but Really, the research happened so fast for us to be able to identify how to stop the spread whether we did or not But how to stop the spread what the best moves forward were and most importantly We have the first ever approved and being used mRNA vaccine We have two of them Not one but two Yes, and we have more vaccines that are gonna work completely different And also in new and exciting ways on the precipice right now um for that's gonna come out in 2021, but um, you know the mRNA vaccine it was just It was something that we kind of teased towards the beginning of the year You're like, oh, is this gonna be a it sounds like it could work in theory ends using crisper, right? so like this is That's tying back into what we were talking about before but it's it's inoculating people in a way that We've never done before So it's I don't know. It's it's astounding to me. It's exciting. I think it's amazing how um transparency Was there to help Guide us through the process. So it wasn't just like boom. There's a vaccine. Do you want to take it? It some interpretation maybe was needed because there hasn't been that level of transparency for vaccines in the past And so I think there needed to be some explanation Which is partly what we tried to do. Hopefully, but um The transparency I think and the cooperation across countries also was really inspiring and Uh, yeah, it's pretty it's it's set up to be pretty life-changing. So So what are the one of the fun backstories to is there's a there was a woman who was at penn state Uh Who had developed some of this mRNA mRNA technology back and published on it and back in 2012 She wasn't producing enough work for the satisfaction of the university. She got knocked off her tenure program to be professor Uh, she struggled to get funding. They bypassed that funding to get to other people And she persisted she got knocked off a tenor track and stayed at the university to pursue her work Eventually leaving creating that technology which they have patented and and left to to join a biotech company Uh, they're run the biotech company the research department biotech company Which is now partnered with visor, which is what how they have developed this So so this is sort of, you know, it's not quick It's it looks that way to the outside observer. Hey scientists were like, hey, here's just a new problem Knocked it out of the park. Yeah, this is people who've been working really hard and sometimes Decades It's on the shoulders of giants and on the shoulders of previous publications Yeah And and so and so this is this is a lot of hard work by science. This is why we need to fund these people You know, this this technology that came out or this pub paper that was published eight years ago Could have been much more advanced by now if we had seen the value in it sooner Or if the the grantors had seen the value in it So there's there's a lot of these back stories. I can't wait to hear I can't wait to see That that that really good deep dive into the people behind These different vaccines that are out the research that went into it and how it how it got them And I have to tell you on a personal note I know beth just shared in the chat room that That she's so grateful to have received her first vaccine on saturday so But I think probably everyone listening at this point knows that my husband works in the emergency room This has been a long eight months and I've tried to be very effusive and supportive and not kind of try to show how Intense and scary it was at times and he got his first dose Almost two weeks ago now and I'm like tearing up now because like it It's a huge relief to feel like he is protected huge relief and a hundred percent at least partially Even just a little bit is gonna help and that's amazing Yeah, because he's going out there every night and he's working in the er and taking care of people that Um, some of them have coveted some of them broke their leg and might also be an asymptomatic carrier And every person he comes in contact with every night Could potentially get him sick Just the the the number of contacts that he has no matter how careful they are It's it's huge to me that this was able to happen as quickly as it did and as safe as it did and I was so Proud of him that he went for it right away. No hesitation and I was so excited that he got it Brian's a stud I think I I mean not just Brian, but so many of our front front line workers I know nurses doctors fire fighters so many individuals who are stepping up and getting the vaccines and I'm not shying away from it and And it's going to help it's it's really it's going to protect not just them But hopefully other people because they won't be as able to carry the virus and so You know the the hope is that this is really going to turn the tide on the entire pandemic and I mean, we're still in for A couple of months of I mean we're moving into 2021 and we're all excited to be done with 2020 and I'm just gonna Cap it off with that. This is yes. We're finishing up a really bad year The next couple of months are still not going to be easy our icus are full our hospitals are Are pushing are pushing people away ambulances are leaving people at their houses like things are bad at the moment And we have new year's eve happening right now We just had Christmas It's going to get worse because there are a lot of people still not being careful Yes, absolutely But if people so we're we're in for a couple of months Really bad still with hospitals and our infrastructure and things being pushed So please continue to be careful to protect the healthcare workers that are not vaccinated to Keep yourself and your loved ones out of The hospitals so that you're not putting any additional pressure on that infrastructure. Please do the best that you can It's going to be a little while longer But there is a light at the end of the tunnel because of the vaccines Regardless of I mean we also have amazing research going on the ability to genetically sequence Uh test samples If this had happened a decade ago, we would not be able to do this as rapidly the fact that we have isolated A new variant of the virus in the uk another one in south africa We know it's all over the place it basically if countries or localities are testing They're going to be finding these things because if you allow viruses to replicate They will be mutating and that just is part of the whole process The more you let it spread the more mutations happen the more possibility for escape from vaccine So please be careful so that we can maintain The usefulness of the vaccines that we have so that we don't have to the research companies and the pharmaceutical companies Don't have to go back and tweak their formula anymore. They can and they will and it'll happen but we have the power to slow it all down and I think that is as tired as we are Ah, stay home have a zoom new years and be careful so that we can have a great 2021 After everyone's vaccinated, please The researchers have been working their butts off this year so that next year and the years following will be better Yep Dirt will die. I have to say it's my I got it. I got a soapbox here. Didn't I? Yeah No, that's good. It's important when when we talk about it. It's Something I've noticed also. This is a whole extra tangent. I'll be quick, but the show has really I feel like it has grown with the times in a way where You know towards the beginning it was just like very black and white science reporting, right? Um to a certain extent and and then as kind of social media grew and the the media itself kind of grew and the interpretation of science got kind of more mucked I feel like uh, that's also when we started to recognize that science is kind of forced to be somewhat political and social and um an opinionated it it has to be part of the conversation and I think that um I have really appreciated this show for that is kind of an outlet to be able to have those conversations and discuss the kind of The data influenced but not data based part of the conversation, which is exactly what this is, right? is like what is the social implication implication of the data that we have this week and um COVID has been a time where one of the stories we talked about on the show this year Was about how COVID was a moment where we really saw how conspiracy theories are birthed and grow and and garner support um in our current era And so this has been a really good opportunity for us to help try to try to squash those as well So yeah, hopefully a little bit here Yeah I hope so too and I think that that pushes forward to number one I think this really is a good uh a good place to transition to our number one Number one Story of 2020 Which is me too stem and black in stem and really underrepresented people in stem and the voices that Were amplified this year the people That were given platforms that had previously had none or very little Gave us insight into what science has been lacking Gave us insight into what science could be and how much better the institution of science can be if we allow all people To to stand equally so that certain voices Are not diminished and so this year because of we first saw me too stem arise and then We saw the riots and out of the riots came black in stem black in ivory back black in academia and there were there were days of protest Where black academics stayed out of the labs stayed off the university campuses to show What was missing? And that was a very important point that needed to be made and for the rest of the year We saw special weeks in social media. There was Black in microbiology black in space black in chemistry black in psychom black in You name it black in birding Yeah, they're black birders week. I mean every Every section of scientific inquiry Needs to have diverse voices and if diverse voices are left out We are going to be missing pieces of the puzzle Are we really curious about the world? Are we really curious about the universe? We can't just let certain people tell the narrative Well, and there was science this year that came out that showed us that even if you have a double blind study with a large sample size and all these other things if all of the researchers are white men Your dad is different so One of my favorites one favorite ones was uh, that historically Research on bird calls have only looked at male birds because the assumption was that only male birds sing Which is just silly Uh, and so then they discovered a female Uh researcher was like maybe we should look at female bird song. So it's just just maybe Yeah Yeah, look for the things ask the questions allow the stories to be told there is room for improvement and so the reason it is the number one topic for 2020 is because of the ultimate impact that Changes that started this year Could have and hopefully will have on science as a whole Mm-hmm. It's it's a question of not just making sure your door is open But making sure that everyone knows that door exists and can get to that door at all Really, it's it's like a square one conversation Yep What door what do you mean? There's an uh, huh? Yeah, that's not for me. Oh, yes, it is I'm sure everyone has had an experience where you learn about something for the first time And it's just mind-blowing that this thing has existed in the world unbeknownst to you For decades centuries even you had no clue and there are all these people who are part of a community who are like Oh, yeah, totally time. I have dreams and talking my sleep about this You're a newcomer and it's like how come I never learned about that It's all a part of access If you've ever had that experience of of Realizing you haven't had access to something you you understand what A lot of people experience every single day And it needs to change I don't know what to get access once you get access the institution. I cannot be uh hardwired against you Spring-loaded against you Something in this documentary that I think we all watched From AAAS I won't go into details about it, but it was it was a couple of female future scientists starting their post-grad work looking around and seeing 60 percent of the class their classmates were women and were like, this is great You know women in STEM. It's happened. It's here by the time they graduated that number had been dwindled down to less than the quarter of Of their class Something between entering and exiting that institution had a filtering effect on them On the population of who got through so Uh, yeah, yeah, you need the access to get in the door But you need that institution also to be functioning without bias Which is the next level of stuff But it's maybe even the first one because that's how you get The influencers that's you get to get the teachers That's how you get the role models in society That's how you get the people who are going to actually be in those labs and breaking those as well Yeah, if you change the institutions, which is I believe the conversations and hopefully the practices to change have started in many places If that process continues the institutions hopefully will change enough so that those like you said the influencers will be there to grow awareness to drive interest And that will I don't know but it's good. It's going to have such a huge impact. That's number one I don't know what your top 20 or top 20 top 11 for 2020 would have been all of you out there But let us know if you agree with our countdown or not Let us know uh, you can leave us a message on our facebook page Over on twitter at twist science or you can send us an email Let us know But okay, we have finished our official top 11 countdown Now let's talk about The weirdos Honorable mentions and weirdos. Yes. Let's get there. Yeah, uh, it's just kind of a cursory glance First of all, I have to mention what I said was I think my favorite story of 2020 when I reported it Which is about pandas rolling around in horse poop to give them the feeling that they're warmer in cold Even though it doesn't actually make them warmer. It's just there's a chemical in the poop That's like it's almost like menthol in a vix papo rub situation So they think that they're warmer for a second. So they roll around in horse poop. So there's You're both mocking it But have you tried it? No, have you tried rolling around? I will tell you Justin remember I was a zookeeper. So I have had Many types of animal poop on my body. I will not rolled in you have not rolled in it I've fallen in it. Oh, okay. All right, then Yes, I don't know. Anyway, um, so uh, Next, uh, just a quick mention of frogs and toads and the amazing gifts that they gave us this year in one a story about snakes disemboweling um frogs and uh eating their organs while they're still alive and then of course Um a story about toads and live beetles escaping From their vent. Yes, you know what that is. Um, again while they're alive live beetles coming out of their rear So that they're they're they're bottoms. Also now. I'm thinking maybe I confused the frogs and the toads. Did I Did you I can tell the difference I'm just Frogs so yes, so the frogs are the beetles and the toads are the snakes. See I didn't write it down and I So the snakes disembowel the toads, right and which is good. That's a good thing Toads, is that was a poisonous toad of some sort? This is the asian black spotted toad um So I don't I don't remember now. Is it good? I don't think it's good So they um, this is a poisonous toad and that's how they get around their poison and gland Um, yes, that's right. They ate they disemboweled them. So they wouldn't eat the poison. Yes Yeah, I don't I don't think this is actually a good thing, but I think it's just how they eat them. Um But yeah, so next time a small child asks you what the difference between frogs and toads is you can say Um, you see toads get disemboweled by snakes and frogs have live beetles crawl out of their rears So there you go. You're welcome Okay, uh, okay um Also There was a lovely story about alligator corpses in this was one of my favorite stories. Yes. Tell me about it kiki Do you remember? Yes, so this story was uh researchers wanting to know more about what goes on at the bottom of the deep ocean So they dropped dead alligators down to the bottom of the ocean And then just watched to see what happened and they found um, they let them decompose They let animals eat them and they discovered a new species of bone eating worm as a result of doing this and also There was something that came along And it was big and took huge bites out of these croc these alligator corpses And they don't know what it was, but it was something giant at the bottom of the ocean that The How big are we talking? big Eat enough to big enough to really eat an alligator eat enough to big an alligator. That's right. That's Yeah, so there are all these these invertebrates these worms and other things Waiting for the walls, right? They just they're down there and they conserve their energy and they don't do a lot until Something edible comes around and then everything It's like an oasis and they're like Yeah Yeah, chew it all up crustaceans all sorts of stuff, but they Yeah, they found pill bug isopods chewing on these alligators. Uh, but they're yeah There was a lot of stuff going on down there one of the corpses that they retrieved was just A large predator had eaten it and hauled the carcass away. They think maybe a shark, but they don't know They don't know So anyway, I just thought that was just such a it was such a fun story. I'm like, oh What goes on at the bottom of the ocean? Let's throw dead alligators down and see like, I mean Why not? Talk about observational science Um speaking of the fishes something for the fishes four-eyed fishes of the genus An ableps have luck leaning or right leaning genitalia They assumed that was genetic trait, but it turned out to just be luck I thought that one that was a really funny story Blair I remember when you reported on that one and I just I was like really we're talking about fish genitalia and Left or right leaning by chance It's a random indeed and speaking of genitalia as you do in Blair's animal corner. Um sperm I we learned this year. I love this. This is this is Oh, this is a life changer for me Sperm we don't look at it in 3d very often Turns out they're corkscrews that spin they don't They don't I decide or the up and down wiggle They're they're drilling through which explains why some sperm are way faster than others is because just like I don't I think about like opening a bottle of wine. I don't know. It's the right time here And like sometimes you can just like Right, but like sometimes you're like Can't get through that cork, right? Or this this corkscrews batter. Whatever anyway, so they drill So I love that drilling Um also, uh eye spots on the butts of cows Let's has them predated less often so they look it's like eye spots on a um butterfly that look like an owl eye It's yeah, they they're this is actually happening. I think it's in africa, right? Yeah, they painted eye spots on the butts of the cows. Yeah, so they actually They're looking to attack from behind. They don't want to attack for head-on. So yeah, it's like Has a head on both ends. I don't know what to do It's in but want to yeah, so not only On both sides, but those are but that's binocular vision Which looks like a predator and the eyes are way bigger than cow eyes So it looks like especially in the dark it looks cut they specifically tried to draw a lion the eyes So it looks like another lion. So like no, thanks. Um humans might be able to uh, sense magnetic fields That was this year that was the the the isolated people in a little like a box that had no vibrations and had Like it was isolated this soundproof vibration proof box and then they Changed magnetic fields on them and people were able to sense it Yeah I gotta say but it's interesting. It was a proof of concept, but as a concept. It's like what? Yes, and then also uh Next to last in your technology. Um, everyone knows what I'm saving for last in the show, but um Your smartphone could tell when you're drunk Based on the way that you move around Right stick that phone in your pocket and it's the sway in your hips The way that you move could tip off your phone as to whether you're drunk or not and last but certainly not least I'm ready. Um, a new toilet design identifies users You guessed it by their anal print so just like a thumb print They can take a take a quick peek identify you and Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. You don't remember the story justin. Oh, yeah So first so it's taking a picture I mean, yes and no it's like Yeah, it's it's another print Can identify the human Yes It's I want to go ahead and say like oh That's greg. Let's let's see how great urine is today. Oh, you need to drink more water greg If you know if greg sits to pee is the thing or if somebody is a diabetic and you're you're sensing sugar levels in the urine Or if somebody has hormonal differences that need to be monitored Or if you're monitoring medication and how it is coming out of somebody Or if there's blood in your stool To track this toilet could identify it by the person and tell the doctor Or you could just you know, yeah put in a number. Is that what you're gonna say? Or if you just want that next level security system Oh, yeah Unknown rear detected Broke into your house I want to get into this top secret compartment. Uh, is it like a rental scan? No, that's gonna be copy now As a fingerprint though, that's too too easy. You know, we have another I gotta tell you though. Why not just be like i'm number two on the toilet, haha Like a seat setting You have Get the angle you like anyway, how come toilets are not adjustable? How come there's no height adjustment on a toilet though? Just say your name Like that technology definitely exists Why what yeah, why do you have to have the printing? Why does it have to identify you by your rear end? Because somebody wanted to prove that it was possible And you might not understand the significance of this at this moment, but one day that technology It might be the thing that saves humanity Right. It's the bio the bio Have you ever heard about this like from any forensic dun dun dun? Okay, we're going to solve a crime Here we're going to go to the lab for part of the show And do some sciency taco on about a cadaver Have you ever been like, well, we couldn't get fingerprints or dental records But his dairy was intact. Yes But we still had to identify how you had only all you had We didn't even have a torso. Yeah, I barely didn't need it. You didn't have legs with it. No, no No, we only had you only had a small portion of the victim. Yeah, but it's fine. It's fine. We got it You're right, Jonathan. We need to put this story behind us But that is the end of our This brings us to the end of our show Oh 2020 behind us. Yes Let's look forward Putting our best feet forward. Yes imagining what science will come in the year to come 2021 It's been a great year for as much of a terrible year No for as terrible of a year as it's been It's been a great year. There have been some good moments. There have been some great achievements. The science has been Amazing and I am so glad To have gone through it with you Thank you Yeah, I mean we were the original Zoom hangout. I gotta say People are like, how do you do this and I'm like, uh, it's pretty easy. We got this covered. Just watch our show. It's fine It's one thing that like didn't have to move virtual. It just already was virtual. This one thing Didn't change in my life and felt static and solid And kept me grounded in such an amazing way like otherwise We've all seen the tweets and things about people not knowing what day it is, but at least on Wednesdays I knew what day it was We knew when it was Wednesday. Thank you. Yeah, thanks for all of this We've come to the end of our show. It is the end of another year. Wow We've been waiting for this happy new year everybody Thank you for joining us for another episode and I do hope you enjoyed it I hope you enjoyed our review of the year I want to give some shout outs shout outs to fata. Thank you for help with social media and show notes You put so much effort into the work that you do Gord, thank you for the chat room. Thank you so much for that identity for thank you for recording the show You have made this show possible in so many ways by recording it And for the boroughs welcome fund and our patreon sponsors. Thank you for your support We really really really can't do this without you Thank you too Woody ms andray beset chris wozniak dav bun vegaard chef's dad Hal snyder donathan styles a.k.a don stylo john sheoligium john lee alikoff and gaurav sharmak Shoebrew sarah for far darwin hannon donnell munda steven alberon darryl my shack stu polyc andrew swanson fredes 104 skylark paul ronovich Bentley the translator big knell kevin reardon noodles jack bryan kerrington matt bass joshua fury shonanina lamb john mckay gregg riley mark hesson flow Jean telier steve leesman a.k.a. zima ken haves howard tan christopher rap and richard brendan minnish melizon johnny gridley kevin railsback flying out richard porter christopher drier mark masaru's artem Ardeum greg briggs john atwood conrad michaels is a russian super spy broody garcia dave wilkinson rodney lewis paul matt sutter philip shane curt larson mountain sloth jim drapeau Sarah chavis alex wilson john ratna swami sue doster jason olds dave neighbor eric nap e o kevin paroch and iran luthan steve debbel bob calder marjorie paul stanton paul disney patrick pecker raro ben rothig gary s tony steele ulysses adkins brian kondren jason roberts and dav fridel Thank you for all of your support on patreon And if any of you out there are interested in supporting us on patreon head over to twist.org and click that patreon link On next week's show It's our annual prediction show We're gonna be telling you about the future Yeah, we predict the future will review our predictions from last year, which I am I haven't looked at them yet I've been holding off on it and I'm really interested to see how much of 2020 we actually got right But I can think of a couple of things we did not get right And then the one big thing we missed Yeah, totally totally, but we'll be predicting 2021 and hopefully this next prediction round We'll have some more winners in it And when are we gonna do that next wednesday apm pacific time? 5 a.m. Central european time broadcasting live from our youtube twitch facebook channels and from twist.org slash live Hey, do you want to listen to us as a podcast? Maybe uh While you bake some bread or cookies or clean the house just something fun You can do while you listen just search for this week in science wherever podcasts are found if you enjoy the show Please get your friends to subscribe as well Yeah for more information on anything you've heard here today show notes links to stories as well as an explanation that carol of ambinoid Wrote a paper about the paper For her university uh in regards to the room temperature Uh super conducting not the paper itself, which I think was clear, but maybe it wasn't anyway She wants to make sure everybody knows that uh links to stories and other available information on our website twist.org so you can sign up for our newsletter You can also contact us directly email kirsten at kirsten at this weekend science dot com justin at twist many an gmail.com Or me blare at blare bass at twist.org Just be sure to put twist Twi s in that subdesign or your email will get spam filtered into last year Oh, which is this year? Which is don't you don't want it going there? No If you don't think that uh, you get any questions answered here We want to talk to us more see what we're talking about you can hit us up on the twitter Where we are at twist science at dr. Kiki at jackson fly and at players of menagerie We love your feedback If there's a topic you would like us to cover address a suggestion for an interview a haiku that comes to in the night Please let us know We'll be back here next week for that prediction show that kiki mentioned and we hope you'll join us again for more great science news And if you've learned anything from this last year of this weekend science remember It's all in your head Science This weekend science This weekend science This weekend science it's the end of the world So i'm setting up shop got my banner unfurled it says the scientist is in i'm gonna sell my advice Show them how to stop the robots with a simple device I'll reverse all the warming with a wave of my hand And all it'll cost you is a couple of grand This week science is coming your way So everybody listen to what I say I use the scientific method for all that it's worth and i'll broadcast my opinion all over the air Because it's this weekend science this weekend science this weekend science science science This weekend science this weekend science This weekend science I've got one disclaimer and it shouldn't be news That what I say may not represent your views, but i've done the calculations and i've got a plan If you listen to the science you may just get understand that would not try to threaten your philosophy We're just trying to save the world from Japanese And this weekend science is coming your way So everybody listen to everything we say and if you use our methods that are rolling to die We may rid the world of toxoplasma God the eye Because it's this weekend science this weekend science This weekend science Science science this weekend science this weekend science This weekend science science science I've got a laundry list of items I want to address From stopping global hunger to dredging Loch Ness I'm trying to promote more rational thought and i'll try to answer any question you've got The how can I ever see the changes I seek when I can only set up shop one hour a week This weekend science is coming your way You better just listen to what we say and if you learn anything from the words that we've said Then please just remember it's all in your head Because it's this weekend science this weekend science This weekend science Science science this weekend science this weekend science This weekend science science science science science this weekend science This weekend science this weekend science this weekend science This weekend science this weekend science this weekend science this weekend science this weekend science This Week in Calendars. Vardvark. Vardvark? Vardvark. Vardvark. Vardvark. I forgot to mention I was on a Daily Tech news show last week. No, you did mention that. Oh, I mentioned it at our holiday thing last week. At our holiday party. Yeah. You did. Hey, everyone. It's the after show. My cat is purring like crazy. She's down here and she's like purring at me. She's like, you're dancing. I'm purring. I'm purring. You're happy. I'm happy. There's her tail. Hi. What do you want? She wants things. The cat wants things. Thank you for another great wrap up roundup show. That was good. That was good. Oh my goodness. I cannot believe it's 2021 next year. Next year. I can't believe it. Next year. Already. Two days from now. I never thought I'd see the end of this year. But we have. Yes, Shubu cats always demand things. It's true. And yes, strengths. I am bouncier than Jackson Fly's headwear is true. It's because I realized I can stand up in my studio and for a long time I just had myself sitting in a chair doing the show. And I think it affected my bounciness. So beware for the next year. Bounciness to come. Hicker. Oh, Thunderbeaver likes my shirt. It says Steminist. This is actually my bachelorette party shirt. I say it like that because it was like two hours long and we sat around with Massum in a backyard six feet apart, just me and my bridesmaids. They was lovely. It was lovely. But it was not what was originally planned, so hopefully we're going to do something a little bit bigger before the big wedding. But I hope so. But yes, this is our fun shirts. Steminist. It was all science themed. It was very cute. That's fun. That is a different kind of bachelorette party. Yeah. Yeah. It was definitely not a normal hen night. My maid of honor got like a bunch of beakers and put dry ice and like food colored water in all the beakers on the stack table. And yeah, it was very cute. Carol Ann, thank you. So getting married during COVID was the optimism we needed. Yes. It was great. I'm glad we did it. I was especially glad that we did it two weeks after we did it because nobody got sick. Even though we did it outside, it wasn't during a surge. Everyone wore masks. We were all far apart. Nobody touched each other. We did everything by the books. It still felt weird because it was, yeah, because it was still like more than just me and him. So essentially, since I hadn't seen my parents for months at that point, he hadn't seen his parents for months at that point, so there's always risk, right? But we talked it out with everybody. We told everybody that there was no pressure to come. It was very short. It was in the middle of the day. Everything I just said, but yeah, it's after two weeks went by and we didn't get a call. It was like, now I can say I'm really glad I got married. Yes. You can say that. Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome. I'm glad you got to do that. Yeah. That's good. You can't let it stop things, you know? Yeah, I think you can. I think you can let it stop a lot of things. You can let it stop some things, but you can't let it stop you from, I guess, like moving forward with your life in whatever ways are appropriate. Yeah. Like, yes, you're right. There's no good way to say those words, but do you know what I mean? Yeah. I also got a new job in the middle of COVID, which was weird. Yeah, I did do it a little bit. You did. Yeah. Interviewing people. I lost the job in the bits of the COVID. Oh, jeez. Yeah. I've been doing the same thing I always do. And I've been doing a lot of international traveling during the COVID, which is fun. Airports are different. The plane rides I've been on are socially distanced in seating. It is wild how empty an airplane looks when it's not full of people, shoulder to shoulder, breathing the same air. Yeah. That's a different experience for sure. I'm kind of glad I haven't done that. Well, you know, actually, that was probably one of the least frightening things. I felt very, I felt more secure on the airplanes than I did, like, having to go to a grocery store. Yeah. Some grocery stores give me panic attacks at this point. Yeah. Like a dangerous place. Like, this is the thing. It persists and hangs in the air. Every, I think it's every third minute, the cabin air on the airplane is replaced completely. And people are being socially distanced. It's probably even is the equivalent of being outside and well socially distanced. You know, people don't think about this. One of the most important places to wear a mask, it might be an elevator. You know, this is a contained airspace that, if the thing is lingering in that airspace, you need to mask up to get on an elevator, even if it's just you by yourself in there. You also have to sort of, you know, the analogy I've been trying to give people is smoking. Right. Oh yeah. For sure. If somebody, if that person near you had a cigarette, could you potentially smell it? And then even social distancing in the six foot thing, yes, you could. It's not, that's not even really the safe distance. I'm still frustrated in hindsight that, you know, in March, April, May, June, July, there's a lot of, I can go through all the months, that we didn't just take one off completely. You know, and we didn't and the half measures and the optimism and that, well, it's not affecting this area or this age group yet. So whatever, all of these half step measures that took, and now we're at the peak. It's worse now. Like we talked about the year was bad. It's the worst now by a magnitude than it was by many magnitudes than it was when we were really doing lockdowns. Right. And we're doing less now than we did before. I keep thinking, I'm like, darn it, I should have been going out and going to restaurants and doing things last spring, comparatively, it was safer. No, you know, I'm hoping that we learn the lesson that we are not still applying in real time with the threat present. But I feel like there should be that, that, that, that binder that is in every health department going forward from what we learn from this, that next time, and there will be a next time, a novel virus is introduced to society, that next time we open up that binder and say, Oh, lessons learned. Here's the mistakes we made. Here's how we can do it right the next time. It kind of sucks to be living through the lesson learned version of that right now. And those who, those who, when they open up that binder in the future, people complain, Oh, this is terrible. Why are they doing this? This is why and we're living the why. We're living the why now. Yeah. So hopefully this sticks. I mean, hopefully, hopefully, I mean, I think that's one of the big public health epidemiologist kind of questions moving forward is have we hopefully the lesson that we've learned is that we are woefully were woefully unprepared for a pandemic. And if there's another one, if it's worse, which is likely, are we going to be ready next time? And hopefully we're putting together systems to make it work. So one of it, I want to share, I'm going to go to my Twitter and share in the chat rooms a link to a review article that just came out this week that is amazing. And it's like, absolutely clear cut and talks about all the things that we should be doing to protect ourselves and why. And it's, it's, it's amazing. So I'm going to put that in the chat room, but I just wanted to say that before you go ahead. So one thing I think that we need to do, because as much as we talked, I did all this bloody blah, blah, about lessons learned and maybe we can in the future have a better, you know, I kind of consider this as a problem of infrastructure of governments globally. If you have any, any system of government has something akin to a department of justice that decides how to investigate or prosecute crimes within their society, and they, you know, if something that they're not interested in prosecuting, then it doesn't get prosecuted, but they have this sort of power to leverage law enforcement say as an example, throughout a society, I think we do need a science based medical oversee like a surgeon general type position that is non political is moved as much as possible from the political system that can make actual authoritative decisions for societies, because our political systems globally largely failed us in putting interests or the half measure interests or not understanding perhaps the danger ahead of action. And I think having having a regulatory regulatory about a position within governments that can say, I get that you have all of these other concerns, but we're putting this one first, because it is so dangerous. You know, and that was very much lacking watching, watching local, you know, everything from mayors of cities, governors, throughout the political system here and abroad, other place, everywhere, enforcing differently or downplaying even the threat is how we got here. It was definitely a the people with it. There's there's it's fine. Nobody wanted to do the bad guy. And, you know, to use broad brushes that are no, I know are kind of like outdated and it's a joke. So internet don't get mad at me. It's like a lot of politicians wanted to be fun dad. Didn't want to be responsible bummer mom. It's like mom comes in with the tough rules. Fun dad is like, eat ice cream for breakfast. It's like, I felt like that's what we were dealing with, right? It was like a bunch of politicians who were like, no, do whatever you want, vote for me. Yeah, but this is also would be the brilliant thing. And I think if I'm making it sound like this is a law enforcement position that we create, it's not quite that. But if, if, for instance, there was we're going to shut down restaurants for the next three months came from the Department of Health official who has the power to shut down restaurants for six weeks or whatever it is. The politicians haven't out. Perfect. There's no political blowback for having made that unpopular decision, you know, you put it in the hands of expertise, first of all, and you additionally separate those those leverages of power from the political side. So the political side doesn't even have to like, oh, I'm not going to do it because I won't get voted in again, or I might get nasty letters, or one of my contributors businesses might be affected or something of this nature, making masks mandatory, very unpopular, perhaps. So you get it out of the politicians hands so that we can do the smart, important thing that needs to be done without having to worry about that, that political posturing atmosphere and environment altogether. Yeah, I mean, if there, if there are systems in place, which we thought there were, that was part of it. And then politics intervened. I mean, that's, that's, there's a real tension between short term and long term goals of politics, right? There's short term goals of politicians and long term goals of like society and that that politics in general, right? We want to keep the economy going. We want to keep people healthy. We want, how do we do that? How do we maintain it during a pandemic? And can you, is it possible to do it? I mean, we saw many Asian countries totally like they went through their pandemic stuff and then they got, they dealt with it. And now Wuhan is their videos of people in Wuhan out partying, maskless people in Queens, Victoria, Australia, are partying, going and having Christmas and New Year's. New Zealand is having a great time. I mean, there are ways to deal with something like what happened. We just have to have the systems in place and the political wherewithal to actually implement them and let a machine work. It's like it's not just the machine, right? Yeah. The doctors say it's a pandemic and the machine and the machine goes, right? It has nothing to do with politics. It's just the machine. Yeah, but that's my whole point. Get the political wherewithal and this out of it. And then the politicians can just be the good guys. If the if the medical whatever Department of Medical State lever pulling says, you know, shut down the restaurants and the bars for six weeks, politicians can jump in and say, hey, we need to come up with a funding program to save our small businesses and they're a hero. It's not my unpopular decision, but I get to do the good part. And the politicians just love that. Just do it that way. Come on, people to put the reason ration. What is the what is that old Aristotle? The philosopher, King State could do a little hybrid of that with democracy. You have those little people who are really studying and smart and working on these things and predicting the future and take their advice when other people who listen to them. Yeah, take their advice because you don't have a choice sometimes. I'm laughing right now because we've seen that people don't want to listen a lot. But let's just clear the air for a minute, 2020. We can we can manage for a little while. This marathon isn't over. We can do this. Hopefully we can we can make things work differently moving forward because I don't know how many people like what's going on. I think red, blue, left, right, whatever. Nobody likes what's going on. And that is one thing. That's not fun. It's one thing everybody has in common. We do not like the pandemic generally. It sucks. We can start from there, right? That's common ground. Just how we deal with it is what we choose moving forward. 2021. We can make it a whole new year. Start getting back to somewhat normal, although I don't know if I need to go back to normal. Was normal good? I don't think normal was good. It was it had issues and I hope that the new normal will fix some of those. We'll see what happens moving forward. A lot of people are going to work from home. Yeah, I think a lot of jobs will at least change to like a day a week work from home. Telecommuting is going to be a big, big thing moving forward. I think a lot of that can stay. I hope handshakes don't come back. I always found those virtual conferences. I really hope I'm just going to say it. I love the DJ culture on Twitch. Just going to put it out there. There are so many good, not just DJ, but music on Twitch has been one of the saving graces of this year. I have seen so many good concerts and so musical acts. DJs, great DJ sets, heard so much great music because the venues were closed and Twitch gave musicians a platform. DJ is a platform to go to to find an audience. And it's it's been that's it's been one of my favorite places. I'm going to say for this last year, it's great. Identity 4 refuses to work from home. I love the idea of folks being able to write if people want to and they can. Why not? Shoebrew loves not having to be in the office all the time because of COVID and he wrote it all the time. And I'm just going to say, I think the new like, sweat, sweat sheet fashion movement is amazing. I mean, it's the professional on top. PJs on the bottom kind of movement. I mean, I'm going to be left here alone. Where's everybody? Sweats, OK. They're like, where are you going with this? Where are you going with that? Where are you going? So so, yeah, as we have to 2021 clothes, it's not going away. I think 20, you know, 2021 is going to also be a COVID year because because 2020 didn't wear a mask. So 2021 got it. And I think we're going to be like, 2021 is going to be worse in terms of tragedy. It's going to start off really a high number. And by that, it's the worst is yet to come. But I think we're going to have that sort of strange optimism where it's like, yeah, but it's not 2021's fault. It's not it's not it's not 2020. It's not 2021's fault. And there's hope right now. But I am going to I mean, knock on bamboo tabletop. I'm really hoping that 2021 doesn't come in and go, hey, 2020, hold my beer, because that would be bad. Yeah, no, it's I think we're we're yeah, this. Well, I think we really need to talk about this in 2022, which means you got to wear a mask, you know, to get there. Can we all get to 2022, please? Please, that's what I want to do safely. I want everyone to get there. So you've saved money in laundry and haircuts, right? Seriously. Oh. Oh, the dog, Blair's dog had to take care of things. Yeah, I haven't paid for so much gas, although my car battery has gone dead several times and had to be jumped because we're not driving as much. Yeah, that's a new thing. And I forget to go out and start the car. I'm like, I don't even go outside anymore. So. Oh, Carol Ann's school, Carol Ann's son's school had its first confirmed cases of covid. That's no good. Yeah, I think I remember you saying that last week across the fingers. Yeah, Kev B. This is a really interesting point and climate change was something that was big this year. We really, I think it really hammered home. How present climate changes and how much is happening right now that we need to be fixing stuff right now. I think 2020 did did that and hopefully hammered at home for more and more people. But even this year with all of the cuts that we've done, nobody driving and all that kind of stuff, it only decreased CO2 by about 10 percent. And so what we need to change is much, much more for our carbon dioxide production. And so it's not just going to be lifestyle changes. It has to be where we get our energy. And it has to be manufacturing. It has to be trucking. It has to be there's so many agriculture. There are so many pieces to the puzzle. Yeah, yeah, but that's also a little bit of a misleading number. And here's kind of why. So I think it was I think it took us all the way back to what was it? Two thousand nine levels of 2012 wasn't that far back. But that's what a 10 percent cut that. So every decade, our fossil fuel usage equals is is is as is equal to all of the other decades of ever using fossil fuels, meaning the 90s used as much fossil fuels as the 80s, the 70s, the 60s, the 50s, the 40s, the 30s all combined. The the odds, what do you call them? The 2000 2010 used as much as the 90s, the 80s, the 70s, all put the and we've been doubling our consumption of user expenditure of fossil fuels every decade, yep, which is why I'm like only cutting my 10 percent. I move his back right there. It's it's it's not doing much, you know, who's like one of the things it's sort of on the horizon here. You look at a company like Tesla, which now has for a while ago was worth more than all of the other car companies combined and is like also skyrocketed during the pandemic somehow. If that if that electric car technology becomes the norm and and based on how it's positioned, I can only imagine that's what's going to happen. Not just everybody's going to drive at Tesla, but every car manufacturer at some point will have to lease their technology probably from Tesla as their R&D capabilities are now astronomically and sometimes in space better than anybody else's. That's a big that's a big step, getting the the point source vehicles to stop burning fossil fuels. You still have to generate it cleanly to provide it to those vehicles that we don't have coal power plants powering electric cars. But it is a that's one of those big steps with big pieces of that puzzle that's going to help. But yeah, we need more drastic action. We absolutely do. Yep, we absolutely do. We need we need the governments to do it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And they won't. So then what? That's the thing. We need the government to government could do it, but won't. So what is the next option? Yeah. OK. Twist question for New Year's. New Year's question. What do we want to? Is there anything we want to change about the show for twenty twenty one? I mean, I think if we figure out a way to get is that a question for the audience? Everyone. I got the OK. Oh, wait, I don't want to change. Oh, oh, you sure? So I think I think we'd find a way. Oh, boy, if I could find a way to to get like an intern or someone that does like production-y stuff, it'd be very cool to have not have you have to deal with all of the tech that's happening during the show and really just do the show. I think that that would be more fun for you, I'm guessing. And I think that that would be really great. Yeah, not to be so multitasked. Yeah, all the time. Not that I can tell, but it's, you know, I can imagine that it would be. You know, I mean, I just I feel like I feel like that would be nice. And then also, you know, that would be the person that we could ask to. For example, when we do an interview, split the podcast into two pieces, right? I still think I still really like that idea because I also do feel like if I don't know, me personally, I feel like I would treat the interview differently and the whole show itself differently if if it was being split into two podcasts, right? Right. To two episodes ish that were released during the same week. Yeah, I wouldn't feel like, you know, whether or not I'm supposed to, I still kind of sometimes feel like I want to rush through the story part because it's gotten so late and the show is getting so long. It was getting so long and not that I want to shorten the interview, but I don't know. Yeah, because I mean, I think one of the best things about the interviews is being able to dig in and have a conversation. And it's like, oh, we had got to talk for like an hour with this person. You know, that's awesome. But then suddenly the show is two and a half hours long, three hours. Or in the case of Brian Hare, three and a half hours. Longest episode ever, but one of the best was good. But so, yeah, so it would be the same YouTube. It would be the same on our end. But yeah, just in the podcast. So wait a second, wait a second, hang on, hang on. Blair, but can I reach out something real quick? Yeah. So your suggestion is we should have Kiki doing less technical editing type work. And at the same time, you have also suggested that we create a whole second podcast that needs to get edited out cleanly from the live for her to also do. That's where I'm tearing it. What are you more incurring to do it yourself? I pair it, what I said was if we got somebody to help with the production side, that is something that they could do. Or like identity for is saying, splitting the recordings as they're recorded and something that we could do. But the the weird thing would be, I think from a production standpoint and what has always blocked me is I have to sit down and write up a new intro and a new and a new outro. Because if we do split it into two episodes, the interview then doesn't have an outro that has all of the, oh, and go to the social media all that kind of stuff. And then the science part, the news part doesn't have, you know, and Justin doesn't want to do two disclaimers. So why don't we do that? Right. OK. But yeah. But do we want to like set it up? So it's like, how do we want to set that up? So it's like, how do we what are the things that we say and do and can we put that all in the rundown? So it's all within the one recording period. Yeah. You know, can we break it up into, you know, three episodes? I don't know. But as long as all those pieces are recorded, it's easy to break up. But if if I don't have the intros and the outros, then it makes it really then I'm like, then I have to record something. And then it's like, no, it's just that I've just had issues. And so that is what's blocked me. And so maybe if we want to sit down and figure that stuff out at some point, like that would work. I think we should be able to do because I mean, we're just used to doing this live, but it should be able to do a blanket. Welcome to the Twist Interview Show, where we interview a scientist at the outset, and then our beginning of our interview where you do the introduction would stay stay like it is. Right. Right. Yeah. But I mean, it's just a matter of creating a it's Wednesday, whatever, and we're interviewing so and so. Or this is the Twist Interview Show. Welcome, you know, for and whatever the intro is. I need to make that. And that's. Oh, Thunder Beaver has a really good one. Take the audio from the after show and put that on Patreon. I'm doing that. It's already. Oh, you are. Oh, OK. It's always released to our patrons. Every patron can get the after show. As audio. That's very cool. I didn't know we did that. Yeah. So the Patreon RSS feed podcast feed gets the podcast episode and the after show. Oh, that's very cool. Yeah. Yep. Yep. That's the the one podcast I donate to on Patreon. They release every once in a while, like 15, 20 minutes of content just for the Patreon feed, which is mostly behind the scenes stuff is it's pretty fun. Yeah, I like to have stuff specifically, like, you know, pictures of Justin trying on hats. Yeah. If you don't think you shouldn't speak. Caroline says nothing wrong with the production. We love this. Thank you, Caroline. But I also saw that Caroline suggested keeping the themes international. And she had said earlier that having it having it more global in scope is more interesting for an international audience. So not necessary. I mean, approaching everything not so much from a Northwest, you know, Pacific Northwest perspective, but from a global science perspective, which I think we do. Yeah, fair. I mean, we during fire season, we're like, California fires. But then during Australia fire season, we're like, Australia fires. Oh, California drought. But because California is huge, that's a big deal. Right. But I mean, I'm not picking up on droughts in Africa as much, unless they're really major droughts. You know, very, very Western. I know we have a very Western perspective. So that said, it's also sort of tricky to say something like this, because the the one of my favorite stories this year was the cave in Mexico. That was found to have tools that were 30,000 years old. And that was cool. Who took the lead on that? University of Copenhagen. I mean, so it's it's a very international show in that the science where it's originating from isn't all in the United States. It's coming from all over the world. I think this was the first year that triple A.S. submissions for the sort of database of stories that they collect there that we pull from quite a bit. It was the first year that they had more than half of their submissions were from overseas. And even when you're saying, OK, the submission came from overseas or the submission was from here, oftentimes when they say an international group of scientists or a collaboration of group of scientists, it's many countries. It's usually not one university. In fact, I mentioned the University of Copenhagen and that's one state. There was, I think, John Hopkins. There was another university here in the United States that was also participating in that and part of that study. So, you know, I try to do break down a little bit of where these stories are coming from. So we have an idea that science is a global effort. But when I'm talking politics or if I'm talking local fires and that sort of thing, it's partly because it's right here in the backyard or that's what you're familiar with. Like, I don't know what the political struggles are in Lithuania in terms of dealing with COVID. They're probably the same or similar to Estonia or Latvia. But I don't know if there's different as the US and Canada approaches the backyard. Yeah, I don't know. Speaking of triple AS, I need to get them an MP3 recording for by January 5th. So that's next Tuesday, I think. They are doing a virtual meeting this year, last year. So speaking of looking back over the year. Yeah, we were in Seattle. We were in Seattle. The American COVID case was in Seattle. We were in Seattle. Yeah, right when it was all starting to percolate. In a conference center, no mask. It's just a cold. Who the hell don't overreact, people? Yikes. It's not home. Yeah, it can happen. Anywho, they're doing a virtual meeting this year and they're doing their podcast Siamite stage and they're making a virtual podcast library. And they have said they would host a new or heritage recording of this week in science relevant to our theme of understanding dynamic ecosystems. They'll create a profile page with links and other stuff encouraging people to subscribe. So I need to figure out episode and an episode, which we think would be a great episode. Highlighting ecosystems. I want to look at our research that you made. Yes. Oh, well, it's not an episode though. It's not a full or can we call one together? There was the ones about the they were getting rid of the they got rid of the rats on the island. And then the coconut trees stick over. That was a big. Yeah, that was interesting. That was pretty recent. That was the last couple months. Here's a funny joke from John Ratnaswamy, who is in our chat earlier, a topologist, an epidemiologist and an HVAC expert walk into a bar because they can't agree on what counts as outdoor dining. They walk into the bar because I can't. I thought that was funny. I like that. Yeah. So dynamic ecosystems. And they say the meeting theme research topics, which may be addressed. Let's see. We are embedded in a variety of ecosystems, including the environments that we can inhabit and the many social systems which we live and work, finding ways of maintaining the stable balance of these ecosystems. The face of rapidly changing circumstances is critical for our advancement. Drawing a multitude of scientific perspectives, this annual meeting seats to feature diverse ways of understanding the complexities and dynamics of biological, physical, social and economic systems across scales, as well as strengthening and activating new connections to address underlying problems in various spheres. These challenges facing contemporary society will provide the opportunity to creatively harness science, engineering, technology and policy to promote sustainable change. Research topics, which may be addressed, toxins and pollution remediation, artificial intelligence, robotics, nanotechnology, human machine interface applications, modeling, microbiomes, genetic engineering challenges, social ecosystems, systems of interaction and community building invasive species. Anyway, I think we have lots of episodes and other things that would fit inside of this, but yeah. I think we have an interview from two years ago. When was Santa Fe? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that was a great one. That was 2019, June 2019, but that was a great interview. Yes. Yeah. I don't remember what was that one about. Foodwebs. Foodwebs, yeah, it was complexities and dynamic ecosystem, foodweb stuff. Yeah, that would be great. Oh, here it is, Jennifer Dunn. Yeah, Jennifer Dunn. Interesting. I drank all my wine. Mike Shoemaker, it's not scary, you understood all that. I was rattling it out a bit, but. Thunder Beaver said he wanted all of us nails and put that on the list. To record our audio separately and cobble it together. It was pretty funny. Who's gonna do that? Again, if we had a production assistant, that would be great. Oh, yeah. We could very easily do that, you know, like just open quick time or whatever and record our side. It's not hard to do, but if the cobbling together is what's different. Cobbling. Thunder Beaver was asking about, is it only in the Patreon RSS feed? It's no way to know what's in there without dropping it into a feed reader. Right, and you have to be on the Patreon, subscribed to, I think they call it the podcast feed. And anything that goes out through that, it should be in there. Those after shows should be in there. Justin's going after hours club. Except now you're down, you're back, you're more normal now. Yeah, it's actually, I think it's, what time is it? Here it's eight in the morning, something like that. Who else, who else? I like Gaurav, the inviting PhD graduate students to explain their research in five minutes, even better if they're a minority. I like that, that could be fun. I like to have them have people record or come on and it's just, they got to do it really fast. The problem is, if people come on this show, we're going to talk to them. That five minute presentation and then we're going to be like, so, I want to know more. Yeah, I think being recorded is a good idea. And then we could just talk to each other about it. Yeah, there are lots of graduate students who are looking for ways to, I don't know, practice their science communication skills, their presentation skills. This would have to be, it could be audio, but I think video, a video fun, video presentation. Yeah, they could be nice. Because we're a video program first, as long as it is clear in the audio, yeah. Caroline, yeah, pre-record the fun and then chat with them. Yeah. Something along that lines that would sort of be interesting too is just to reach out to a whole bunch of scientists and just ask them, not the defending a thesis or anything like this or even necessarily a paper, but ask them what they work on and why do they do it in five minutes? And just throw, we could do a whole bunch of those where that would be fun. I don't know. There's all kinds of possibilities for that quick, quick introduction to somebody doing something interesting. I was thinking, another thing is that once a month, so in terms of interviews that we have, it's fun to interview scientists and have the scientists talk about their science and to make sure we have at least one of those interviews every month. But then also once a month, maybe it would be to have another science communicator who is a podcaster or a YouTuber come on and do the show with us, basically be another co-host. But it would just be, and if that would be the one day that if one of us had to take a break, we could. So it would be either a substitute or just, but it would be a regular segment to have an additional person. And that idea would be that we would be getting them on so they'd talk about it to their audiences and hopefully that would help grow our audience a bit. Yes, and I love Fraser Kane and Pamela Gaye. They're both amazing. We should have a crossover episode like we did with what the F-I-F. F-I-F. F-I-F. That was fun. Yeah, crossover episodes would be good. Must keep a tongue friendly and cheek. Yeah. Okay. Intro's Outro's, it was a fun episode. What else? What did I miss from people? They got flak or vocal. I'm not gonna do agvorbus or any specialized audio stuff because there just aren't enough people who are into that and the audio quality of just vocals don't change enough stuff. If we were doing more music, that would be worth it. Justin has to spend a day partying because it's already New Year's where Justin is. So I'm guessing Justin's on his way out. We can split episodes up. Noodles, we'll have more Roger. More Roger, so let's get Roger on again. More Roger. I missed that episode. Roger from- Oh, yes. Yes, Daily Tech News show. He's very fun. More Roger, extra goodies for Patreon. Oh, Shubrew says dares us to host one of the Minions for a show. We've had Minions on the show before. Minions co-host. Make that a Patreon level. I used to just be my go-to if Kiki had to go somewhere. I'd be like, hey, who wants to jump on to the show next week? We all want one. That's right. Three new hosts, hot rod. Rude, how great my hair is. Very rude. That would be great. We'll do that. We'll just get three new hosts completely. No explanation. Bye. No explanation of whatsoever. This is twist. Production, I'm writing down my last production in turn, and I need to pay an editor. So I don't have to edit the show anymore. Aw, thanks, Carolyn. No one can- Wait, that means me and Blair, if nobody can replace Kiki, does that mean me and Blair are replaceable? Yes. Wait, what are you talking about? No, it was taken place here. I don't know if I like this shift. Anybody else here? All right, everybody. But no, you're right, you're right. It would be welcome to This Week in Science, but enough about science. Let's talk about something completely different. Let's talk about what happened on The Real Housewives this week. Okay. Maybe we can have more wine. No. No, new segment. This Week in Debunked Science, Pseudoscience. I think we do kind of cover that. I try and hit topics that are like, oh, this is where the headlines went this week, but this is what's really happening, and trying to, every once in a while, I try and dig into the headlines a bit. A little bit. Yeah, empty. Aw, great. We can't be replaced by AI yet. That's great. Not yet. Oh, that's funny. Identity Force says if all three hosts were replaced, it already exists. It's called Skeptics Guide to the Universe. It's true. That's another crossover that we need to do. Okay, that's good. Astronomycast and SGU. That would be another one. Okay, that'd be good. Yeah, it's like 8 a.m. for Justin right now. Yeah, I'm gonna go find my missing star. He lost a star. I'm gonna go find that monkey McBean character. Aw, Steven Rain. Yeah, I'm just gonna have two stars now, and I'm gonna have the one. Stop now. You're just having too much fun, too much fun this New Year's. Steven Rain is gonna follow you. He says unsubscribing from us following you to your new channel. Oh, perfect, thank you. You guys have love over there. We'll be talking hidden things you didn't know about the tax code that may affect people you don't know. Hey, goodbye, everybody. I'm gonna say good night, Blair. Good night, Blair. Say good night, Justin. Good night, Justin. Good night, Kiki. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. Good night, everyone, and happy New Year. Yeah, happy New Year, everybody. I hope you have a wonderful, safe celebration, all the masks, and all the social distancing, and we will see you in the next calendar year. It has been a big one. Thank you for being with us. We said it before. Say it again. Can't wait to see you next year. Thank you. You're the best. Just the best. You're the best audience. The best audience. The best co-host. Hey, hey, Kiki, just go ahead. The best audience. I know. I'm still here. Remember the show. Yeah, I'm here. All that praise will go to their heads. I know. Right to the heads. All right, good night. Good night, Blair.