Please Explain (The Leonard Lopate Show)

On this week’s Please Explain we’re looking at the art and science of art conservation.

We’ll find out the difference between brown body fat and white, how fat forms and functions, where its stored, how its burned, and how much is too much. Maudene Nelson, registered dietitian, New York State Certified Dietitian-Nutritionist, and a Certified Diabetes Educator at the Institute of Human Nutrition, joins us.

With the recent explosion on an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico and the oil slick heading toward the shore, on today's Please Explain, we're looking into how offshore drilling is done how much oil might be discovered under the Atlantic now that the Obama administration is proposing to open vast expanses along the Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling. Paul Bommer, Senior Lecturer in the Dept. of Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering, University of Texas at Austin, and Tyler Priest Professor and Director of Global Studies in the Bauer College of Business at the University of Houston, and oil historian.

Our latest Please Explain is all about plastic recycling! Eric Goldstein, senior attorney in the Natural Resource Defense Council's New York office and co-director of NRDC's urban program, joins us to explain what happens after plastic is tossed into the recycling bin and goes through the process of being re-created and reused.

Sugary cereals claim to be "heart healthy" and packages that say a food is "all natural" still have a list of mysterious ingredients. On today’s edition of Please Explain, Marion Nestle, Paulette Goddard Professor in the Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health and Professor of Sociology at New York University, and author of the blog www.foodpolitics.com, and Urvashi Rangan, Director of Consumer Report's GreenerChoices.org and Consumers Union's Director of Technical Policy, join us to explain how to decipher the real information from the marketing claims, and let us know what to look for in the nutrition facts–and what to avoid—when we’re choosing our foods in the grocery store.

On this week's Please Explain, we're looking into skin care and skin care products. There are numerous lotions and potions that promise to restore youthful skin, but us there any truth to the claims they make?

On today's Please Explain, we'll look into how happiness is studied, and what some recent research reveals about what makes people happy, and why it's sometimes not what they'd expect. Sonja Lyubomirsky, Department of Psychology, University of California

On today’s Please Explain we’ll look into how hypnosis works, and how it can be effective in treating people who want to stop smoking, lose weight, or calm their nerves before a test. We’re joined by Dr. Roberta Temes, hypnotist, psychologist, and author of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Hypnosis; and Dr. Amir Raz, Professor in the Departments of Psychiatry, Neurology and Neurosurgery, and Psychology, and Canada Research Chair in the Cognitive Neuroscience of Attention, at McGill University and SMBD Jewish General Hospital.

Today's Please Explain is all about botanical mysteries and wonders—from meat-eating plants to phosphorescence. Jamie Boyer, Director of Children's Education at the New York Botanical Garden, and Amy Stewart, author of Wicked Plants: The Weed That Killed Lincoln's Mother and Other Botanical Atrocities.

She'll be speaking about her book Wicked Plants

Dust is everywhere: under our beds, on our computer screens, in cracks in the sidewalk, and on our skin. Particles from the Sahara can be found as far away as the Caribbean, and dust from melting glaciers can impact the Earth’s climate. On this week’s edition of Please Explain, Hannah Holmes, author of The Secret Life of Dust, and Paul Lioy, Professor and Deputy Director of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School-University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, and author of the forthcoming book Dust: The Inside Story of Its Role in the September 11th Aftermath, join us to discuss where dust comes from, what it’s made of, and the good and bad contributions it makes to the planet and even to space.