Science Talk

By Scientific AmericanScience

Science Talk episodes

February 01, 2016 Antioxidant Use Still Small Mixed Bag
At a Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health forum on diet and health, Walter Willett, chair of the school's nutrition department, talked about benefits and risks associated with antioxidant supplements.

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4 min
January 29, 2016 Sweet Song Gives Away New Bird Species
The newly discovered Himalayan forest thrush looks a great deal like the alpine thrush, but its far silkier song stylings gave it away as a potential new species.

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4 min
January 28, 2016 Suicide Differences by Region Related to Gun Availability
The presence of a gun increases the likelihood that someone in the home will die a violent death, particularly by suicide.

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4 min
January 27, 2016 Musical Pitch Perception May Have Long Evolutionary History
A tiny primate, the marmoset, appears to process pitch perception the same way we do, implying that the ability evolved in a common ancestor at least 40 million years ago.

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4 min
January 26, 2016 Quick Test Could Tell If a Patient Needs Antibiotics
Antibiotics work against bacterial infections but are often prescribed to people with viral infections, which don't respond to the drugs. But a new gene test could show if a patient's infection is viral or bacterial.

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4 min
January 25, 2016 Pluto Killer Thinks He Has New Ninth Planet
Caltech astronomer Mike Brown, the driving force for demoting Pluto, now claims evidence for a massive, distant replacement ninth planet in our solar system.

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4 min
January 21, 2016 Sharks Head Straight Home by Smell
Sharks that could smell headed straight back home when taken a few miles away whereas some that had their senses of smell blocked took slower, more erratic paths to their old haunts.

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4 min
January 20, 2016 Volcano Role in Dino Death Gets Mercury Boost
Researchers found a spike in mercury, which is produced by volcanoes, in ancient ocean sediments from southern France that span the time of the dinosaurs' mass extinction, lending support to the idea that massive eruptions played a role, in addition to the asteroid impact.

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5 min
January 19, 2016 Healthful Diet Switch Helps Even Late in Life
At a Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health forum on diet and health, Walter Willett, chair of the school's nutrition department, said that adoption of more healthful eating habits even late in life still has benefits.

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3 min
January 18, 2016 Better Gut Microbiome Census through Computing
Sophisticated computational techniques make it possible to analyze gene samples from all the bacteria in the gut at once to take a census of the species present.

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4 min

About Science Talk

From the publisher's feed

Science Talk is a podcast of longer-form audio experiments from Scientific American--from immersive sonic journeys into nature to deep dives into research with leading experts.