This is a Science Show

Holding a miniature sun in a magnetic bottle isn't easy. But that's how you make a fusion reactor. In this episode I chat with plasma physicist John McCone about the challenges of building a functional fusion reactor. We talk about plasma blowtorches, neutron bombardment, lumpy magnetic fields, and ways to make a nuclear bomb.  

In 2015, the world's second largest car maker got caught cheating on emissions tests. It was bad. Really, really bad. VW diesel cars were cranking out toxic levels of nitrous oxides—and not the happy laughing gas kind. The deadly kind. Here's how it all went down.

Many of us never got to experience it, but the air quality in LA in the ‘40s  ‘50s, ‘60s, and ‘70s was deadly. Smog hung in the air like a thick fog and many residents actually said that it hurt to breathe.

Sources:

https://www.kcet.org/history-society/how-los-angeles-began-to-put-its-smoggy-days-behind

https://earther.gizmodo.com/environmental-regulation-has-helped-cut-deaths-from-air-1829875441

https://www.hemmings.com/magazine/hcc/2007/09/After-Burner/1509192.html  

https://www.marketplace.org/2014/07/14/sustainability/we-used-be-china/la-smog-battle-against-air-pollution

https://www.geek.com/geek-cetera/spaceballs-becomes-reality-canadian-company-is-selling-bottled-air-to-the-chinese-1642442/

https://www.cnbc.com/2015/12/15/canadians-are-selling-cans-of-fresh-air-to-china.html

http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20170515-the-entrepreneurs-making-money-out-of-thin-air

https://www.cnn.com/2016/02/08/world/fresh-air-britain-china-bottles/index.html

https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/about/history

This summer a lot of science news bubbled up out of the quantum foam, but the one thing that really caught my attention was booze. And not Oregon’s world-famous craft beers. A study landed that allegedly found that any amount of alcohol—any—is bad for you. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't drink.

Sources:

That’s the bone-chilling shriek of America’s favorite pest, the trash panda. Or Raccoon. And while they may sound like demons shredding the flesh from helpless babes, there’s something even more terrifying about them: Their poop.

Psychologist and author David P. Barash recently wrote an article for Nautilus Magazine arguing that now is the time to make a humanzee. I wrote a story about an experiment gone horribly wrong. How are they related? Listen to find out!https://dustindriver.com/simple-procedure.html http://nautil.us/issue/58/self/its-time-to-make-human_chimp-hybrids

No fancy sci-fi introduction is needed this time, folks, because today we have world-renown CRISPR expert Sam Sternberg. Sam worked with biochemist, author, and science celebrity Jennifer Doudna to refine CRISPR gene editing technology at UC Berkeley. The two wrote best-selling book A Crack in Creation about the discovery and what it could mean for humanity. Today Sam is working on CRISPR at Columbia University in New York. Sam was kind enough to take an hour or so out of his busy schedule to chat about CRISPR and how it’s being used to revolutionize science and medicine.