Voyager 1 Approaches Interstellar Space, Zombie Ladybugs
Podcasting from Boston again this week. Elsa brings us the latest mix of science news stories, and they include news about the Voyager 1 spacecraft’s whereabouts. Also, our Music in Science segment is back with psychologist Disa Sauter talking about music she heard in Namibia. Our ongoing Science Forum about the search for extraterrestrial intelligence continues through June 29th. You can stop by the discussion here.
Elsa’s Favorite Science Stories:
Voyager 1 on the Edge: Launched in 1977, the Voyager 1 spacecraft has finally reached the boundary of our solar system. Conditions there are turning out to more tranquil than astronomers expected.
Science Friday interview with Voyager scientist Ed Stone.
More about the Voyager mission from NASA.
Zombie Ladybird Beetles: Parasites often manipulate their hosts’ behavior in astonishing ways. Here’s a crazy new example, courtesy of a wasp whose larvae develop inside ladybird beetles. When the larva exits the beetle’s body to spin a cocoon, it injects a toxin that turns the beetle into a mindless, twitching bodyguard for the vulnerable wasp pupa. Incredibly, some ladybugs actually recover.
More about the zombie ants Elsa mentioned.
The study of Toxoplasma and human culture.
More on Toxoplasma and human behavior from The Economist.
Skulls, Science and Bias: A set of human skulls, measured more than 150 years ago, is at the center of a long-running debate about bias in science. Researchers have re-measured the skulls and concluded that the anthropologist who first studied them in the mid 1800s didn’t do such a bad job after all. His conclusions may have been skewed, but his measurements were not.
Wired Science coverage.
The old Scientific American editorial on eugenics.
Music in Science: Psychologist Disa Sauter studies how culture influences the way we express emotions such as surprise, disgust and pleasure. Her work sometimes takes her to remote communities that have no exposure to Western culture. Sauter recalls the music she heard during a trip to Namibia, where she met an isolated group of people called the Himba.
Guest: Disa Sauter is a psychologist at the Max Planck institute for Psycholinguists in the Netherlands.
Music: Omoramba and Aounga, both from the album Namibia: Bushmen and Himba.
See Podcast 52 for the results of Sauter’s work with the Himba.