Mouse’s Vineyard

Undiscovered

Science Friday and WNYC Studios

Wnyc, Society & Culture, 805813, Science, History, Friday, Studios

4.6 • 768 Ratings

🗓️ 27 June 2017

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Martha’s Vineyard has a Lyme disease problem. Now a scientist is coming to town with a possible fix: genetically engineered mice. An island associated with summer rest and relaxation is gaining a reputation for something else: Lyme disease. Martha’s Vineyard has one of the highest rates of Lyme in the country. Now MIT geneticist Kevin Esvelt is coming to the island with a potential long-term fix. The catch: It involves releasing up to a few hundred thousand genetically modified mice onto the island. Are Vineyarders ready? Kevin Esvelt makes the case for engineered mice, at a public meeting at a Vineyard public library. (Photo: Annie Minoff) Kevin Esvelt takes questions from the Martha’s Vineyard audience. (He’s joined by Dr. Michael Jacobs and Dr. Sam Telford. (Photo: Annie Minoff) Bob, Cheryl, and Spice (the lucky dog who gets a Lyme vaccine). (Photo: Annie Minoff) No lack of tick-repelling options at a Martha’s Vineyard general store. (Photo: Annie Minoff) (Original art by Claire Merchlinsky) GUESTS Kevin Esvelt, Assistant Professor, MIT Media Lab FOOTNOTES Read Kevin Esvelt’s original paper describing the gene drive mechanism in eLife. Less technical descriptions available here via Scientific American, and here via Esvelt’s Sculpting Evolution Group. Watch Kevin’s July 20, 2016 presentation on Martha’s Vineyard (Unfortunately there is no direct link. Search “7.20.16” to find the video, titled “Preventing Tick-Borne Disease.”) Listen to Kevin Esvelt talk about gene drive on Science Friday. Read about Oxitec’s proposed mosquito trial in Key West, and watch the public meeting excerpted in this episode. Learn more about Kevin’s lab, the Sculpting Evolution Group. Looking for more information about Lyme disease? Here are resources from the CDC. CREDITS This episode of Undiscovered was reported and produced by Annie Minoff and Elah Feder. Editing by Christopher Intagliata. Fact-checking help by Michelle Harris. Original music by Daniel Peterschmidt. Our theme music is by I am Robot and Proud. Art for this episode by Claire Merchlinsky. Thanks to Science Friday’s Danielle Dana, Christian Skotte, Brandon Echter, and Rachel Bouton. Special thanks to Joanna Buchthal, Bob Rosenbaum, Dick Johnson, and Sam Telford.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Listener supported WNYC Studios.
0:09.2	I'm Ella and I'm Annie, and you're listening to Undiscovered, a podcast about the backstories of science.
0:17.9	This story starts on a porch on Martha's Vineyard.
0:21.2	It's July 2016, a beautiful peak summer day.
0:25.7	And I'm sitting with Bob Rosenbaum and Cheryl Steinberg.
0:28.3	We're looking out over their freshly cut backyard.
0:31.4	And they're telling me about something that happened to their son, Ben.
0:35.1	He wound up coming home one day and he said, something very weird is happening.
0:41.1	I can only blink one eye.
0:43.7	I actually brought him to the eye doctor and the eye doctor said that what he had was
0:48.1	Bell's palsy because it actually affected the whole side of his face.
0:52.6	And I did not know that Bell's palsy was related
0:55.6	to Lyme's disease, but it was. So that's my education. You've probably heard of Lyme disease.
1:01.6	You get it from a tick bite. And usually it's not subtle. There's a big red rash in the shape of a
1:06.5	bull's eye. But not always. And if you don't get that bull's eye rash, you might not know you have Lyme. You
1:12.5	might not treat it, which is when some really scary symptoms can kick in. Maybe the side of your
1:17.8	face is paralyzed or your knees start to swell up or there's shooting pain in your hands and
1:22.6	feet. Ben's facial paralysis, it went away. But for his dad, Bob, it was the beginning of an all-out war against lime and the ticks that carry it.
1:34.0	Well, the first thing I do is I spray my clothes and my shoes with a product called permethrin.
1:41.3	Pomethrin's an insecticide.
1:42.9	Bob uses more of it on his yard.
1:44.7	He uses deat on his skin.
	...

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