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Science Friday

Ocean Migrations, Deep Divers, Summer Skies. April 20, 2018, Part 2

Science Friday

Science Friday and WNYC Studios

Natural Sciences, Wnyc, Science, Friday, Life Sciences

4.46.3K Ratings

🗓️ 20 April 2018

⏱️ 47 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Every night, the largest migration on Earth happens underwater, as jellies, crustaceans and fish swim up hundreds of meters towards the surface to feed. Those daily pilgrimages might also create propulsive jets behind the animals capable of stirring ocean waters, according to research in the journal Nature. Stanford engineer John Dabiri and his team investigated that phenomenon in the lab using brine shrimp (commonly known as sea monkeys). He joins Ira to discuss the theory. Plus: Consider the spleen. Many may not appreciate or even think about them very much at all, unless they’ve had them removed, but the Bajau people of Southeast Asia rely on them every day without even knowing it. The Bajau are “sea nomads,” meaning they get everything they need to live by diving up to 65 feet under water, multiple times, for up to 8 hours a day. But it’s not their large lung capacity that give them an advantage during a dive—it’s their extra large spleens. Dr. Melissa Ilardo, post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Molecular Medicine at the University of Utah, and Dr. Cynthia Beall, Professor of Anthropology at Case Western Reserve University, join Ira to discuss the spleen and other evolutionary adaptations that allow humans to survive in extreme environments. And it’s been a hard road getting there this year, but spring is finally in the air in much of the country. And that means summer is not far away, bringing with it warmer temperatures and lazy nights made for stargazing. Dean Regas, outreach astronomer at the Cincinnati Observatory and co-host of the PBS series ‘Star Gazers,’ joins Ira to talk about some of the highlights of the summer night skies, from planets to constellations to meteor showers.

Transcript

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0:00.0

This is Science Friday. I'm Ira Flato. We're coming to you today from the studios of Cincinnati Public Radio and beautiful downtown Cincinnati.

0:08.5

But later at the hour, scientists have uncovered a new reason to appreciate your spleen. Think about that.

0:15.1

But first, think of the Earth's great migrations. There are thundering herds of wildebeest on the savannah. That may come to mind.

0:22.3

Or delicately fluttering swarms of monarch butterflies. Sandhill cranes gracefully sweeping through the plains.

0:30.7

But the largest migration on Earth? I bet you don't know where that happens. It happens every day.

0:37.4

And it's far less glamorous or photographed than those other migrations.

0:41.9

But it may have big consequences for the world's oceans if my next guest's hunch turns out to be right.

0:49.4

John DeBerry is a professor in the School of Engineering at Stanford University.

0:56.0

Welcome back, Dr. DeBerry. Thanks for having me back.

0:58.0

Oh, giant ocean migration.

1:00.0

Take us into this underwater world.

1:03.0

Will you tell us about this migration?

1:05.0

Absolutely.

1:06.0

So right now somewhere on Earth, it's about sunset, and that means there's going to be

1:10.0

millions or even

1:10.9

billions of tiny organisms making their way up to the surface.

1:15.1

And they do this largely to feed, we think, but also to feed while avoiding predators

1:19.4

seeing them in action.

1:21.8

And as they make those large migrations over hundreds of meters in some cases, it turns

1:26.4

out that they're moving a lot of water with them.

1:28.7

And so in our research, we wanted to understand how that movement of water could potentially impact much larger scales than the tiny organisms themselves.

1:38.0

So you set up an experiment to model this, right?

...

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