Science of Pain and Phantom Limbs

The Naked Scientists Podcast

Dr Chris Smith

Natural Sciences, Science, Science Radio, Naked Scientists, Health & Fitness, Engineering, Medicine, Technology, Life Sciences

4.6 • 958 Ratings

🗓️ 4 February 2007

⏱️ 55 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The science of pain is our hot topic this week. David Julius reveals the molecular mechanisms of pain and what a chilli pepper has in common with a tarantula, Geoff Woods describes the genetic mutations that lead to people not feeling pain at all, and to explain the phenomenon of phantom limbs and ways in which we can deal with pain is pain consultant Cathy Stannard. In Kitchen Science Derek Thorne braves freezing weather to sniff out the science of sausages, and in the final part of our Science of Colour series, Anna Lacey discovers how colour could find you your perfect date. Like this podcast? Please help us by supporting the Naked Scientists

Transcript

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0:00.0	Stripping down science, the naked scientists.
0:07.0	Hello, welcome to this week's edition of the naked scientists with me, Chris Smith.
0:11.0	And also here this week, here's Phil Rosenberg. Hi Phil, hi Chris.
0:15.0	Now this week bird flu is on our doorstep but is the next pandemic hovering on the horizon.
0:19.2	We'll stay with us, we'll be discussing it shortly.
0:21.5	Also researchers have shown this week that road
0:23.7	traffic pollution can trigger heart disease and we'll be finding out why and also the
0:28.2	Hubble space telescopes on its last legs it's showing its age, find out why in a
0:31.9	couple of minutes time.
0:33.0	Phil.
0:34.0	Also this week we're exploring the world of pain with Cambridge University Jeff Woods who's
0:37.7	found a group of people who can't feel anything painful whatsoever.
0:41.0	Apparently they're very good at fire walking so look forward to that.
0:44.7	We'll also be hearing about phantom pain. Now this is where people who've lost limbs can actually
0:48.9	still feel the pain from their missing body part and pain specialist Kathy Stanard will be joining us
0:53.4	later to talk about that. Also we have David Julius from the University of
0:57.5	California San Francisco and he's going to explain what tarantulas have in
1:01.1	common with chili plants and why curryiby makes your mouth feel hot and
1:04.4	why mince make your mouth feel cold.
1:07.0	And if you're in the mood to win some stuff, then up for grabs this week is a copy of my new book.
1:11.3	It's called Naked Science and it's full of the fun, funky and intriguing
1:15.9	science discoveries that we talk about generally here on the naked scientist. I'm giving a copy
	...

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