March 6, 2025 • 24 mins
It’s the home stretch! Buckle up for ideas 8 through 5, which include some magical molecules, a sea creature that helped reinvent plywood, a medical treatment with terrifying origins, and a discovery that practically upended the world of classical music.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope
and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Guess what Mango?
Speaker 1 (00:13):
What's that will?
Speaker 2 (00:14):
It's day four of our countdown of the twenty five
greatest science ideas from the past twenty five years. Can
you believe it? Just a few short days ago it
was day one of our twenty five greatest science ideas
in the past twenty five years.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
I'm pretty sure you know you're doing something right when
you've got four sequels. What do you mean by that, Well,
George Lucas stars Star Wars basically with the fourth film, right.
Henry the fourth was such an interesting king that Shakespeare
wrote a play about him. But you didn't even bother
with Henry the Third, No not worthy and Rush Hour
four was so good at made Toy Story two seem
like Spider Man three.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
I'm pretty sure you're just saying things now.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Yeah, you're right, but maybe you should just get into
the episode. Today we are covering ideas eight through five,
and if you want to know what makes us try
to various sounds so good, how a HeLa monster is
helping the world, and why a single injection might help
paralyze people walk again. You're gonna love this one. Let's
dive in.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm
Will Pearson, and of course I'm here with my friend
Mangesh hot Ticketter and over there in the booth gazing
wistfully at a portrait of David Dukovney. I don't know
where he got this thing, but it's a it's an
interesting portrait. It's our PALIN producer, Dylan Fagan. I mean,
I can't tell if this has anything to do with
today's episode.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
They just like slax Files apparently.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
Oh okay, well enjoy that, Dylan.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
But speaking of fun, you your podcast listening life will
be a lot more fun if you're subscribed to Part
Time Genius on whatever app you use. And you can
make sure our lives are more fun by leaving us
a nice review.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
We really appreciate everyone who takes the time to do that.
But all right, well let's get back to the countdown.
So one day in the early two thousands, a man
named Kai Ching Lee was strolling down in Oregon beach right,
and Lee is an engineering professor at Oregon State University,
and he was just enjoying his walk washing the Pacific Ocean,
(02:31):
just waves roll in and now, and suddenly he noticed
something along the coast. There were hundreds of muscles clinging
to rocks, and Lee was impressed with their strength. No
matter how violent the waves were, no matter how strong
the pull of the tide was, the muscles just stayed
in place there and when you actually tried pulling one away,
it wouldn't budge. And that got Lee thinking about plywood.
(02:55):
M had he also been to an Ikea recently that
might have.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
I mean, maybe I don't know, but I do know
that plywood is everywhere, not just furniture and cabinets, but
also walls, boats, fencing, toys, and for good reason. Like
plywood is super affordable because instead of a single solid
chunk of wood, it's made from thin layers glued together
into a slab. But it turns out the glue that
holds the plywood together is really kind of nasty. It's
(03:21):
often made with formaldehyde and other chemicals that you don't
want to breathe in, and in fact, there's research suggesting
that people who work in plywood manufacturing plants are at
increased risk of developing leukemia and other cancers. And that's
what Kaiching. Lee was thinking about that day on the beach,
how to make a better, safer plywood glue.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
And if muscles can stick themselves to rocks, maybe they
could stick wood together too.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Yeah, so muscles. Natural adhesive has two big advantages over
traditional plywood glues. First of all, it's non toxic, and secondly,
it's waterproof. So if you've ever gotten plywood furniture wet,
you know what a pain it can be because if
the water isn't dried quickly, the wood layers can start peeling.
This is a known problem with industrial adhesives, like many
of them lose their stickiness in the presence of water,
(04:05):
but not muscle glue.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Right, but how do you get glue out of a muscle?
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Yeah, it's a good question. So Lee realized right away
that would be difficult and expensive, not to mention unpleasant
for the muscles. But he headed to his lab to
see if he could cook up a synthetic version of
the muscle glue, and one day, while he was eating
his lunch, he had another light bulb moment. He realized, soybeans,
I love how this daily life was just handing him
(04:31):
the scientific answers that he needed. I know, it's just
inspiration is everywhere anyway. People have been making adhesis from
soy for decades. The problem is, soy based glues tend
to be weak and they're not waterproof. But Lee knew
that soybean, flower and muscle glue were made from similar
makeup of proteins and amino acids, and he wondered, what
(04:52):
if I altered the chemical profile of soybean glue to
make it more like the kind made by muscles. So,
with the help of a grant from the US, Lee
started tinkering with soy's chemical makeup, and by modifying the
amino acids in the bean, he successfully created an adhesive
that was just his waterproof and just as strong as
the glue made by muscles. In fact, the soybean based
(05:14):
glue was twice as sticky as hot glue, three times
stronger than Elmer's glue, and had about the same adhesive
power as contact cement.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
And has this revolutionized the plywood industry or what? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (05:25):
So it's definitely changed things. Like Lee presented his discovery
to Columbia Forest Products. They're a major plywood manufacturer, and
they quickly signed on. So fast forward to today, the
company has converted all of its factories from formaldehyde glues
to soy, and pollution rates that some of these plants
have dropped by as much as ninety percent. Wow, isn't
(05:46):
that insane? And other companies have joined them too, so
today soy based plywood is an option at most hardware
and home improvement stores. Other big companies like Ikea and
General Motors now use soy for some of their plywood
products because it's safer, stronger, and better for the planet. Anyway,
in honor of Lee's incredible discovery that changed home DIY forever,
(06:07):
we're running a contest on Instagram today. We're giving away
a home Depot. Gifts are to the get, and our
lawyers want to make it very very clear that this
is no way sponsored by Home Depot. But head over
to Instagram at part time Genius to get all the
details in enter.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
All right, So I'd like to dedicate this next one
to all the violinists who have dreamed of owning a
Stratavius violin but can't stomach the instruments two million dollar
price tag. They're just not that serious about it, magat
they don't want to spend the two million, so here
we Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
I would love to know how many professional violinists listen
to the show. But two million dollars is obviously a
steep price tag for a three hundred year old violin
that you're probably too scared to play anyway.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Indeed, but thanks to research from Swiss arborist Franz Schwartz,
there's now a cheaper alternative. And while the new instruments
don't carry the distinction of having been crafted by Italy's
most revered violin maker, they do boast a tone quality
that many experts consider to be just as good and
in some cases may be better, a claim that might
seem stunning enough, but the real shock is who's responsible
(07:13):
for the superior sound? Are you ready for this?
Speaker 1 (07:16):
It's fungus like Geseppe fungus, the famous Italian violin maker. Nope, nope,
actual fungus that infested the wood used to make the instruments.
It is totally bizarre because in most cases, a fungal
attack destroys wood cell walls and it results in this
kind of loose soft wood that doesn't sound very pleasant
if it's made into an instrument. But at Schwartz discovered
(07:37):
in the late two thousands. There are rare cases where
fungal infections have a milder effect on the wood's density
and actually make it sound better. So what happens is
they thin out the wood cells structure just enough to
improve its acoustic properties. And so how did he figure
this out? Exactly? Like do arboris just go around knocking
on trees to see what sounds they make?
Speaker 2 (07:58):
I'm sure that's not how they describe, but it is
kind of like that. Scientists really do bounce sound waves
off of trees to gauge their health. The funkier the echo,
the more widespread the wood rot. And so Franz Schwartz
was using this method himself when he hatched the idea
for his fungal violin. He wondered how gentler kinds of
fungus might affect the sound of a wooden instrument, so
(08:20):
he partnered with Swiss violin maker Michael Ronheimer to find out.
They selected two different species of wood eating fungi for
the job. And while I won't bother to pronounce their
scientific names, I can tell you their nicknames their Rusty
crust and dead mule's fingers. So those are both.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Pretty good I'm not sure which is grosser, but I
think i'd go with rusty crust.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
That is the right answer. But anyway, the top plate
of the violin, which was made of spruce, was inoculated
with rusty crust, and on the bottom, the sycamore plate
was treated with dead mule's fingers. Both plates were submerged
in a box of water to stimulate the fungui's growth,
and a few months later, after killing off the spores,
(09:01):
Ronheimer put the two halves together to create the world's
first bio violin. So Schwartz was blown away by the
instrument's sound, which he described as warmer and rounder than
that of a conventional violin, and he was so pleased
with it that he decided to stage a blind sound
test at an annual forestry conference in Germany, so on
September first, two thousand and nine a jury of acoustics
(09:24):
experts and conference attendees. They listened carefully as British violinist
Matthew Trussler played five different instruments from behind the curtain.
Four of the violins were made by Ronheimer, two of
them with fungus treated wood and the other two with
untreated wood. From the same trees, but the fifth instrument
came from Trustler's own collection, a violin made by Antonio
(09:47):
Strativeris himself way back in seventeen eleven.
Speaker 1 (09:51):
So I guess the goal was to identify which one
was the true strat in the mix.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
That's exactly right. So attendees were asked to rank the
sound of each instrument they heard and to guess which
one of them was over three hundred years old. Schwartz
later admitted that as good as they sounded, he never
expected one of the fungal violins to be confused for
a multi million dollar instrument. But in the end, that
is exactly what happened. Out of more than one hundred
and eighty attendees, one hundred and thirteen of them thought
(10:20):
that one of Ronheimer's violins, which had been covered with
fung gui for nine months, was produced by stratuv Areas.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
So it wasn't It wasn't even close.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
No, I mean, the real strat came in a distant second,
but the other fungus violin claiming third place, and the
two untreated instruments pulling up the rear so like it
really does show the difference that it made I mean.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
I get that, like a fungus could change the wood
and the sound of a violin, but like, why are
they comparable to stratavarius.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
It's a good question, and honestly, no one can really
say for sure why is violin sound as good as
they do. The best guess is that it's due to
the weather in Italy during his lifetime, so strata areas
happened to live through what people knew as central yuar
rops little ice age. This happened in the seventeenth century,
and it brought long winters and cool summers to the region.
So the unusually chilly temperatures would have slowed the cell
(11:10):
growth of the local trees there, causing their wood to
develop more slowly and uniformly, which was the perfect recipe
for producing wood with stellar acoustics. So, according to Schwartz,
the fungi treatment he used was able to recreate that
same ideal structure.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
That's really cool. But if a fungus violin produces a
richer sound, why don't they do that for all violins now?
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Well, partly because not every violin needs the same tonal
quality as the strativarius. Like it's nice to have different options,
but the main reason is that Schwartz and his colleagues
are still working out the details on how you'd actually
mass produce these. Once they do, the plan is to
sell the instruments for about thirty thousand dollars each, which
sounds like a lot, but it's actually about what you'd
pay for other high quality violins.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
And a lot less than two million dollars.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Definitely, you're good at math.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
We've got a pause for a quick break, but we'll
be back more great science ideas right after. Welcome back
(12:18):
to part time genius listeners, and we are counting down
to number Okay, So I'm not going to beat around
the bush on this one. This research totally blew my mind.
So scientists and Northwestern University have developed a new treatment
for spinal cord injuries that allowed paralyzed mice to walk
again after a single injection. Not only that, the treatment
(12:42):
has loads of other applications, potentially impacting the way we
treat everything from bone loss to neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
I can't I've never heard of this. I mean, it
sounds like a real life cure. All yeah, I mean,
it's still early days. From the research perspective, the team's
big breakthrough was only back in twenty twenty one, but
so far the data is really incredible and promising. So
just to give a little background on why this is
such a big deal, They're currently about three hundred thousand
people living with a spinal cord injury in the US alone,
(13:12):
and in the most severe cases, less than three percent
of them will ever recover any basic physical functions. The
reason for that is that the neurons and their spinal
cords have been completely severed, and thus far as scientists
haven't been able to find therapeutics that can successfully trigger
spinal cord regeneration. But that changed with the study from
Northwestern University. So researchers were able to reverse paralysis and
(13:36):
mice by injecting them with something they called dancing molecules.
I've actually never heard of that either, so I'm curious
that are the molecules themselves dancing or is it that
they can restore the mouse's ability to dance? What are
we referring to?
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Yeah, so no word on whether the mice can dance
before or after the treatment, but the molecules that were
injected absolutely can dance. So after being injected as a liquid,
the molecules coalesced to form tiny synthetic nanofibers that surround
the spinal cord. And the fibers were composed of tens
of hundreds of thousands of molecules, and the researchers found
(14:11):
that by changing their chemical structure, they could control the
molecule's collective motion. This allowed them to fine tune the
synthetic molecules movements, speeding them up to match the motion
of biological molecules within the spinal cord. It turned out
that the most hyperactive molecules, the ones that were dancing
the most, were able to connect more effectively with receptors
in neurons and other cells.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
So once the molecules made that connection, they were able
to like tell the cells to repair the damage neurons.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Yeah, So the dancing molecules triggered to bioactive signals. The
first prompted the tails of the neurons to regenerate and
that effectively restored communication between the body and the brain,
and the second signal promoted the regrowth of lost blood
cells that feed the neurons and other cells related to
tissue repair, and the result of this intervention was that
(15:00):
after just four weeks, these paralyzed mice could regain the
ability to walk, which is just stunning.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Yeah, and it's also kind of a testament to the
power of dance if you think about it, because it
sounds like the approach didn't work so well when they
tried it with more sluggish molecules.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
Yeah, that souped up molecular motion really was the key
factor in all of this. The cells and receptors within
the body are constantly moving, so once the team was
able to match that speed or vibration, the fast moving
molecules encountered the receptors much more often, and that allowed
them to send their signals again and again. The breakthrough
therapy actually has obvious implications for improving the spinal injuries
(15:37):
of both humans and animals, but there's reasons to hope
that the underlying discovery could also be used in other treatments,
as we allude to before. According to the studies, lead
researchers Samuel Stupp quote, the central nervous system tissues we
have successfully regenerated in the injured spinal cord are similar
to those in the brain affected by stroke and neurodegenerative
(15:58):
diseases such as als, Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. Beyond that, our
fundamental discovery about controlling the motion of molecular assemblies to
enhance cells signaling could be applied universally across biomedical targets.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Okay, so they're thinking they could fine tune molecules to
match the motion of other damage cells, not just the
ones in the spinal cord exactly.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
And the most amazing part is they've already done it.
So just last year, the team from Northwestern applied their
strategy to damaged human cartilage cells and they found some success. Now,
normally there's no way for humans to regenerate the tissues
in our joints once we reach adulthood. So if you
have a disease in which cartilage breaks down over time,
you eventually get to a point where the bone is
(16:41):
grinding against the bone with no cushion between them. And
currently the only treatment for this is joint replacement surgery,
which is extremely invasive and also very expensive. But once again,
the team here has found a much better solution. So
using their injectable therapy, they were able to spur cartilage
regeneration and damaged cells within just a matter of days,
(17:03):
and once again it was the molecules dancing that triggered
the process. So building on that second success, the team's
next goal is to test the therapy's effectiveness at regenerating
bone and from there the sky's limit because, as Stuff explained, quote,
now we have observed the effects in two cell types
that are completely disconnected from one another, cartilage cells in
(17:24):
our joints and neurons in our brain and spinal cord.
This makes me more confident that we might have discovered
a universal phenomena and it could be applied to many
other tissues.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
That really is amazing. So what's the status of the
spinal cord repair?
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Like?
Speaker 2 (17:36):
Have they been able to test this in humans yet?
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Fortunately not. The team's been petitioning the FDA for approval
to start clinical trials, but so far it's yet to
be granted.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
Well, I hope it does come through sooner rather than later,
and it sounds like something that could seriously change people's
lives and of course the lives of mice as well.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Yeah, we'll have them all dancing again soon.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Well, our next breakthrough is a reminder that medical advances
can truly come from anywhere, even from inside the mouth
of a venomous lizard. Now we know this for a
fact thanks to the work of doctor John Aang. He's
an endocrinologist and VA researcher who found a way to
stimulate the insulin producing cells in the pancreas using a
hormone found in wait for it, the saliva of a
(18:18):
HeLa monster.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
I feel like there's no way to make that not
sound crazy.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
Yeah, Well, just to be clear, helo monsters are not,
in fact, spased monsters or aliens. They're big, desert dwelling
lizards native to the southwestern United States. They can grow
to be about twenty inches in length and are easy
to recognize thanks to their splotchy orange and black coloring. No,
it's rare to see one in person, though, since they
spend about ninety percent of their lives underground and only
(18:44):
come to the surface when it's time to eat.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
I mean, if you dc one, you should probably clear away,
right because they're pretty venomous.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
Well, you really don't want to mess with one of
these guys. They have a pretty powerful bite, and because
their main defense is to pump you full of venom,
they tend to hang on to whatever they chomp on
for as long as possible, and the venom glends are
inside their mouths obviously, right yeah, and they're they're lower jaws,
I think. So the longer a helo monster clamps down,
the more venom is injected through their teeth and into
(19:13):
the bite wound. It was unfortunate enough to have been bitten,
say the venom stings like molten lava, So these people
have not only been bitten, but they also have experienced
molten lava. Apparently are unlucky to keep rough, but for
people with type two diabetes, it actually can be a
life saver.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
Which is wild. So how did doctor Ang even think
to try this? Like, like, why was messing around with
helo monster spit like the first thing you was thinking about?
Speaker 2 (19:42):
I actually wondered that too. But keep in mind that
medications derived from animal venom aren't that unusual. Sure, the
venom of snakes, scorpion, spiders, even the world's only other
venomous lizard, the komodo dragon. They've all contributed to different
treatments over the years, and some of the existing research
is what convinced doctor Ng that helo monsters might be
helpful for treating diabetes. So let's go back to the
(20:04):
nineteen eighties, when doctor Ng was practicing as a physician
and a researcher at the VA Hospital in the Bronx.
He was working to discover new animal hormones with medical potential,
and since he was an endocrinologist, he was especially interested
in ones that might treat diabetes. This eventually led him
to an article from the National Institutes of Health about
the effects of certain snake and lizard venoms on the pancreas.
(20:27):
Studies showed that some venoms, including that of the Helo monster,
could trigger inflammation in the pancreas where insulin is produced. Now,
this convinced doctor Ing that the HeLa monster venom was
worth a closer look, and so in nineteen ninety two
he discovered a new hormone in the animals, salivam, which
he called extendin four Now. When he tested the compound
on mice, he was shocked to find that it reduced
(20:49):
their blood glucose levels by stimulating the insulin producing cells
in the pancreas. In fact, it worked very similarly to
the GLP one hormone found in the digestive tract of humans,
with one other important difference. Extending four degraded in the
body much slower, so for reference, a diabetic would have
to inject GLP one every hour to keep an effective
(21:10):
amount of insulin in the bloodstream, but extending four would
only need to be injected once a day, which obviously
sounds like a game changer. It absolutely was, but unfortunately
it took quite a while for doctor Ang's discovery to
get the attention it deserved. Although the VA had funded
his initial research, it showed very little interest in his findings,
and neither did big pharmam. Injecting diabetics with proteins from
(21:33):
lizard venom was just kind of deemed too weird for
mainstream medicine, so doctor Ang's research wound up languishing for
years until this small biotech startup with a focus on
diabetes finally took notice. So the resulting drug, exenotide, was
approved by the FDA in two thousand and five, and
it's now used by millions of diabetic patients worldwide.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
I do love that these like venomous lizard creatures are
you know, these things that like everyone is afraid of,
are responsible for saving humans lives.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Yeah, and they don't even know it the lizards or
the people.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Yeah, also, the lizards might not be too happy about it.
I read that HeLa monster numbers are way down in
recent years because we keep destroying their habitats, and if
we aren't careful, we might lose those little guys completely.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Which would be a huge loss, even from a self
serving perspective. I mean, if they prove this to be
useful and humans wants, who's to say other medical secrets
might be hiding in there.
Speaker 1 (22:29):
I also think it's kind of a branding problem, Like
if we renamed them helaqds instead of Heala monsters, I
feel like they'd have more of a chance.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
I think that's a great idea. Maybe we should push
for that.
Speaker 1 (22:40):
Anyway, that's it for today's episode. Be sure to tune
in tomorrow for our big, big finale, where we'll be
counting down to the number one greatest science idea of
the past twenty five years. And don't forget to check
out our Instagram at part Time Genius. For today's contests,
you could win a home Depot gift certificate, which again
is very much not sponsored by Home Depot, but from
(23:02):
Gabe Dylan, Mary Will Lucas Riley and myself. Thank you
so much for listening. Part Time Genius is a production
(23:23):
of Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio. This show is hosted by Will
Pearson and me Mongais Chatikler and research by our good
pal Mary Philip Sandy. Today's episode was engineered and produced
by the wonderful Dylan Fagan with support from Tyler Klang.
The show is executive produced for iHeart by Katrina Norvel
and Ali Perry, with social media support from Sasha Gay,
(23:46):
Trustee Dara Potts and Viney Shorey. For more podcasts from
Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows. The
You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope
and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Guess what Mango?
Speaker 1 (00:13):
What's that will?
Speaker 2 (00:14):
It's day four of our countdown of the twenty five
greatest science ideas from the past twenty five years. Can
you believe it? Just a few short days ago it
was day one of our twenty five greatest science ideas
in the past twenty five years.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
I'm pretty sure you know you're doing something right when
you've got four sequels. What do you mean by that, Well,
George Lucas stars Star Wars basically with the fourth film, right.
Henry the fourth was such an interesting king that Shakespeare
wrote a play about him. But you didn't even bother
with Henry the Third, No not worthy and Rush Hour
four was so good at made Toy Story two seem
like Spider Man three.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
I'm pretty sure you're just saying things now.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Yeah, you're right, but maybe you should just get into
the episode. Today we are covering ideas eight through five,
and if you want to know what makes us try
to various sounds so good, how a HeLa monster is
helping the world, and why a single injection might help
paralyze people walk again. You're gonna love this one. Let's
dive in.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm
Will Pearson, and of course I'm here with my friend
Mangesh hot Ticketter and over there in the booth gazing
wistfully at a portrait of David Dukovney. I don't know
where he got this thing, but it's a it's an
interesting portrait. It's our PALIN producer, Dylan Fagan. I mean,
I can't tell if this has anything to do with
today's episode.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
They just like slax Files apparently.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
Oh okay, well enjoy that, Dylan.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
But speaking of fun, you your podcast listening life will
be a lot more fun if you're subscribed to Part
Time Genius on whatever app you use. And you can
make sure our lives are more fun by leaving us
a nice review.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
We really appreciate everyone who takes the time to do that.
But all right, well let's get back to the countdown.
So one day in the early two thousands, a man
named Kai Ching Lee was strolling down in Oregon beach right,
and Lee is an engineering professor at Oregon State University,
and he was just enjoying his walk washing the Pacific Ocean,
(02:31):
just waves roll in and now, and suddenly he noticed
something along the coast. There were hundreds of muscles clinging
to rocks, and Lee was impressed with their strength. No
matter how violent the waves were, no matter how strong
the pull of the tide was, the muscles just stayed
in place there and when you actually tried pulling one away,
it wouldn't budge. And that got Lee thinking about plywood.
(02:55):
M had he also been to an Ikea recently that
might have.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
I mean, maybe I don't know, but I do know
that plywood is everywhere, not just furniture and cabinets, but
also walls, boats, fencing, toys, and for good reason. Like
plywood is super affordable because instead of a single solid
chunk of wood, it's made from thin layers glued together
into a slab. But it turns out the glue that
holds the plywood together is really kind of nasty. It's
(03:21):
often made with formaldehyde and other chemicals that you don't
want to breathe in, and in fact, there's research suggesting
that people who work in plywood manufacturing plants are at
increased risk of developing leukemia and other cancers. And that's
what Kaiching. Lee was thinking about that day on the beach,
how to make a better, safer plywood glue.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
And if muscles can stick themselves to rocks, maybe they
could stick wood together too.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Yeah, so muscles. Natural adhesive has two big advantages over
traditional plywood glues. First of all, it's non toxic, and secondly,
it's waterproof. So if you've ever gotten plywood furniture wet,
you know what a pain it can be because if
the water isn't dried quickly, the wood layers can start peeling.
This is a known problem with industrial adhesives, like many
of them lose their stickiness in the presence of water,
(04:05):
but not muscle glue.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Right, but how do you get glue out of a muscle?
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Yeah, it's a good question. So Lee realized right away
that would be difficult and expensive, not to mention unpleasant
for the muscles. But he headed to his lab to
see if he could cook up a synthetic version of
the muscle glue, and one day, while he was eating
his lunch, he had another light bulb moment. He realized, soybeans,
I love how this daily life was just handing him
(04:31):
the scientific answers that he needed. I know, it's just
inspiration is everywhere anyway. People have been making adhesis from
soy for decades. The problem is, soy based glues tend
to be weak and they're not waterproof. But Lee knew
that soybean, flower and muscle glue were made from similar
makeup of proteins and amino acids, and he wondered, what
(04:52):
if I altered the chemical profile of soybean glue to
make it more like the kind made by muscles. So,
with the help of a grant from the US, Lee
started tinkering with soy's chemical makeup, and by modifying the
amino acids in the bean, he successfully created an adhesive
that was just his waterproof and just as strong as
the glue made by muscles. In fact, the soybean based
(05:14):
glue was twice as sticky as hot glue, three times
stronger than Elmer's glue, and had about the same adhesive
power as contact cement.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
And has this revolutionized the plywood industry or what? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (05:25):
So it's definitely changed things. Like Lee presented his discovery
to Columbia Forest Products. They're a major plywood manufacturer, and
they quickly signed on. So fast forward to today, the
company has converted all of its factories from formaldehyde glues
to soy, and pollution rates that some of these plants
have dropped by as much as ninety percent. Wow, isn't
(05:46):
that insane? And other companies have joined them too, so
today soy based plywood is an option at most hardware
and home improvement stores. Other big companies like Ikea and
General Motors now use soy for some of their plywood
products because it's safer, stronger, and better for the planet. Anyway,
in honor of Lee's incredible discovery that changed home DIY forever,
(06:07):
we're running a contest on Instagram today. We're giving away
a home Depot. Gifts are to the get, and our
lawyers want to make it very very clear that this
is no way sponsored by Home Depot. But head over
to Instagram at part time Genius to get all the
details in enter.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
All right, So I'd like to dedicate this next one
to all the violinists who have dreamed of owning a
Stratavius violin but can't stomach the instruments two million dollar
price tag. They're just not that serious about it, magat
they don't want to spend the two million, so here
we Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
I would love to know how many professional violinists listen
to the show. But two million dollars is obviously a
steep price tag for a three hundred year old violin
that you're probably too scared to play anyway.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Indeed, but thanks to research from Swiss arborist Franz Schwartz,
there's now a cheaper alternative. And while the new instruments
don't carry the distinction of having been crafted by Italy's
most revered violin maker, they do boast a tone quality
that many experts consider to be just as good and
in some cases may be better, a claim that might
seem stunning enough, but the real shock is who's responsible
(07:13):
for the superior sound? Are you ready for this?
Speaker 1 (07:16):
It's fungus like Geseppe fungus, the famous Italian violin maker. Nope, nope,
actual fungus that infested the wood used to make the instruments.
It is totally bizarre because in most cases, a fungal
attack destroys wood cell walls and it results in this
kind of loose soft wood that doesn't sound very pleasant
if it's made into an instrument. But at Schwartz discovered
(07:37):
in the late two thousands. There are rare cases where
fungal infections have a milder effect on the wood's density
and actually make it sound better. So what happens is
they thin out the wood cells structure just enough to
improve its acoustic properties. And so how did he figure
this out? Exactly? Like do arboris just go around knocking
on trees to see what sounds they make?
Speaker 2 (07:58):
I'm sure that's not how they describe, but it is
kind of like that. Scientists really do bounce sound waves
off of trees to gauge their health. The funkier the echo,
the more widespread the wood rot. And so Franz Schwartz
was using this method himself when he hatched the idea
for his fungal violin. He wondered how gentler kinds of
fungus might affect the sound of a wooden instrument, so
(08:20):
he partnered with Swiss violin maker Michael Ronheimer to find out.
They selected two different species of wood eating fungi for
the job. And while I won't bother to pronounce their
scientific names, I can tell you their nicknames their Rusty
crust and dead mule's fingers. So those are both.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Pretty good I'm not sure which is grosser, but I
think i'd go with rusty crust.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
That is the right answer. But anyway, the top plate
of the violin, which was made of spruce, was inoculated
with rusty crust, and on the bottom, the sycamore plate
was treated with dead mule's fingers. Both plates were submerged
in a box of water to stimulate the fungui's growth,
and a few months later, after killing off the spores,
(09:01):
Ronheimer put the two halves together to create the world's
first bio violin. So Schwartz was blown away by the
instrument's sound, which he described as warmer and rounder than
that of a conventional violin, and he was so pleased
with it that he decided to stage a blind sound
test at an annual forestry conference in Germany, so on
September first, two thousand and nine a jury of acoustics
(09:24):
experts and conference attendees. They listened carefully as British violinist
Matthew Trussler played five different instruments from behind the curtain.
Four of the violins were made by Ronheimer, two of
them with fungus treated wood and the other two with
untreated wood. From the same trees, but the fifth instrument
came from Trustler's own collection, a violin made by Antonio
(09:47):
Strativeris himself way back in seventeen eleven.
Speaker 1 (09:51):
So I guess the goal was to identify which one
was the true strat in the mix.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
That's exactly right. So attendees were asked to rank the
sound of each instrument they heard and to guess which
one of them was over three hundred years old. Schwartz
later admitted that as good as they sounded, he never
expected one of the fungal violins to be confused for
a multi million dollar instrument. But in the end, that
is exactly what happened. Out of more than one hundred
and eighty attendees, one hundred and thirteen of them thought
(10:20):
that one of Ronheimer's violins, which had been covered with
fung gui for nine months, was produced by stratuv Areas.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
So it wasn't It wasn't even close.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
No, I mean, the real strat came in a distant second,
but the other fungus violin claiming third place, and the
two untreated instruments pulling up the rear so like it
really does show the difference that it made I mean.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
I get that, like a fungus could change the wood
and the sound of a violin, but like, why are
they comparable to stratavarius.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
It's a good question, and honestly, no one can really
say for sure why is violin sound as good as
they do. The best guess is that it's due to
the weather in Italy during his lifetime, so strata areas
happened to live through what people knew as central yuar
rops little ice age. This happened in the seventeenth century,
and it brought long winters and cool summers to the region.
So the unusually chilly temperatures would have slowed the cell
(11:10):
growth of the local trees there, causing their wood to
develop more slowly and uniformly, which was the perfect recipe
for producing wood with stellar acoustics. So, according to Schwartz,
the fungi treatment he used was able to recreate that
same ideal structure.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
That's really cool. But if a fungus violin produces a
richer sound, why don't they do that for all violins now?
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Well, partly because not every violin needs the same tonal
quality as the strativarius. Like it's nice to have different options,
but the main reason is that Schwartz and his colleagues
are still working out the details on how you'd actually
mass produce these. Once they do, the plan is to
sell the instruments for about thirty thousand dollars each, which
sounds like a lot, but it's actually about what you'd
pay for other high quality violins.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
And a lot less than two million dollars.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Definitely, you're good at math.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
We've got a pause for a quick break, but we'll
be back more great science ideas right after. Welcome back
(12:18):
to part time genius listeners, and we are counting down
to number Okay, So I'm not going to beat around
the bush on this one. This research totally blew my mind.
So scientists and Northwestern University have developed a new treatment
for spinal cord injuries that allowed paralyzed mice to walk
again after a single injection. Not only that, the treatment
(12:42):
has loads of other applications, potentially impacting the way we
treat everything from bone loss to neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
I can't I've never heard of this. I mean, it
sounds like a real life cure. All yeah, I mean,
it's still early days. From the research perspective, the team's
big breakthrough was only back in twenty twenty one, but
so far the data is really incredible and promising. So
just to give a little background on why this is
such a big deal, They're currently about three hundred thousand
people living with a spinal cord injury in the US alone,
(13:12):
and in the most severe cases, less than three percent
of them will ever recover any basic physical functions. The
reason for that is that the neurons and their spinal
cords have been completely severed, and thus far as scientists
haven't been able to find therapeutics that can successfully trigger
spinal cord regeneration. But that changed with the study from
Northwestern University. So researchers were able to reverse paralysis and
(13:36):
mice by injecting them with something they called dancing molecules.
I've actually never heard of that either, so I'm curious
that are the molecules themselves dancing or is it that
they can restore the mouse's ability to dance? What are
we referring to?
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Yeah, so no word on whether the mice can dance
before or after the treatment, but the molecules that were
injected absolutely can dance. So after being injected as a liquid,
the molecules coalesced to form tiny synthetic nanofibers that surround
the spinal cord. And the fibers were composed of tens
of hundreds of thousands of molecules, and the researchers found
(14:11):
that by changing their chemical structure, they could control the
molecule's collective motion. This allowed them to fine tune the
synthetic molecules movements, speeding them up to match the motion
of biological molecules within the spinal cord. It turned out
that the most hyperactive molecules, the ones that were dancing
the most, were able to connect more effectively with receptors
in neurons and other cells.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
So once the molecules made that connection, they were able
to like tell the cells to repair the damage neurons.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Yeah, So the dancing molecules triggered to bioactive signals. The
first prompted the tails of the neurons to regenerate and
that effectively restored communication between the body and the brain,
and the second signal promoted the regrowth of lost blood
cells that feed the neurons and other cells related to
tissue repair, and the result of this intervention was that
(15:00):
after just four weeks, these paralyzed mice could regain the
ability to walk, which is just stunning.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Yeah, and it's also kind of a testament to the
power of dance if you think about it, because it
sounds like the approach didn't work so well when they
tried it with more sluggish molecules.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
Yeah, that souped up molecular motion really was the key
factor in all of this. The cells and receptors within
the body are constantly moving, so once the team was
able to match that speed or vibration, the fast moving
molecules encountered the receptors much more often, and that allowed
them to send their signals again and again. The breakthrough
therapy actually has obvious implications for improving the spinal injuries
(15:37):
of both humans and animals, but there's reasons to hope
that the underlying discovery could also be used in other treatments,
as we allude to before. According to the studies, lead
researchers Samuel Stupp quote, the central nervous system tissues we
have successfully regenerated in the injured spinal cord are similar
to those in the brain affected by stroke and neurodegenerative
(15:58):
diseases such as als, Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. Beyond that, our
fundamental discovery about controlling the motion of molecular assemblies to
enhance cells signaling could be applied universally across biomedical targets.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Okay, so they're thinking they could fine tune molecules to
match the motion of other damage cells, not just the
ones in the spinal cord exactly.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
And the most amazing part is they've already done it.
So just last year, the team from Northwestern applied their
strategy to damaged human cartilage cells and they found some success. Now,
normally there's no way for humans to regenerate the tissues
in our joints once we reach adulthood. So if you
have a disease in which cartilage breaks down over time,
you eventually get to a point where the bone is
(16:41):
grinding against the bone with no cushion between them. And
currently the only treatment for this is joint replacement surgery,
which is extremely invasive and also very expensive. But once again,
the team here has found a much better solution. So
using their injectable therapy, they were able to spur cartilage
regeneration and damaged cells within just a matter of days,
(17:03):
and once again it was the molecules dancing that triggered
the process. So building on that second success, the team's
next goal is to test the therapy's effectiveness at regenerating
bone and from there the sky's limit because, as Stuff explained, quote,
now we have observed the effects in two cell types
that are completely disconnected from one another, cartilage cells in
(17:24):
our joints and neurons in our brain and spinal cord.
This makes me more confident that we might have discovered
a universal phenomena and it could be applied to many
other tissues.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
That really is amazing. So what's the status of the
spinal cord repair?
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Like?
Speaker 2 (17:36):
Have they been able to test this in humans yet?
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Fortunately not. The team's been petitioning the FDA for approval
to start clinical trials, but so far it's yet to
be granted.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
Well, I hope it does come through sooner rather than later,
and it sounds like something that could seriously change people's
lives and of course the lives of mice as well.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Yeah, we'll have them all dancing again soon.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Well, our next breakthrough is a reminder that medical advances
can truly come from anywhere, even from inside the mouth
of a venomous lizard. Now we know this for a
fact thanks to the work of doctor John Aang. He's
an endocrinologist and VA researcher who found a way to
stimulate the insulin producing cells in the pancreas using a
hormone found in wait for it, the saliva of a
(18:18):
HeLa monster.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
I feel like there's no way to make that not
sound crazy.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
Yeah, Well, just to be clear, helo monsters are not,
in fact, spased monsters or aliens. They're big, desert dwelling
lizards native to the southwestern United States. They can grow
to be about twenty inches in length and are easy
to recognize thanks to their splotchy orange and black coloring. No,
it's rare to see one in person, though, since they
spend about ninety percent of their lives underground and only
(18:44):
come to the surface when it's time to eat.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
I mean, if you dc one, you should probably clear away,
right because they're pretty venomous.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
Well, you really don't want to mess with one of
these guys. They have a pretty powerful bite, and because
their main defense is to pump you full of venom,
they tend to hang on to whatever they chomp on
for as long as possible, and the venom glends are
inside their mouths obviously, right yeah, and they're they're lower jaws,
I think. So the longer a helo monster clamps down,
the more venom is injected through their teeth and into
(19:13):
the bite wound. It was unfortunate enough to have been bitten,
say the venom stings like molten lava, So these people
have not only been bitten, but they also have experienced
molten lava. Apparently are unlucky to keep rough, but for
people with type two diabetes, it actually can be a
life saver.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
Which is wild. So how did doctor Ang even think
to try this? Like, like, why was messing around with
helo monster spit like the first thing you was thinking about?
Speaker 2 (19:42):
I actually wondered that too. But keep in mind that
medications derived from animal venom aren't that unusual. Sure, the
venom of snakes, scorpion, spiders, even the world's only other
venomous lizard, the komodo dragon. They've all contributed to different
treatments over the years, and some of the existing research
is what convinced doctor Ng that helo monsters might be
helpful for treating diabetes. So let's go back to the
(20:04):
nineteen eighties, when doctor Ng was practicing as a physician
and a researcher at the VA Hospital in the Bronx.
He was working to discover new animal hormones with medical potential,
and since he was an endocrinologist, he was especially interested
in ones that might treat diabetes. This eventually led him
to an article from the National Institutes of Health about
the effects of certain snake and lizard venoms on the pancreas.
(20:27):
Studies showed that some venoms, including that of the Helo monster,
could trigger inflammation in the pancreas where insulin is produced. Now,
this convinced doctor Ing that the HeLa monster venom was
worth a closer look, and so in nineteen ninety two
he discovered a new hormone in the animals, salivam, which
he called extendin four Now. When he tested the compound
on mice, he was shocked to find that it reduced
(20:49):
their blood glucose levels by stimulating the insulin producing cells
in the pancreas. In fact, it worked very similarly to
the GLP one hormone found in the digestive tract of humans,
with one other important difference. Extending four degraded in the
body much slower, so for reference, a diabetic would have
to inject GLP one every hour to keep an effective
(21:10):
amount of insulin in the bloodstream, but extending four would
only need to be injected once a day, which obviously
sounds like a game changer. It absolutely was, but unfortunately
it took quite a while for doctor Ang's discovery to
get the attention it deserved. Although the VA had funded
his initial research, it showed very little interest in his findings,
and neither did big pharmam. Injecting diabetics with proteins from
(21:33):
lizard venom was just kind of deemed too weird for
mainstream medicine, so doctor Ang's research wound up languishing for
years until this small biotech startup with a focus on
diabetes finally took notice. So the resulting drug, exenotide, was
approved by the FDA in two thousand and five, and
it's now used by millions of diabetic patients worldwide.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
I do love that these like venomous lizard creatures are
you know, these things that like everyone is afraid of,
are responsible for saving humans lives.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Yeah, and they don't even know it the lizards or
the people.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Yeah, also, the lizards might not be too happy about it.
I read that HeLa monster numbers are way down in
recent years because we keep destroying their habitats, and if
we aren't careful, we might lose those little guys completely.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Which would be a huge loss, even from a self
serving perspective. I mean, if they prove this to be
useful and humans wants, who's to say other medical secrets
might be hiding in there.
Speaker 1 (22:29):
I also think it's kind of a branding problem, Like
if we renamed them helaqds instead of Heala monsters, I
feel like they'd have more of a chance.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
I think that's a great idea. Maybe we should push
for that.
Speaker 1 (22:40):
Anyway, that's it for today's episode. Be sure to tune
in tomorrow for our big, big finale, where we'll be
counting down to the number one greatest science idea of
the past twenty five years. And don't forget to check
out our Instagram at part Time Genius. For today's contests,
you could win a home Depot gift certificate, which again
is very much not sponsored by Home Depot, but from
(23:02):
Gabe Dylan, Mary Will Lucas Riley and myself. Thank you
so much for listening. Part Time Genius is a production
(23:23):
of Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio. This show is hosted by Will
Pearson and me Mongais Chatikler and research by our good
pal Mary Philip Sandy. Today's episode was engineered and produced
by the wonderful Dylan Fagan with support from Tyler Klang.
The show is executive produced for iHeart by Katrina Norvel
and Ali Perry, with social media support from Sasha Gay,
(23:46):
Trustee Dara Potts and Viney Shorey. For more podcasts from
Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows. The
Part-Time Genius News
Hosts And Creators
Will Pearson
Mangesh Hattikudur
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