5.8.25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Radioized Diary of Science and Nature. Your reader's
Kelly Taylor. I have some articles on the topics of
science and nature, but first a reminder that RADIOI is
a reading service intended for people who are blind or
have other disabilities that make it difficult to read printed material.
From the BBC Science Focus magazine, we have What's the

(00:24):
most painful insect sting? And the Schmidt Scale for stinging
insects ranks the pain of insects stings on a scale
of one to four. On this scale, the sting of
the western honeybee scores a paltry two, while one of
the red paper wasp and the Clug's velvet ant achieve

(00:48):
a three. At four, however, is the sting of the
South American bullet ant Entomologist Doctor Justin Schmidt, who won
a twenty fifteen Ignoble Prize for devising the scale, described
being stung by the feisty nipper as pure, intense, brilliant pain,
like walking over flaming charcoal with a three inch nail

(01:11):
embedded in your heel. And now from the same source,
we'll get into a related article. Some scientists think insect
populations are increasing here's why they are wrong. And this
is from no date. Okay. Back in twenty twenty, when

(01:37):
French scientists doctor Lawrence gome gaume E and Marion desk
Kilbet first heard the news about a new international insect
decline database, they felt something was off. It suggested that
some insect species were actually on the rise, a claim
the contradicted years of research. We were concerned. We felt

(02:00):
the conclusions were over optimistic, says desk Quilobette, an environmental
economists at Toulouse School of Economics. It went against prior results,
clearly pointing to a decline in insect biodiversity. When I
talked to them five years later, old concerns about mistakes
in the insect database shined a light on new big

(02:23):
picture qualms about how biodiversity is measured, but more than that,
whether scientific discovery should be up for debate. The database
they were initially concerned with was called insect Change and
merged various other data sets created by researchers. In twenty twenty,

(02:44):
scientists from Germany, Russia, and the US published an analysis
of insect Change, examining its data and findings. The main
takeaways were that while insects on land weren't doing well,
declining at a rate of nine percent per decade. Fresh
water insects were making a comeback, increasing at eleven percent

(03:04):
per decade. It made the picture of worldwide insect decline
look much more nuanced than previously thought. The findings left
some scholars scratching their heads, as other research suggests that
insect decline is continuing at a far greater pace. In fact,
more than sixty scientists published letters saying they had concerns

(03:25):
with the results. The database's team issued some corrections to
the data and chalked others up to misunderstandings or differences
in opinions. We kept feeling concerned about the impact of
the publication, says deskq wuill Abet. After all, the decline
paper is cited at eleven hundred and twelve times in
scientiary journals, while their feedback is quoted just sixty times.

(03:50):
Gaumet and Desquibet dug into the data set themselves and
claimed to uncover over five hundred and thirty methodological and
statistical mistae. Almost all data sets one hundred and sixty
one out of one hundred sixty five had at least
one issue. They said, for one, the database gathers data

(04:12):
sets with all sorts of different units of measurement, but
then applies a faulty mathematical transformation that doesn't yield the
real percentage of insect change per year. According to Kome,
an insect ecologists at Montpelier University, data sets about aquatic
insects also include non insect invertebrates such as muscles, snails, worms,

(04:35):
and crustaceans. For instance, data from a lake in Kazakhstan
suggests that insects have increased over the past century, but
include invasive muscle blooms, which make up ninety five percent
of the invertebrates in the lake. Most of the data
sets also came from re wilding projects with the end

(04:59):
goal of increasing insect populations through methods such as building
artificial pawns. These environments have been manipulated and so don't
represent a natural insect habitat. The user is left unaware
of the biases, says Gome. The insect Change team heard
the concerns loud and clear quote. There are mistakes in

(05:21):
our data, says database creator doctor Roll van Klink, an
ecologist at the German Center for Integrated biodiversity research. Quote
like their ar mistakes everywhere in quote. The team is
working to incorporate corrections and update the database to make
it as accurate as possible, as well as expanding it.

(05:41):
They aim to publish a new and improved version of
the database in the next six months. They also asked
Gome and desk Quibett to work on the project, but
the pair refused. Quote. The real question is does it
matter for the outcome of the analysis? I say it doesn't,
says Van Clink. The results wouldn't be different if all
these tiny mistakes were weeded out. He also notes that

(06:04):
not separating insects from invertebrates in the freshwater data collection
was a choice he and his team made. Still, this
insect change debacle tells a wider story. In the era
of the biodiversity crisis, scientists are scrambling to measure what's
happening to nature and determine trends of what might happen next.
These huge databases are hard to cross reference and keep

(06:27):
in check as more and more information is added. Every
study has flaws, limitations, and biases. Quote. These complexities and
limitations are rarely discussed because we've been convinced that simplified
narratives are the desired norm for science communication, says doctor
Manu Saunders, ecologists from the University of New England in Australia,

(06:50):
who wasn't involved in either of the studies. That's why
Saunder says scientists should continue to engage in debate. Just
because the research was public doesn't mean its scientific pursuit
is over. Science is a method, not a finished product.
And now another insect related article, this time from CBS

(07:11):
News dated April twenty eighth. Cicada brewed fourteen is emerging
in twenty twenty five. Here's what to know about the
periodical bugs. A massive brood of periodical cicadas will emerge
soon across the United States with a notoriously raucous springtime.
Insects due for their twenty twenty five appearance. Known for

(07:34):
their buzzing hordes and ability to rapidly infiltrate the environments
where they show up, cicadas are expected to swarm parts
of Kentucky and Tennessee this year, while arriving in smaller
quantities in various places along the East Coast, from Massachusetts
and New York down to western Georgia. Here's what to
know about the infamous creatures. Periodical cicadas are moderately sized

(07:57):
bugs with red eyes and translucent windings, usually measuring about
an inch long with a wider wingspan. They are sometimes
mistakenly associated with locusts like grasshoppers, but cicadas are actually
an entirely different sort of insect, part of the same
family as stink bugs and bedbugs. The synchronized behavior of

(08:17):
periodical cicadas is their most defining characteristic Compared with annual cicadas,
which appear in generally modest amounts each summer. Periodical cicadas
emerge in the spring and essentially rise from the ground
in unison in either thirteen year or seventeen year intervals.
Cicadas that emerge on the same schedule are called a brood,

(08:38):
and each is labeled using Roman numerals. This year, the
group belongs to Brood XIV, the second largest brood of
periodical cicadas known to scientists, according to the University of Connecticut.
Researchers with the university's Cicada Project note that while they
cannot technically know with certainty where a particular brood is

(08:59):
going throughmor next. Its last known locations during previous emergence
events usually provide valuable insights. Because periodical cicadas typically lay
their eggs in or near the areas where they've just emerged,
the next generation of broods tends to emerge themselves in
similar places. Based on University of Connecticut research, CBS News'

(09:21):
data team created an interactive map that charts the expected
spread of brood fourteen, which last arose seventeen years ago
and is the only brood emerging in twenty twenty five.
The map shows the cicadas primarily concentrated in Kentucky and Tennessee,
in addition to parts of Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, North Carolina, Virginia,

(09:44):
and West Virginia. Farther north, the brood is also expected
to take shape in smaller pockets in Cape Cod, Massachusetts,
Long Island, New York, and central Pennsylvania. The brood will
emerge before the end of spring on June twenty first,
but cicada's arrivals in different parts of the US will

(10:05):
likely vary. Cicada expert Matthew Kyson told CBS News in
twenty twenty four that the exact timing of a brood's
emergence is linked to the temperature of the soil therein
before moving above ground, Cason said cicadas are prompted to
exit the soil when it reaches sixty four degrees, so

(10:26):
groups within the larger brood may travel to the surface
sooner than others in cooler locations. The life cycles of
periodical cicadas are closely tied to how and where they emerge.
Before a brood materializes on land, each of its members,
sometimes trillions of them, exist underground as larvae, subsiding on

(10:47):
fluids from plant roots. According to the National Wildlife Federation,
they live in those conditions for thirteen or seventeen years,
depending on the brood, Then, almost all at once, the
insects burrow upward and break through the surface of the soil,
often making their presence known by erupting in loud and
at times constant choruses. Conspicuous noises from cicada swarms are

(11:11):
a mating tactic, the Wildlife Federation writes, as the male
insects gather in groups and create loud sounds to attract females.
The mating process begins within a few days of cicadas
emerging When it ends, the females cut shallow grooves into
tree branches and lay their eggs inside. Researchers at Arizona

(11:33):
State University say those eggs usually hatch within eight weeks,
and newly born cicadas fall from the branches down to
the ground called nymphs. At that point, the young bugs
proceed to dig their way back underneath the soil, where
they remain until it's time to emerge again. Adult cicadas
typically remain above ground in a given location for four

(11:56):
to six weeks before they first emerge. Note that most
of the individual insects live for less time, but that
window accounts for some degree of staggering when the brood emerges,
since that happens over a period of about two weeks.
Cicadas are not dangerous to humans or pets. They don't
bite or staying, and they aren't poisonous or venomous. Quote.

(12:19):
If dogs or cats eat many cicadas, this may temporarily
cause an upset stomach or vomiting, but there is no
need to worry if a pet eats a small number
of cicadas. The Environmental Protection Agency says they are also
largely beneficial to the ecosystem. They are a food source
for birds and other predators that eat insects. They can
aerate soil and when they decompose they provide nutrients. They

(12:42):
can help trees grow. Cicadas may harm young trees, which
can be protected with mesh or netting. They don't eat leaves, flowers,
fruits or garden produce. The EPA says, And now we'll
go back to BBC Science Folks Magazine, and the article

(13:03):
is headlined what would happen if Yellowstone erupted? Barely a
month goes by that these days without the Yellowstone supervolcano
hitting the headlines somewhere or other, and this one is
no exception. It might be a swarm of earth tremors
or a minor steam driven explosion that sets the hearts

(13:23):
of news editors and disaster preppers racing, or on occasions
like this, a new piece of research that sheds light
on prospects for the next Big Bang. Sometimes it can
seem as if the entire world is waiting for Yellowstone
to blow, in a sense, almost willing it. So what
to do? So what do the latest findings tell us?

(13:44):
And do they bring good news or bad? Let's dig
a bit deeper. In January this year, researchers in the
United States Geological Survey the USGS published a new analysis
in the journal Nature that reveals exactly what's going on
underneath Yellowstone. By measuring and mapping the electrical conductivity of
the rocks, they were able to paint a three dimensional

(14:06):
picture of how much magma there is and where it's located.
This is because molten rock can be up to a
thousand times more conductive than its solid equivalent, so it's
pretty easy to pick out. Bad news is that there
is one hell of a lot of magma down there.
The good news is that it's not all in one place,
nor is it filling some great subterranean void. Most of

(14:29):
the magma, in fact, is contained in pockets, each making
up two to thirty percent by volume of the hot
solid rock within which they are contained. Furthermore, the areas
of magma hosting rock are not all joined up, so
even if the volcano did blow, it couldn't all come
out in one go. The most interesting revelation, however, lies

(14:50):
in what the study tells us about where the next
volcanic action might be centered. It turns out that the
magma is not evenly distributed. Most of it is concent
traded under the northeast of the Yellowstone Caldera, a huge
crater left by the last supereruption six hundred thirty thousand
years ago. Somewhere between four hundred and five hundred cubic kilometers,

(15:15):
or that ninety five to one hundred and twenty cubic
miles of sticky silica rich rhyolite magma is squatting there.
That's significantly more than the volume of magma that erupted
in Yellowstones huge Mesa Falls blast around one point three
million years ago. Furthermore, hot the salt magma rising from

(15:36):
the mantle below is pumping more and more heat into
this part of the volcano, keeping the rhyolite magma hot
and over time ramping up the total volume of molten rock.
This may sound disconcerting to say the least, but remember
that the magma is spread around. All these pockets of
molten rock would need to connect up and pool together

(15:58):
before there is sufficient volume to come out in one
hefty eruption. Nevertheless, the authors of the Nature paper have
hypothesized that this part of the volcano will be the
most likely place for the next big outburst. The big
question is when there's a great deal to talk about
the next Yellowstone supereruption being due. But this, as the

(16:21):
latest research also bears out, simply isn't the case. Alongside
the aforementioned to Mesa Falls eruption, there have been two other,
much bigger blasts, the Huckleberry Ridge eruption a little over
two million years ago and the six hundred thirty thousand
year old Lava Creek outburst. The average return period of
the three eruptions is seven hundred thirty five thousand years, So,

(16:45):
notwithstanding the lack of any statistical rigor given such a
small sample size, there's no reason to think that another
supeeruption is in any way imminent. It's also worth observing
that the Mesa Falls eruptions, how massive, wasn't deserving enough
to be awarded the epithet super as the volume of

(17:06):
its deposits fell below the one thousand qb kilometer threshold
that's required. Consequently, the return period between the two really
big ones is nearer one and a half million years.
The reality, then, is that the next Yellowstone supereruption could
be a very long time coming, but it will come
and when it does, its impact on the United States

(17:26):
and the entire planet will be immense. To get some
idea of what a future Yellowstone supereruption might look like,
we need to look back in time at those earlier explosions,
which have many features in common. All involved a detonation
so great that the erupted magma was torn apart, creating
colossal quantities of ash. In addition, each eruption was followed

(17:51):
by the collapse of the crust above the emptied magma reservoir,
leading to the formation of a giant caldera. The current
sixty kil wide Yellowstone caldera was formed during the most
recent Lava Creek eruption. While each supereruption marked the climax
of an eruption cycle that was terminated by collapse, this

(18:13):
was both preceded and followed by volcanic activity on a
smaller scale. This highlight's an important point that doesn't get
much airing in discussions about the Yellowstone threat, and that
is that there have been plenty of smaller eruptions between
the three biggest, and many of these have not been explosive.

(18:33):
In fact, the last eruption of Yellowstone involved the relatively
quiet extrusion of lava around seventy thousand years ago. But
let's zero in on the big ones, which, let's face it,
for what everyone wants to know. What would we experience
as Yellowstone girded itself for volcanic cataclysm and during the
eruption itself. One thing we don't know too much about

(18:55):
is how long the build up to a big one
takes and what the warning signs would be. Even today,
there are hot springs, bubbling mud pools, and swarms of
earth trimmers. Meanwhile, the land's surface continually rises and falls,
as if a giant slumbers below, which in a sense
it does. It might seem logical to expect a supereruption

(19:16):
to be preceded by more of the same warning signs
we see in smaller eruptions, just on a larger scale,
possibly with growing unrest over decades or longer. However, research
on past eruptions at another supervolcano, Mount Toba, in Indonesia
suggests otherwise. The findings indicate that warning signs could be minimal,

(19:38):
offering little to suggest that a world changing eruption was
on its way. This is very bad us for anyone
living within sixty miles or so of the Yellowstone volcano,
because once all hell breaks loose, there would be little
chance to escape. This is to say that Yellowstone supereruption
will explode onto the scene unannounced. Recent field work by

(20:01):
geologists has revealed that the six hundred thirty thousand year
old Lava Creek event was preceded by two smaller scale
explosive eruptions, probably separated by years, may be even decades.
When the volcano reawakens, we may well see the same
thing again, smaller starter events heralding the main course. From

(20:24):
a mitigation point of view. In such a case, the
big problem lies in trying to predict which eruption, if any,
will be super something that will not actually become apparent
until after the event, when the amount of disgorged material
can be quantified. However, whether Yellowstone vomits out five hundred,

(20:44):
seven fifty or one thousand cubic kilometers of ash is
pretty immaterial. All would be cataclysmic and devastating for the country.
Whenever it comes, the next Yellowstone supereruption will be impossible
to miss, and whether you live close by or on
the other side of the planet, its consequences will be unavoidable.
The eruption is likely to be focused initially at least

(21:07):
at a single vent breaking through where the swelling crust
above the magma reservoir is weakest. As viscous rhyolite magma
packed with gas and under enormous pressure, breaks the surface,
it tears itself apart, the initial detonation, deafening anyone unfortunate
enough to be in the vicinity. Blasting upwards faster than

(21:30):
the speed of sound, a plume of ash and pummice
reaches the edge of space within minutes, spreading literally to
plunge everywhere below into pitch darkness. A torrent of hot
ash and pummice falling across yellowstone in the surrounding region

(21:51):
starts fires, heats the air, and makes it almost impossible
to breathe. But there's worse to come, much worse. As
part of the column collapses under its own weight. It
triggers fast moving surges of hot ash, incandescent gas, and
near molten plumae fragments known as pyroclastic flows, that hurtle

(22:13):
outwards in all directions, traveling at speeds of more than
one hundred eighty miles per hour. Overtopping hills and filling valleys.
These pyroclastic flows destroy and bury everything within about sixty
miles of the vent, turning every living thing from lodgepole,
pine to chipmunk, from moose to human into charcoal. Meanwhile,

(22:37):
the upper part of the column of ash and plumus
expands rapidly, even pushing against prevailing winds, forming an ever
widening giant umbrella that brings darkness and a deluge of
ash and pummice as he goes. Within twenty four hours,
ash should be falling across much of the United States
and parts of Canada, bringing down power lines, shorting out electronics,

(23:00):
causing transport chaos, flattening crops in the fields, and contaminating
water supplies. Normal life would be at a standstill. Modeling
of the ash cloud generated by a future Yellowstone supereruption,
conducted by USGS scientist Larry Maston and colleagues reveals that

(23:20):
for most scenarios, ash more than a centimeter deep would
cover a land area of anything between a few and
several million kilometers. Places like Miami and New York would
get away with just a few millimeters of falling ash,
while up to three centimeters would fall as far afield
as Chicago, San Francisco, and Winnipeg, and Canada. Anywhere closer

(23:44):
than nine hundred and thirty miles like Denver and Salt
Lake City, would experience extremely disruptive ashfall, the depth increasing
to minimeters as yellowstone is approached. As ash particles act
as nuclei for water in the atmosphere, heavy rains would
be triggered to add to the mayhem, turning much of
the country into a sea of mud, clogging rivers and

(24:07):
bringing widespread flooding. The ash would also carry with it
huge quantities of toxic metals such as arsenic, cadmium, lead,
and mercury, bringing the potential for long term contamination of water,
crops and animal feed. It's likely that all of this
ash won't be dumped in one go, and that the
eruption will happen in stages, perhaps as new events open up,

(24:30):
extending its disruptive impact. The worst could well come during
the climactic phase, when magma is erupted in the form
of giant curtains along great arcing fractures. These would open
as the central block of crust above the magma reservoir
sinks into the evacuated space to form a new caldera.

(24:51):
In total, the whole thing could last for weeks, perhaps
as long as a month, but this is just the beginning.
While the effects of the heavy and extensive ash fall
would devastate agriculture across most of North America and bring
the US economy to its knees, this isn't the worst
of it. Any remaining ash in the atmosphere will settle

(25:12):
out pretty quickly, But this isn't the case for the
vast quantities of sulfur dioxide gas blasted high into the
stratosphere during the eruption, which will spread across the planet
within weeks. When combined with atmospheric water vapor, the gas
forms an aerosol of tiny particles that build a global vale.

(25:33):
This shields the planet from incoming sunlight and lowers surface temperatures.
The nineteen ninety one eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the
Philippines brought about a sudden drop in global temperature of
around zero point five degrees celsius for a couple of years.
Although this was the second biggest volcano blast of the
twentieth century, it was around one hundred times smaller than

(25:56):
Yellowstone's Lava Creek supereruption. Traveling back a couple of centuries,
the Great eighteen fifteen eruption of Indonesia's Tambora volcano had
a major impact on global weather, leading to the so
called Year without a Summer in Europe. Widespread harvest failures
across the continent and in the Eastern United States brought

(26:18):
civil unrest, bread riots, and the last major subsistence crisis
in the developed world. What then, would be the result
of a future Yellowstone explosion that was twenty five times bigger.
It would be reasonable to think that scaling up would
result in a much bigger climate impact, and computer modeling
suggests this is the case. The global temperature after a

(26:40):
Yellowstone super eruption sized event is predicted to fall by
up to four degrees sea or seven degrees fahrenheit on average,
by up to seven degrees sea or thirteen degrees fahrenheit
across land, and by more than eighteen degrees fahrenheit across
central North americaperature begin to climb again within a few years,

(27:02):
but it takes a couple of decades for them to
return to previous levels. Not surprisingly, the sea ice cover
at the poles increases significantly, and there are major changes
in global weather patterns. Needless to say, such severe cooling
would be catastrophic for global agriculture, leading to widespread harvest

(27:22):
failure and famine on an unimaginable scale. All things considered,
it be a surprise if global society and economy survived
in any form that we might recognize. But there's a
glimmer of light through the gloom. A recent NASA study
has broken with the consensus to speculate that the temperature
fall following Yellowstone superieruption might end up not being much

(27:46):
greater than that following Pinatubo or Tambora. So good news. Maybe.
Perhaps the only saving grace is that, as the latest
research tells us, it doesn't look like happening anytime. Well
that's all for today's Diary of Science and Nature. Your
reader was Kelly Taylor. Now stay tuned for the Health

(28:07):
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