WeWow on the Weekend (6/7/25)

Hey, grown-ups! Happy Dino Day! It's me, Mindy. And before we start the show, did you know that scientists actually don't know what color dinosaurs were? Yeah! Scientists make educated guesses based on fossilized feathers or skin impressions, but no one... is 100% certain what colors dinosaurs actually were when they roamed the Earth 66 million years ago.

So, when we made our own Wow in the World dinosaur toys, Guy Raz and I added a little pop of color to make those dinos really roar. Yep, that's why the Wow in the World Jumbo T-Rex... dinosaur is neon blue and purple and the baby brontosaurus in our baby dino bucket is bright orange and pink to discover even more wows about dinosaurs for the dino fans in your world Visit Amazon.com slash Wondery Kids to shop all of our colorful dinosaur toys and more coming soon.

Plus, don't forget to pre-order our newest book, Dinosaurs Are Wow. A roaring thunder of... historic wonder coming to a bookshelf near you this October. Pre-order today wherever you get your books. Just search dinosaurs are wow at your favorite retailer. That's it. And now let's get back to the show. Woo-hoo-hoo! Cause this is what we do on the weekend Talking, laughing Me and Reggie Singing, laughing And then we Oh wait, no, I said laughing twice

I'm here. Reggie, I told you I was going to the bathroom and I'd be right back. What? I haven't been upstairs for two hours. What time is it? Oh, whatever. An hour? 445 minutes is not two hours. Besides, I'm ready now. We can start. Hello and welcome to WeeWow on the Wee- What? You already did the intro?

Well, did you tell the listeners that I'm the host and you're the co-host? And you told everyone that we chit-chat and answer questions from devoted listeners? And listen to our favorite episodes of Tinkercast Podcasts? Okay, great. I'll take it from there. And we listen to our favorite episodes of Tinkercast Podcasts. And today, we're gonna... Um... Today, we're gonna... Psst. Rajay.

What are we going to do on the show today? Questions! Great! Yes, we're going to answer questions today. Okay, time for the first segment that I totally planned on having. The Q&A segment! The Q&A segment. This is the part where we print out a bunch of questions that people left us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify or whatever and read them aloud. Right. These aren't reviewsies. These are questions. Our first question comes from Helen. Helen asks...

Why don't butterflies just be butterflies? Why do they have to be caterpillars first? Wow, this is a great question, Helen. Because, Reggie, Caterpillars turning into butterflies is what we call a glow-up. Right, so when caterpillars are born... Hatched. Whatever. When caterpillars are hatched and they're just the little wormy things, they're not too special, right? Right. But then, after they take a nap in their little sleeping bags...

chrysalises, whatever. After they take a nap, they transform into beautiful butterflies. Exactly. Everybody loves a transformation. It's like magic. And then everyone's like... Wow, did you see that butterfly who used to look like a green bean with legs? What a glow up. Hope that helps. Next question. This next question is from Landon R. Landon asks,

How do they choose the colors in the rainbow? And why those colors? Good question, Landon. Okay, so just to review, the colors of the rainbow are red, orange, yellow, green... Blue? Um... Indigo, right? I always forget about that one. And purple. Violet. Whatever. And I think they choose those colors because they're pretty. Although, they probably chose indigo just to confuse people because I don't know anything.

anyone who ever says the word indigo? Wait, Reggie, what do you mean nobody chose the colors? The colors in a real rainbow come from refracted light and reflection and dispersion and physics and science? Well, I don't know what any of that means, but Landon? If you're drawing a rainbow, you can choose whatever colors you want, okay? Next question. This last question comes from Joe, who asks, can you play the...

guitar? And if so, can you give us a sample? Well, of course I can, Joe. Just let me pull the old git fiddle out. Gotta tune this baby up real quick. Uh-huh. That sounds good. And here we go. Raw, raw, raw, you're about jelly down the stream. It sounds horrible. Fine, then you do better.

have it, Joe. Me and Reggie can both play guitar pretty well. Okay, fine. Reggie's really good and I need to practice more. Whatever. Okay, I think that's enough for today. Thanks for your questions, everyone. Keep them coming.

If you write me a question on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, I just might read it on WeeWow on the weekend. Okay, next up is a little segment I like to call Inside Tinkercast Studios. Ahem. Inside Tinkercast Studios. This is the part where we revisit an episode of one of my favorite Tinkercast shows. And today... We're listening to Wow in the World Season 2, Episode 9, called Homegrown Genome. Wait, what's a genome? Is it like genes? Like...

Pants for gnomes? Okay, okay, let's just listen to the episode. Here we go. And play. WeeWow will be right back. Grownups, this message is for you. Hey, grown-ups. It's Mindy and Guy Raz from Wow in the World, and guess what? What's the good news, Mindy? Once Upon a Beat is back with brand new...

Oh, I love that podcast. We here at Tinkercast have partnered with our friends at Wondery to bring your family new episodes of Once Upon a Beat. Once Upon a Beat remixes fairy tales and fables as old as time, giving... them a fresh spin with some rhythm and rhyme. This podcast is hosted by the amazing DJ Fuch and features original hip-hop songs from Grammy award-winning artist Secret Agent 23's Kadoo. Once Upon a Beat is...

where hip-hop and fairy tales meet. And you can listen to new episodes right now. Follow Once Upon a Beat on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Once Upon a Beat early and at... free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app in Apple Podcasts. That's it. Now back to the show. Okay, Reggie, wrench me. All right, just twist that up there. I'm going to need the hammer, table gun.

Good morning, Guy Raz. Mindy, I came over as soon as I heard about your new invention. I'm so excited to see it. Thanks for your enthusiasm, Guy Raz. Put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into this baby, but it's going to be worth it. I know I talk about it a lot, but I really think gene editing technology is one of the most exciting and fascinating things happening in science right now. Well, I hope you brought your brain pump, Guy Raz, because this invention...

is going to blow your mind. Now sit back and relax as I present to you the latest and greatest in gene editing technology. Ladies and gentlemen, say hello to... The Party Pants Pocket Pizzazzer! Huh? Wait, what is that, Mindy? It looks like a... cross between a stapler and a sewing machine. Let me ask you a question, Guy Raz. How many times have you looked at yourself in the mirror and thought, hmm, if only there was a way for me to...

Buy some, these old wool trousers. Like maybe you wanted to attach some little bells to the bottoms, but couldn't find the time. Well, I don't. Well, those problems are a thing of the past with the party pants pocket pizzazz. Just gonna rev this baby up. Mindy, when you invited me over to share your latest invention in gene editing technology, I thought you were talking about genes, not genes. Oh!

Clearly we're not on the same page here. Ah, yeah, you're talking about genes in our bodies, and I'm talking about the genes that you wear on your body. Well, this is embarrassing. Yes, genes as in genome.

as in the DNA, as in the code of life, as in the stuff that makes you, you, and me, me. I know what genes as in genomes are, Guy Raz. They're like the instruction manuals for our bodies. Genes decide... what color our eyes are, how tall we are. Or whether or not we have to wear glasses, like you. Exactly. Your genes decide whether you have allergies or red hair or, in some cases,

If you're born with a certain type of condition called a genetic disorder. So like when a person has something like celiac disease, for example, and their bodies don't like gluten, and then they get really sick if they eat it. That kind of thing? Yep. Every time I hear people talk about the genes in your body, they always seem to talk about DNA as well. Exactly. So if genes are kind of like the instruction manual for the body, then DNA are the...

And if I remember correctly, Guy Raz, the letters that make up the DNA code are A, G, C... And T, right? Well, that's right. Every single species on Earth is made up of these four letters. A, G, C, and T. And each letter represents a different... chemical that is a little like a building block that makes us...

Well, us. So kind of like if we humans were buildings, then each letter would be a different brick. And Mindy, if you printed out every single letter that makes up one human being's genetic code, it would be... 3.2... 3.2 billion letters? Skyra, that's like 800 dictionaries worth of letters. Yes, and those 800 dictionaries, well, together it's...

It's like the recipe book for one human being. Whoa. And Mindy, the cool thing is that depending on the order you put those four letters in, well, that determines so much about our physical characteristics. Okay, I think I got it. So let's say, for example, I was born with a unicorn horn. That might mean that my DNA letters were all scrambled up, right? Well, yeah.

even though that would be very, very rare and possibly unlikely. So then why were you so excited when you heard that I was inventing a gene editing machine? Well, because it would mean that we could reorder or change or...

edit those DNA letters and possibly help to heal people who are sick. So it's kind of like editing a book or a newspaper or even an email to your grandma on the computer. You could just swap out an A and a C and replace it with a T. Or if there was DNA code that actually makes you sick, well, in theory, with a gene editing machine, we could just edit those out or cut out those pesky...

Well, I guess that means it's adios to the party pants pocket pizzazzer. No, don't throw it away, Mindy. I mean, you could still use it on, you know, on the... Jeans you're wearing. Yeah, that's a good point. I guess I could just edit my Levi's into me-vi's. Me-vi's? Yeah. Me-vi's? Um. Me-vi's? Oh, now I get it. Levi's into me-vi's.

Uh, Mindy, where'd you go? Hang on a second, Guy Raz. I just had to grab a book from my library. Wait, go ahead. Okay, I'm back. All right, let's see here. I got my trusty genetic dictionary. Now let's see, um, chromosomes, no, codominance, no, copy number variation, nope, that's not, oh, here it is, CRISPR! Look, Mindy, we've had fried chicken for lunch every day, and I'm getting sick and... I'm not talking about crispy fried chicken, Guy Raz. I'm talking about Gene and...

Oh, of course, right. CRISPR, you're talking about the groundbreaking, path-making gene editing technology that could revolutionize medical science. When you were talking about gene editing, I remembered that I... read something about this new way to heal humans who are sick and it's with this technology called

CRISPR! Also known as clustered, regularly interspaced, short palindromic repeats, or CRISPR. And this amazing scientific technology was developed by biologists working for Professor Jennifer... at UC Berkeley in California. And biologists are scientists who study life. Life like humans and animals and plants and even microscopic or teeny tiny organisms like...

The bacteria on your hand. I have bacteria on my hands? I just washed them like two weeks ago. Why do I have hand bacteria? Well, we all do. Lots and lots of it. I gotta go wash them again. Be right back! Back. Where were we? We were talking about CRISPR technology. Oh, yeah. The easiest way to explain it is that CRISPR makes it easy to move genes around in any living thing. So living things like bacteria and...

And of course, humans. And with CRISPR technology, you could go into the human body, find the chain of letters that causes a disease or a genetic disorder, and then just cut out those letters or replace them. Well, it hasn't been done in an actual living, breathing human just yet. But scientists have successfully used this technology in human embryos in a laboratory, so they know that it could eventually work in us. Wow, a human embryo, that's the stage when we grow inside our minds. Yep.

And there's a lot of excitement around the possibility of being able to change some genes inside the human embryo. Genes that if they weren't changed could cause the embryo to become a human with a disease. Wow, what? kinds of diseases or genetic disorders. Well, for starters, things like cystic fibrosis or muscular dystrophy or Huntington's disease. That's amazing, Mindy. I know that kids and grownups with cystic fibrosis have a really hard time breathing and they can get sick a lot.

And muscular dystrophy is also a condition that some people are born with. And over time, their muscles break down, which means they have a difficult time walking. So in theory, if CRISPR technology works, scientists... could fix these genetic disorders even before the baby was born, while it was still growing inside her mommy's belly. Guy Raz, scientists have already shown that it can be done in the lab, working on human cells.

So it's just a matter of time before this technology is going to be used on real, live human beings. Yeah, and in fact, there are already some clinical trials happening right now. And clinical trials are when doctors ask... People who are sick to volunteer to take certain medicine or try out a new medical operation. You got it. Well, that all sounds really cool, but you know what I'm super excited about? Oh, no. Guy Ross, please don't tell me you're genetically engineered.

Slurpees to taste like kale salad. What? No, no, Mindy. I'm talking about bringing the past right here to the present. Wait a minute. Say that again? Bringing the past. Right here to the present. You mean yesterday to today? Well, sort of, yeah. What does that have to do with gene editing? Well, actually, Mindy, I'll show you. Here.

Did that just fall through my gingerbread ceiling? Hop into the time machine. Well, okay, but I'm driving this time. Wait, what? Saddle up, Ben. Hold on to your hot tamales, Guy Raz. Wait, no. No, Mindy, you drive... Dude! Well, I'm glad I glued all my old stuffed animals to the walls of this thing. Really made for a softer landing. Oh, yeah. I thought they were for insulation. Oh, well. Hey, let's open this hatch up. Let's do it.

Are we back in the Pleistocene era? Because it's breathing. I know. We're just here for a brief moment because I want you to see those over there. Holy man! What do those mammoths remind you of? A Snuffleupagus? No, no, no. I mean a real animal. Oh, oh yeah. Well, I guess an elephant. Exactly right. Elephants are distant relatives of the woolly mammoth. Kind of like how we humans are distant cousins of chimpanzees. Yes, exactly. Okay, so why are we looking at woolly mammoths?

Because believe it or not, Mindy, there are scientists who believe that we could take some of the DNA from these woolly mammoths and combine it with DNA from modern elephants. and possibly bring these gentle giants back to life. Gentle? Guy Raz, isn't that a stampede of wooly mammoths heading our way right now?

We better get out of here, Mindy. Run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run. Okay, hop inside, Guy Raz. Let me punch in the coordinates. Hurry up, Mindy. They're getting closer. I'm going as fast as I can. I don't think our time machine is going to survive this mammoth stampede! Almost there! Hurry! I must admit, Mindy, those stuffed animals really do make the landing a lot more comfortable.

I told you we needed them all. Yeah, fair point. So you started to tell me about these scientists who want to bring back the woolly mammoth using gene editing technology? Yes, it's amazing. There are scientists at Harvard University in Kansas. who say that we might be able to crack this nut within two years. Two years? Wooly mammoths in two years? Well, maybe not...

real live woolly mammoths, but we might be on the path to truly discovering how we could do this. So how will they do this? Well, the cool thing about DNA is that it stays around even after... So we can actually get woolly mammoth DNA even though they're extinct? Yup. That's bon... And even more amazing, Mindy, is that scientists believe that by using gene editing technology, they could, in theory...

cut out the letters of an elephant's DNA code, and then replace those letters with DNA from a big, hairy, woolly mammoth. That's... Amazing. But let me just get one thing straight. So if that happened, it wouldn't become a real woolly mammoth because it would be part elephant. So it might be more like a woolly elephant? Actually, that's right.

Sort of like when you cross two different types of dogs. The baby dog that's born looks a little like both. So how could these mammoth fins help us? Well, the researchers at Harvard have suggested that these woolly heroes... could help us fight climate change. You know, the temperature of the Earth getting hotter by reducing the amount of permafrost melting in frozen areas of Earth. Oh, yeah, permafrost. So permafrost is that land up around...

The Arctic Circle closer to the North Pole that's permanently frozen. And when it melts, it releases huge amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, right? That's right. And these big woolly mammoths could in... theory help slow down the permafrost melting by using their huge legs to push down on the snow and compact it and keep it frozen. That's so cool!

And even cooler than that, Mindy, is researchers at Imperial College in London because they've experimented with gene editing technology that could make mosquitoes that don't have a virus called malaria. Wait. Wait a minute. Isn't malaria like a super dangerous virus that can make us really sick? Yes, yes. And while it can be cured, it...

can still make you really sick. And it's usually only found in mosquitoes in very, very warm places, so countries that are around the equator or the center of our planet. And just to be clear, you can protect your... by being really, really careful to use a lot of mosquito repellent, right? That's right. But the best part of this new mosquito gene editing is that the mosquitoes that were born with the ability to fight off or resist the malaria virus also passed along that genetic trait.

or characteristic, to their babies. So you're saying that the mosquitoes babies were also malaria-resist, even though they never had their genomes edited? Yes, exactly. Hey, Roz, do you know what this means? What? We can see the end of malaria, one of the deadliest diseases on our planet.

and it could happen within our lifetime. Indeed we could. Well, I know my original jean editing machine was a little bit different, but I could still edit your woolly trousers together with these skinny hipster jeans. Just picked up at the store. No thanks, Mindy. I think I'll stick with my wool trousers. But I could edit on some bells. and some sequins. I'm not sure. Maybe some rhinestones, some glitter, a few patches, beads, pearls, ribbon, some flowers.

Sure, sure, sure. All that stuff about woolly mammoths and making mosquitoes resistant to malaria and helping cure genetic disorders and diseases. That stuff's cool, too. But I'm talking about pants. Yes, Reggie, I want my blue jeans edited. I need more pockets. Yes, I want so many pockets that my pockets have pockets. Ooh, or maybe one big pocket. Okay, let's wrap up the show and then go to Mindy's house so she can make us pocket pants.

Thanks to all you listeners out there for tuning in to Wee Wow on the weekend. If you have a question for me, call and leave me a message at 1-888-7-WOW-WOW. That's one, eight, eight, eight, seven, wow, wow. I just might answer your question on Wee Wow on the weekend. Okay, should we do the goodbye song? Good. That's the end. of the show I need to go and pick some pockets but I don't mean stealing I mean selecting a bunch of new pockets for my pants but I'll do another show tomorrow

But for now, that's the end of the show. Bye! Grownups, if you like WoW in the World, you can listen early and ad-free... Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Wondery Kids Plus on Apple Podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. And before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.