Big birds with bitty brains are still kind of bright We’ve learned a lot about the remarkable intelligence of birds like crows and parrots, but not much work has been done on large flightless birds. A new study that explored the problem-solving abilities of emus, ostriches and rheas suggests that some of these birdy behemoths have impressive cognition too. In a first-of-its-kind study, a team led by University of Bristol’s Fay Clark trained the birds to use puzzles to get food, and they found th...
Feb 28, 2025•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Scientists are recruiting elephant seals to learn more about the oceans’ twilight zone Below about 200 metres there’s still a lot going on in the ocean, but it’s tremendously hard to observe and understand even with modern technology. Scientists from the University of California, Santa Cruz have maintained a long-term monitoring study of elephant seals. The team, including PhD candidate Allison Payne, has discovered they can use the seals as scientific sentinels, to help humans better understand...
Feb 21, 2025•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast As soon as the last ice age glaciers melted, Indigenous people occupied this site A recently discovered archaeological site in Saskatchewan, dated to just less than 11,000 years ago is the oldest settlement in the region by about 1,500 years. It also is evidence that Indigenous people settled there as soon as the environment could support them after the glaciers disappeared. Glenn Stuart, from the University of Saskatchewan, is one of the archaeologists working along with local Indigenous commun...
Feb 14, 2025•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast A little bit of scratching can do some good, but too much can hurt Scratching an itch can feel great, so scientists decided to dig into why that is the case since we know too much scratching isn’t good for us. Dr. Dan Kaplan, a professor of dermatology and immunology at the University of Pittsburgh, said they found that scratching drives inflammation to the skin, which, in light moderation, helps to fight bacterial skin infections. But he warns that continual or excessive scratching can prolong ...
Feb 07, 2025•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Bits of Bennu have building blocks of life NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission took six years to travel to the asteroid Bennu and return samples to Earth. Now, the first results from the analysis of these rocks are being released. Researchers found evidence of salty water, as well as the elements necessary for life, such as amino acids and the building blocks for RNA and DNA. We spoke with Kim Tait, senior curator of mineralogy at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, and co-author of one of the recent stu...
Jan 31, 2025•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Reintroducing Hawaii’s sacred crow to the wild The world’s most endangered crow, the Hawaiian crow or or ʻalalā, is making tentative steps towards a comeback. After going extinct in the wild, only 120 birds remain in captivity, in two facilities operated by the San Diego Zoo. Over the years, researchers have attempted reintroductions in the bird's native habitat on the Big Island of Hawaii, but those efforts have all been unsuccessful. Recently, the team tried something different - reintroducing...
Jan 24, 2025•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Ancient human ancestors didn’t eat meat, and so couldn’t build big brains One of the main reasons scientists think we became so smart is because at some point in our evolutionary past, our ancestors started eating energy-dense meat to fuel the growth of large brains. However it hasn’t been clear when this started. Using a new technology, scientists were able to analyze the tooth enamel of seven 3.5 million year old Australopithecines to directly measure their meat consumption. Tina Lüdecke, from...
Jan 17, 2025•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Was Rome’s fall due to heavy metal poisoning making Romans dumber? Ice cores that preserve traces of atmospheric pollutants through history have revealed that industrial activity by Romans – particularly the use and production of lead – meant the air the Romans breathed was heavily contaminated. The levels were high enough to cause neurological problems, including a drop in cognitive function across the population. Joe McConnell and his team at the Desert Research Institute published their findi...
Jan 10, 2025•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Genevieve Willis from London, Ontario asks: Is there any evidence to suggest that “getting cold” by, say, dressing inadequately in cold weather, or sitting in a cold draft, actually increases our susceptibility to illness? For the frigid answer, we spoke with Michael Kennedy who is an associate professor of exercise physiology at the University of Alberta. Jim Raso from St. Albert Alberta wrote us: My question has to do with our sense of time passing. As I have gotten older – I am 73 now –...
Jan 03, 2025•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Some optimistic and positive science news to end the year. For rats, anticipation of a pleasurable event is a pleasure in itself One day early in the pandemic, behavioural neuroscientist Kelly Lambert from the University of Richmond went to check on her rats. The rats responded with excitement when they saw her, anticipating the treats they were about to receive. That inspired her to pivot her research to study the effects that anticipating pleasurable experiences could have on the brain. ...
Dec 27, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast How ancient artifacts emerge from melting ice As Earth’s glaciers and ice sheets melt due to global warming, they are revealing rare archaeological treasures released from a frozen time capsule. These objects are often made of organic material – human and animal remains and wooden tools that only survive in ice. In her book, The Age of Melt: What glaciers, ice mummies, and ancient artifacts teach us about climate, culture, and a future without ice , Lisa Baril tells the story of the archaeologis...
Dec 20, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast A NASA probe is going to touch the Sun for Christmas The Parker Solar Probe is going to be making its closest approach to our Sun on Dec. 24, diving at 800,000 km/h into the corona of our star and getting within 6.5 million kilometers to the solar surface. It’s the culmination of a successful mission during which the probe has measured the solar wind and flown through solar storms. We speak with C. Alex Young, the Associate Director for Science Communication in the Heliophysics Division at NASA'...
Dec 13, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Early people in North America had mammoth appetites The people of the Clovis culture, who lived across Ice Age North America 13,000 years ago, left behind many tools and artifacts that suggest they were skilled hunters. And now chemical analysis of the incredibly rare find of bones of a Clovis child has given us the first direct evidence of what they were eating. The research, co-led by James Chatters of McMaster University, revealed they were “super-carnivores” whose diet mostly consisted of ma...
Dec 06, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast What the dinosaurs left behind tells the story of their rise to dominance Bones aren’t the only thing we can use to understand the dinosaurs. A new study of a rich trove of fossilized feces and vomit is telling the story of how dinosaurs diversified and came to dominate the planet starting 230 million years ago. Paleontologist Martin Qvarnström from Uppsala University in Sweden said it appears that the secret to dinosaurs’ success is in their ability to adapt to their changing environment. Their...
Nov 29, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Octopus camouflage is incredibly hard work Octopuses have the remarkable ability to change their appearance in the blink of an eye – assuming new skin coloration and patterns for camouflage or communication. A new study in the journal PNAS has explored how much energy this takes, and it turns out transforming themselves is a workout harder than you’d ever get at the gym. Dr. Kirt Onthank is a professor of Biology at Walla Walla University and known as The Octopus Guy on social media. Bigger isn’...
Nov 22, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Canadian bird flu case raises potential pandemic concerns A teen in BC critically ill with H5N1 bird flu has raised concerns about a new pandemic, since it’s not clear how they acquired the virus. Researchers are closely monitoring the virus as it spreads, primarily among animals for changes that could indicate it spreading more easily in humans. Matthew Miller, the Canada Research Chair of Viral Pandemics from McMaster University, says the timing of this case is particularly concerning given th...
Nov 15, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Blood drinking bats can suck energy out of their protein-rich meals Vampire bats are famous for exclusively drinking blood, but they’re also surprisingly good runners. And part of why that’s surprising is that blood contains very little carbohydrates or fat, which most other mammals rely on for fuel. So Kenneth Welch and Giulia Rossi at University of Toronto Scarborough ran bats on a specially-designed treadmill to find out more. They discovered that the bats can almost instantly convert the ami...
Nov 08, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast There’s no time like this time for Standard Time In most of Canada and the US, our clocks are “falling back” an hour as we switch to Standard time for the winter and as usual we’re hearing mutterings about abandoning the time change.. Chronobiologists like Malcolm von Schantz, who study our internal circadian rhythms, are saying that if we do ditch the practice, we should revert to standard time instead of having permanent daylight time, because morning light is very important to regulating our ...
Nov 01, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast A Zombie star’s outburst could soon be appearing in the night sky In 1946 a stellar explosion brightened the night sky as the result of a zombie star going nova 3,000 light-years away reached Earth. The nova soon dimmed, but scientists are expecting a repeat performance any day now. NASA astrophysicist Elizabeth Hayes, the project scientist of the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, described it as a white dwarf star devouring so much of its companion star that it reaches a critical threshold resul...
Oct 25, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Canaries in the coal mine — a report on Canada’s bird life is an environmental report card Using millions of observations, collected over 50 years, from bird watchers across the country, the conservation group Birds Canada and Environment and Climate Change Canada have released a report called The State of Canada’s Birds. The big takeaways are that many bird species, such as grassland birds and arctic birds, are in trouble because of climate change, damage to habitat and other causes. The good n...
Oct 18, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast A CBC Radio One Special: We are in a new space race and this one looks a lot different than the Apollo missions. More women are donning space suits, and more nations are aiming for the stars. What was it like for the women who broke the mold, and what challenges persist? Co-hosts Nicole Mortillaro and Jaela Bernstien get real with four trailblazing women: three astronauts who shattered the glass ceiling, and a space historian. We talk about sexism, awkward moments, hard-won achievements and what...
Oct 16, 2024•49 min•Transcript available on Metacast A Nobel prize for understanding how genes are turned on and off The early-morning call from Sweden came on Monday to American molecular biologist Gary Ruvkun for his work in discovering microRNAs, which are essential for regulating genetic activity in plants and animals. Ruvkun says that research based on this work helps us understand basic biology, but has also provided significant insight into disease and might even help us understand whether there is life on other planets. Biologists di...
Oct 11, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Hurricane Helene’s killed hundreds, but the true death toll could end up in the thousands Hurricanes and tropical storms in the US kill about 24 people directly, but a new study looking at “excess deaths” suggests that in the affected areas the mortality rate is elevated for about 15 years. Rachel Young, a postdoctoral researcher from UC Berkeley, analyzed the long tail of these storms from 1930-2015. She found the true death toll ranges from 7,000 to 11,000 per storm. Her team suspects many fac...
Oct 04, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast A Central American lizard creates a bubble of air underwater to breathe Semi-aquatic lizards in the western rainforests of Central America have the ability to hide from predators underwater by breathing from a bubble of air they form over their heads. In a new study in the journal Biology Letters, ecologist Lindsey Swierk from New York State University at Binghamton, found that the lizards with this bubble-breathing trick could stay underwater for 30 per cent longer than the lizards without a bu...
Sep 27, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Earthquakes create a spark in quartz that can form massive gold nuggets Scientists have figured out why up to 75 per cent of all the gold ever mined forms inside quartz in areas with a long history of earthquakes. Chris Voisey, a Canadian geologist at Monash University in Australia, said he was trying to solve how gold arose inside quartz. In his study in the journal Nature Geoscience, he found that earthquake stress on quartz crystals generates an electrical voltage that causes dissolved gold t...
Sep 20, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Wrestling 14-foot 'dinosaurs' to figure out why they're dying Dr. Madison Earhart, a postdoctoral fellow from the University of British Columbia, spent her summer fishing for enormous white sturgeon in the Fraser and Nechako Rivers in British Columbia. Since 2022, there have been a large number of deaths of this fish along the west coast of North America and it’s concerning when a species that’s been around for hundreds of million years suddenly starts dying off. She and her colleagues are ...
Sep 13, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast A behind-the-scenes chat about the making of the CBC Radio collaboration called "Overheated." White Coat, Black Art, What on Earth, and Quirks and Quarks are exploring how heat is affecting our health, our communities and our ecosystems. This originally broadcast on The Current.
Sep 09, 2024•15 min•Transcript available on Metacast Quirks & Quarks launches our new season with a special on urban heat. It's part of a collaboration with White Coat, Black Art and What on Earth called "Overheated." Host Bob McDonald and Producer Amanda Buckiewicz tell the story of how a city’s design can influence the way we experience and cope with heat. Bob will cycle through the streets of Montreal with a Concordia researcher on specially-equipped bikes - these are equipped with sensors that measure how temperatures change across neighbo...
Sep 06, 2024•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
