This week: Argentine farmers are caught between worries about the weather and Wall Street speculators. We peek inside the ears of the golden mole, which is a blind, desert predator that lives in the Namib Desert. Scientists are drilling into an Antarctic glacier for clues to the past and future of the continent’s climate. And our Science Forum guest Freija Descamps is taking your comments and questions until April 7th. Stop by and join the conversation here.

Worries for Argentine Soy Farmers: Soy crops are important to Argentina’s economy, but the weather this year hasn’t been kind to Argentine soy farmers. It’s been a dry summer. But it’s not just the weather that farmers have to worry about – it’s also Wall Street speculation. Julia Kumari Drapkin reports.
Read more about the Argentine farmers’ stresses here.

The Golden’s Mole’s Middle Ear: The golden mole is a small, blind predator that lives in deserts in Africa. It feeds on termites and other small insects. So how does a predator with no eyes find its prey? The secret is inside its ears. Peter Narins of UCLA has been studying these animals in the Namib Desert and has discovered some fascinating facts about the bones inside the mole’s middle ear. (Photo: Credit Wikimedia Commons)
Basic facts about the golden mole on the BBC.
How the golden mole’s ear is so sensitive to vibrations on the ground. (abstract only)

Drilling Down in an Antarctic Glacier: Eric Niiler reports on the search for ancient air trapped in the ice of an Antarctic glacier. It could provide a window into the climate of the past and clues to the warmer climate of the future.
Read more here.

This week: You’ll hear the true story of a Siberian tiger that hunted a poacher. We’re also talking about tigers in our latest Science Forum discussion. Our guest is renowned tiger expert, John Seidensticker. He’s taking questions about efforts to save wild tigers. Check out what he has to say in the podcast then join the conversation.   Also in today’s show, U.K scientists release first drafts of the wheat genome sequence. And please tell us what you think in this online survey!

‘The Tiger’: That’s the name of a new book that tells the true story of a Siberian tiger that killed a poacher, for revenge. The drama takes place in the late 1990s, in far-eastern Russia, just across the border from China. We spoke with the author, John Vaillant.
Guest: John Vaillant
Read the first chapter of ‘The Tiger’.

More about the Siberian tiger on National Geographic.
John Vaillant’s previous book, The Golden Spruce.

Saving Wild Tigers: The tiger is facing extinction. There are some 3500 of the beasts left in the wild today. That’s barely half their number just a decade ago. Poaching and habitat loss are among the many threats facing tiger populations around the world. Several countries are gearing up to enforce stricter measures to protect the species as part of the new Global Tiger Recovery Program. But can we save the species? Or is it doomed to become extinct? Listen to our interview with tiger expert John Seidensticker. Then bring your questions for Seidensticker to the latest Science Forum discussion. He’ll be taking your thoughts and questions until September 13th.
Guest: John Seidensticker.
Join our online conversation about tigers.
Tiger facts from the World Wildlife Fund.

Wheat Genome Sequences: Scientists in the U.K have released draft sequences of the wheat genome. The discovery comes at a time when wheat crops around the world are threatened by disease and climate change. The findings provides scientists and crop breeders with genetic tools to help select for hardier varieties of wheat in the coming years.
Guest: Neil Hall
International Wheat Genome Sequencing Consortium.
FAO cuts outlook for global wheat harvests
More work needed to get the entire genome sequenced.
Stem rust and global wheat production on Podcast 62.

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This week: An update on a story we aired on The World in 2005 – a water pump built into a merry-go-round that many hoped would provide drinking water for impoverished African villages. Also, we visit one Norwegian town that remains enthusiastic about offshore oil drilling. We look at the genetic basis of Tibetans’ adaptation to high altitudes. Elsa brings news about dinosaur eggs and organic agriculture.

Problems with the Playpump: A water pump built into a children’s merry-go-round. The idea was simple: harness the energy of children at play to draw well water up from the ground. It was meant to provide clean water for thousands of African villages. Philanthropists loved the PlayPump project. Until it fell apart.
Guest: Amy Costello.
Watch the video of Amy’s documentary, “Troubled Waters.”
Watch the original 2005 video about the PlayPump.
More about technological failures in developing countries, in Podcast 39.
Our Science Forum discussion about fixing technology fixes.

The Evolution of High Altitude Tolerance in Tibetans: Tibet is known for its mountain peaks and high altitudes. It is also known for its people who can tolerate those high altitudes. It turns out there are real genetic differences between Tibetans and those of us who live closer to sea level. According to a newly published study, those genetic changes occurred over a relatively brief period of evolutionary time.
Guest: Rhitu Chatterjee.
The study.

Mixed Support for Oil Drilling in Norway: Most Norwegians seem to support their government’s moratorium on deepwater drilling, especially after the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. But not all Norwegians feel that way. We visit one Norwegian town where just about everyone says the environmental risks are worth it.
Report by: The World’s Gerry Hadden.
Other countries are rethinking their drilling plans as well. Learn more in an interview with author Michael Klare.
Oil spill coverage from the BBC.
What else is going on in Hammerfest? (The town’s tourist information site.)

Elsa’s Favorite Science Stories:

• Dinosaurs Steamed Their Eggs: Giant herbivorous dinosaurs kept their eggs cozy and warm–but not by sitting on them. A fossil find in Argentina reveals the eggs nestled near geysers and hydrothermal vents.
  The study.
  National Geographic‘s virtual museum of dinosaur eggs and hatchlings.
• Organic Farming–Good News and Bad News: First, the good news. In Washington potato fields, leaving off the synthetic pesticides promotes a higher diversity of predatory insects, which, in turn, provide better protection against the problematic Colorado potato beetle. On the other hand, some natural organic pesticides can actually be harder on the environment than well-chosen synthetic ones. That’s the finding of a new study on chemicals for controlling soybean aphid.
  The potato study.
  The soy study.
  Nature News article.
  More about the organic food industry in Podcast #71.

This week:  We’re coming a day late to you this week. But as I promised you’ll hear some breaking news about how global warming is threatening lizard species. Also a scientist on board a research vessel tells us what he’s seeing around the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Elsa has news about evolution of humans and human civilizations. We have some revolutionary music for our Music in Science segment.

Global Warming Threatens Lizard Populations: In recent decades, scientists have documented serious threats to frog species across the globe. Frogs and other amphibians have vanished from many areas. The exact cause is in question. It might be an infectious disease, or pollution, or habitat destruction. A study published by the journal Science suggests the world’s lizards are also in peril, and what’s threatening lizards is climate change.
Report by: Yours Truly, Rhitu Chatterjee.
The study.
Website of study author Barry Sinervo.
Sceloporus lizards in the Encyclopedia of Life.

Spilled Oil in the Deep Ocean: At least 4 million gallons of oil have leaked into the Gulf of Mexico from the damaged Deepwater Horizon well, according to the Associated Press reports, and the desperate efforts to protect the gulf coast’s ecosystem from the slick continue. We hear from oceanographer Vernon Asper of the University of Southern Mississippi. Asper and a team of researchers are aboard a research vessel called the Pelican. They’re analyzing in real time the impact of the oil spill on marine organisms.
Guest: Vernon Asper
Oil spill coverage from Science magazine’s policy blog, ScienceInsider.
BBC coverage.
Fighting the spill with hair and hosiery–from The World’s Technology Podcast.
University of Southern Mississippi’s oil spill response team.
More oil spill photos from the Boston Globe.

Some of the spilled oil has started to sink into the ocean. Note the streaks of red just under the water’s surface.
Credit for above photos and video: Oceanographer Vernon Asper and his colleagues aboard the Pelican kindly shared the images and video with us.

Elsa’s Favorite Stories:

• Mixing with Neanderthals: The Neanderthal genome–newly sequenced from ancient bones–reveals that Neanderthals and early modern humans interbred in the Middle East.
  The study and news coverage from Science magazine.
  More on human evolution from the Smithsonian.
• Climate, Soil, and Economic Inequality: Why is wealth distributed unevenly around the world? It’s not all history and politics. Regional differences in climate and soil go a long way toward predicting whether humans will use land for agriculture or hunting-gathering. Land use, in turn, predicts population density and power.
  The study.
  Website of study author Jan Beck. (His lab usually studies how insects, not people, are distributed on the planet.)
  A review of Jared Diamond’s book Guns, Germs and Steel.
• Mayan Water Pressure: Residents of the ancient Mayan city of Palenque might have enjoyed flush toilets and decorative fountains, thanks to a high-pressure spring-fed aqueduct. A constriction at the end of the aqueduct pressurized the water, which might have spouted up to six meters high. The aqueduct is the first evidence of engineered water pressure in the Americas before the Spanish arrived.
  The study.
  History and photos of Palenque.

Music in Science: When he was in graduate school, Alonso Córdoba’s research addressed the evolutionary relationships among animals. This meant amplifying and sequencing a lot of DNA using PCR (polymerase chain reaction). Find out which little-known Bob Marley song Alonso looped for hours on end in the lab. Alonso now teaches genetics and molecular biology at Ohio Northern University.
Song: Revolution, by Bob Marley
Album: Natty Dread

This week: The 2008 global food shortage may be a distant memory to most of us, but hunger and malnutrition remain a serious problem in many parts of the world. Today, you’ll hear about a famine early warning system developed in the U.S. One scientist explains how climate change will affect agriculture. A journalist and author talks about a fungal disease threatening the world’s wheat crop. Also, one scientist’s efforts to develop improved crop varieties in nutrient poor parts of the world by studying roots.  And don’t forget our conversation about geoengineering on the Science Forum goes through Monday, the 19th.  So stop by and join the discussion!

Stem Rust Threatens Global Wheat Production: Stem rust is a fungal disease of cereal crops so pernicious that it has been called the polio of agriculture. In the 1970s scientists working with the late Norman Borlaug (the father of Green Revolution) developed a variety of wheat resistant to the fungus. That resistant variety helped farmers for decades, until in 1999 a new strain of the pest emerged in Uganda in 1999. The spores of the new fungal strain have been carried by the wind from Africa to Asia. The fungus is now on its way to India and Pakistan, where 20% of the world’s wheat is produced.
Guest: Susan Dworkin, author of The Viking in the Wheatfield: A Scientist’s Struggles to Preserve the World’s Harvest.
The U.N Food and Agricultural Association’s Wheat Rust page.
USDA’s resources on UG99.

Roots of a Second Green Revolution: The Green Revolution in the 1960s and ’70s led to massive increases in global food production. But not everyone benefited. The improved crop varieties needed better irrigation and external fertilizers. And poorer farmers especially in Africa couldn’t afford to buy fertilizers or set up proper irrigation. Now, researchers are developing crop varieties with roots that are more efficient in drawing nutrients from the nutrient-poor soils. They believe their work could lead to a second green revolution.
Guest: Jonathan Lynch.
Read this article about Lynch’s work in the Christian Science Monitor.

Climate Change and Agriculture: Climate change will affect global food production. Rising temperatures and changing rainfall patterns are expected to hurt agriculture in some places, and help it in others.  But there’s time to adapt our food production system to make it more resilient, say researchers.
Guest: David Lobell.
What will it cost to adapt our food production system?

An Early Warning System for Famine: The U.S government has developed a network for early warning system for famine around the world. To do so, researchers use satellite data on rainfall and agricultural yield.
Guest: James Verdin.
Famine Early Warning System Network.

[player] Download MP3

This week: How barbecue may have sparked human evolution.  Also: giant kangaroos, shrinking dinosaurs, and some old grain.

Catching Fire: Harvard anthropologist Richard Wrangham has written a new book called “Catching Fire.” In it, he argues that – more than anything else – what allowed our hominid ancestors to evolve into modern humans was the invention of cooking.

Wrangham has spent decades studying primates in Africa. He says cooking gave our ancestors access to a wider range of foods, helped their brains grow, and – because they no longer had to eat berries and leaves for six hours a day – gave them leisure time to develop tools and technologies.

Richard Wrangham

Wrangham also proposes other provocative ideas: how the explosion of modern, over-processed foods plays a key role in today’s obesity epidemic; and how cooking led to the subjugation of women. And Wrangham shares his own experiences eating raw meat and leaves like chimpanzees do.

Wrangham is also our guest in The World’s interactive science forum. Join us for a lively conversation. Ask questions, share your ideas, or just exchange your favorite zebra and gazelle recipes.

Guest: Prof. Richard Wrangham, Harvard University.

And….. Elsa’s Favorite Science Stories For the Week

More on prehistoric food:

Humans killed Australia’s giant kangaroos (illustration below). (The study.)
Dinosaurs were smaller than we thought. (The study.)
Earliest granary discovered in Jordan. (The study.)

Music:
Mashed Potatoes USA, by James Brown
Struttin’ With Some Barbecue, by Louis Armstrong

Hunting may have driven giant kangaroos (Procoptodon goliah) to extinction. Image courtesy of Gavin Prideaux, Flinders Univeresity.