Photo: NEPTUNE Canada

This Week: Scientists and the general public are listening to the deep ocean, to whales, dolphins, under water volcanoes and people drilling for oil. But that has some worried. As many as 2 million songbirds a year are killed in the Mediterranean country, most to be eaten as a delicacy in local restaurants. A Saudi Arabian company has leased tens of thousands of acres in western Ethiopia to grow rice for export. The Ethiopian government says it will help provide food security for its citizens, but some who live in the region, say they’re not seeing any benefits.

Listening to the Deep Ocean:Scientists are establishing a worldwide network of deep-sea listening posts connected to the Internet. It allows researchers and the public to hear whales, ships and other underwater sounds. But the U.S. Navy is uneasy because these sounds might reveal the location of its submarines.
Read this story here.
My blog on efforts to understand noise pollution in the oceans.
Noisy oceans may hurt squids.

Saudi Company Invests in Ethiopian Agriculture:A Saudi Arabian company has leased tens of thousands of acres in western Ethiopia to grow rice for export. The Ethiopian government says it will help provide food security for its citizens, but some who live in the region, say they’re not seeing any benefits.


(Photos: Dallas McNamara)

Illegal Bird Trapping in Cyprus: As many as 2 million songbirds a year are killed in the Mediterranean country, most to be eaten as a delicacy in local restaurants.

Photo credit: Jessica Cooney/Leslie Van Gelder

This Week: I posted this week’s podcast from Gothenburg, Sweden. However, the stories in this episode are from Canada and France. The one from Canada is about a public health expert who is helping his home town—Victoria, British Columbia—measure and promote happiness as public policy. He’s also the guest in our Science Forum discussion. You can stop by with your own thoughts here. And a French cave has revealed prehistoric finger drawings by children.

Measuring and Promoting Happiness: As countries around the world try to figure out ways to boost their economies, some countries and cities are looking beyond economic growth as a measure of societal progress. They’re trying to promote happiness and overall well being. One of the scientists pioneering that effort is Michael Pennock. He’s a public health expert in Victoria, British Columbia. In 2006, Pennock helped Bhutan develop its Gross National Happiness Index. He has since developed a survey to measure happiness in his home town. The survey is being used to develop a happiness index not just in Victoria, but also in other cities around the world. Listen to my story about Pennock’s work and join our online conversation with him in our latest Science Forum.

Prehistoric Cave Art by Kids: Archaeologists have long been studying the paintings and drawings on the walls of a famous cave complex in France. The stone age art dates back to the Paleolithic Age. Many of the drawings represent woolly mammoths. In fact the place is nicknamed the “Cave of a Hundred Mammoths.” Lately, researchers have been focusing on some finger drawings. They think children as young as three, four or five did some of the artwork. So, part of the cave complex may have served as a kind of prehistoric nursery where kids were encouraged to develop their creative skills in cave art – 13,000 years ago. The World’s Marco Werman spoke with Jessica Cooney at the University of Cambridge, which hosted a conference on the archaeology of childhood.

Photo: Credit NEPTUNE Canada

I’m back in Boston, and podcasting from The World newsroom this week. We have two stories, both about international collaborations to understand the world’s oceans. One involves a robot called Wally (named after the 2008 Pixar movie Wall-E) that resides deep in the Pacific Ocean. The other involves a space project that aims to better understand Earth’s salty oceans. Also, my colleague Clark Boyd has launched a new Science Forum about the search for alien life. Click here to join the conversation.

Wally—A Deep Sea Crawler: It looks like Wall-E, the robot in the 2008 Pixar movie of the same name. But unlike Wall-E, Wally resides in the deep ocean, and is helping scientists explore deep parts of the Pacific Ocean. Wally is the creation of Laurenz Thomsen, a marine scientist at Germany’s Jacobs University Bremen. Thomsen can control Wally through the internet, and is using it to explore methane hydrates in the Pacific Ocean. These hydrates are rich sources of methane and there’s growing interest in understanding these hydrates as potential future sources of natural gas. There’s also fear that with increasing ocean temperatures, these hydrates may release more methane, a potent natural gas.

Wally is part of a new network of cabled deep ocean observatories called NEPTUNE Canada.
Check out the cabled network of observatories off the coast of Vancouver Island in this video.

Argentine Space Mission: The U.S. and Argentina are collaborating on a new space project. It’s called Aquarius, and it is aimed at understanding the salinity of our planet’s oceans. The data will help scientists understand variations in the water cycle, which in turn would help understanding of global changes in climate.
See this video to learn more about Aquarius.

Download audio file (science109.mp3)
Download MP3

This week: A new report says the Arctic permafrost is rapidly thawing due to climate change. We hear about a study of dengue fever in a modern Malaysian city, which shows that mosquito-borne diseases can occur in clean, well-planned environments — not just in poverty-stricken areas. We talk to a researcher who has been studying the secrets behind long-distance navigation by tiger sharks in the Pacific.

Melting Permafrost: We have heard a lot about the problem of melting ice as climate change warms the Arctic. But scientists are also worried about something else that is melting up there – permafrost. Permafrost is the permanently frozen soil underneath much of the northern part of the planet. Now, a report says over half of it may thaw out within the next 200 years, with big consequences for the global climate.
The projected changes in permafrost.
National Snow and Ice Data Center.
All about frozen ground.

Dengue Fever in Malaysia: We think of mosquito-borne infectious diseases like dengue as ailments that plague poor parts of the world. But modern urban development does not necessarily lead to controlling such diseases, according to new findings recently presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Kate Mulligan is a graduate student at Canada’s McMaster University, and her research shows that well-planned, modern cities can also cause the spread of infectious diseases like dengue fever.

How Sharks Find Their Way: The Pacific Ocean is home to countless species of fish that have a natural ability to navigate around their underwater environment. Anchor Marco Werman speaks with marine biologist Yannis Papastamatiou of the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville about his research on how fish of one species — the tiger shark — seem to  how exactly where they’re going.

Bilingual Babies: Janet Werker is a language researcher at the University of British Columbia,and she has been studying bilingualism in babies. I caught up with her after a session on bilingualism at the recent annual conference of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, in Washington D.C. She talks about what she and her colleagues are learning about how bilingual babies learn their native tongues. They’ve been studying babies in Catalan, French, Tagalog and English speaking households.
Guest: Janet Werker.
Watch these videos of Werker’s experiments with bilingual babies here, and here.
There are more videos here.
Read my blog post about the benefits of bilingualism.
More about the session on bilingualism at the AAAS annual conference.

Bringing Solar Power to Tanzania:Most of us take electric light for granted. For the most part, we flick a switch and the light comes on. That’s not the case in much of the world. The World’s Jeb Sharp reports on the promise and challenge of bringing solar power to rural Tanzania where most people still don’t have access to electricity.
Read a transcript of Jeb’s story here.
See a slide show of pictures from Jeb’s trip to Tanzania.

So I was thrilled to learn that the 2011 annual conference of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) had a session on bilingualism. It was titled ‘Crossing Borders in Language Science: What Bilinguals Are Telling Us About Mind and Brain.

Recent research by neuroscientists is starting to reveal some surprising facts about the basis of bilingualism in our brains. I’ll have more about these findings in upcoming episodes of my Science Podcast, which you can subscribe to from here. For now, here are the best bits from yesterday’s session.

“Bilinguals are mental jugglers,” says Judith Kroll, a psychologist at Penn State University and the organizer of the session.

Every time a bilingual person speaks or hears a language, they do more mental math than their monolingual friends. It turns out that a second language is always active in a bilingual’s brain. (more on that here) Even for simple tasks like naming an object, a bilingual’s brain has to choose between two options.  As several researchers described it, this leads to a “conflict” between the two languages in a bilingual’s brain.

That ‘conflict’ has become more apparent in my own life lately. Growing up in urban multilingual India, I switched back and forth between languages, and borrowing words from one language when speaking another. In other words, I often spoke Hinglish (Hindi+English), or Hindali, or Bengdi (Hindi + Bengali) or Benglish (Bengali + English). (Note: My father coined those terms out of frustration that my brother and I didn’t speak Bengali without mixing it up with Hindi and English) But once I moved to the U.S., I was stuck with one language – English. Even though I speak it fluently, I sometimes find myself at a loss for words. And when I do, my brain throws Bengali, or Hindi words at me. Unlike when I lived in India, I now have to ignore those words and continue to look for the right word in English.

So how does the brain of a bilingual or multilingual person resolve these conflicts? Well, that’s something that researchers are starting to figure out. (you can read more in this Science magazine article) But one thing that they do know now is that all this mental juggling comes with some advantages.

As York University’s Ellen Bialystok said during her presentation, bilinguals exercise parts of their brains involved in higher functions, like attention, multitasking and problem solving. As a result, bilinguals are often much better at problem solving than monolingual people. (Phew! At least there are some benefits to the battle of languages inside my brain.)

Bialystok’s more recent work also suggests that being bilingual can protect us against the cognitive decline that comes with ageing. It can even push the onset of dementia by 4-5 years. So, if you are considering learning a new language, remember doing so can come with a lifetime of benefits.

Blogger: Rhitu Chatterjee
More on language in The World’s Science Podcast:
Click Languages in Podcast 100
Clues to Bilingualism in Podcast 29.
Evolutionary Roots of Language in Podcast 88.

Elsa’s Favorite Time Stories:

• Redefining the Second: To most of us, a second is just a fraction of one day. But the official international second is defined in terms of the cesium atom and the frequency of the microwave radiation that it can absorb. This ultra-precise atomic clock is the basis of GPS technology, but physicists such as Patrick Gill say we could do even better. New atomic clocks could measure time with a precision in the trillionths of a second (instead of mere billionths)–but the formal definition of the second won’t change until at least 2019.
  Patrick Gill’s work on new atomic clocks.
  All about the cesium clock at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Boulder, Colorado.
  A brief history of timekeeping, from NIST.
• Hugs in the Present Moment: Olympic athletes hug their coaches for three seconds following a performance. That rule applies to Asians, Europeans and Americans alike, says developmental psychologist Emese Nagy. Her discovery fits in with decades’ worth of data that suggest that our perception of the present moment lasts about three seconds.
  The study.
  Related news story from ScienceNOW.
• Tricking Our Internal Clocks: Our natural sense of time is fairly mysterious–and it’s susceptible to illusions. There isn’t a pacemaker in our brains that ticks off seconds, minutes and hours; rather, our timing emerges from a variety of brain functions. And, according to a new study led by neuroscientist Maneesh Sahani* and colleagues, what we see makes a difference too. The researchers could accelerate or brake participants’ perception of a half-second by changing the rate at which random movement played on a computer screen.
  The study.
  Watch the “rolling clouds” clips that fooled peoples’ internal clocks.
  More on our sense of time from the L.A. Times and from Discover.
  *Correction: Maneesh Sahani is at University College London, not King’s College as I said on the podcast. -EY

Chevron in Ecuador: Anchor Lisa Mullins speaks with the BBC’s Irene Caselli about the latest turn in a long legal battle over the environmental legacy of oil drilling in the Ecuadorian Amazon. A court yesterday ordered the U.S. company Chevron to pay damages of roughly $9 billion in the case.
Irene Caselli’s BBC coverage.
New York Times coverage, including background on the case.
Ecuador’s plans to conserve forest by keeping some of its oil in the ground.

Northern Bird Habitat: The Great Backyard Bird Count gets under way this weekend. The idea is to report on what’s on view in your backyard. Miyoko Chu of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology explains why counting birds such as the bar-tailed godwit is important.
The Great Backyard Bird Count.

Rethinking Polio Control: In podcast no. 72, we brought you an interview with D.A. Henderson, the man who wiped out smallpox. At the time, Henderson was skeptical of aims to eradicate polio. He has since changed his mind.
Read more in this New York Times article.
‘Gates calls for final push to eradicate polio,’ in the New York Times.

Peruvian Potato Varieties Headed for Doomsday Seed Vault: Indigenous groups in Peru have announced that they’re sending some 1500 varieties of potatoes to the doomsday seed bank in Svalbard, Norway. The potatoes are currently grown in the Cusco Potato Park, located in the Sacred Valley of the Incas. Read more here.
More about potatoes from The International Potato Center.
More about potatoes in this slide show by The World’s David Baron.

This week:  We’re taking you to Newfoundland for an update on the collapsed Atlantic cod fishery, followed by a quick look at global fisheries. Fisheries are also the topic of our ongoing Science Forum discussion. We’re speaking with Fisheries economist Rashid Sumaila. Join the discussion and learn what you can do to help protect fish species around the world. Also, a brief chat with the author of the new book, Written in Stone.

A Glimmer of Hope for the Atlantic Cod: Some of the world’s most endangered wildlife are obscure species, haunting far-flung corners of the planet, but other endangered creatures are much more familiar. Scotland is the last refuge of a small wild cat that has prowled parts of Great Britain since the last ice age.
Reporter: Jeb Sharp
See Jeb’s slide show from Newfoundland.
Jeb Sharp’s Encounters documentary.

Global Fisheries in Decline: According to a new WWF report, seventy percent of commercial marine fisheries are on the decline. Rashid Sumaila directs the Fisheries Center the the University of British Columbia. He tells us about the problems facing the global fisheries industry, and what consumers can do to encourage sustainable fishing practices. Dr. Sumaila is also the guest in our online Science Forum. Join the discussion here.
Guest:Rashid Sumaila

Written In Stone: Fossils tell a fascinating tale of the process of evolution and our own place in nature. And that’s the topic of the new book, Written in Stone: Evolution, the Fossil Record, and Our Place in Nature. I caught up briefly with Switek, just before he headed out to the New Jersey State Museum to clean a fossil crocodile.
Guest: Brian Switek.
Smithsonian’s Dinosaur Tracking Blog.

This week: I’m back from India and podcasting from The World newsroom again. You’ll hear a story about a rare disease that’s affecting hundreds of people in the Netherlands, and about migrating sandhill cranes that stop in Nebraska on their way to their nesting grounds in the North. Elsa’s back with her mix of science news. And in our music-in-science segment you’ll hear from an evolutionary biologist from Duke University. (images courtesy of VJ Movement).

Q Fever Outbreak in the Netherlands: The Netherlands is grappling with an outbreak of a rare disease. It normally strikes farm animals, but it’s now sickening hundreds of people who have no contact with farms. While most people get something like the flu or pneumonia for a few weeks, some are sick for months, and a handful have died. From the Netherlands, Emily Kopp reports.
Report by: Emily Kopp.
Photos, Videos and Transcript of the story.
More on Q Fever from the CDC

Migration of the Sandhill Cranes: For millions of years, sandhill cranes have been migrating from parts of Canada, Alaska, and Siberia to their wintering grounds in Mexico, Florida, and Cuba. On the way back to their nesting grounds in the spring, they stop for a few weeks along the Platte River in Nebraska. You’ll hear what the birds sound like and learn about this natural spectacle.
Guest: Alicia Hardin of Nebraska’s Game and Parks Commission.
Watch videos of the cranes in Nebraska.

Elsa’s Favorite Stories:

• Fragments from a Mystery Human Species: Scientists have found the remains of a finger from a mystery human species. The specimen, discovered in a cave in Siberia, is about 40,000 years old, and a DNA analysis reveals that it’s genetically different from the two other human species alive at the time – modern humans and Neanderthals.
  The Study.
  More on the BBC.
  More on human origins from the Smithsonian.
• Bt-Resistant Cotton Bollworm in India: A few weeks ago you heard about a moratorium on the transgenic (Bt) eggplant in India. Now, Monsanto says that its Bt cotton crop in the country may be in trouble. One of the cotton pests – the pink bollworm – is now resistant to the Bt toxin.  This news is a fresh reminder that resistance to transgenic crops can be a serious problem and that farmers need to take precautions with this technology.
  Monsanto’s statement.
  More about Bt toxin and how it works.
• Strange New Hawaiian Caterpillar Species: Researchers have stumbled upon an array of new and fascinating species of caterpillars in Hawaii. Some are amphibious – the only amphibious caterpillars known to science – and others eat snails.
  The study on amphibious caterpillars.
  The snail-eating caterpillar study.
  More on the snail-eaters from the BBC.
  Check out pictures of these caterpillars here!

Music-in-Science Segment: As promised, this segment is back after a brief hiatus. In today’s show you’ll hear from evolutionary biologist Anne Yoder of Duke University. She uses fossil and DNA evidence to study the evolution of lemurs and other vertebrates in Madagascar. This means frequent trips to the island nation. But when she’s back in the lab at Duke, Yoder’s often cranking it up.
Produced by: Elsa Youngsteadt.
Anne Yoder’s Home Page.
The Band – Asian Dub Foundation.
The album: Facts and Fictions.
The song: Witness.
OK, I just found a TED video of Douglas Adams (author of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy) and he starts out talking about lemurs in Madagascar.  So check it out!

This week: You’ll hear a story on the controversy over U.S. imports of oil extracted from the Canadian oil sand reserves. We have a story about agricultural failures in Nigeria, told by a reporter who first visited the country twenty-five years ago. Then some good news about  U.S fisheries, the first venomous dinosaur find and an inter-continental concert with the synthesized sounds of an ancient Greek instrument. And we launch our new Music in Science segment. (Credit for photo on left: Mike Blyth)

Canadian Oil Sands: Three weeks ago, we brought you new findings about the environmental impacts of extracting and refining the bitumen that lies deep underground in northern Alberta. Canada is under fire for the ongoing extraction of oil from those reserves. But it’s the United States that buys much of that oil. New pipelines are under construction to bring even more of it south.
Report by: The World’s Jeb Sharp.
Environmental hazards of oil sand extraction on Podcast44.
Canada’s ‘dirty oil challenge’ on the BBC .

Farming Failures in Nigeria: A few decades ago, Nigeria launched a plan to embrace modern farming. But today the country is more dependent than ever on imported food. To find out what went wrong with these agricultural efforts, a reporter travels to a Nigerian village he first visited in the 1980s.
Report by: David Hecht
Africa’s Food Challenge, a paper by the U.N Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

Elsa’s Favorite Science Stories:

• Saving Fisheries from Decline: Rampant overfishing has caused some fisheries to collapse. Individual fishing quotas called catch shares could help conserve fish stocks. A new analysis of catch share fisheries in the U.S. shows that the mechanism yields more stable fish stocks.
  The study.
  FAO report on climate’s impact on global fisheries.
  The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on catch-shares.
• Fanged Dinosaurs:  Scientists have found the first evidence of venom glands in dinosaurs. Sinornithosaurus, a feathered dinosaur that lived some 128 million years ago, had grooved teeth and facial features much like today’s rear-fanged snakes. The researchers think these raptors used venom to stun and kill their prey.
  The study.
  More on the BBC.
• Finding Lost Sounds: European researchers are reconstructing the sounds of ancient musical instruments. They’re using equations that describe sounds based on the shape and material of an instrument. They recently reconstructed the sounds of the barbiton, an ancient Greek stringed instrument. The sounds of the barbiton were recently used in a concert in Stockholm.  See video below.
  More about the ancient instruments project.
  More about the powerful grid-computingnetowrks used by the researchers.
  Video credit: Ancient Instrument Sound/Timbre Reconstruction Application.

Music in Science: This is a new segment on the podcast.  This week, we spoke to evolutionary biologist Tim White, one of the researchers who discovered and studied the remains of our oldest known ancestor, Ardipithecus ramidus, or Ardi. White works in a remote desert region in Ethiopia with an international team of researchers. Listen to the podcast to find out what he and his team listened to as they dug out the remains of Ardi.
Tim White.
Ardi on The World Science Podcast 34.