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 simian version of HIV is more lethal than scientists knew. The 40th anniversary of the first moon landing, from a Russian perspective. A Chinese take on the solar eclipse. Plus: a Neanderthal murder mystery, tracking a huge dust storm as it travels the globe, and a close analysis of a click language.

Chimp AIDS: Scientists believe that the human AIDS virus, HIV, evolved from a virus called SIV, which infects monkeys and chimpanzees. Researchers had thought that SIV was relatively harmless, but a new study has found that SIV-infected chimpanzees in Tanzania are dying of an AIDS-like illness. The finding could change approaches to AIDS treatment in people.

Guest: Dr. Beatrice Hahn of the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Moon Landing: For almost two decades, the U.S. and the Soviet Union raced to be the first to the moon. The race obsessed both countries, and cost tens of billions of dollars (and rubles). Russians therefore have a different perspective than Americans on this 40th anniversary of the first lunar landing.
Report: By Jessica Golloher in Moscow.
Guest: Roald Sagdeev, former director of the Soviet Space Institute.

Solar Eclipse: The longest total solar eclipse of the 21st Century took place this week in Asia. It lasted more than six minutes. In China, the eclipse held deep cultural meaning.

Report: By Bill Marcus in Shanghai.

Elsa’s favorite science stories of the week:

• Scientists implicate an anatomically modern human in a Neanderthal murder attempt. (The study.) Here’s that novel we mentioned on the podcast.
• Researchers track a Chinese dust cloud as it circles the globe. (The study.)
• Linguists unpack the multiplicity of click consonants in an endangered language, N|uu. (The study and the press release.) At this site, you can hear more N|uu words, recorded by linguist Amanda Miller and colleagues.

Music:

• Moonwalk, by Pee Wee Ellis
• Total Eclipse of the Heart, by Bonnie Tyler