Big Brains University of Chicago Podcast Network

If aliens landed on Earth tomorrow, how would we talk with them? Well, we already have a kind of creature on this planet we could attempt to talk to first, and in the last few years a team of renowned scientists have been exploring the ocean studying sperm whales to get that conversation going.

David Gruber is a professor of biology and environmental science at CUNY and the founder of Project CETI, an interdisciplinary scientific initiative that is using the latest developments in AI to understand, and possibly communicate with, sperm whales. The day when we break the cross-species communication barrier may be here sooner than you think. Just this year CETI managed to decode what could be called a sperm whale “alphabet”.

We all know that extreme weather events like hurricanes are getting worse due to climate change, but what scientists would really like to know is: By how much worse exactly? This year a team of researchers argued that hurricanes have become so much more extreme due to climate change that we need to add a new category 6 to the Saffir-Simpson scale, which measures the wind speed of hurricanes.

One of those scientists was Michael Wehner from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Using the latest and fastest computers to model how a warming world is reshaping extreme weather events, Wehner is leading a new realm of climate modeling called "end-to-end attribution." This would allow us to not only understand how much worse disastrous weather is becoming but even quantify that difference in terms of damage and destruction.

We've all heard the phrase "Manifest Your Destiny" when it comes to wanting that new promotion, figuring out a new career path or just trying to achieve that long-term goal. It turns out that the act of manifestation is not merely pseudoscience—it actually has a body of research in neuroscience to back it up. Dr. James Doty has been exploring this topic throughout his career; and offers scientific research as well as tools on how to manifest your goals in his new book, Mind Magic: The Neuroscience of Manifestation and How It Changes Everything.

James Doty is a clinical professor of neurosurgery at Stanford University, where is also the founder and director of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education. He explores how manifestation is not only a tool to achieve what we want, but it is also fundamentally about being selfless and caring for others in order to activate our deep internal happiness.

Link to the advertised Chicago Booth Review Podcast: https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/podcast?source=cbr-sn-bbr-camp:podcast24-202405/02

They’re perhaps the oldest questions in the science: Why do we die? And could we find a way to live forever? But for decades, anti-aging research was a “backwater” of the scientific community, consider too fanciful and unrealistic. That is until the last few years. Modern advances in biology have taught us a lot about how we age and why we die—could that knowledge help us turn back the clock?

In his new book, “Why We Die: The New Science of Ageing and the Quest for Immortality”, Nobel Prize-winning scientist Venki Ramakrishnan delves into the latest science of aging and investigates the nearly $30 billion dollar longevity industry to separate fact from fiction in our modern quest for immortality.

Every dog owner has faced the hard realization that their dog won’t live as long as they do, but we’ve all probably wondered: Why do some dogs live longer than others? It turns out that several factors are at play, according to the largest research study of dogs, known as The Dog Aging Project.

Prof. Daniel Promislow of the University of Washington is co-director of the project, which examines how biology, lifestyle and environment can increase both the health and lifespan of more than 50,000 dogs. We spoke with Promislow about whether we can help our dogs live longer—and what their research could actually teach humans about aging.

Link to the advertised Chicago Booth Review Podcast: https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/podcast?source=cbr-sn-bbr-camp:podcast24-20240404

For more than a century, scientists have been studying Alzheimer’s disease and developing theories about its underlying cause. The leading theory for decades has been that abnormal amyloid plaques in the brains of those who suffer from the disease are the central cause. But, according one renowned Alzheimer’s researcher, this myopic focus is not only flawed, but may be holding back our search for a cure.

Neurobiologist Karl Herrup argues that we need to go back to the drawing board, redefine the disease and understand the many factors that could cause it before we can race for a cure. A professor of neurobiology and an investigator in the Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Herrup is the author of How Not to Study a Disease: The Story of Alzheimer’s.