Not all birds can fly. Penguins, ostriches, and kiwis are some famous examples.
It’s pretty easy to figure out if a living bird can fly. But it’s a bit tricker when it comes to extinct birds or bird ancestors, like dinosaurs. Remember, all birds are dinosaurs, but not all dinosaurs evolved into birds.
Scientists at Chicago’s Field Museum wanted to figure out if there was a way to tell if a dinosaur could fly or not. They found that the number and symmetry of flight feathers are reliable indicators of whether a bird or dinosaur could lift off the ground.
Ira talks with two of the study’s co-authors about their research and how it might help us understand how dinosaur flight evolved. Dr. Yosef Kiat is a postdoctoral researcher and Dr. Jingmai O’Connor is the associate curator of fossil reptiles at The Field Museum in Chicago.
Sacre Bleu! Some French Cheeses At Risk Of ExtinctionThere’s bad news for the Camembert and brie lovers out there: According to the French National Center for Scientific Research, some beloved soft cheeses are at risk of extinction. The culprit? A lack of microbial diversity in the mold strains used to make Camemberts and bries.
As with many foods, consumers expect the cheese they buy to be consistent over time. We want the brie we buy today to look and taste like the brie we bought three months ago. But there’s a downside to this uniformity—the strain of Penicillium microbes used to make these cheeses can’t reproduce sexually, meaning it must be cloned. That means these microbes are not resilient, and susceptible to errors in the genome. Over the years, P. camemberti has picked up mutations that make it much harder to clone, meaning it’s getting harder to create the bries we know and love.
Joining Ira to talk about this is Benji Jones, senior environmental reporter at Vox based in New York City.
Transcripts for each segment will be available the week after the show airs on sciencefriday.com
Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.
696: ‘Mysterious’ Canine Illness: What Dog Owners Should Know
694: An App For People Of Color To Rate Their Birthing Experiences | How Different Animals See
697: NASA Opens Canister With Asteroid Sample | ADHD Prescription Rates Spiked During The Pandemic
693: AI Helps Find Ancient Artifacts In The Great Lakes | An Artist Combines Indigenous Textiles With Modern Tech
691: When The ‘Personal’ Computer Turned 30
690: How The Moon Transformed Life On Earth, From Climate to Timekeeping
692: From Scans To Office Visits: How Will AI Shape Medicine?
689: Rhesus Monkey Cloned With Modified Approach Has Survived Into Adulthood
688: 3,000 Types Of Brain Cells Categorized In Massive Brain Cell Atlas
685: Brain ‘Organoids’: Lab-Grown Cell Clusters Model Brain Functions
687: The Lasting Allure Of Shackleton’s ‘Endurance’
684: How Close Are We To Answers About Aliens?
686: NASA Delays Crewed Moon Missions | Top Technologies To Watch In 2024
683: To Get Ready For Mars, NASA Studies How The Body Changes In Space
682: Science Journalism Is Shrinking–Along With Public Trust In Science
680: (Part 2) Endangered Species Act At 50: Orchids And Red Wolves
679: (Part 1) Endangered Species Act at 50: Hawaiian Land Snails
681: Solar Activity Flares Up In 2024 | Underground Hydrogen Reserves And Clean Energy
678: SciFri Reads ‘The Alchemy Of Us’
677: SciFri Reads ‘The Kaiju Preservation Society’
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
The Daily
Just Dumb Enough Podcast
Voices of Misery Podcast
House of Whimsical Terror
Stuff You Should Know