Learn about why newborn babies’ heads each smell distinct; why lemmings have a reputation for blindly following others; and, 5 illegal drugs that you used to be able to buy as medicine. Please vote for Curiosity Daily in the 2019 Discover Pods Awards! We're a finalist for Best Technology & Science Podcast. Every vote counts!https://awards.discoverpods.com/finalists/ In this podcast, Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer discuss the following stories from Curiosity.com to help you get smarter and learn something new in just a few minutes: Newborn Babies' Heads Each Smell Distinct, According to An Amazing New Analysis — https://curiosity.im/34oXn0i 5 Illegal Drugs That Were Once Sold as Medicine — https://curiosity.im/2pCiQUN Additional sources: Lemming Suicide Myth | Alaska Department of Fish and Game — https://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=wildlifenews.view_article&articles_id=56 Are Lemmings Really Suicidal? The Truth Behind Animal Myths | National Geographic — https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/05/150523-animals-myths-lemmings-science-cats-dogs/ The truth about Norwegian lemmings | BBC Earth — http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20141122-the-truth-about-lemmings
Learn about why newborn babies’ heads each smell distinct; why lemmings have a reputation for blindly following others; and, 5 illegal drugs that you used to be able to buy as medicine.
Please vote for Curiosity Daily in the 2019 Discover Pods Awards! We're a finalist for Best Technology & Science Podcast. Every vote counts! https://awards.discoverpods.com/finalists/
In this podcast, Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer discuss the following stories from Curiosity.com to help you get smarter and learn something new in just a few minutes:
Additional sources:
Find episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/babies-heads-smell-distinct-illegal-drugs-that-used-to-be-medicine-and-lemming-myths
CODY: Hi! We’re here from curiosity-dot-com to help you get smarter in just a few minutes. I’m Cody Gough.
ASHLEY: And I’m Ashley Hamer. Today, you’ll learn about why newborn babies’ heads each smell distinct; why lemmings have a reputation for blindly following others; and, 5 illegal drugs that you used to be able to buy as medicine.
CODY: Let’s satisfy some curiosity.
Newborn Babies' Heads Each Smell Distinct, According to An Amazing New Analysis — https://curiosity.im/34oXn0i (from 11/3 — freelancer due 10/31) (Ashley)
If there's one thing all new parents know, it's that newborn babies' heads smell amazing. Now, for the first time, scientists have analyzed the chemical makeup of odors from the noggins of these little bundles of joy, and it's shedding light on the formation of mother-infant relationships.
Here's how they did it. First, scientists fitted five newborn babies with special hats full of smell-trapping beads to collect odors from their heads. Then, they collected smells from vials of the mothers' amniotic fluid. The samples immediately yielded a groundbreaking tidbit: A lot of scientists thought baby head smell came from amniotic fluid, but their analysis showed that the chemicals present in the baby-head odor are different.
What's more, the odors collected a few hours after birth were much more distinct from one another than the odors collected a few days after birth. This means the smell helps create a distinct bond with a parent right away.
Things got even more interesting when the researchers used the samples to see how easily adults could recognize a baby by smell alone. They made some artificial odor mixtures based on the head and amniotic fluid samples, and asked 62 university students to smell them. Fifteen minutes after the first sniff, the students had to identify the sample they'd smelled earlier.
Astonishingly, the students identified the smells easily, and they correctly matched the head smells more than 70 percent of the time. In contrast, the students could only match the amniotic fluid odors 55 percent of the time. So, the substance babies are producing to create that smell is working as a unique identifier that might be used to form a bond with their parent and ensure they're fed, clothed, and safe.
Newborn babies can't tell you what their needs are, but they can cry. And they can also declare their kinship and woo would-be caretakers with their intoxicating, one-of-a-kind smell. According to this new research, that's probably enough.
Lemmings Script (Kelsey) https://docs.google.com/document/d/1nKdK1VB1UfJZELOrRUB994evkSuB44SwuBEV2q2rP7Q/edit?ts=5db8960b (Cody)
When you hear the word “lemming,” you might think of a person who blindly follows others. You might also think of that classic computer game with the little green-haired creatures who have to make it through each level by… well, blindly following others. But in fact, lemmings are real animals: they’re furry little rodents that live in the Northern Hemisphere, have big cheeks and tiny eyes and, y’know… a reputation for blindly following others, often right off of cliffs into the ocean, resulting in mass suicide. But it turns out that lemmings do not blindly follow each other.
Why do we think they do, then? It all goes back to a staged nature documentary filmed by Disney in 1958. To film a lemming “mass suicide,” producers bought little lemmings from Inuit children for one dollar each, popped them in a truck, and drove them to a river for filming.
Let’s pause for a dramatic reading of the narration in that film. As the lemmings run, Winston Hibbler says, quote: "A kind of compulsion seizes each tiny rodent and, carried along by an un-reasoning hysteria, each falls into step for a march that will take them to a strange destiny. That destiny is to jump into the ocean."
Yikes. Then, the viewer watches the lemmings leap off of a cliff into the water below.
Because of this one film, many people still see lemmings as crazed creatures who might march to their deaths at any moment.
The truth is that lemming populations do fluctuate pretty wildly, and that can lead to some deaths. But lemmings don’t die on purpose.
Changes in climate, food, and predators can mean a lemming population can increase by a factor of 10 in a single year. When the population is high and food is scarce, lemmings move somewhere new. Sometimes a large pack will run up against a river or lake and eventually, they have no choice but to try to swim across. And sometimes they drown.
Okay, so that’s sad. But it’s also definitely not what Disney advertised back in the 50s — and thank goodness for that.
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CODY: PROMO CODE CURIOSITY
5 Illegal Drugs That Were Once Sold as Medicine — https://curiosity.im/2pCiQUN (from 11/2 — freelancer due 10/31) (Ashley)
We’re gonna wrap up with a fun history lesson about 5 illegal drugs that were once sold as medicine. Sometimes it might feel like it takes FOREVER to bring a new drug to market, especially if that drug is desperately needed. Once you hear about these drug sales from history, though, I have a feeling the rigorous approval process might not seem quite as bad.
Number one on the list is MDMA, which you may have heard referred to as ecstacy or molly or lots of other nicknames. MDMA was originally patented in 1913 as a helper compound in a drug to stop bleeding. In the 1970’s it was used in therapeutic settings, but in 1985 the FDA banned it, declaring it had no accepted medical use whatsoever. Then in 2017 the FDA changed its mind, and approved clinical trials of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy. Right now it’s being extensively researched as a potential treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.
Drug number two is a little less promising, to put it mildly: heroin. Yes, we actually thought heroin was a non-addictive substitute for morphine when it was first produced in 1898. Once its addictive qualities became clear, it was banned in 1920.
Drug number three: cocaine. It was used in 1885 in a variety of drugs thanks to its effectiveness as an anesthetic. So, who could blame John Pemberton for adding it to his recipe for Coca Cola? Yep, that urban legend is true. But around 1900, when its dangers became clear, Pemberton removed it from his recipe, and cocaine was banned in the US in 1922.
The fourth formerly-legal drug is chloroform, which was used as a safer alternative to ether for more than a century, despite the risk of cardiac arrest. But the discovery of even safer anesthetics — and research that linked it to cancer in rats — led to its banning in 1976.
The fifth and final drug used to be a cure for insomnia, and it was repopularized thanks to "The Wolf of Wall Street" star Leonardo DiCaprio. I’m talking about Quaaludes, which were originally only on the market for 20 years. It was banned in 1983 after recreational use led to overdoses.
So, I’m definitely feeling better about the rigor of the FDA right now.
C: Before we wrap up, we wanted to thank you for helping Curiosity Daily become a finalist for the Best Technology & Science Podcast in the 2019 Discover Pods Awards!
A: You nominated us, and now we’re in the running for a little extra recognition. And if you wouldn’t mind giving us a little extra help, then we’d like to ask for just one more favor: please vote for us!
C: Every vote seriously counts, so please visit awards-dot-discoverpods-dot-com and you’ll find us in the category of Best Technology & Science Podcast. Voting is open through November 18, so don’t delay!
C: Again, that’s awards-dot-discoverpods-dot-com, or find a link in today’s show notes. And thanks again! Okay, so why were we so excited about today’s episode?
[ad lib optional]
CODY: Today’s stories were written by Kelsey Donk and Brian VanHooker, and edited by Ashley Hamer, who’s the managing editor for Curiosity.com.
ASHLEY: Scriptwriting was by Cody Gough, Sonja Hodgen, and Kelsey Donk. This podcast was produced and edited by Cody Gough.
CODY: Join us again tomorrow to learn something new in just a few minutes.
ASHLEY: And until then, stay curious!