Environmental cardiology researcher Dr. Aruni Bhatnagar explains why experts are looking at our environment to improve our health. Then, learn how Polynesians and Native Americans connected across more than 2,000 miles of ocean — all the way back in the 12th century.
Environmental cardiology researcher Dr. Aruni Bhatnagar explains why experts are looking at our environment to improve our health. Then, learn how Polynesians and Native Americans connected across more than 2,000 miles of ocean — all the way back in the 12th century.
Environmental cardiology resources from Dr. Aruni Bhatnagar:
DNA suggests that Polynesians interbred with distant Native Americans 800 years ago by Grant Currin
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Find episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/how-the-environment-affects-your-health-w-dr-aruni-bhatnagar-and-how-polynesians-mingled-with-native-americans-800-years-ago
CODY: Hi! You’re about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from curiosity-dot-com. I’m Cody Gough.
ASHLEY: And I’m Ashley Hamer. Today, you’ll learn about why experts are looking at our environment to improve our health, with help from Dr. Aruni Bhatnagar [BOT-nah-GAAR]. Then, you’ll learn about how Polynesians and Native Americans connected across more than 2,000 miles of ocean — all the way back in the 12th century.
CODY: Let’s satisfy some curiosity.
You've probably never heard of environmental cardiology — I don't blame you. It's an emerging field of study that looks at how environmental factors contribute to heart health. That's pretty exciting, since figuring out how our environment affects our hearts could go a long way in helping us prevent and treat heart disease. To learn more, we got in touch with one of the pioneering researchers in the field, Dr. Aruni Bhatnagar [BOT-nah-GAAR]. He’s a Professor of Medicine and Director of Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute at the University of Louisville. Here’s Dr. B. with the scoop on where the idea for environmental cardiology came from, and why it matters.
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Who knew your environment could have such a big impact on your health? Again, that was Dr. Aruni Bhatnagar, and he’ll be back tomorrow. Stay subscribed to learn the surprising ways urban and rural environments can impact our health, along with tips to help you stay healthy.
Did Polynesians interact with Native Americans in the twelfth century — even though the two were divided by 2,000 miles of ocean? New genetic research says yes!
First, where’s Polynesia again? Well, Polynesia isn’t so much a place as a thousand places. This collection of islands spans 4,000 miles of the Pacific Ocean, from Hawaii to the north to New Zealand to the southwest to Easter Island to the southeast. Its first inhabitants arrived 3,000 years ago from the east coast of Asia. Over the next 2,000 years, their descendants settled island after island until they reached Easter Island, also known as Rapa Nui.
For this study, researchers compared the DNA of people from Rapa Nui and other Polynesian islands, along with those from countries along the Pacific Coast of South America — more than 800 people in all. A lot of the Polynesians had Native American and European DNA from recent ancestors — no surprise there, because traveling huge distances is no big thing these days.
The big surprise was that six of the Polynesians, from five different islands, had stretches of DNA from the Zenu people of Colombia. Based on the length of the DNA fragments, researchers think those Native American ancestors lived about eight centuries ago.
Soooo, how’d that happen? Researchers have a couple of ideas. The most promising one is that groups of Polynesians sailed thousands of miles to South America and then brought some of the people they encountered with them on the return trip. It’s also possible that South Americans made the voyage themselves.
That second idea hearkens back to an older theory called “random drift,” which holds that the first Polynesians were South Americans who rode ocean currents to Polynesia on rafts. A proponent of this theory was a Norwegian adventurer named Thor Heyerdahl [HIGHER-doll], who brought a lot of attention to the idea in 1947 when he rode a balsawood raft from Peru to the Tuamotu [TOO-ah-MOH-too] Archipelago in the Pacific.
But there’s not much evidence to support that theory. It’s also based on the racist idea that native Polynesians couldn’t have had the incredible seafaring skills needed to navigate the Pacific and land on some of Earth’s most isolated islands.
Scientists now accept what Polynesians have known for a long time. The indigenous people of the Pacific have been incredibly skilled seafarers for centuries. Polynesian explorers were making extremely long voyages — probably in double-hulled canoes — right around the time the study suggests they made contact with South Americans. This was right when Polynesians were discovering a lot of islands in the Pacific, including Hawai’i, New Zealand, and Rapa Nui. With all that exploring, making it 2,000 miles to South America doesn’t seem that far-fetched.
CODY: Let’s recap today’s takeaways. Starting with
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CODY: Today’s last story was written by Grant Currin, and edited by Ashley Hamer, who’s the managing editor for Curiosity Daily.
ASHLEY: Today’s episode 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!