Learn about where fruit flies come from and what they do from special guest Stephanie Mohr, author of “First in Fly: Drosophila Research and Biological Discovery.” You’ll also learn about why your brain makes you extra antisocial when you’re sick, and how entomologist Justin Schmidt created a pain scale from insect stings. Get your copy of “First in Fly: Drosophila Research and Biological Discovery” on Amazon: https://amazon.com 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: Your Brain Makes You Extra Antisocial When You're Sick — https://curiosity.im/2GA2npZ This Scientist Created a Pain Scale by Letting Bugs Sting Him — https://curiosity.im/2J3vTG2 Additional resources from Stephanie Mohr: “First in Fly: Drosophila Research and Biological Discovery” — https://amazon.com Follow Stephanie Mohr on Twitter @smohrfly — https://twitter.com/smohrfly Harvard Medical School bio — https://fgr.hms.harvard.edu/people/stephanie-e-mohr If you love our show and you're interested in hearing full-length interviews, then please consider supporting us on Patreon. You'll get exclusive episodes and access to our archives as soon as you become a Patron! https://www.patreon.com/curiositydotcom Download the FREE 5-star Curiosity app for Android and iOS at https://curiosity.im/podcast-app. And Amazon smart speaker users: you can listen to our podcast as part of your Amazon Alexa Flash Briefing — just click “enable” here: https://curiosity.im/podcast-flash-briefing.
Learn about where fruit flies come from and what they do from special guest Stephanie Mohr, author of “First in Fly: Drosophila Research and Biological Discovery.” You’ll also learn about why your brain makes you extra antisocial when you’re sick, and how entomologist Justin Schmidt created a pain scale from insect stings.
Get your copy of “First in Fly: Drosophila Research and Biological Discovery” on Amazon: https://amazon.com
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 resources from Stephanie Mohr:
If you love our show and you're interested in hearing full-length interviews, then please consider supporting us on Patreon. You'll get exclusive episodes and access to our archives as soon as you become a Patron! https://www.patreon.com/curiositydotcom
Download the FREE 5-star Curiosity app for Android and iOS at https://curiosity.im/podcast-app. And Amazon smart speaker users: you can listen to our podcast as part of your Amazon Alexa Flash Briefing — just click “enable” here: https://curiosity.im/podcast-flash-briefing.
Find episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/sickness-makes-you-antisocial-fruit-fly-facts-w-stephanie-mohr-and-a-sting-pain-index
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 your brain makes you extra antisocial when you’re sick; and, how one researcher created a pain scale from insect stings. You’ll also hear the fourth and final edition of our “Fruit Fly Friday” miniseries, where you’ll learn about the role of fruit flies in our ecosystem with some help from Stephanie Mohr, author of the book “First in Fly.”
CODY: Let’s satisfy some curiosity.
Your Brain Makes You Extra Antisocial When You're Sick — https://curiosity.im/2GA2npZ (Cody)
According to research, your brain makes you extra antisocial when you’re sick. So don’t blame yourself if you’ve got the sniffles and you suddenly feel like blowing off that thing you were supposed to do with your friend. Because, after all, your immune system is connected to your brain. And that means that it may, in fact, influence your social behavior. The science here starts with your vagus nerve. That’s a network of fibers that connects parts of your body like your gut and lymph nodes. The vagus nerve can detect cytokines, which are compounds your immune system shoots out when you're fighting an illness. Your brain gets word of the illness through the nerve, and before you know it, you're glued to the couch. Researchers speculate there are two main reasons your brain tries to ground you. First, it's an evolutionary adaptation to keep you and the people around you healthy. If you stay inside when you're sick, you're a lot less likely to spread around the sickness to other people. That wouldn't be beneficial for the survival of our species, right? Spreading sickness… not exactly good for the survival of our species. And the second reason is that holing up at home gives your body the time to fight the infection and bounce back. Before you go blaming your immune system on your antisocial-ness, though, keep in mind that it can work in the total opposite way, too. If your health is firing on all cylinders, your brain may nudge you toward being extra extroverted. In a 2010 study, participants were given a flu shot. In the 48 hours following the flu shot, participants interacted with significantly more people, and in significantly larger groups. Sounds to me like if I want to start having more parties, I should step up my workout routine! And, of course, get vaccinated. But that goes without saying.
Stephanie Mohr Interview Clip 4 - Where fruit flies come from and what they even do (Both)
Interview Clip 4 - Where fruit flies come from and what they even do
ASHLEY: For our last entry in the Fruit Fly Friday mini-series, we’re gonna tie everything together by zooming out and covering a few fruit fly basics. As in: what do fruit flies do out in the wild, how safe are they from humans, and most importantly, how do you get rid of the fruit flies in your house? Stephanie Mohr is a lecturer on genetics at Harvard Medical School and the author of the book “First in Fly: Drosophila Research and Biological Discovery,” and here she is with the details — starting with: what do fruit flies actually eat, and what purpose do they serve in the ecosystem?
[CLIP 3:11]
CODY: Again, Stephanie Mohr is a lecturer on genetics at Harvard Medical School and the author of the book “First in Fly: Drosophila Research and Biological Discovery.” You can find links to the book and more in today’s show notes, including a link to our Patreon page. If you support Curiosity Daily on Patreon, then you can download and listen to our full, uncut conversation with Stephanie Mohr. As always, you can find our Patreon page at patreon-dot-com-slash-curiosity-dot-com, all spelled out. And we hope you enjoyed our Fruit Fly Friday mini-series!
[NHTSA]
ASHLEY: Today’s episode is paid for by NIT-suh.
CODY: It can be a little frustrating, especially if you’re in a hurry or running late, to find yourself at a railway crossing, waiting for a train. And if the signals are going and the train’s not even there yet, you can feel a bit tempted to try and sneak across the tracks.
ASHLEY: Well, don’t. Ever. Trains are often going a lot faster than you expect them to be. And they can’t stop. Even if the engineer hits the brakes right away, it can take a train over a mile to stop.
CODY: By that time, what used to be your car is just a crushed hunk of metal and what used to be you… well, better not to think about that.
ASHLEY: The point is, you can’t know how quickly the train will arrive. The train can’t stop even if it sees you. The result is disaster.
CODY: If the signals are on, the train is on its way. And you... just need to remember one thing… Stop. Trains can’t.
This Scientist Created a Pain Scale by Letting Bugs Sting Him — https://curiosity.im/2J3vTG2 (from Saturday) (Ashley)
Most people know that a sting from a hornet is worse than a sting from a honeybee, but in terms of getting stung by bugs, that’s about it. Now imagine you’re an entomologist. You study bugs, and sometimes, you get stung. In fact, for entomologists, stings are pretty much a part of life; an occupational hazard, if you will. How are you supposed to know how much a sting might hurt? Well if you’re entomologist Justin Schmidt, you create the Schmidt Sting Pain Index. It’s a scale that rates the pain of 78 different stinging species. Sounds great, right? Well there’s only one problem: in order to actually create that pain index, he had to actually get stung by all those species. Every sting on his scale happened within the scope of his work — as in, they were side effects, not the main goal. But still, that’s a lot of stings. Of course, subjective pain ratings are by definition less than scientific, and the single subject, cornucopia of sting locations, and small sample size makes Schmidt's ratings hard to extrapolate to what you or I might experience. But the index serves a purpose, if only to show that sting pain and venom toxicity aren't always related. His scale goes from 0 to 4. For a baseline, he used the pain of a honeybee sting and rated it a 2. Most people have experience with that pain, so they have something to compare the others to. His ratings are useful, but it's his sommelier-like descriptions that keep you coming back. Here are just a few of his descriptions:
You can read more of his decriptions in our full write-up on this, which you’ll find on Curiosity-dot-com and on our free Curiosity app for Android and iOS. In the meantime? I think I’ll just stick with fruit flies, thanks.
CODY: That’s all for today, but you can keep learning all weekend on curiosity-dot-com.
ASHLEY: This weekend, you’ll learn about the ages when you’re best at everything, according to research;
Whether boys and girls are actually born with different spatial reasoning skills;
Why our closest star may have a habitable planet;
20 Myths about sleep;
And more!
CODY: If there’s something ELSE you’re curious about, send us your question! You can find our contact info and links to everything we do on our podcast website, curiosity-daily-dot-com.
ASHLEY: Come hang out with us again Sunday on the award-winning Curiosity Daily and learn something new in just a few minutes. I’m Ashley Hamer.
CODY: And I’m Cody Gough. Have a great weekend!
ASHLEY: And stay curious!