Learn about why your dog might be lying about its size and how physicists just achieved room-temperature superconductivity for the first time. But first, food science expert Harold McGee is back to talk about the smells that existed before Earth did.
Learn about why your dog might be lying about its size and how physicists just achieved room-temperature superconductivity for the first time. But first, food science expert Harold McGee is back to talk about the smells that existed before Earth did.
Additional resources from food science expert and author Harold McGee:
Your Dog Might Be Lying About Its Size by Reuben Westmaas
Physicists just achieved room-temperature superconductivity for the first time by Grant Currin
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Find episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/the-smells-that-existed-before-earth-w-harold-mcgee
ASHLEY HAMER: Hi, you're about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from curiositydotcom. I'm Ashley Hamer.
NATALIA REAGAN: And I'm Natalia Reagan. Today, you'll learn about why your dog might be lying about its size and how physicists just achieved room temperature superconductivity for the first time. But first, food science expert Harold McGee is back to talk about the smells that existed before Earth did.
ASHLEY HAMER: Let's satisfy some curiosity. Did smells exist before noses did? It's kind of a trippy question, sort of like if a tree falls in the forest and there's no one around to hear it, does it make a sound? But it's a question that today's guest researched for his latest book. And it turns out that the answer is fascinating.
Harold McGee is a leading expert on the science of food and cooking, who recently turned his sights on smells with a new book, Nose Dive-- A Field Guide to the World Smells. And I asked him to tell me what he learned about smells that existed before the Earth was born.
HAROLD MCGEE: I began to wonder, when smells are in different things on the planet, and plants, and animals, and that kind of thing, I began to wonder what they were doing there. But then I began to wonder, well, if a person with a nose was around from the very beginning of the universe, when would the universe begin to have smells? And I figured that the answer would be, well, when planets form and living things begin to emit smells.
But no, it turns out that radio astronomers have been able to detect about 200 different molecules in outer space by the way that they either emit or absorb radiation from the stars around them. And it turns out that many of the molecules that we're familiar with as smells here on Earth are out there in outer space without any living thing having anything to do with them.
So examples would include hydrogen sulfide, which is the smell of cooked eggs; ammonia, which is the smell of household cleaners; acetic acid, which is the smell of vinegar. There are even now detections of a few esters, which are particular combinations of acids and alcohols that are typical of fruits. So there are parts of space that would smell fruity if we had the ability to fly out there and take a sniff.
ASHLEY HAMER: Wow. And I mean, that just goes to show how these molecules aren't specifically for smells. They're parts of actual compounds that do other things that we are just incidentally sensing with these organs in our faces.
HAROLD MCGEE: That's right. These molecules in outer space, in particular, they exist simply because it's in the nature of carbon, and hydrogen, and oxygen, and nitrogen, and sulfur. Those five are especially important in our experience. But it's just in their chemical nature to react with each other under the right circumstances, the right temperature, the right concentrations.
And they, by themselves, will form these particular molecules, which here on Earth have very specific connotations and identifications for us because they're characteristic of particular living things or things that we make. But they're, in a way, primeval. We're just making them again here on the planet for other reasons.
ASHLEY HAMER: Really puts household cleaners in a whole new light, right? Again, that was food science expert and author Harold McGee. His new book is called Nose Dive-- A Field Guide to the World's Smells. And you can find a link to pick it up in today's show notes.
NATALIA REAGAN: If you know small dogs, you know they can be aggressive. Turns out, they might be liars, too. Well, at least when it comes to their size. According to a 2018 study out of Cornell University, your lap dog might be trying to puff itself up to impress the neighborhood pups every time it goes to do number one.
When dogs raise their leg to pee on something like a tree, fire hydrant, or telephone pole, the angle they aim for tends to be higher the smaller they are. As a result smaller dogs tend to spray higher relative to their body size, perhaps even high enough to be mistaken for a much larger pooch.
It raises the question, are these dogs intentionally trying to misrepresent their size to their friends and peers? If so, they wouldn't be the only ones to do it. Another study found that dwarf mongooses sometimes flip themselves upside down and perform a handstand while scent marking their territory. What's more? The smaller the mongoose, the more likely it was to perform this strange behavior.
For the Cornell study, researchers followed 45 adult male dogs during their bathroom breaks over the course of two years. And it wasn't easy. The pee stains had to be measured before they dried but without interrupting the dog's business. What happened? Well, as a group, the dogs raised their leg anywhere between 85 degrees and 147 degrees. And the smaller the dog, the more extreme the angle.
But don't despair over your dog's lies quite yet. Turns out, smaller dogs might just be trying to overmark. Overmarking is when your dog comes upon another dog scent and leaves its own scent behind to cover it up. If most other dogs are bigger than yours, yours will have to aim pretty high if it's going to paint over the other dogs graffiti. Sorry, I ever doubted you, Cujo.
ASHLEY HAMER: A team of researchers in New York have solved a problem that scientists have been wrestling with for a long time. They've created a material that conducts electricity with perfect efficiency at room temperature. But there's a catch. OK, well, their definition of room temperature is on the nippy side. We're talking 59 degrees Fahrenheit or 15 degrees Celsius.
There's another catch.
All right, all right, hang on. Here's the deal. Conducting electricity is super inefficient. That's because you lose a little energy every time an electron runs into one of the atoms that make whatever your electrical current is flowing through. That's bad because we end up wasting a lot of natural resources to generate power that never gets used.
But there could be a better way. Physicists working more than a century ago realized that in certain conditions, electrons can make the atoms in the conducting material vibrate. Those vibrations turn right around and make the electrons pair up, forming what scientists call Cooper pairs. Those duos form big groups that are able to pass through the conducting material without losing any energy at all. Thanks quantum mechanics, those materials have a fitting name-- superconductors.
But there's a practical problem. We've only been able to turn these materials into superconductors by making them very, very cold. That's why this new research is a big deal. These researchers combined hydrogen, carbon, and sulfur to create a superconductor that works at 59 degrees Fahrenheit. And again, that might not be room temperature, but it's balmy compared to the temps other researchers have used to create superconductors. We're talking negative 94 degrees, negative 10, 8 above.
Tell them about the catch.
OK, yes. This superconductor still has one massive limitation. It only works under very, very high pressure, which the researchers achieved by pressing the compound between the points of two diamonds. The force they exerted was about 3/4 of the pressure you'd find at the center of the Earth. So there's the catch. It's a little impractical.
But it does mark a step in the right direction. Once the team has figured out exactly how the pressure changes the molecular makeup of new material, theoretical physicists will get to work figuring out why it becomes a superconductor at a relatively warm temperature. That information might lead us to a world where no electricity is lost on the trip from solar farm to cell phone charger.
NATALIA REAGAN: Let's recap the main things we learned today. Well, we actually learned that molecules we smell exist whether there's a nose to smell them or not. I mean, that makes sense. It's kind of like, you said, forest-- if a tree falls in the forest, we're not there to hear it, yeah, it's still falls. So I don't know, it's just kind of interesting to think that these molecules exist not for us to smell? Rude.
ASHLEY HAMER: Right. I think it's easy to think like a flower has scent molecules that waft up so that you can smell it. But really, the flower just has molecules that make it a flower, and you end up smelling those in the interim. The ability to smell them it's a very beneficial ability to be able to smell those molecules, but they're not for you to smell. That's not why they exist.
NATALIA REAGAN: I mean, we're so, gosh, species-centric. We're like, everything was put on Earth for our liking. That rose there, it's for us to stop and smell.
ASHLEY HAMER: I like the idea of traveling back in time to right after the Big Bang, and everything smelling like a recently cleaned fast food bathroom. Just like ammonia everywhere.
NATALIA REAGAN: Yeah. What does primordial ooze smell like? I mean, I can't imagine it smells all that great, but still you never know, I mean--
ASHLEY HAMER: Oh, yeah. I mean, sulfur probably, just like sulfur all over the Earth if you were there when everything was first getting going. Not good smells. And speaking of smells, we learned that small dogs take big steps to make sure their territory marks are taller than they should be. Yep, they aim higher to appear bigger to other dogs walking by. Here's hoping they don't run into that bigger dog on the street because all bets will be off. Their lies will be exposed.
NATALIA REAGAN: Again, the backside of dogs being the information superhighway for the animals sniffing them, determining, wait a minute, I know you, you're on the maple on the corner of 11th and Fig. You're much smaller than I thought, you know? I mean, I wonder just what you do to feign size. It's impressive.
ASHLEY HAMER: Yeah, it's the well-angled profile photo of the dog world.
NATALIA REAGAN: We also learned that scientists have finally been able to create a superconductor that works at almost room temperature. Well, it might be a superconductor, it's not super practical, since it can only be used with lots and lots of pressure between two diamonds. So there's that.
ASHLEY HAMER: I will admit it, the term superconductor is something that I forget the definition of literally once a month. I have to find out what it means again and again. So hopefully, if you're like me, you have just been reminded what a superconductor is. You're welcome.
NATALIA REAGAN: Yeah. It's either a super cool train operator are really awesome leader of an orchestra. That's what I've always thought.
ASHLEY HAMER: There you go, yeah. Superman in front of the New York Phil, I think it'd be great.
NATALIA REAGAN: Today's stories were written by Grant Curran and Reuben Westmaas and edited by Ashley Hamer, who's the managing editor for Curiosity Daily.
ASHLEY HAMER: Scriptwriting was by Natalia Reagan and Sonia Hodgson. Today's episode was edited by Jonathan McMichael and our producer is Cody Gough.
NATALIA REAGAN: Join us again tomorrow to learn something new in just a few minutes.
ASHLEY HAMER: And until then, stay curious.