Why Aren’t We Still Flying Supersonic Planes Today? Seeker+ 2022-01-18 | The sound barrier was officially shattered in 1947, and by the 1950s military jets started routinely breaking the sound barrier, and not just small fighters, but big bombers too. So the next logical question was, when would the public go supersonic too? The early history of supersonic flight is complicated, and it involves gorgeous engineering, soviet espionage, and terrorizing citizens of Oklahoma. » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comThe first sonic boom from an aircraft rang out over the Mojave Desert in southern California in October of 1947. Piloting the rocket-powered Bell XS-1, Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier and joined an exclusive club of which he was the first member. Better known by its later designation of “X-1," the XS-1 was built for speed, with a body shaped like a .50 caliber bullet, wings that were thin but very strong, and control surfaces at the tail that could move as one big unit so they’d work despite the shock waves. That last innovation was a major breakthrough for high speed flight that was kept top secret, and it would give early American fighter jets an edge over their Soviet-made opponents in the Korean war. Racing to establish themselves at the forefront of what was thought to be the future of air travel, three big players emerged: the United States, the Soviets, and a cooperative effort between the French and the British, with those being listed in order from least successful to most successful. In the last few years, NASA and a few startups have decided to take another look at bringing SSTs back. #Supersonic #Concorde #Airplanes #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Read More:Breaking the Sound Barrier | The Greatest Moments in Flightspace.com/16709-breaking-the-sound-barrier.html“In 1935, a simplified explanation of the challenges of supersonic flight led to the creation of the term "sound barrier," which seemed to imply a physical wall that could not be overcome. Bullets and cannon balls had exceeded the speed of sound for hundreds of years, but the question loomed as to whether or not a plane — or a man — could withstand the pressures that accompanied it. The U.S. Air Force set out to answer this looming question.”The American Concordes that never flewbbc.com/future/article/20160321-the-american-concordes-that-never-flew“It was one of the most ambitious aircraft design projects in history, so what happened to the US plans to master supersonic passenger flight?”Soviets test supersonic airlinerhistory.com/this-day-in-history/soviets-test-supersonic-airliner“In 1965, the French arrested Sergei Pavlov, head of the Paris office of the Soviet airliner Aeroflot, for illegally obtaining classified information about France’s supersonic project. Another high-level Soviet spy remained unknown, however, and continued to feed the Soviets information about the Concorde until the spy was identified and arrested in 1967.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
The Myth of Hypoallergenic Pets Seeker+ 2022-04-30 | You may think this is the perfect time to get a hypoallergenic cat or dog, but there's only one problem: they don't really exist. Check out our latest Seeker+ series all about allergies to learn more. youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwwOk5fvpuuIQpbWWgxzPQHIX7mu2f7ba
Are We Close to an Allergy Cure? Seeker+ 2022-04-27 | Is there a cure for allergies? In this episode of Seeker+, we'll look into the different approaches used to help manage allergies. Watch the other episodes in this series: Part 1 - youtu.be/nk7O92DTA4APart 2 - youtu.be/kDuwZzrFO3k» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylistBefore you try and treat your allergies it may help to know exactly what you’re allergic to, and to find out you can see a specialized doctor called an allergist. The first step to help narrow down the list is an interview about your medical history, how often you experience symptoms, what your home and office environment are like, if you have any pets, and if anyone in your family is allergic to anything. If it sounds like you are indeed having an allergic reaction to something there are a few different tests a doctor can order to try and identify the culprit. One is a blood test that looks for abnormally high levels of IgE antibodies. Because these antibodies play such a big role in allergic reactions, elevated levels of certain IgE antibodies could point you in the right direction. There’s also skin tests where potential allergens are pricked against the skin or injected just underneath for more sensitivity. These tests have their limits though and should be administered based on what the allergist thinks the problem is. If something in your environment could be to blame, a blood test might not be particularly helpful because it could miss some allergies. In this instance a skin prick test is better suited. If a specific food may be the problem, it’s important your allergist knows that based on your health history. Otherwise a skin or blood test on a broad range of foods has a high potential for false positives.Once the allergen that’s sending your immune system into overdrive is identified, the next step is figuring out a treatment. Unfortunately there is no way to completely cure an allergy, but there are ways to reduce their frequency or mitigate how severe they are.#Allergies #SeasonalAllergies #Allergy #FoodAllergy #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead more: Hay Feveracaai.org/allergies/allergic-conditions/hay-fever "Allergic rhinitis – commonly known as hay fever – is a group of symptoms affecting the nose. But don’t be misled by the name – you don’t have to be exposed to hay to have symptoms. And hay fever doesn’t cause a fever."Face masks suitable for preventing COVID-19 and pollen allergy. A study in the exposure chamberncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8278371 "Since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, the population in Germany has been asked to wear face masks in public areas. The masks are accepted by the public. People with a pollen allergy have an interest in knowing whether masks can also provide protection against pollen and thus prevent symptoms even without medication."The race to deliver the hypoallergenic catnature.com/articles/d41586-020-02779-3 "Researchers are looking beyond allergen immunotherapy to help people whose pets make them sneeze."--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Who Gets Allergies? Seeker+ 2022-04-26 | So why do some people get allergies, while others don’t? Well that’s exactly the topic of today’s episode, so stay tuned as we dive in.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylistOf course plenty of you don’t have allergies, but that doesn’t mean you won’t some time in the future. So let’s talk more about it.A surprisingly large percentage of people have allergies to at least one substance. By one estimate about 50 million people in the United States do, so that’s about 15% of the population. That percentage has been on the rise for the last 50 years and it looks like it’ll keep trending upward. Generally allergies are more common in children but people of any age can suddenly discover a fun new allergy to something. Environmental allergies can develop with age, and likewise allergies can be outgrown. Actually quite a lot of kids with milk or egg allergies eventually outgrow them, as many as 60-80%. Then they become more powerful than you could possibly imagine. Some allergies rear their ugly heads again though after years of remission. Maddeningly, we’re not sure why. But there do seem to be risk factors that make a person more likely to develop allergies. Some of them are genetic, and some are environmental.Let’s start with genetics. In an effort to see how big a role they play scientists have studied twins. For fraternal twins when one has a peanut allergy, the other also has that allergy only 7% of the time. But when the twins are identical, that allergy is shared 64% of the time. That’s a big increase that points to genes being a factor.A person is more likely to have an allergy if their parents do too, but strangely, a child won’t necessarily have the same allergy as their parents. If someone is allergic to bees, their kid has a greater chance of also being allergic to something, but it could be nuts or cats instead. It’s also possible that an allergy doesn’t appear until adulthood because it’s been slowly building up over time. Exposure to new allergens later in life could trigger new reactions. Things like moving to a new area with different flora or getting a pet cat.#Allergies #SeasonalAllergies #Allergy #FoodAllergy #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead more: Allergies and the Immune Systemhopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/allergies-and-the-immune-system “Allergic disease is one of the most common chronic health conditions in the world. People with a family history of allergies have an increase risk of developing allergic disease. ”What causes allergies?livescience.com/what-causes-allergies “Wondering what causes allergies and if there's a cure? Well, allergies are exaggerated immune reactions to foreign substances. ”Are ‘WiFi allergies’ a real thing? A quick guide to electromagnetic hypersensitivity.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/08/31/are-wifi-allergies-a-real-thing-a-quick-guide-to-electromagnetic-hypersensitivity Sufferers of EHS, estimated as “several” per million people, tend to experience some combination of physical symptoms like nausea, headaches, palpitations, fatigue and rashes/other dermatological problems, often at the same time. --Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Why Are Allergies So Common? Seeker+ 2022-04-25 | Every time spring comes along, it bodes bad news for those who suffer from allergies. So what exactly are allergies and how do they activate the immune system. » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylistThe definition of an allergy is pretty broad. Allergic reactions happen when the body’s immune system overreacts to something that’s normally harmless. These substances are called allergens. For people with allergies, their first exposure to an allergen may be harmless. On the outside, everything might look normal. But on the inside their body is ringing alarm bells and gearing up for future invaders. Days or even years can pass between the first exposure and the first allergic response. Really you never know if you might have an allergy and just not know it yet. Some people may seem as though their bodies are reacting the very first time they’re exposed to an allergen, but they may have unknowingly encountered it before through their skin, or when they were babies being breastfed, or even in the womb. But for their immune system to respond, it must have had a run-in with the perceived threat before.After that initial encounter, a person with allergies will start producing more of a specific antibody inside their… body. Now to be clear, antibodies are an incredibly useful part of your immune system. They’re little Y-shaped proteins that are part of your body’s adaptive immune system, which can learn to recognize new threats and destroy them. Antibodies are also known as immunoglobulins and humans have five varieties: IgG, IgA, IgM, IgD, and IgE. IgE is responsible for a lot of allergic reactions.#Allergies #SeasonalAllergies #Allergy #FoodAllergy #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead more: What are antibodies?livescience.com/antibodies.html “Our body has a specialized search-and-destroy army. Antibodies are key players in that fight.”IgG subclasses and allotypes: from structure to effector functionsfrontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2014.00520/full“Of the five immunoglobulin isotypes, immunoglobulin G (IgG) is most abundant in human serum. The four subclasses, IgG1, IgG2, IgG3, and IgG4, which are highly conserved, differ in their constant region, particularly in their hinges and upper CH2 domains.”Anaphylaxishopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/anaphylaxis “Anaphylaxis, also called allergic or anaphylactic shock, is a sudden, severe and life-threatening allergic reaction that involves the whole body.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
The Science of A Beautiful Mind Seeker+ 2022-04-19 | In this latest episode, we look at A Beautiful Mind with Dr. Dilip Jeste and Chuck Nice to understand the world of John Nash.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylistEach week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!Is there a distinction between visual hallucination for someone with schizophrenia, is that one type? And how does that differ between what you normally encounter in not only as a trope in entertainment, but maybe just in general as voices in your head. What would cause those?What Nash did have is auditory hallucination, in the sense, he heardvoices that were not there. He didn't see people, but he heard voices. He heard the voice of Ed Harris’s character, for example, or his roommate’s character or his niece. He didn't see them, but in his mind he visualized those people. And how can he show that? That's why in the movie,these are shown as real people that he saw.So part of the brain that is involved in visual hallucinations is different from that involved in auditory hallucination. It is just like the part of the brain involved in vision is different from the part involved in hearing. Those are different.What studies show is that if you do brain imaging while you are hearing something, and then you do brain imaging while a person is having auditory hallucinations, you see the same thing happening in the brain. So that means that you really hear those voices. It is almost like a dream. We have a dream and we feel it's really happening. We get so nervous. It's a nightmare and so on.This is like that, except that they're fully conscious and awake and still they're hearing voices or sometimes seeing people.#ABeautifulMind #Schizophrenia #MentalHealth #EdHarris #RussellCrowe #SeekerPlus #Seeker--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Life in a Martian Simulation: Part 2 Seeker+ 2022-04-14 | What's it like to live in a Martian Simulation? Join Sarafina as she experiences what it's like to live there for two weeks. To learn more about what it would take to actually live on Mars, check out our Focal Point: youtu.be/ppNGnm9abyg » Subscribe to Seeker! http://bit.ly/subscribeseeker
The Science of Breaking Bad Seeker+ 2022-04-12 | In this latest episode, we dive into the world of Breaking Bad with Phil Cook and Matthew Broussard, where we discuss the science behind the show.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comEach week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!In the show, Walt uses red Phosphorus in that very first episodeas a reducing agent. You could also use iodine. He also uses the red Phosphorus to poison the gangsters that are threatening him. This is kind of a kinda situation because phosphorus will react with hot water to make something called phosphine. And phosphine is really, really toxic. You don't need much in the air at all.It's a very strong nerve agent, causes respiratory issues, causes severe skin and subcutaneous kind of irritation. The problem is it's the white phosphorus form that's the most reactive. And if you watched the episode, he tosses it into the boiling water and then like immediatelyeveryone is overcome by these fumes of phosphine.There's a little bit of artistic liberty there that was taken, which is fine because it will react. Phosphorus will react to make phosphine. But the white Phosphorus form reacts most rapidly.The red Phosphorus form, you'd have to let it cook for a while to really build up those toxic levels. The other thing that happens with phosphine gases, there's a side reaction where you create diphosphine and phosphine. When they get in the air in a concentrated enough amount, they become pyrophoric, which means as soon as they come in contact with oxygen in the air, they burst into flames. They kind of auto ignite.So you can imagine this situation where he's got this kind of frying pan with some water that he pours into it. And then he throws in the redphosphorus from match heads. In reality, it would have burst into flames if that reaction was happening at a fast enough rate because of the byproducts that you would make in addition to the phosphine gas.#BreakingBad #WalterWhite #AaronPaul #BryanCranston #Chemistry #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Life in a Martian Simulation: Part 1 Seeker+ 2022-04-11 | What's it like to live in a Martian Simulation? Join Sarafina as she experiences what it's like to live there for two weeks. To learn more about what it would take to actually live on Mars, check out our Focal Point: youtu.be/ppNGnm9abyg » Subscribe to Seeker! http://bit.ly/subscribeseeker
What Would It Take to Terraform Other Planets? Seeker+ 2022-04-06 | What if you could turn Mars or Venus into another Earth? Would you do it? That’s the idea behind terraforming, but what does it actually entail? Plus, if this were to happen in the future, what are the odds of something like this succeeding? In the third and final episode about the weather, Julian explores modifying the weather on steroids: terraforming our neighboring planets.Watch the other episodes in this series: Part 1 - youtu.be/t5Z-mrmsS7sPart 2 - youtu.be/0P0Ocv6D2AI» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comIf you're like us, you’ve played your fair share of video games and in some of them you can build and construct without limitations. You can make whole cities, you can alter the environmental conditions, and do all these things on other worlds. This is basically the idea of terraforming. The line of thinking goes that an environment isn’t suitable for humanity, whether because it’s too hot, too cold, maybe it doesn’t have an atmosphere we can “breathe," so the place is modified to accommodate all of these pressing needs. One of the first scientists to propose a terraforming project was actually Carl Sagan, yes the Carl Sagan. He published an article in 1961 that involved altering Venus to make it more Earth-like. Before diving into his proposal, if it sounds strange to imagine that such a famous scientist would propose an outlandish idea steeped more in science-fiction than science fact, well here’s a little more context for you. Scientists had just figured out how to modify the weather about fifteen years earlier with cloud seeding experiments, which is all about modifying clouds to increase precipitation. So, it wasn’t far-fetched to believe this concept could be taken even further to a global level by altering the climate. By the 60s were also when we finally learned more about the conditions on Venus, especially its thick clouds, upending decades of previous thought about the planet. So in the article, Sagan suggested infusing Venus’ carbon dioxide-dominated atmosphere with algae to convert the CO2 into organic compounds, reducing the runaway greenhouse effect, hopefully cooling the planet. Obviously, this proposal never came to fruition and later on, Sagan himself even thought the idea was flawed. Again, terraforming is much easier said than done. #Weather #Terraforming #Terraform #Mars #Venus #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Read More:Can We Terraform Mars to Make It Earth-Like? Not Anytime Soon, Study Suggestsspace.com/41318-we-cant-terraform-mars.html“ A main staple of many Mars-colonization concepts is terraforming — a hypothetical process of changing the conditions on a planet to make it habitable for life that exists on Earth, including humans, without a need for life-support systems. Unfortunately, according to a new paper, with existing technologies, terraforming Mars is simply not possible.”The Definitive Guide To Terraforminguniversetoday.com/127311/guide-to-terraforming“In recent years, we’ve heard luminaries like Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking claiming that humanity needs a “backup location” to ensure our survival, private ventures like Mars One enlisting thousands of volunteers to colonize the Red Planet, and space agencies like NASA, the ESA, and China discussing the prospect of long-term habitability on Mars or the Moon. From all indications, it looks like terraforming is yet another science-fiction concept that is migrating into the realm of science fact.”Forget Mars: Let's Terraform Venus Instead!interestingengineering.com/forget-mars-lets-terraform-venus“Luckily, with the right kind of ecological techniques and some serious elbow grease, Venus could be terraformed into an ocean planet with mild temperatures and endless beachfront property. As with Mars, it comes down to three major goals.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Controlling the Weather Isn’t Science Fiction Seeker+ 2022-04-05 | The idea of controlling the weather sounds like an evil plan hatched by a James Bond villain, but it’s closer to reality than you might think. In this episode, we deep dive into the ways people have tried to harness the weather, be it for good or nefarious purposes.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comHere’s a true story that once made headlines, but today is little remembered: In the 60s, war was raging in Vietnam and the U.S. military thought “Well this isn’t going our way; maybe we should try something a little more unconventional?”, which usually doesn’t end well. Their idea was to start a clandestine operation to extend the monsoon season in Vietnam by releasing silver and lead iodide into an existing storm. By making more rain, the goal was to increase flooding, thereby disrupting troop movement and the delivery of supplies for the North Vietnamese. The “enemy” would be destabilized and the U.S. would win the war. “Make mud, not war” was even an unofficial catchphrase used by the pilots on these cloud-seeding missions.These missions were dubbed "Operation Popeye." They went on for five years before the public found out about them and the cloud seeding stopped. While there's no confirmation that these missions had any real effect, we can confirm what was happening in the skies based on atmospheric science and previous lab experiments. The U.S. isn’t the only country to dabble in weather modification, but it’s not always used for nefarious purposes. See, after Operation Popeye, weather modification was banned from being used in warfare. However, it’s still allowed when it comes to peaceful purposes.#Weather #Climate #ArtificialRain #CloudSeeding #WeatherControl #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Read More:With Operation Popeye, the U.S. government made weather an instrument of warpopsci.com/operation-popeye-government-weather-vietnam-war“Though it cycled through several names in its history, “Operation Popeye” stuck. Its stated objective—to ensure Americans won the Vietnam War—was never realized, but the revelation that the U.S. government played God with weather-altering warfare changed history.”Does cloud seeding really work? An experiment above Idaho suggests humans can turbocharge snowfallscience.org/content/article/does-cloud-seeding-really-work-experiment-above-idaho-suggests-humans-can-turbocharge“Cloud seeding—sowing clouds with small particles to make them rain or snow—has a reputation as dodgy as the weather. That's because even though scientists have been seeding clouds since the 1940s, there was precious little proof the technique worked. Now, researchers flying two small planes through a bank of clouds in Idaho have shown, for the first time outside the lab, that humans can artificially turbocharge snowfall.”Geoengineering: Can we control the weather?livescience.com/geoengineering-the-weather“As modern technology advances and our understanding of meteorological processes grows, scientists are discovering new ways to control the weather. Instead of succumbing to nature's schedule, projects are in place to make the skies rain, remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and prevent extreme weather events such as hurricanes and flooding.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Why Is the Weather So Hard to Predict? Seeker+ 2022-04-04 | If you think the weather forecast is always wrong, well then we’ve got news for you. In Part 1 of this series about the weather, Julian explains everything you need to know about predicting the forecast and why it’s inherently a chaotic mess of math and hailstorms.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comForecasting the weather is pretty hard stuff, to put it mildly. Meteorologists look at real-time data from numerous sources like weather balloons, buoys, radar, and satellites to make predictions about what might happen next, and even with all that data there’s always some uncertainty. The weather is inherently unpredictable and meteorologists try to provide order for that chaos. In fact, a key principle in chaos theory, the “butterfly effect,” has its origins in weather forecasting.The term “butterfly effect” was coined in the 60s by meteorologist Edward Lorenz. The idea goes that small changes to initial conditions can have large consequences down the road. The saying you’ll often hear is “a butterfly flapping its wings on one side of the world can cause a hurricane on the other side,” but that’s not how the effect got its name. It actually relates to the resulting shape when Lorenz plotted points to equations representing the motion of a gas on a graph. These plotted points kind of look like a butterfly’s wings and show that small changes can make big differences, but that the outcomes aren’t totally random. Whatever happens still has to be within the realm of possibility. Today, meteorologists largely rely on two major modeling systems: the American model and the European model. Both run on some of the fastest supercomputers in the world, handle tons of variables for things like temperature and pressure, and gather millions of measurements to help handle the initial conditions of the atmosphere. Between the two of them, most forecasters actually agree that the European system is a tad more accurate, mainly because it has a more powerful supercomputing system and can rely on medium-range forecasts. Those are the forecasts between 3-7 days. #Weather #Climate #Forecast #Meteorology #Terraforming #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Read More:How Reliable Are Weather Forecasts?scijinks.gov/forecast-reliability“A seven-day forecast can accurately predict the weather about 80 percent of the time and a five-day forecast can accurately predict the weather approximately 90 percent of the time. However, a 10-day—or longer—forecast is only right about half the time.”When the Butterfly Effect Took Flighttechnologyreview.com/2011/02/22/196987/when-the-butterfly-effect-took-flight“On a winter day 50 years ago, Edward Lorenz, SM ‘43, ScD ‘48, a mild-mannered meteorology professor at MIT, entered some numbers into a computer program simulating weather patterns and then left his office to get a cup of coffee while the machine ran. When he returned, he noticed a result that would change the course of science.”One More Coronavirus Problem: Accurate Weather Forecastsnpr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/04/03/826848818/one-more-coronavirus-problem-accurate-weather-forecasts“The National Weather Service uses more than 250 million measurements from aircraft every year, which are fed into complex weather computer models. As of the end of March, meteorological data provided by U.S. aircraft had dropped by half.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
The Science of Jackass Seeker+ 2022-03-29 | How does the JACKASS crew survive such brutal stunts? And should we all try to do them for funzies? Join our guests Dr. Adam Goodcoff & Cole Garrett and find out!» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comEach week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!Let’s talk about bruising because we see a few different ways thatthey are getting bruised up. One, for example, is when Johnny Knoxville gets this riot gun projectile shot into his belly.So, how does the body heal itself and deal with that type of blunt trauma? Basically, when you injure the body or have some kind of bleeding underneath the skin, you'll see bruising, and that bruising can come in the form of whatever hit you and just the damage of the capillaries, which are the small vessels in that area, or it can be larger. If you kind of have a big injury and rupture a big vein or something like that, you're going to have a massive amount of bruising. Or think of gettingpunched in the face, there's a lot of blood vessels there, a ton of blood will come out and pool there.When you see stuff like what happened to Johnny Knoxville, taking all that force to the abdomen, that's just like being in a car accident. With that amount of force, you can easily rupture your spleen or have a laceration to the liver. There's a ton of serious outcomes.#Jackass #JackassMovie #Stunts #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Why Venusian, Not Venerean #Shorts Seeker+ 2022-03-19 | If you didn’t already know, Earth’s got an evil twin. Its name is Venus and in our latest Seeker+ series, we cover everything you should know about the planet.Learn more here: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwwOk5fvpuuJ4WctPitaZajSuujWlzY8i
So Long Mars, Venus Is NASA’s Hottest New Thing Seeker+ 2022-03-16 | Why does it feel like Venus is suddenly everywhere in the news? Maybe it’s because of a controversial study suggesting life could exist in the clouds or because the planet offers a glimpse at what happens when the climate gets out of control. Perhaps it’s actually something else. In the third and final episode about Venus, Julian explains why the planet is back in the spotlight again. Watch the other episodes in this series: Part 1 - youtu.be/BCUqDel7slYPart 2 - youtu.be/IfjJLWuHYwgLearn more about NASA's Venus rover here: youtube.com/watch?v=UAhVi7IkL08» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comTo understand why Venus is seemingly everywhere today, let's back up a couple of decades first. From about the 60s to the 80s, Venus was actually a central focus of space exploration. It was the planet next door that we could reach in shorter and cheaper intervals than sending spacecraft to our other planetary neighbor, Mars. But by the 90s, like a broken VCR, things took a hard pause.In the Summer of 2021, as part of NASA’s Discovery program, two missions to Venus were selected. Since the 90s, there have been more than 30 Venus proposals to NASA, but none were chosen. One of the two recent missions that were selected is called DAVINCI+. The mission will include an orbiter and a descent probe. The orbiter has four cameras onboard that will image Venus in multiple wavelengths from above, while the probe will have a slightly more treacherous journey. The probe will measure Venus’ atmosphere in greater detail by using a couple of spectrometers to determine the type of compounds that make up the atmosphere. Scientists are hoping these findings will shed new light on how and when its atmosphere got so bad. Venus wasn’t always the hellish place we know it as today. It’s theorized that Venus may have even had an ocean almost 700 million years ago until a runaway greenhouse effect suffocated the planet. So knowing more about what went wrong with Venus can help planetary scientists compare Venus to Earth and potential Earth-like exoplanets, which for the latter, seems like an alluring opportunity as the search for alien life solidifies its place in the mainstream. #Venus #SolarSystem #Planet #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:Why Venus is back in the exploration limelightspace.com/venus-exploration-campaign-nasa-missions“On Wednesday (June 2), NASA announced that it will launch two missions to Earth's hellishly hot sister planet by 2030 — an orbiter called VERITAS and an atmospheric probe known as DAVINCI+. The duo will break a long Venus drought for the space agency, which hasn't launched a dedicated mission to the second rock from the sun since the Magellan radar-mapping orbiter in 1989.”NASA Selects 2 Missions to Study ‘Lost Habitable’ World of Venusnasa.gov/press-release/nasa-selects-2-missions-to-study-lost-habitable-world-of-venus“DAVINCI+ will measure the composition of Venus’ atmosphere to understand how it formed and evolved, as well as determine whether the planet ever had an ocean… VERITAS will map Venus’ surface to determine the planet’s geologic history and understand why it developed so differently than Earth.”NASA to Explore Divergent Fate of Earth’s Mysterious Twin with Goddard’s DAVINCI+nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2021/nasa-to-explore-divergent-fate-of-earth-s-mysterious-twin-with-goddard-s-davinci“The science impact of DAVINCI+ will reach even beyond the solar system to Venus-like planets orbiting other stars (exoplanets), which are expected to be common and will represent important targets for NASA’s upcoming James Webb Space Telescope. But these planets may be difficult to interpret, especially if they are enveloped in thick Venus-like clouds.”VERITAS, NASA’s Venus mapperplanetary.org/space-missions/veritas “These are some of the key questions that NASA’s VERITAS mission aims to answer. VERITAS — short for Venus Emissivity, Radio science, InSAR, Topography, And Spectroscopy — will provide us with the highest resolution global maps of Venus' surface to identify specific geologic and volcanic processes that actively shape it.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
How Venus Went From Dream to Deadly Seeker+ 2022-03-15 | Venus is hell today, and we’ve got hard evidence to back up that idea. However, thanks to sci-fi, for a long time, people actually thought Venus might be a paradise under its thick clouds. In this episode, we examine how our thoughts of the planet evolved over time.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comSome science fiction writers imagined Venus as an ocean world without any land, while others wrote about a primordial twin to Earth that was covered in vast forests, had massive sharks dominating the seas, and even mammal-like creatures that were just getting started. Another vision depicted Venus as more of a paradise, eden-like in almost every regard. These many far-flung ideas about Venus persisted for decades — and without much evidence to suggest otherwise, they remained the popular notions of what life on Venus was like. Yes, there were a few outliers during this time who thought Venus was a desolate place under those thick clouds, but it took until the height of the Cold War for hard evidence to come through. Thanks to the space race we slowly realized which vision was actually true. The moon gets all the attention but the Soviets and Americans weren’t just focused on the most expensive cheese run in history. Other celestial bodies were targets for each country’s bragging rights, and their respective space programs sent probes and landers to both Mars and Venus. In 1962, NASA’s Mariner 2 probe reached Venus, which made it the first spacecraft ever to explore another planet. Mariner 1 was supposed to take that title, but because the rocket guidance software had a missing hyphen, the probe went off course and had to be destroyed on launch. Rockets are hard. Still, Mariner 2’s rocket presumably added the hyphen and the mission was a success. As you can imagine, “firsts” were all the rage during the space race so for Venus that’s USA 1, USSR 0. But besides getting there first, the probe did something incredible; when it scanned the cloud-covered world, it changed our understanding of Venus overnight. #Venus #SolarSystem #Planet #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:Every Mission to Venus, Everplanetary.org/space-missions/every-venus-mission“Venus was one of the first planets to be visited by spacecraft from Earth. Probes do not last long on the surface, where the atmosphere is 50 times denser than Earth's and temperatures are hot enough to melt lead. Spacecraft headed to Mercury use Venus' gravity to adjust their trajectories; even missions headed to the outer solar system often fly by Venus first.”These scientists spent decades pushing NASA to go back to Venus. Now they’re on a hot streakpopsci.com/space/nasa-new-venus-missions-davinci-veritas“Our next-door planet is similar to Earth in size and composition, but extreme conditions made Venus a hellscape. Devoted researchers want to know what caused their wildly divergent paths.”Venus, Earth’s Evil Twin, Beckons Space Agenciesscientificamerican.com/article/venus-earths-evil-twin-beckons-space-agencies“The newfound interest stands in stark contrast to the fact that nations have long overlooked Venus in favor of chasing Mars, asteroids and other planets. Over the past 65 years, for example, NASA has sent 11 orbiters and eight landers to Mars, but just two orbiters to Venus—and none since 1994. This has not been for lack of scientific interest. Since the mid-1990s, U.S. scientists alone have submitted nearly 30 Venus proposals to NASA.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Why Venus Didn’t Turn Into Another Earth Seeker+ 2022-03-14 | There are plenty of reasons why Venus gets called Earth’s evil twin. The planet’s got scorching temperatures, a poisonous atmosphere, and crushing pressures, but it also may have been habitable at one time. In Part 1 of this series about Venus, Julian explores how the planet next door turned into a hellscape.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comLet’s look at how Venus compares to Earth. As the similarities go: Earth is only about 5% larger than Venus, the two planets weigh almost the same with Earth edging Venus out again, and they both have iron cores surrounded by a mantle of silicate rock. The prevailing solar system origin theory even suggests that Venus and Earth formed at the same time roughly 4.5 billion years ago, when a nebula condensed into the Sun and heavy, rocky materials formed the inner terrestrial planets. These reasons explain why Venus gets the “twin” moniker, but it’s where the similarities end and the “evil”, unforgiving part begins. Compared to Earth, Venus has a thick, toxic atmosphere filled with carbon dioxide. There are clouds of sulfuric acid, yes clouds of acid, which are so thick and unrelenting that they trap heat in the atmosphere. This runaway greenhouse effect explains why despite not being the closest planet to the Sun, it’s actually the hottest in our solar system, clocking in at around 475 degrees Celsius.To some, Venus may sound like a lost cause, but the planet we know today may not have always been that way. #Venus #SolarSystem #Earth #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:NASA Overview: Venussolarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/venus/overview“Venus is the second planet from the Sun and is Earth’s closest planetary neighbor. It’s one of the four inner, terrestrial (or rocky) planets, and it’s often called Earth’s twin because it’s similar in size and density. These are not identical twins, however – there are radical differences between the two worlds.”NASA Climate Modeling Suggests Venus May Have Been Habitablenasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/nasa-climate-modeling-suggests-venus-may-have-been-habitable“Scientists long have theorized that Venus formed out of ingredients similar to Earth’s, but followed a different evolutionary path. Measurements by NASA’s Pioneer mission to Venus in the 1980s first suggested Venus originally may have had an ocean.”How Venus Turned Into Hell, and How the Earth Is Nextspace.com/venus-runaway-greenhouse-effect-earth-next.html“It's hard to not exaggerate just how bad Venus is. Seriously, imagine in your head what the worst possible planet might be, and Venus is worse than that.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
What It Takes to Live on Mars #Shorts Seeker+ 2022-03-11 | Join Sarafina as she continues her next step of astronaut training. To learn more about what it would take to actually live on Mars, check out our Focal Point: youtu.be/ppNGnm9abyg » Subscribe to Seeker! http://bit.ly/subscribeseeker
What It Takes to Train Like an Astronaut #Shorts Seeker+ 2022-03-09 | What should you do to prepare for space? Follow Sarafina as she goes underwater for her next phases of astronaut training. To learn more about what it would take to actually live on Mars, check out our Focal Point: youtu.be/ppNGnm9abyg » Subscribe to Seeker! http://bit.ly/subscribeseeker
The Science of Dune Seeker+ 2022-03-08 | Time to get your darn head outta the sand and listen to this episode about DUNE with Justin Clark and Julian Huguet. In the episode, they discuss futuristic tech, regenerative healing, and sand worms.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comEach week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!We have to talk about the sand worm in Dune. It's absolutely humongous. They described them as being up to 400 meters long, so four football fields basically. If anything, it seems bigger just in the way that it's moving across the desert. When you start imagining extra-terrestrial biology, there's so many interesting shapes they can take, but a worm is a solid bet. We're very familiar with worms. Nematodes draw a lot of parallels because they can have all these different mouth kind of configurations depending on their environment. If it's in a place where there's a lot of other nematodes it could eat, it might have a tooth to attack. But if it's in another place that it might be eating smaller things or like sifting through the soil, it can have more of a kind of filtered mouth. The sand worms were so massive, like 400 meters in length. For comparison's sake, a blue whale, the largest animal on earth today is like 30 meters in length. But then at those scales, you start to hit issues. Just the sand worm crushing itself under its own weight. The reason sea animals can get so large is because the water supports the weight of their body. And then when they get beached, unfortunately they die because they crush themselves to death. They're just too heavy for their frames to support. So you can imagine a 400 meter long sand worm having this issue, especially because worms are also like invertebrates, they don't have backbones and skeletons to support their body. So if you scale them up, it wouldn't work. It's why you don't see giant insects today. Their exoskeletal structures just can't support them. But the sand worms are a really important part of the Dune universe.#Dune #SpaceTravel #ScienceFiction #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
What Does Zero-G Feel Like? #Shorts Seeker+ 2022-03-07 | Ever wonder what space feels like? Astrophysicist Sarafina Nance got the closest thing to that experience in our latest Field Trip episode. To learn more about what it would take to actually live on Mars, check out our Focal Point: youtu.be/ppNGnm9abyg » Subscribe to Seeker! http://bit.ly/subscribeseeker ____________________Welcome to Field Trip. Tag along on the adventure of a lifetime with Seeker’s most innovative and courageous scientists. Whether they’re delivering medical supplies in remote areas, digging fossils on the Jurassic Coast, or planting coral in at-risk reefs... we’ll be there every step of the way.____________________Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Visit the Seeker website seeker.com/videos Subscribe now! http://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=dnewschannel Seeker on Twitter http://twitter.com/seekerSeeker on Facebook facebook.com/SeekerMedia Seeker http://www.seeker.com
The Science of Loki Seeker+ 2022-02-22 | If you want to dive into topics like free will, Marvel, and multiple dimensions, then today is your LOKI day! Wow, what a pun! Listen as Dominic Andre and Julian Huguet help Ethan attempt to understand these fascinating concepts.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.com Each week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!Talking about the multiverse and free will, do you think that everything is predetermined, that we live in a deterministic universe where because you have no free will, if you can see the beginning point, you can logically see the endpoint of any scenario?In the Loki universe, there is no free will because he's literally killing off anyone who doesn't do exactly what they want to do. So, you can't blame Loki because even when he tries to do something good, and probably many of the universes, he gets killed off, he gets taken out, and they get reset. So, we can't blame any of these people because the person who's really making decisions is the TVA, and so, that's who's really making the decisions specifically in this universe.We can't look at Loki and be like, "Wow, what a horrible person." There are probably many universes where he tried to be a good person, and they're like, "No, you need to be a bad person." That's something he discovers and that's something he gets upset about.#Loki #MultipleDimensions #TomHiddleston #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
What Happens If a Particle Accelerator Hits Your Brain? #Shorts Seeker+ 2022-02-19 | For our latest Seeker+ series we took a really deep look at the Higgs boson. One thing we talk about is why it took an incredible machine like the Large Hadron Collider to find it. Learn more about the "God Particle" here: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwwOk5fvpuuIHfN1iODpP27WtDSkeiupx
What Gave the “God Particle Away? Seeker+ 2022-02-16 | Did you know that it’s actually impossible to observe the Higgs boson? The Higgs boson decays incredibly fast and has a lifespan of just 1 zeptosecond. No instrument we can make can snap an image of it fast enough, but it is possible to see what it turns into when it decays. In the third and final episode about the Higgs boson, Julian talks about how scientists actually found it in the first place.Watch the other episodes in this series:Part 1 - youtu.be/CufRfgjDusgPart 2 - youtu.be/ry0KXMArb6E» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comThe Higgs itself may be impossible to detect, but it is possible to see what it turns into when it decays. It prefers to decay into particle-antiparticle pairs that have a similar mass to itself. That means the particles it will most likely decay into is a bottom quark and an antibottom quark. A bottom quark is a heavier relative of the quarks that make up protons and neutrons.More than half the time the Higgs boson decays into a bottom-antibottom pair, but that doesn’t mean that’s the only thing scientists were on the lookout for. The Higgs boson also decays into pairs of W bosons and other particles we haven’t talked about yet like Muons and Tauons. That’s assuming a collision of two protons makes a Higgs boson at all, which isn’t a guarantee.When the scientists at CERN examined the data from billions and billions of collisions, they concluded the particles they saw at the energies they saw could not be accounted for without a particle like the Higgs boson to a certainty of 5 sigma. They revealed this monumental finding to the public on July 4th, 2012, and there was much rejoicing. Still, they wanted to be extra sure this wasn’t some Higgs-like impostor, so they analyzed 4 times more data. Finally, after looking at over two and a half quadrillion collisions, they decided that was probably enough for them to confidently say they had found the bona fide Higgs boson. With that, the last puzzle piece of the standard model was put in its place. So we’re done here, right? We know everything? No, of course not. Finding the Higgs boson doesn’t mean there’s nothing left to discover in particle physics. In fact, the Higgs boson actually hints at more questions, some tantalizing and some terrifying.#GodParticle #ParticlePhysics #DarkMatter #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:One more piece in the puzzle of the universe—a Higgs-shaped onehttps://www.science.org.au/curious/space-time/higgs-boson“The Higgs mechanism gives quarks and electrons their mass, without which these particles wouldn’t be able to construct atoms, molecules, and us.”5 Sigma What's That?blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/five-sigmawhats-that“Chances are, you heard this month about the discovery of a tiny fundamental physics particle that may be the long-sought Higgs boson. The phrase five-sigma was tossed about by scientists to describe the strength of the discovery. So, what does five-sigma mean?”The status of supersymmetrysymmetrymagazine.org/article/the-status-of-supersymmetry“Once the most popular framework for physics beyond the Standard Model, supersymmetry is facing a reckoning—but many researchers are not giving up on it yet.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Why We Need the Large Hadron Collider Seeker+ 2022-02-15 | To find the Higgs boson, a global collaboration of scientists and engineers had to design and build the most complicated machine ever. In this episode, we look at how the Large Hadron Collider was built and why it almost didn’t see the light of day. » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comWhen the search for the Higgs began there was nothing that could get them going fast enough. So scientists set to work and in the 1980s they proposed the biggest, baddest proton smasher imaginable. No, not the Large Hadron Collider, we're talking about America’s Superconducting Super Collider. Sounds pretty super doesn’t it? The SSC, as it’s known for short, was supposed to be an absolutely mammoth machine. It would have been a ring nearly 90 kilometers around running underneath Texas, capable of smashing protons together with an energy of 40 trillion electron volts. It was supposed to be so absurdly powerful that the governments of Europe nearly scrapped their plans for their own accelerator. Fortunately for us, they didn’t.Europe’s accelerator is, of course, the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC. Hadrons are particles that interact with the strong force, like protons, in case you ever wondered. The LHC is often called the most complex machine ever built by humans, which is quite a claim. #GodParticle #LargeHadronCollider #SuperconductingSuperCollider #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:How Particle Accelerators Workenergy.gov/articles/how-particle-accelerators-work“A particle accelerator is a machine that accelerates elementary particles, such as electrons or protons, to very high energies. On a basic level, particle accelerators produce beams of charged particles that can be used for a variety of research purposes.”Inside the Large Hadron Collidersymmetrymagazine.org/article/inside-the-large-hadron-collider“The LHC collides two beams of protons at a combined energy of 13 TeV, or 13 trillion electronvolts. An electronvolt is a unit of energy, like a calorie or a joule. Electronvolts are used when to talk about the energy of motion of really small things such as particles and atoms.”The Supercollider That Never Wasscientificamerican.com/article/the-supercollider-that-never-was“The Texas-based high-energy accelerator would have easily found the Higgs and been capable of searching for still more evidence of new physics”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
What Is the “God Particle”? Seeker+ 2022-02-14 | “The God Particle” is a sexy name, but many physicists absolutely hate it. It’s also led people to think that maybe the discovery of the Higgs boson has something to do with the search for God, but it doesn’t. Its discovery isn’t evidence of any sort of higher being and that’s not why scientists were searching for it. In Part 1 of this series about the Higgs boson, Julian takes an in-depth look at this discovery.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comThe particle’s discovery may not resolve the debate about God, but it was nonetheless a huge advancement of our understanding of the universe. The Higgs Boson made the behavior of other particles we’ve discovered make sense, it explained how atoms could exist and stars could shine. It was the last big piece of a fantastically complex jigsaw puzzle, and it’s not like scientists had a picture on a box to guide them. The Higgs Boson was the last piece of a puzzle, and in a literal sense that’s true. It was the last particle predicted by the Standard Model of Particle Physics, which is our framework for organizing and describing elementary particles.The Standard Model is split into two main groups. One group is the fermions, which are particles like electrons and quarks, the building blocks of protons and neutrons. The other group is the bosons, which particles use to exchange energy.Photons, Gluons, and the W and Z bosons are called gauge bosons. Then there’s the Higgs boson, which is special. It’s not the boson itself that’s so important, but its existence points to something larger that solves a big problem with the standard model.#GodParticle #ParticlePhysics #Physics #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:The Man Who Coined 'The God Particle' Explains: It Was A Joke!npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/03/15/174440162/the-man-who-coined-the-god-particle-explains-it-was-a-joke“We've explained it many times: Physicists are irked when we in the media call the Higgs Boson, "The God Particle." The Higgs is important because the elusive subatomic particle is believed to give everything its mass. But as Marcelo Gleiser — of NPR's 13.7 — explained, the nickname doesn't quite explain the particle because while it "does have something of a centralizing influence," it's "nothing quite divine."”DOE Explains...the Standard Model of Particle Physicsenergy.gov/science/doe-explainsthe-standard-model-particle-physics“The Standard Model of Particle Physics is scientists’ current best theory to describe the most basic building blocks of the universe. It explains how particles called quarks (which make up protons and neutrons) and leptons (which include electrons) make up all known matter. It also explains how force carrying particles, which belong to a broader group of bosons, influence the quarks and leptons.”The Higgs bosonhttps://home.cern/science/physics/higgs-boson“A problem for many years has been that no experiment has observed the Higgs boson to confirm the theory. On 4 July 2012, the ATLAS and CMS experiments at CERN's Large Hadron Collider announced they had each observed a new particle in the mass region around 125 GeV.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
The Science of Squid Game Seeker+ 2022-02-08 | Do you think you can survive this episode? We’re discussing gun shot wounds, falling to your death, and all things Squid Game w/ Dr. Richard Brown and Austin Rogers. » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.com Each week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!So we're talking about the injuries in Squid Game including how people are dying or just getting severely injured in this show, and whether or not it was realistic. In the series, there's a scene where Kang Sae-byeok has this huge shard of glass in her gut and she pulls it out with just her hand and then just kind of ties something around. What is the move? If we have a shard in us, do we leave it until we get to a hospital? Do we dump alcohol on it? What's the move here? In real life, you don't pull something out. The reason for that is in real life, if it's occluding a vessel and you pull it out, you unclot the vessel, the obstruction, because it could be obstructing the bleeding and then you bleed out and you die. So in movie terms, it depends on what they hit. If that was a flesh wound and it was just into the muscle and the soft tissues, pulling it out, it's not going to do anything. But if it actually penetrated the abdominal cavity, you could have intestines and stuff coming out and yeah, you could have a major problem. #SquidGame #SquidGameSeries #LeeJungJae #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Why Are Stimulants Used to Treat the Brain? #Shorts Seeker+ 2022-02-02 | Our latest Seeker+ series is all about ADHD so we invited a neuroscientist and a clinical counselor to tell us about it. We asked about how prescription stimulants like Ritalin or Adderall can affect people with ADHD so differently from people without it, and we got some bonus science about depression and MDMA, a drug better known as Ecstasy.Learn more about ADHD here: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwwOk5fvpuuIe0jiE5dpzxqw9rcEdHQaE
Why Does ADHD Seem So Common? Seeker+ 2022-02-02 | It would be great if people with ADHD could have their brains scanned and the results would illuminate a flashing neon sign that definitively diagnosed the condition, but of course it’s never that simple. In the final episode on ADHD, we’ll dive into how it’s diagnosed and what the most common treatments seem to be.Watch the other episodes in this series:Part 1 - youtu.be/EyjaW6oN1T0Part 2 - youtu.be/W54vyWtJI_U» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comResearch indicates the ADHD brain looks and behaves differently from neurotypical brains, but imaging technology like CT scans, PET scans, or MRIs can’t be used to diagnose it, in part because they’re not sensitive enough yet to work on a case-by-case basis or differentiate between other possible causes.There are a wide malady of tests that can be given, but frankly, you don't even need any tests necessarily to diagnose ADHD. It could be diagnosed through observation, interview, that sort of thing. Often it just comes down to the observations of a trained medical professional like a psychiatrist, psychologist, or pediatrician. To meet the criteria for an ADHD diagnosis the symptoms have to negatively impact work, school, or social functioning, be persistent for at least 6 months and in at least two settings like at school and at home, and they have to appear before age 12. Patients under 17 must have at least 6 symptoms, and those 17 and up must show at least 5. Still, even detailed guidelines applied by medical professionals don’t guarantee an accurate diagnosis.#ADHD #ADD #Neuroscience #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Read More:Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: Diagnosisnhs.uk/conditions/attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder-adhd/diagnosis“Diagnosing ADHD in adults is more difficult because there's some disagreement about whether the list of symptoms used to diagnose children and teenagers also applies to adults. In some cases, an adult may be diagnosed with ADHD if they have 5 or more of the symptoms of inattentiveness, or 5 or more of hyperactivity and impulsiveness, listed in diagnostic criteria for children with ADHD.”ADHD Medications for Adults and Children: ADD Stimulants, Nonstimulants & Moreadditudemag.com/adhd-medication-for-adults-and-children “Adderall. Vyvanse. Ritalin. Strattera. Concerta. The number of ADHD medication options is staggering, and finding the right treatment feels overwhelming at times. Here, an ADHD specialist explains the stimulant and nonstimulant options for adults and children in terms we can all understand.”How Technology Can Help You Cope With ADHDwired.com/story/how-technology-help-cope-with-adhd“Technology helps ADHDers by providing brain stimulation, but technology can also help the brain slow down through meditation practices and apps such as Calm, Headspace, and Open, which includes movement with mindfulness. Do we need technology to meditate? Absolutely not. But can it help achieve results? Absolutely.”Neuro Transmissionsyoutube.com/c/neurotransmissions/featured“Neuroscientist Alie and clinical therapist Micah created Neuro Transmissions with a singular mission in mind: explain the brain . . . simply!”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Why You Think You Might Have ADHD Seeker+ 2022-02-01 | Most people experience many symptoms of ADHD to some degree, and one of the most well known is the inability to stay focused. However, there are other less common symptoms of ADHD that people often struggle with. In this episode on ADHD, Julian describes these other symptoms and how they can overlap with other disorders.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comPeople with ADHD can also have an ability to dial into certain tasks with the intensity of a laser beam. This so-called hyperfocus can be confusing for their parents, teachers, or co-workers who don’t understand how they can be totally absorbed by one task and then seemingly absent for many others.The reason ADHD is a disorder though is that inability to focus on important tasks can be so persistent it disrupts daily life.ADHD is split into three subtypes with different associated symptoms. There’s the inattentive type that’s characterized by that inability to focus, or to finish tasks or even start them.There’s the hyperactive / impulsive type, which is associated with an inability to sit still or to stop talking, or a tendency to interrupt others or blurt out the answers to questions before they’re completed. And then there’s the combined type, the chocolate and vanilla soft-serve swirl of the other two. Symptoms of the hyperactive / impulsive type are pretty easy to spot, but the inattentive type is less obvious, and interestingly it seems to have a big impact on how we diagnose people depending on their gender. #ADHD #ADD #Neuroscience #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Read More:Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)nhs.uk/conditions/attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder-adhd/symptoms “Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a condition that affects people's behaviour. People with ADHD can seem restless, may have trouble concentrating and may act on impulse. Symptoms of ADHD tend to be noticed at an early age and may become more noticeable when a child's circumstances change, such as when they start school.”Anxiety? Depression? Or ADHD? It Could Be All Threeadditudemag.com/adhd-anxiety-depression-the-diagnosis-puzzle-of-related-conditions“ADHD is often missed when it co-exists with depression or anxiety, and vice versa. Here’s what to look for — and how to ensure you get a thorough and accurate diagnosis.”What Are the 3 Types of ADHD?additudemag.com/3-types-of-adhd“The three types of ADHD are primarily hyperactive and impulsive, primarily inattentive, and combined. Each presentation is distinguished by a set of behavioral symptoms outlined in the DSM-5 that physicians use to diagnose the condition.”Face It — People with ADHD Are Wired Differentlyadditudemag.com/current-research-on-adhd-breakdown-of-the-adhd-brain“Understanding how ADHD brains are wired is critical for understanding how to explain and treat the disorder. For decades, we weren’t sure how ADHD brains worked, and this led to many misunderstandings about the syndrome.”Neuro Transmissionsyoutube.com/c/neurotransmissions/featured“Neuroscientist Alie and clinical therapist Micah created Neuro Transmissions with a singular mission in mind: explain the brain . . . simply!”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
How Is the ADHD Brain Different? Seeker+ 2022-01-31 | If you’re online, you may notice that conversations around ADHD are everywhere. You may even be starting to wonder, as you flick from one app to the next, that you yourself may have ADHD. So in Part 1 of this series about ADHD, Julian explores what this disorder is, what’s happening in the brain, and so much more.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comSo, what is ADHD? ADHD can come in a few different flavors. Typically, when we think of ADHD, we think of someone who's hyperactive. Someone who's just all over the place, but ADHD is a disorder, a diagnosis that describes someone who struggles with executive functioning, and with attention, typically to the degree that it causes pretty significant disruption to daily life.People with ADHD aren’t just particularly inattentive and/or hyperactive, their brains are empirically different compared to people without ADHD. People with ADHD appear to be low on two important chemicals in their brains, dopamine and norepinephrine. But their brains might not just fire differently, they could be built different. Particularly there appears to be differences in the circuitry that connects the front of their brains to other parts of it.#ADHD #ADD #Neuroscience #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Read More:Why everyone's talking about ADHD right now (and why it’s kinda annoying)mashable.com/article/adhd-tiktok-twitter“Over the past year or so, ADHD (attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder) seems to have exploded on social media, particularly on TikTok and Twitter. Simultaneously (almost inevitably), the growing interest sparked increasingly contentious online discourse about it.”What is ADHD?cdc.gov/ncbddd/adhd/facts.html“ADHD is one of the most common neurodevelopmental disorders of childhood. It is usually first diagnosed in childhood and often lasts into adulthood. Children with ADHD may have trouble paying attention, controlling impulsive behaviors (may act without thinking about what the result will be), or be overly active.”7 Differences in the ADHD Brain vs. the Neurotypical Brainpsychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-reality-gen-z/202112/7-differences-in-the-adhd-brain-vs-the-neurotypical-brain “A 2017 MRI imaging study found that overall brain volume and brain volume in six of the seven brain structures listed below were smaller in people with an ADHD diagnosis. Multiple studies have validated significant brain developmental delay and 3-5 percent smaller whole brain volume in individuals with ADHD compared to neurotypical brains.”Neuro Transmissionsyoutube.com/c/neurotransmissions/featured“Neuroscientist Alie and clinical therapist Micah created Neuro Transmissions with a singular mission in mind: explain the brain . . . simply!”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Why Flying Now Is Slower Than the 1960s #Shorts Seeker+ 2022-01-19 | While it feels like everything is moving faster these days, there’s actually one thing moving slower now than it used to. We're talking about commercial airplanes. Did you know that it takes about 19 more minutes flying from New York to Denver today than it did in the 1980s? Why is that?If you want to learn more about pushing flight to greater speeds aka breaking the sound barrier, check out our three-part Supersonic series here: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwwOk5fvpuuLAHTL9GBKnG6fJVdBR3ZLR
Supersonic Air Travel May Soon Be a Reality Seeker+ 2022-01-19 | Supersonic travel isn’t here for the public to use… yet. However, NASA and a handful of private startups are exploring making supersonic travel a reality for the first time in almost 20 years. One of their goals is to make a quieter sonic boom, which is a lot easier said than done. In the last episode on supersonic flight, Julian explores the future of traveling faster than the speed of sound. Watch the other episodes in this series:Part 1 - youtu.be/p7dNDkgNjMwPart 2 - youtu.be/pmXsrTGTGes» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comOne company, Spike Aerospace, is developing a jet that the vast majority of us will still never get to buckle into. They’re focused on making small private planes aimed at wealthy business executives. Another startup called Boom has a very different strategy. They’re developing a jet called the Overture that’s eerily reminiscent of the only commercially successful SST to date, the Concorde. Boom’s stated goal is to eventually offer flights anywhere in the world in under 4 hours for as little as 100 dollars a ticket. Some big airlines have shown interest; United ordered 15 Overtures. But as the makers of Concorde will tell you, just because an airline has placed an order doesn’t mean they won’t change their mind and cancel later. Even if these designs can get off the ground, there’s still a big problem they’ll have to overcome. Civil supersonic flights over the US are still banned because of that inescapable consequence of the physics of sound, the sonic boom. In the last few years though, engineers have been searching for a way to turn down the boom’s volume. Maybe if it’s quiet enough, people on the ground won’t mind it (or even notice it), and the FAA might lift its ban. That would open up transcontinental or long haul routes for SSTs, making them viable to buy and operate in bigger numbers and drive down overall costs.One of the most promising hopes for quieter, faster-than-sound travel is being developed by NASA in collaboration with Lockheed Martin.#Supersonic #Concorde #SonicBoom #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Read More:Supersonic Technologiesnasa.gov/feature/supersonic-technologies“The development of a new experimental plane called the X-59 QueSST—which stands for Quiet Supersonic Technology—is advancing as part of the Low-Boom Flight Demonstration mission. When the new X-plane arrives from Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company’s Skunk Works plant, Armstrong researchers will qualify and flight test it.”Aviation companies are plotting the return of supersonic flight — and they think their jets will be better than the Concordebusinessinsider.com/aviation-companies-are-plotting-the-return-of-supersonic-flight-2018-4“Since the Concorde was retired in 2003, supersonic flight has been absent from the aviation industry. Fifteen years later, three startups and a major defense contractor are plotting its return.”Boom Supersonic aims to fly 'anywhere in the world in four hours for $100'http://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/boom-supersonic-four-hours-100-bucks/index.html“Designed to seat between 65 and 88 people, Overture will focus on over 500 primarily transoceanic routes that will benefit from the aircraft's Mach-2.2 speeds -- more than twice as fast as today's subsonic commercial jets. A journey from New York to London would take just three hours and 15 minutes while Los Angeles to Sydney would be cut down to eight and a half hours.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
What Makes a Sonic Boom So Loud? Seeker+ 2022-01-17 | Commercial airplanes now are no faster than they were in the 1960s. We’ve made advances in engines and materials and computers, so why can’t we strap fancy ultra-powerful engines to a jetliner and go from New York to LA in half the time it takes now? There are a lot of reasons and pretty much all of them are rooted in the physics of sound. To understand why the speed of sound is so important for aircraft, first we have to have a solid understanding of what sound is. Here’s everything you need to know about sound and sonic booms in our first of three episodes on supersonic flight. » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comSound is a wave that carries energy. Sound is what’s called a longitudinal wave, and it oscillates in the same direction it propagates. Sound is also a mechanical wave, meaning it needs a medium to travel through. That can be a gas like air, or a liquid, or a solid. Unlike light, it can’t travel through a vacuum. It’s why they say in space no one can hear you scream.Anyway, sound travels at different speeds depending on the medium, moving the slowest through gas and the fastest through a solid. And its speed also changes depending on the temperature of the medium. Temperature is after all how fast molecules are vibrating, so at higher temperatures they’ll bounce off each other more quickly and sound will travel faster. So let’s come back to the key question: why does all this matter for airplanes? Well sound, as we established, travels as air molecules bump into each other, and it moves at a finite speed. Airplanes travel, wait for it… through the air. If an airplane is flying well below the speed of sound the air ahead of it can move out of the way. But as its speed approaches Mach 1, things start to act very, very differently. Even though the plane itself may not be going the speed of sound, air passing over some parts of it like the top of the wing can go supersonic. When that happens, the air molecules get squeezed together faster than they can get out of the way, and they create a shock wave.#Supersonic #Airplanes #ShockWave #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Read More:What Is Supersonic Flight?nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/5-8/features/nasa-knows/what-is-supersonic-flight-58.html“Vehicles that fly at supersonic speeds are flying faster than the speed of sound. The speed of sound is about 768 miles per hour (1,236 kilometers per hour) at sea level. These speeds are referred to by Mach numbers. The Mach number is the ratio of the speed of the aircraft to the speed of sound. Flight that is faster than Mach 1 is supersonic.”Concordebritannica.com/technology/Concorde“Concorde, the first supersonic passenger-carrying commercial airplane (or supersonic transport, SST), built jointly by aircraft manufacturers in Great Britain and France. The Concorde made its first transatlantic crossing on September 26, 1973, and it inaugurated the world’s first scheduled supersonic passenger service on January 21, 1976.”How the Astounding Sonic Boom Phenomenon Actually Worksinterestingengineering.com/how-the-astounding-sonic-boom-phenomenon-actually-works“The shock wave forms a “cone” of pressurized or built-up air molecules, which move outward and rearward in all directions and extend all the way to the ground. As this cone spreads across the landscape along the flight path, it creates a continuous sonic boom along the full width of the cone's base. The sharp release of pressure, after the buildup by the shock wave, is heard as the sonic boom.”--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
The Science of Invention of Lying Seeker+ 2022-01-11 | Today we discuss The Invention Of Lying with Greg Bryant and Jacquie Brown and we find out how to most effectively mislead those closest to you!» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.com Each week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!Instead of just being honest, people throughout the movie were really dishing out their intimate thoughts. They were being very blunt about every single thing that came into their head. Can someone tell if you're lying? There are some signs and they are mostly facial and body signs. There aren't a lot of reliable vocal cues, but there are some really obvious ones. If you reveal that you're nervous, that can come through in your voice, but those are the more subtle cues and the more obvious ones are in the face.When people are talking to you, whether they look you in the eye or not, that's going to mean something. So if they're averting your direct gaze, that means that they're potentially up to something. There's also what are called micro expressions, which are these uncontrollable, very subtle, tiny movements in your muscles, like around your eyes and around your mouth. So if you see tiny, little shakes, in micro expressions, that can indicate that they're trying to manipulate their facial muscles in a way that's maybe different from their more automatic system that is controlling your facial muscles. #TheInventionOfLying #Lying #MicroExpressions #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
This Is the Future of Finding Lost Civilizations Seeker+ 2022-01-05 | What will the future of archaeology look like? And could technology enable us to be less invasive in our approach to archaeology? We get into all of this and more in this episode of Seeker+! » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comPicture a dirt mound, maybe 500 square meters. We think there might be something incredible inside but we don’t know what. Instead of digging carefully into the mound with shovels and brushes for say, 40 years, a fleet of drones is deployed. The drones are equipped with thermal infrared, hyperspectral sensing systems and LiDAR. More on LiDAR later, but basically these drones have the systems to shoot lasers and detect architecture below the surface of the ground with incredible accuracy. Oh and this only takes a few minutes to do.Then these 3D images could be analyzed by a technician to understand not only what the structure looks like underground, but also show in different colors how construction may have occurred in different phases. Computer models can get even more information by comparing these images to a database of similar ones. Remember, no digging at all has occurred. And then, you send tiny robots down to collect DNA from bones or little material samples. Maybe you even 3D print the artifacts that were scanned so that they can be put in museums or brought to schools. Or put in replica buildings. They could even be printed in the same materials like lapis lazuli! #Archaeology #Artifacts #AncientMystery #Seeker #SeekerPlus Read More:Galactic Archaeology: On the Milky Way, Dark Constellations, a Black Hole & Our Galaxy“The Milky Way is an iconic feature of the night sky. In this episode, we’ll help you spot the center of the galaxy and well-known nebulae in the Milky Way. And we’ll explain how galactic archaeologists like Dreia Carrillo figure out what the Milky Way is actually made of.”youtube.com/watch?v=ZoL6Em5OZl4&list=PL6uC-XGZC7X6dljhMx_AnhaIv9vzaLr8G&index=2&t=2sThe High-Tech Future of the Ancient Science of Archaeology“Emerging technologies could soon allow archaeologists to virtually excavate an entire site within an hour. In many ways, archaeology is still conducted in much the same way it has been for centuries. A single archaeological team might work at a particular dig site for more than 40 years, carefully excavating, studying, preserving, and documenting their findings, and they would barely scratch the surface.” onezero.medium.com/the-high-tech-future-of-the-ancient-science-of-archaeology-391bf290efdeThe CyArk“CyArk was founded in 2003 by Ben and Barbara Kacyra after they were shocked and moved by the destruction of 5th century Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan. We continue to lose our heritage at an astounding rate with mounting pressures from climate change, urban development, natural disasters and armed conflict and CyArk seeks to create a record of these places before further loss”cyark.org/about--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
The Controversial Dark Side of Archaeology Seeker+ 2022-01-04 | We’ve learned so much about ancient humans through archaeology over the years but this feels like a good time to talk about whether we should be digging up ancient people and the objects that once supported their livelihoods in the first place. Archaeological digs haven’t always gone down in the most ethical ways. That might be because archaeology really came into its own as an academic discipline in the nineteenth century, right around the same time that modern nation states were emerging. So let’s get into it.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comThere are people who think disturbing any human burial site is wrong, even if it’s done respectfully for scientific reasons. Some think it depends on the beliefs or cultures of the group in question. And there are groups actively working to approach archaeology from a decolonial lens acknowledging how colonial domination was a huge piece of early archaeology.And at the same time, some believe that archaeology will teach modern humans lessons that could really help inform our decisions about the future.What’s amazing is just how much genetics and new technologies are letting us get more and more precise with our analysis. And the tech just keeps getting better.#Archaeology #Artifacts #AncientMystery #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:Decolonization in Archaeological Theory“Decolonizing approaches in archaeology emerged as a means to counter the dominance of colonial ideologies and improve the accuracy.”https://repository.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1171&context=anthro_papersNationalism and Archaeology“This article reviews the historical relationship between the emergence of modern nation-states and the development of archaeology.”jstor.org/stable/223370Sask. First Nation announces discovery of 751 unmarked graves near former residential schoolCowessess Chief Cadmus Delorme made the announcement Thursday.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/cowessess-marieval-indian-residential-school-news-1.6078375--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
How Do Archaeologists Know How Old Things Are? Seeker+ 2022-01-03 | Ultimately the goal of archaeology is to find out about historic humans and their lives. To answer questions about how they lived, what they ate, did for fun, what they believed in, and how they communicated. But beyond just facts about the past, archaeologists are tasked with interpreting them to gain a deeper understanding of why some communities flourished and some failed. Here’s everything you need to know in the first of three episodes on archaeology! » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comSo archaeology - we’re going to talk about some of the coolest discoveries made recently in the field and get into the insane futuristic technology that is completely revolutionizing the field. Because archaeology often gets overlooked in the big science headlines, but it’s literally the study of everything we know about humans of the past. And it takes a lot of careful investigation, insight and plenty of creativity to interpret the things that we’ve left behind. So how does this all go down? Well, the field of archaeology is based around something called the archaeological record. Think of it as the big book of time chronicling who lived where and what they were up to. Unlike a lot of other sciences that involve hands-on experiments and interactions with living people, archaeology is forced to rely on found objects and evidence of activity. Which can make it tricky to find concrete answers.This archaeological record is made up of all the things people have left behind. It’s their trash, their tools, their buildings, and even their bones.#Archaeology #Artifacts #AncientMystery #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:The Science of Archaeology“Archaeologists want to learn all about past peoples: where they lived, what they ate, how they were organized, what they believed, where they succeeded and failed, their language, their religion—everything. In a sense, archaeologists are detectives, finding clues to the past and trying to sort out what happened and why. Archaeologists do more than simply obtain facts about the past; they also interpret the information to create an understanding of the past.” pearsonhighered.com/assets/samplechapter/0/2/0/5/020589531X.pdfWhat Do Archaeologists Do?“The methods used by archaeologists to gather data can apply to any time period, including the recent past. One archaeologist in the U.S. has become known for his study of the garbage discarded by the people of Tuscon, Arizona in the 1970s! This ‘garbology’ project proved that even recent artifacts can reveal a lot about the people who used and discarded them. Over the past 150 years, archaeologists have developed effective methods and techniques for studying the past. Archaeologists also rely on methods from other fields such as history, botany, geology, and soil science.”saa.org/about-archaeology/what-do-archaeologists-doArchaeology enters the ‘atomic age’: a short history of radiocarbon, 1946–1960“Developed in the United States in the late 1940s by an alumnus of the Manhattan Project, radiocarbon dating measures the decay of the radioactive isotope carbon-14 (C14) in organic material, and calculates the time elapsed since the materials were removed from the life cycle.” cambridge.org/core/journals/british-journal-for-the-history-of-science/article/abs/archaeology-enters-the-atomic-age-a-short-history-of-radiocarbon-19461960/855D6E2E66D09F7467C6051C77C2D6B0--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
The Science of Blade Runner 2049 Seeker+ 2021-12-28 | Today we'll help prepare you for the future as we discuss romantic AI, robots, and all things BLADE RUNNER 2049 w/ Rebecca Delgado Smith & Tim Verstynen.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.com Each week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!The whole point in the original Blade Runner was at some point, are the replicants just as human or more human than humans are? That's the famous line that comes out of there - more human than human. Associate Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at the Neuroscience Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, Tim Verstynen said, "At some point, if you're artificially created through some slip and slide tube that Jared Leto has, that you just kind of come out of, but every other aspect of you has feelings, and memories, and emotions, and can feel pain and can cry and can bond and you could do all of that stuff, well, then, you have all the aspects of being a human. Does that mean that just because of what method you were born defines us as human? Or is it based off of your behavior?"These are, in a lot of ways, in the field of artificial intelligence what people talk about a lot. A lot of people write and talk a lot about this, even though it's kind of far off into the future, but, at some point, there should be rights for artificial entities, if we're going to make them have artificial consciousness. We're going to make them have synthetic emotions. Just because we built it doesn't mean that it doesn't have these things. #BladeRunner #BladeRunner2049 #VideoPodcast #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
5 Things You Can Do in the Metaverse #Shorts Seeker+ 2021-12-23 | You may have heard the news that Facebook recently rebranded itself as Meta, making a huge statement about how the company is staking itself on the metaverse.So, we thought we'd take a minute and mention a few things that future you could do in the metaverse.Learn more here: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwwOk5fvpuuIxK8dM2qED1-FZNIK9v-8C
The Metaverse: Incredible Invention or Demise of Society? Seeker+ 2021-12-22 | If you missed episodes one and two that lay out what the metaverse is and how it might get built, be sure to check those out so you know what’s going on here. If you’re up to speed, we can dive in on the two questions we're sure that’s been on your mind since you learned that giant tech companies are trying to build a bigger and more immersive internet. How can the metaverse make the world better? And how might it make it worse?» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comAn obvious concern is people’s privacy. Facebook, now called Meta, became a tremendously wealthy and powerful company by offering a free platform for users to share their pictures and interact. Though “free” doesn’t mean no strings attached. There’s an adage that goes, “if something is free, you are the product.”Tech companies today like Facebook and Google are worth gobs of money because they offer services to people in exchange for data about them. Advertisers can use this data to figure out what you like or what messages you respond to so they can snipe you with a specific ad. A social media profile where a user fills out every minute detail about themselves is basically a hand wrapped present for an advertiser with a little bow on top.Now Meta, is selling users on an even more engrossing platform that, in order to work, will need to collect still more data, like tracking your body, your facial expressions, and your house. As the metaverse takes shape, it’s important that we, the users and inhabitants of this future world, take an interest in how it’s built and who controls it.#Metaverse #FacebookMetaverse #Meta #Seeker #SeekerPlus Read More:What Exactly Is Body Dysmorphic Disorder?“Today, you don’t need to be photoshopped for a magazine or airbrushed for a billboard to alter your appearance—with digital photo filters and editing apps, a new face is just one click away. So, experts are asking what effects that can have on people with BDD, a condition in which people think there’s something wrong with their physical appearance.”youtube.com/watch?v=IIBTth3ckJo&list=PL6uC-XGZC7X5z4nHdUejfSIWix40G52uv&index=6Cambridge Analytica and Facebook: The Scandal and the Fallout So Far“The first step for those filling out the questionnaire was to grant access to their Facebook profiles. Once they did, an app then harvested their data and that of their friends.”nytimes.com/2018/04/04/us/politics/cambridge-analytica-scandal-fallout.htmlFrom ‘Instagram Face’ To ‘Snapchat Dysmorphia’: How Beauty Filters Are Changing The Way We See Ourselves“It is so common among social media users that the term ‘Snapchat Dysmorphia’ was created by plastic surgeon Dr. Tijon Esho in 2018 to describe the increasing phenomenon of people seeking out cosmetic surgery to achieve their filtered face in real life.”forbes.com/sites/annahaines/2021/04/27/from-instagram-face-to-snapchat-dysmorphia-how-beauty-filters-are-changing-the-way-we-see-ourselves/?sh=1b27adb94eff--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
How the Metaverse Will Be Built Seeker+ 2021-12-21 | Constructing a true metaverse is not an easy undertaking. Find out just what it’s going to take to get the technology up and running for a seamless and immersive experience in this episode of Seeker Plus. P.S. This is episode two in a three part series, so be sure to check out the other episodes! » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comA lot of pieces required for this massive undertaking are in place today. VR headsets are at a point where they can render scenes with high enough resolution and frame-rate that they don’t cause motion-sickness, at least not as often. Some don’t even need to be plugged into PC’s graphics cards to work; Facebook’s Quest 2 uses a chip similar to what you might find in a smartphone. Even smartphones could work, though dedicated headsets often have hand-held hardware for interacting with virtual objects, but hand tracking does exist. With the metaverse, companies are seeing an opportunity to make themselves essential for the next internet. A heavyweight title fight is brewing between some of the biggest names in tech, and each has their strengths. Facebook, now called “Meta,” has an enormous user base and if they can convince them that the metaverse is A) worth partaking in and B) best experienced in VR, their ownership of Oculus will be a huge advantage. Epic Games not only has Fortnite, which we established is nearly a metaverse, they also made the game engine Fortnite was built in, Unreal. Unreal is free for developers to download and work in, Epic just takes a cut when the game sells. Google has experience making augmented reality glasses and wearables, the company has mapped entire cities which could be useful for making digital replicas, and their Android operating system is the most widespread in the world. Amazon’s primed to send people physical goods they’ll buy in the virtual world. Microsoft has their mixed reality hololens headset and their established business software suite. Apple has their mobile devices and wearables and the app store. Who's to say who, if anyone, will come out ahead. This could go any number of ways, and some unknown dark horse could end up being the savviest operator or breakthrough innovator.#Metaverse #FacebookMetaverse #Meta #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:Everyone wants to own the metaverse including Facebook and Microsoft. But what exactly is it?“Meta envisions a virtual world where digital avatars connect through work, travel or entertainment using VR headsets.”usatoday.com/story/tech/2021/11/10/metaverse-what-is-it-explained-facebook-microsoft-meta-vr/6337635001A Look At The Oculus Quest 2’s New Touch Controllers“When Facebook is gearing up to launch the Oculus Quest 2, with its higher resolution and promises of a unified PC/wireless VR future, it may seem weird to be excited about, of all things, the controllers.”forbes.com/sites/joeparlock/2020/10/05/a-look-at-the-oculus-quest-2s-new-touch-controllers/?sh=4616f4e37ed6The Metaverse: What It Is, Where to Find it, and Who Will Build It“Technology frequently produces surprises that nobody predicts. However, the biggest developments are often anticipated decades in advance. In 1945 Vannevar Bush described what he called the ‘Memex’ a single device that would store all books, records and communications, and mechanically link them together by association. This concept was then used to formulate the idea of ‘hypertext’ (a term coined two decades later), which in turn guided the development of the World Wide Web (developed another two decades later). The ‘Streaming Wars’ have only just begun, yet the first streaming video took place more than 25 years ago.”https://www.matthewball.vc/all/themetaverse--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Why is Facebook Building a Metaverse? Seeker+ 2021-12-20 | Mark Zuckerberg starred in a video that featured, along with an inexplicably placed bottle of barbecue sauce, an important announcement for the company. Facebook was officially changing its name to Meta, a sign of just how much Zuckerberg has staked the company’s future on the metaverse. After watching the presentation, we still weren’t exactly sure we understood what the metaverse is, or why we’d want to participate in it. So we did some digging.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comVideo games have been bringing people together virtually for decades in a way that more closely resembles the metaverse than other online media. Some games incorporate so many features of a metaverse, the similarities are hard to unsee. Some argue that Minecraft should count as a metaverse. It’s a game people spend hours upon hours in, literally sculpting their own worlds cube by cube. If the world is hosted on a public server it can be shared by huge numbers of people, each one of them capable of contributing to it. Minecraft economies have cropped up organically where players can buy and sell goods with in-game currency or legal tender. Another game that’s been pointed to as an existing metaverse is Fortnite. It had a meteoric rise as a free-to-play battle royale, but it’s grown into so much more. Its popularity brought big competing powers together like Microsoft and Sony, allowing players using hardware from each company to play together and even use characters that were once exclusive to their games like Kratos from God of War and Master Chief from Halo. So a lot of ingredients are there, but for a few key reasons some would argue they fall short of a true metaverse. For one, they’re still experienced the same way we consume most things on the internet: through a flat screen. To separate itself from the internet as we know it, users should feel a sense of “presence”, like they’re actually inhabiting the world. What we have today also falls short in two other key areas. One is the limit for concurrent users in a world. One more thing the metaverse requires is greater interoperability, although exactly how much no one can agree. You might consider each of these games a metaverse unto themselves, but what many futurists picture is one massive, all-encompassing online realm. It’ll even include the internet as we know it today and augmented reality that sits atop the real world.#Metaverse #FacebookMetaverse #Meta #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:What is the metaverse and how will it work?“Essentially, it’s a world of endless, interconnected virtual communities where people can meet, work and play, using virtual reality headsets, augmented reality glasses, smartphone apps or other devices.”apnews.com/article/meta-facebook-explaining-the-metaverse-f57e01cd5739840945e89fd668b0fa27The meaning of the ‘metaverse,’ and all the terms you need to understand it“It is unclear whether there will be one metaverse or many different separate metaverses (or any metaverse at all, really), but this seems to be the one constant: The metaverse is an immersive next-generation version of the internet, likely rendered by virtual or augmented reality technology.”qz.com/2089665/everything-you-need-to-know-to-understand-the-metaverseThe Metaverse Is Already Here — It’s Minecraft“The truth is, a thriving metaverse already exists. It’s incredibly high-functioning, with millions of people immersed in it for hours a day. In this metaverse, people have built uncountable custom worlds, and generated god knows how many profitable businesses and six-figure careers. Yet this terrain looks absolutely nothing like the one Zuckerberg showed off. With Minecraft, you make a metaverse, not the metaverse. This is why these worlds work so well. If a metaverse is yours, you set the rules of engagement. You can allow open-ended activity; you can create your own property-rights systems; you can ban malign activity, or encourage malign activity. If you don’t like one world, another beckons.”debugger.medium.com/the-metaverse-is-already-here-its-minecraft-99c89ed8ba2--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
The Science of Frozen 2 Seeker+ 2021-12-14 | Get your (and Olaf's) questions answered as we dive into gorillas, wombats, glaciers and all things FROZEN 2 w/ Jeff Opperman & Jake Jabbour.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comEach week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!In this episode, we discuss how dam removal and river restoration was the central symbol of renewal in FROZEN 2. We also talk about the jokes made in the film like when Anna asks what sound giraffes make or Olaf saying gorillas burp when they're happy. Global freshwater lead scientist at the World Wildlife Fund, Dr. Jeff Opperman talked about the water technology he is most excited for. "In terms of river conservation - solar panels, because solar panel technology has gotten so cheap and accessible," said Opperman. Countries don't have to build hydropower dams on rivers. That's actually a huge breakthrough in other energy alternatives to not have to build hydropower dams.#Frozen #Frozen2 #Science #RiverConservation #Seeker #SeekerPlus--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Can You Hack Your Brain To Be More Productive? Seeker+ 2021-12-08 | Whether you’re working a 9-to-5, studying for school, or just trying to master a new skill, there has been a lot of research into how we can learn faster, absorb information more efficiently, and increase our productivity. The main takeaway is that we actually work best when we are in conjunction with our biological clocks. This is the third installment in our series about productivity.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comLet’s start off with leaning into your body’s natural abilities when it comes to being productive. This is actually part of a field of science known as performance research. A lot of this research points to the circadian rhythm as the driver for when you are going to be at your best to get things done. Throughout the day, you have peaks and dips in alertness when you’ll be at your best. A compilation of research analysis in the Harvard Business Review said that, on average, people peak in alertness and energy a few hours after the day begins - until around noon. Then from noon to 3 p.m. there is a significant dip. We get another boost from about 3 p.m to 6 p.m. before it tapers off and eventually we need to sleep. People are not completely alike in these times though. There is real evidence that some people are “morning larks” and others are “night owls” - the official term is a chronotype and it’s something that is partially determined in your genes. So working with your clock can help you learn better and be more productive. Try scheduling your most important tasks during your own peaks in energy and see how it goes.#Learning #LearningHacks #Neuroscience #Productivity #Seeker #SeekerPlus Read More:The neuroscience of effective studying“According to Dr. Handy, ‘Bringing neuroscience into learning has really expanded our understanding of study strategies and what the smart, effective student can do to bring their A-game to the academic experience.’ Read on for 4 strategies—based in neuroscience research—that can help you study smarter, not harder.”students.ubc.ca/ubclife/neuroscience-effective-studyingChewing gum while studying: Effects on alertness and test performance“Recent research has demonstrated chewing gum can enhance various cognitive processes associated with learning, but most studies have used cognitive functioning tasks (e.g., selective attention and working memory) as outcomes. The results provide initial support for chewing gum while studying realistic educational materials across a range of topics and study durations.”onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/acp.3467Irregular sleep/wake patterns are associated with poorer academic performance and delayed circadian and sleep/wake timing“The association of irregular sleep schedules with circadian timing and academic performance has not been systematically examined. We studied 61 undergraduates for 30 days using sleep diaries, and quantified sleep regularity using a novel metric, the sleep regularity index (SRI). In the most and least regular quintiles, circadian phase and light exposure were assessed using salivary dim-light melatonin onset (DLMO) and wrist-worn photometry, respectively.”nature.com/articles/s41598-017-03171-4--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
How To Learn Faster, According to Science Seeker+ 2021-12-07 | Learning happens because of neuroplasticity in the brain - neuroplasticity is the ability of the brain cells to adapt and change. To be even more specific, it’s the organizing of the connections between the neurons. Neuroscientists used to think that the brain stopped developing before adulthood and that any later brain trauma was permanent, but now we’re finding that, thanks to neuroplasticity, that just isn’t true. This is episode two in a three-part series on learning and productivity. Enjoy! » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comA way to think about the learning process is that the brain can change in three ways; chemical change, structural change, and functional change. When you first start learning something new, there are tiny electrochemical pulses that fire from one neuron to another across a gap called a synapse. It’s a little chemical change as a result of what you’re interacting with. This forms a learning pathway. At this stage, the information is in the brain as a short-term memory. But the more that these same neurons fire together, the stronger the connections between cells get. So if you practice a task over and over, the connections grow so that a stimulation in one part of the brain is more likely to trigger the next one to go off. This causes the second type of brain change; structural change. As connections are formed over time, the actual structure of the brain starts to change. And it means that the information is stored now in long-term memory.So that’s the first big tip on learning. Repetition and practice. Yeah, no cheat sheet there. Sorry. #Learning #LearningHacks #Neuroscience #Study #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:How Memory Works“Memory is the ongoing process of information retention over time. Because it makes up the very framework through which we make sense of and take action within the present, its importance goes without saying. But how exactly does it work? And how can teachers apply a better understanding of its inner workings to their own teaching? In light of current research in cognitive science, the very, very short answer to these questions is that memory operates according to a "dual-process," where more unconscious, more routine thought processes interact with more conscious, more problem-based thought processes.”https://bokcenter.harvard.edu/how-memory-worksThe Truth About How Your Brain Gets Smarter“Roughly half of your brain is made of grey matter (where neural pathways are forged and reside) and the other half is made of white matter. More on this in a moment. First it’s key to know that neurons that fire together, wire together. This means to learn something new, to set a new habit in place, repetition is required. When you practice something deeply, intentionally, and with some element of struggle a neural pathway is formed.”forbes.com/sites/christinecomaford/2014/11/07/the-truth-about-how-your-brain-gets-smarter/?sh=42034e3119bcThe neuroscience of advanced scientific concepts“Cognitive neuroscience methods can identify the fMRI-measured neural representation of familiar individual concepts, such as apple, and decompose them into meaningful neural and semantic components. This approach was applied here to determine the neural representations and underlying dimensions of representation of far more abstract physics concepts related to matter and energy, such as fermion and dark matter, in the brains of 10 Carnegie Mellon physics faculty members who thought about the main properties of each of the concepts.”nature.com/articles/s41539-021-00107-6 --Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Be Better At Learning, Heres How Seeker+ 2021-12-06 | We all like to learn, but it isn’t easy. There has been a lot of research into what makes people better learners and how people learn differently from one another, but how can we make it work for us? In this Seeker+ series on Learning, the first episode will dive into the steps that the brain takes to learn something new and debunk the idea of people being visual or auditory learners. Tune in and keep an eye out for parts two and three of this series. » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comLet's talk about the science of how we learn things. We're going to do some myth-busting around sensory learning. We'll also explore proven methods for learning new skills faster, or remembering information for longer periods of time. And ultimately, go into how we all could be structuring our time to be the most productive and efficient humans possible.On that note—we’ll get into toxic productivity too. That’s important. In short, learning is how we create a mental model of the world around us.For animals, learning occurs when a personal experience results in a behavioral change. So something happens to them and then they act differently as a result. Not all organisms do this. Some insects, for example, spend their lives following a set of developmental steps without ever reacting differently to the world around them. They may never change their behavior based on something they perceive. They have little need to learn. In a human example, if you were to touch a hot stove, you’d immediately pull your hand away without much thought. Pulling your hand away isn’t a learned behavior, it’s just a reaction. But if in the future, you avoided touching the stove in the first place, that would be learning. You’re changing your behavior based on a past experience.Learned behaviors are developed over time by organisms that need to react to a world that was unstable and unpredictable.#Learning #HowToStudy #ProductivityTechniques #Education #Seeker #SeekerPlus Read More:The Myth of ‘Learning Styles’“A popular theory that some people learn better visually or aurally keeps getting debunked.”theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/04/the-myth-of-learning-styles/557687Another Nail in the Coffin for Learning Styles?“The concept and existence of learning styles has been fraught with controversy, and recent studies have thrown their existence into doubt. Yet, many students still hold to the conventional wisdom that learning styles are legitimate, and may adapt their outside of class study strategies to match these learning styles. Thus, this study aims to assess if undergraduate anatomy students are more likely to utilize study strategies that align with their hypothetical learning styles and, if so, does this alignment correlate with their outcome in an anatomy course”anatomypubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/ase.1777How Memory Functions - Lumen Learning“Our memory has three basic functions: encoding, storing, and retrieving information. Encoding is the act of getting information into our memory system through automatic or effortful processing. Storage is retention of the information, and retrieval is the act of getting information out of storage and into conscious awareness through recall, recognition, and relearning. There are various models that aim to explain how we utilize our memory. In this section, you’ll learn about some of these models as well as the importance of recall, recognition, and relearning.”courses.lumenlearning.com/wmopen-psychology/chapter/how-memory-functions--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
The Science of Red Planet Seeker+ 2021-11-30 | Strap in for a thrilling discussion about terraforming, spaceship etiquette, and all things Mars because we're breaking down RED PLANET with Carla Toro & Dr. Ken Savin.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comEach week we pair a comedian with a scientist, to break down the scientifically inaccurate elements of popular movies and TV shows. Warning: There will be spoilers!In this episode, we're discussing "Red Planet." We're talking all things Mars, Val Kilmer, Carrie Anne Moss and Tom Sizemore.So, are we in a similar situation to what they're saying in "Red Planet?" Are we looking to terraform Mars because we've ruined Earth? Senior Program Director in Space Production at the International Space Station, US National Laboratory, Dr. Ken Zaven thinks we're in a serious situation. We're starting to understand that we are changing our environment, changing the climate of this planet. And the extent to which, for example, plastics are a challenge for life on this world, is extremely serious. The reality is, we're not fully addressing it, so in that way, the movie is making a statement. If we continue to head down the path that we're heading in, we're going to start to see significant changes to the way we have to live our lives because of what we've done to this planet. Now, are we going to try to go terraform another world? If Mars is the solution, then we've got real issues, because you're better off just trying to go to Antarctica and make a life for yourself year round out there, because it's probably warmer there. At least you can breathe the air right, whereas you go to Mars, a minus 70 degree night is not unusual. And, there's no oxygen outright to be breathing and the atmosphere is much lower than ours. Mars is a desolate, frozen desert, so we don't see that as being a solution. But, as we get into talking about the movie, they had to take some artistic leaps to allow for something to be reasonable. #RedPlanet #RedPlanetTrailer #Mars #Seeker #SeekerPlus #SpaceSeeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
Whats NASAs Plan for Future Space Stations? Seeker+ 2021-11-24 | The ISS has been in orbit in one form or another for 23 years now, how many more does the station have? Not many. The ISS is only possible because it’s supported by 5 space agencies and 15 nations. That global partnership is set to end in 2024. In this episode, we’ll dive into the future of the ISS and what the next decade of space travel looks like. » Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comThere are a lot of planned updates coming to the station. A major one just happened in July of 2021 when the new Russian module Nauka was added to the station. Nauka means “science” in Russian so of course it includes a lab, as well as a living area and a toilet. It’s the largest addition to the Russian side of the station since Zvezda was attached to the budding ISS over two decades ago. It might seem like strange timing to add such a large piece now, but Nauka was originally scheduled for launch back in 2007. It had some gremlins that kept causing technical issues and delayed its launch, and it looks like there are still some in there. The new module docked with the ISS without any issues, but after Nauka was secured to the ISS the module’s automated docking system seemed to think otherwise. Twice Nauka has fired up its engines and spun the ISS around. NASA says it’s nothing dangerous but we're sure it’s not fun for the crew when their house makes an unscheduled flip.Aside from a fussy overdue module the ISS has some cutting edge improvements on the docket. In 2022 the station will be adding new solar arrays. They’ll be much more compact than the current massive and iconic arrays, but because they’re much more efficient they’ll make a lot more power for the station. So much so that the plan is to place them in front of the existing panels. That’ll reduce the power the old solars make but the new panels will more than make up for it. It’s also much easier to attach them to something that already tracks the sun. Finally the station is scheduled to add another module, but this time not from Russia or NASA or any of the other space agencies for that matter. This new piece is currently being built by Axiom Space, a private company based in Texas. Axiom Space plans to offer their section as a microgravity lab other companies can rent or an extremely high end hotel room. Axiom has big plans for their own section, stating they intend to double the usable volume of the ISS before eventually separating and operating on their own. #ISS #InternationalSpaceStation #Astronaut #NASA #Seeker #SeekerPlusRead More:Tour Russia's new Nauka space station module with these astronaut home movies“After docking itself with the orbiting lab, Nauka's thrusters fired unexpectedly, spinning the space station around one and a half times.” space.com/nauka-space-station-module-tour-astronaut-home-movies What does the future have in store for the International Space Station?“Much like a sail, the iROSA arrays will be unfolded on top of the old solar panels and partly cover them. While small enough to be carried in the SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft, they will provide a 34% upgrade in energy generation by working in tandem with the original system.” https://www.aerotime.aero/27884-what-future-for-the-international-space-station NASA and Japan finalize Gateway agreement“NASA and the Japanese government have completed an agreement outlining Japan’s contributions to the lunar Gateway as NASA works to wrap up international contributions to the outpost. NASA announced Jan. 12 it signed an agreement with the Japanese government governing Japan’s contributions to the Gateway. They include components for the European-led International Habitation, or I-Hab, module, such as its environmental control and life support system, batteries, thermal control and cameras.”spacenews.com/nasa-and-japan-finalize-gateway-agreement--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
ISS Astronauts On Their Favorite Experiments In Space Seeker+ 2021-11-23 | ISS astronauts aren’t just impressive people capable of performing complex tasks under pressure in a hostile environment and speaking Russian. They’re also scientists. The ISS is, after all, a laboratory unlike any on Earth where experiments can be conducted in microgravity. Several of the modules are dedicated laboratories. Astronauts have compared the station’s research capabilities to world class universities, so find out what science is being conducted onboard the ISS right now.» Subscribe to Seeker+! bit.ly/SeekerPlusSubscribe (then hit the little 🔔 icon and select “all.“) » Watch more! http://bit.ly/SeekerPlusPlaylist» Visit our shop at http://shop.seeker.comSome of the greatest minds in history have proposed that humanity should one day spread beyond earth. Some like Stephen Hawking have even suggested it’s necessary for our survival as a species. If we’re ever going to become a spacefaring species, we need to understand what prolonged trips in space do to us. Gravity seems like such a drag, doesn’t it? Weightlessness seems so much more appealing. But here’s the thing about our bodies: they need gravity. Thanks to millions of years of evolving to survive on the earth’s surface, some systems in our bodies actually rely on gravity to function properly. Thanks to the first extended trips to space we learned that microgravity can take a serious toll on the human body in a surprisingly short amount of time. Astronauts lose an average of 1% of their bone density per month in space. Muscles atrophy faster too so ISS astronauts have to exercise for two and a half hours every day to keep their strength up. Microgravity also causes fluids to shift up into their heads, putting pressure on their eyes and potentially hurting their vision. NASA is developing techniques to keep astronauts in a good head space, like VR simulations of relaxing environments and new LED lighting systems that keep astronauts on a 24 hour rhythm. Getting good sleep is important but it can be a little disorienting when you see 16 sunrises and sunsets a day. Future Mars explorers will have to deal with the planet’s day which is 37 minutes longer than earth’s.#ISS #InternationalSpaceStation #NASA #Seeker #SeekerPlus #AstronautsRead More:For The First Time Ever, NASA Astronauts Get to Eat Space-Grown Chilis on The ISS“Astronauts on the International Space Station grew chili peppers for the first time, which a NASA astronaut used for tacos to feed the crew.The seeds were brought to the ISS in June, part of NASA experiment to see what foods can be grown in space. The experiment was to help establish possible food sources for long missions, potentially to Mars.”sciencealert.com/nasa-have-grow-space-chili-peppers-they-were-just-used-for-tacos20 Breakthroughs from 20 Years of Science aboard the International Space Station“Protein crystal growth experiments conducted aboard the space station have provided insights into numerous disease treatments, from cancer to gum disease to Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy.” nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/iss-20-years-20-breakthroughs The Human Body in Space“For over 50 years, NASA’s Human Research Program (HRP) has studied what happens to the human body in space. Researchers are using what they learn to design procedures, devices, and strategies to keep astronauts safe and healthy throughout their missions.”nasa.gov/hrp/bodyinspace--Seeker+ is your home for deep dives, fun facts, rabbit holes, and more. Join host Julian Huguet as he unapologetically nerds out on the oddball history, astounding science and intriguing future around topics that will make you the smartest person at your next trivia night.--Seeker empowers the curious to understand the science shaping our world. We tell award-winning stories about the natural forces and groundbreaking innovations that impact our lives, our planet, and our universe. Follow us on TikTok: tiktok.com/@seekerFollow us on Instagram: instagram.com/seekerFollow us on Twitter: twitter.com/seeker
