Retracted Research, 3.3 Million-Year-Old Stone Tool, and Panda Guts
12:04 minutes
Rachel Feltman of The Washington Post joins us for a roundup of her top science stories this week: A Science study from December that looked at how short conversations could change the voters’ minds on big questions was retracted by one of the authors; researchers dug up a 3.3 million-year-old stone tool in Kenya; plus, scientists investigated microbiome of pandas.
Then, Megan Palmer, a bioengineer-turned-security policy researcher, joins us to talk about the potential good—and bad—of engineering yeast that can brew up compounds like opiate drugs.
Segment Guests
Rachel Feltman
Rachel Feltman is a freelance science communicator who hosts “The Weirdest Thing I Learned This Week” for Popular Science, where she served as Executive Editor until 2022. She’s also the host of Scientific American’s show “Science Quickly.” Her debut book Been There, Done That: A Rousing History of Sex is on sale now.
Megan Palmer
Megan Palmer is research fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University in Stanford, California.
Meet the Producer
About Alexa Lim
@AlexaLim22Alexa Lim was a senior producer for Science Friday. Her favorite stories involve space, sound, and strange animal discoveries.