Bring it on! A healthy dose of epicatechin, serotonin, caffeine, theobromine, phenylethylamine, and polyphenolsThe scientific name for chocolate, Theobroma, translates to “food of the gods.” This delectable confection has been worshipped for centuries and the fervor for this sweet treat hasn’t abated yet. Scientists have been studying the putative health benefits of dark chocolate for over a decade, and their studies are showing that it shouldn’t necessarily be regarded as a guilty indulgence.

As seen in our QUEST story, "The Sweet Science of Chocolate," UCSF’s Mary Engler conducted a clinical trial that showed that a plant-based flavonoid, epicatechin, helped to promote healthy blood flow in healthy patients.

Other researchers in the late ‘90’s, such as Adam Drenowski at the University of Washington, found that chocolate helps trigger the release of endorphins, while Daniele Piomelli of UC Irvine, conducted research on cannabinoids found in chocolate.

And recent research suggested that chocolate could even be good for your memory. There are other compounds present in chocolate which may have beneficial effects on your mind and body, such as serotonin, caffeine, theobromine, phenylethylamine, and polyphenols. Who knows what future chocolate research may yield, but in the meantime– no joke here– you might even be pumping chocolate-based fuels into your gas tank!

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A pure beauty — your friendly Cathartes aura. a.k.a Turkey VultureArriving at the Lindsay Wildlife Museum, one of the first things you see is actually outside – the Turkey vulture. Now, a vulture isn’t what typically comes to mind for making a good first impression. But this bird is absolutely gorgeous, and unbelievably interesting; we instantly fell in love.

When most people hear vulture, they think of a big ugly bird found in the desert, waiting for something to die, circling, circling… In reality, the Turkey Vulture is a local species, and is one of the more common birds we see soaring the skies of the Bay Area.

While we interviewed Dawn Manning about the Turkey Vulture, there were quite a few "colorful" facts we learned: The Turkey Vulture has no vocal organs – they can only grunt or hiss, although they usually stay silent. They do not build nests – they lay their eggs directly on the ground in caves, crevices, burrows, hollow logs, under fallen trees, or even in abandoned buildings. While they have few natural predators, their main form of defense is vomiting. The foul smelling substance deters most creatures, and will also sting if the offending animal is close enough to get it on them.

Luckily, this pretty lady didn’t seem to mind the camera and all the people; I might even go as far as saying she enjoyed the attention. You never know… yesterday, a wildlife ambassador; today, a star on QUEST; tomorrow, a Hollywood superstar??

Take a visit to the Lindsay Wildlife Museum in Walnut Creek, and say hello to the Turkey Vulture – some day you might be able to say, "I knew her when…!"

Watch "Cool Critters: Turkey Vultures" online.

Shows like CSI can increase the public's awareness of geneticsOne of the most fun parts about my job is answering people's genetics questions at our Understanding Genetics website.  We get around 200 questions each month from all over the world and they definitely keep me on my toes.

They also give me a feel for what is going on with science in popular culture.  I can tell this by looking at Google Analytics data and seeing which of our previous answers has had an upsurge in visits.  (We post around one new answer online per week.)

For example, whenever PBS airs a show on how a mutation called CCR5-delta 32 may have made people resistant to the plague, I get an uptick in the hits on the answer that deals with that topic.  When House (a show on Fox) had a character say that of course someone was adopted because he had a cleft chin and his parents didn't, I got an uptick on the Chimeras start out as fraternal twins that fuse together at a very early stage.  What this means is that chimeras have two sets of DNA.  Some of their cells have the DNA from one twin and the rest of their cells have DNA from the other twin.

As you can imagine, these folks can wreak havoc with a police investigation!  What happened in the CSI episode was that the DNA from the crime scene did not match the DNA from the most likely suspect.  In the end we find out that the suspect is a chimera and that the evidence left behind at the crime scene had one set of DNA and that the blood they tested had a different set of DNA.  From the same person!

It is great that there is so much science starting to seep into popular culture.  If the science is accurate, it is a great way to get people involved in science.  I just wish it was accurate more often.

Today QUEST TV broadcasts its half-hour documentary "Chasing Beetles, Finding Darwin," which tells the story of California Academy of Sciences beetle expert David Kavanaugh's unusual prediction that a new species of beetle would be found in Northern California's Trinity Alps.

The film follows Kavanaugh and his collaborator, University of California-Berkeley doctoral candidate Sean Schoville, as they search for the beetle, then put possible candidates to the test by dissecting them under the microscope and doing genetic testing on them.

It's rare for a biologist to predict the discovery of a new species – even for someone like Kavanaugh, who has discovered 73 new species. For his prediction, he drew inspiration from Charles Darwin's own prediction, which the English naturalist and founder of modern evolutionary biology made in 1862.

When Darwin saw an orchid from Madagascar with a foot-long nectare, he predicted that a pollinator would be found with a tongue (called a proboscis) long enough to reach the nectar inside the orchid's very thin, elongated nectar "pouch." Darwin's prediction was based on his finding that all living beings are related to each other and that some of them evolve closely together. His prediction came true in 1903, when a moth was discovered in Madagascar with a long, thin proboscis, which it uncurls to reach the nectar in the orchid's nectare. In the process of feeding from the orchid, the moth serves as its pollinator. The moth was given the scientific name Xanthopan morganii praedicta, in honor of Darwin’s prediction.

"Chasing Beetles, Finding Darwin" is QUEST TV's contribution to the celebration of Darwin's 200th birthday and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his book "On the Origin of Species."

Watch Chasing Beetles, Finding Darwin online. You can also see additional photos for this story.

At Sonoma County State Beach, just south of the mouth of the Russian River, stand two seastack rock pillars surrounded by large boulders. The prominent blue schist rocks form something like an amphitheater above the coastal cliffs.

There is something about these rocks that draws you in. Maybe it's the way they jut out of the ground? Or perhaps it's the "Stonehenge" way they form an enclosed circle? Or maybe it's just a nice place to get out of the wind? Whatever it is, they seem to pull you towards them. And once you are there, they almost call out to be touched. The rocks, long known as the "Sunset Boulders", have attracted rock climbers for years. I've climbed these rocks before. But like so many other people, I had no idea I was touching history.

During the Pleistocene, 10 to 20,000 years ago, this place was very different than it is today, inhabited by massive mega-fauna; bigger elephants, lions, bears and wolves, than we see today. While those big animals went extinct thousands of years ago, they left their mark on this place.

Looking around these rocks it is easy for me to imagine the herds of Columbian Mammoths lumbering from the nearby wallow to rub against the boulders. I can picture huge herds of camel and horse grazing nearby. Yes, those animals evolved here in North America and then crossed into Asia where they thrived and survived. Weaving my way between the boulders, I can imagine how the predators could have used these rocks as an ambush site. I envision a huge saber-tooth cat slinking between the craggy rocks, looking to pounce on an unwary bison. I can see the prides of American Lion, similar but much larger than African Lions, basking on the tabletop boulders after a big kill. I can also picture the ultimate predator making their campsite here when that first hunting party foraged deeper inland. Yes, humans were here too. And I'm sure the same pull these rocks have today existed back then.

This seems like a sacred place to me. Sacred to history. So when you visit these rocks think about those who came before you. Think about the mammoth and the bison and the camel and the horse. Think about the lions, tigers, bears and wolves. And think about those first people. Tread lightly and respect this wonderful place. With care, these rocks will be here long after we all become part of history.

Special thanks to the San Diego Natural History Museum for contributing artwork and HD video to our story. Also, to see more artistic representations of Pleistocene mega fauna, by the artists who contributed to our segment, see:

Laura Cunningham's artwork

Artwork of Joseph Venus

William Stout's wonderful murals

Watch the Ice Age Bay Area television story online.

In honor of Halloween this month, Quest offers up a short story on bats. But these are not your screeching, swarming, bloodsucking Hollywood movie bats. No… just like you can choose to make a cute, happy jack-o-lantern or a scary jack-o-lantern, you can also choose to do a story about cute fruit-eating bats instead of their less attractive cousins.

So we visited zookeeper Andrea Dougall at the Oakland Zoo to learn about their Malayan and Island Flying Fox. Both are a type of fruit bat, and I couldn’t readily see the difference between them. There are many fascinating things that Andrea taught us about these bats that we couldn't fit into our two minute segment (and honestly, this producer wouldn't mind making a half hour special on these critters!). For instance, they have a lot of blood vessels in their wing tissue, so they make excellent thermo-regulators. If the bat is cold, he wraps himself up in his wings so that the heat from his blood vessels can keep him warm. Likewise, when it's hot out the bats flap their wings to cool off.

When Andrea told us that bats are the only mammals that can have sustained flight by flapping their wings, someone said "but what about the flying squirrel?" Nope– they glide.

These bats don't actually swallow the fruit that they eat, instead they chew it into small pieces, push it up against the roof of their mouth to ring out the juice, which they then swallow, and spit out the leftovers. This is something that Andrea reminded me of when I told her I'd like to take one of these cute critters home as a pet… the amount of rotten fruit pulp that you have to pick up is really unappealing. Plus, of course, it would be illegal.

Perhaps the most intriguing thing to me is the simple fact that these animals spend all of their time hanging upside down. I asked Andrea about that too– how is it possible that they wouldn't experience some sort of leg fatigue and let go of their grip? She told me what's in the scientific literature on other kinds of bats (and we're assuming it applies to fruit bats as well). The deal is that the tendon of the muscle that flexes the claw passes through a tough sheath that consists of 19-50 rings, oriented at an angle so that the inside surface is ridged. So there's some ratchet-action going on in the sheath that holds the claw in a grasping position even after the muscle has relaxed, and it's the tension on that tendon from the body weight that holds the ratchet in place. When the bat wants to move, the tension is released and therefore the claw releases its hold. So basically, the clenched position is the "at rest" position, and the releasing of the foot is the part that takes energy.

If you haven't yet, I highly suggest you make a trip over to the Oakland Zoo to see these highly captivating animals for yourself.

Watch the Cool Critters: Fruit Bats television story report online. Also, if you’d like to see close-up photos of these bats, please visit our photo set over on Flickr.

Although African Americans represent one eighth of the U.S. population, they make up half of the people living with HIV in the country, according to the Los Angeles-based Black AIDS Institute's 2008 report Left Behind - Black America: A Neglected Priority in the Global AIDS Epidemic." An African American woman is 23 times more likely to get infected with HIV than a Caucasian woman. And the overwhelming risk for black women is unprotected sex with men.

The reasons why African Americans are so burdened with HIV are complicated, says doctor Edward Machtinger, director of the Women's HIV Program at UCSF. The high rate of incarceration of African American men plays an important role, with men carrying HIV back to their female partners when they get out of prison.

HIV/AIDS is a disease of poverty. "Sexually transmitted diseases, in general, disproportionately afflict the poor," says Ruth Greenblatt, who is the founder of the Women's HIV Program and the principal investigator of the Northern California site of the Women's Interagency HIV Study. "If you have poor access to health care, you're less likely to see a doctor early on in your HIV infection, and thus you may be more likely to transmit infection, and you may be less likely to be able to afford condoms and medication."

HIV is now the leading cause of death for African American women between 24 and 35 years old. "Women tend to get sicker and die faster and more often than their male counterparts with HIV," says Machtinger. "One reason is that women don't perceive themselves to be at risk."

In its report, the Black AIDS Institute says that turning the tide is possible, but that it will require better planning and more funding from the federal government, and a stronger commitment from African American leaders. And the report calls for people to get tested. "Knowing your HIV status early can save your life," it concludes.

For patients who have access to drugs, infection with the virus ceased to be a death sentence in 1995, when combinations of drugs called highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) were developed. For some patients, drugs can reduce the amount of virus to undetectable levels.

But some virus always hides in the body's immune cells and attacks again if the patient stops taking their medication. Researchers are working on developing a drug to wipe out this latent virus, which could mean the end of AIDS.

Find out more about new research into HIV treatment and a possible cure by watching our HIV Research: Beyond the Vaccine television story report online.

Congratulations to jalbersmead!

Flickr photo community member jalbersmead (John Albers-Mead) will be collaborating with KQED staff on our next 2-minute YPOQ segment for broadcast and web distribution. It will air on November 18, 2008.

His wonderful set of tidepool images from Fitzgerald Marine Reserve in Moss Beach wowed our KQED QUEST editorial staff. His winning submission did a wonderful job of expressing a sense of locale, with a passion for nature, via a process that captures something unexpected and essential.

In his own words:

"Going to tide pools is like a treasure hunt that changes by the minute. The colors, textures, smells, movement, and general feeling of life makes this one of the places where I feel connected with the world."

This was a very difficult decision to make for us - we hope to do more YPOQ calls in the future. If you wish, you may leave your submissions open and we will consider them again in the next round. Sincere thanks to all who participated.

For those of you who are interested in entering the future, sign up for our email newsletter to get an announcement for the next submission call, or head on over to our Flickr photo group for KQED QUEST.

By the time I was ten years old I knew the old California Academy of Sciences building by heart. After countless birthday parties, field trips and family outings, my brother and I, along with our sugar-filled urchin gang of friends and cousins, could have led tours of "the Aquarium."

There was the sunken swamp pit where we would crowd to the railing in hopes of seeing the alligators move. Around the other side were the strange amphibians and reptiles, where we would sidestep from window to window until we came upon the two-headed snake. There was the dark aquarium, were we could pretend to be underwater explorers, "diving" with sharks and electric eels and glow-in-the-dark fish. Then off to the planetarium to watch the pendulum swing, waiting impatiently for it to knock over a peg. We would go on a safari through African Hall with its dusty old stuffed lions, gazelles and giraffes, eat lunch in the courtyard and climb up on the smooth Bufano statues. Over 30 years later, I can close my eyes and see the whole place as it was. Glorious.

Nostalgia can be a pretty tough critic. When the California Academy began the process of replacing the old building in Golden Gate Park, I had little hope that they would "do it right." I had watched powerlessly as an incongruously stark copper "aircraft carrier" replaced the classical De Young Museum across the way. What would happen to "my" beloved aquarium?

My fears were somewhat alleviated as I watched the new Cal Academy building taking shape. In QUEST’s television story about green building, we learned about the living roof and other cool stuff. Still I reserved judgment until I could see it for myself.

When we got our behind-the-scenes tour, it blew me away. On the outside, while clearly modern in design, the building still flows well with the botanic surroundings. It looks like it belongs there, incorporating classic architectural elements harkening back to the cherished old Academy and maintaining a synergy with the other buildings in the park. On the inside the Cal Academy is very different from the place I see when I close my eyes. There is a new rainforest housed in what looks like a grand bio-dome. There is also a new planetarium, aquarium and natural history museum. While expanded and brilliantly redesigned, I think ten-year-old me would immediately recognize this place. They saved many of the iconic touches that made the old place so special to me.

For example, I had not realized how much impact something like a railing could make. But for a small boy rushing to see the alligators at the old aquarium, the first thing he would encounter without really realizing it would be that brass seahorse railing. They saved it and now countless more children will lean over those lined-up seahorses to look below at the alligators. They also saved the old pendulum; recreated African Hall much the way it was and they assured me the Bufano statues would have a home there. All these things fit in seamlessly with the beautiful new surroundings filled with light. I only wish the two-headed snake was alive to see it all.

Watch the "Cal Academy Comes to Life" TV Story online, as well as find additional links and resources.

It's challenging to report on an illness such as autism, which scientists and doctors are only beginning to understand (the disease was described in the 1940s) and over which there is so much debate.

There is even disagreement around the question of whether or not there has been a real increase in the number of children being diagnosed with autism in California. In our TV segment, we interview psychologist Ron Huff, director of clinical services at the Alta California Regional Center in Sacramento. In the mid-1990s, Huff sounded the alarm about an increase in the number of reported cases of autism in California. (Through California's 21 regional centers the state's Department of Developmental Services offers services to children and adults with developmental disabilities).

"In 1996 I asked the Department of Developmental Services to pull some raw data off of their statewide electronic information system. And when I saw that data it was obvious that there were a lot more kids in our system with autism than anyone else had expected,"Huff told QUEST. "By 1999 the (California) legislature decided to have the department do a formal study of the number of people who were entering the system with autism. So we looked at about 11 years of data and recognized that there was a 300 plus percent increase in the number of kids coming in with autism."

Since then, researchers have vigorously been debating whether or not there is a true increase in the number of cases. Huff believes that at least part of the increase is a true increase, in other words, that not all of the increase can be explained by factors such as more accurate diagnosis of autism, increased awareness or better availability of services. But other researchers like Kaiser Permanente epidemiologist Lisa Croen feel there isn’t enough information to conclude that even part of the cases are due to a true increase.

"Unfortunately, I don't think we really have the data, and no one really has the data right now to answer that question adequately," she told QUEST. But in her view, whether or not there's a true increase, there is indeed a crisis afoot. "It goes without question that there are definitely more people being diagnosed with autism today than ever before and that is a really big public health crisis. Estimates across the country are that one in 150 children at about 8 years of age will have a diagnosis of autism. So whether or not the increase, or how much of this increase, is really due to a true increase in occurrence, the question now is what’s causing this and what are the risk factors and that’s what we really have to concentrate on."

The research looking into factors other than genes is just beginning. The Centers for Disease Control have launched a large epidemiological study called SEED that seeks to answer the question of what the environmental causes of autism are. When researchers talk about "environmental factors" they mean this very broadly. These factors include, for example, the age of the parents. For our TV story we filmed Meghan Wallace, a four-year-old with an autism diagnosis who is participating in SEED. In Northern California, Kaiser Permanente is overseeing the research. Both children with and without autism are being enrolled. "There really has never been a large, robust, well-designed epidemiologic study that can adequately study the many possible risk factors for autism spectrum disorders," said Lisa Croen, who is one of the principal investigators on SEED.

At the same time, U.C. Davis' M.I.N.D. Institute is carrying out a smaller study into the causes of autism. It's called MARBLES and it’s funded by the EPA and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. By studying pregnant women, MARBLES principal investigator Irva Hertz-Picciotto hopes to find out if there are any risk factors for autism that happen during pregnancy. In our TV story, we followed M.I.N.D. Institute personnel as they visited one of the families in the study. They had followed the mother through her pregnancy and delivery and were now taking samples from her six-month-old boy. The researchers collected everything from his dirty diapers to dust from the family's rug. In between, they asked the mom about her family's use of pesticides and cleaning products.

Hertz-Picciotto's research stemming from another M.I.N.D. Institute study has already pointed to a connection between autism and pesticides. In May of 2008, she and her colleagues reported at the International Meeting for Autism Research in London that mothers of autistic children were twice as likely as mothers of children who didn't develop autism to report that they had used household insecticides and pet shampoos for fleas or ticks. They reported using these products during a period between three months before conception and the first year of the child’s life. Other risk factors are also starting to emerge. A study by Lisa Croen and colleagues reported that paternal and maternal age are risk factors for autism. "What we found was for every 10 years of increase in the age of a mother or a father, the risk of autism went up by about 20 or 30%," Croen told QUEST.

Both the SEED and the MARBLES studies are looking at the question of whether or not childhood vaccination is a risk factor for autism. This is another issue that we talk about in our TV story. Concerned about guaranteeing that infectious diseases don't reemerge, public health officials at agencies like the CDCs state that research doesn't bear out an autism-vaccine connection. But UC Davis' M.I.N.D. Institute is taking a more nuanced approach to the question. Based on new findings by their researchers showing that the immune systems of autistic children are different than those of typically developing children, the Institute suggests that a small number of children may respond to vaccines in an atypical way. They quickly add that there isn't yet a way to determine who those children might be. Studies like SEED and MARBLES might help elucidate this and other questions about what remains a mysterious disease.

Watch the "Autism: Searching for Causes" TV Story online, as well as find additional links and resources.