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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_27148\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Watson-e1423551319547-1024x573.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-27148\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Watson-e1423551319547-1024x573.jpg\" alt=\"(Courtesy Emmanuel Mignot)\" width=\"1024\" height=\"573\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Stanford University professor Emmanuel Mignot adopted Watson from Vermont soon after his previous narcoleptic dog Bear passed away. (Courtesy Emmanuel Mignot)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Emmanuel Mignot’s new Chihuahua, Watson, is small enough to fit in a handbag, somewhat skittish around strangers and utterly vanquished by a slice of lamb chop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As I spoke to Mignot on the phone, he held the receiver next to Watson so I could hear for myself. The two of them had been snuggling on Mignot’s leather sofa when I asked what it would take to hear Watson’s narcolepsy in action.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mignot produced a lamb chop from his refrigerator and offered his pet a bite. I pressed my ear into the phone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>(Parts of this interview aired on the California Report. Listen \u003ca href=\"http://audio.californiareport.org/archive/R201503020850/c\">here\u003c/a>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It turns out that a narcoleptic Chihuahua doesn’t make a whole lot of noise as it crumples to a cataplexic puddle on the floor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you’re a narcoleptic dog, Mignot is the owner you want. As director of Stanford’s \u003ca href=\"http://sleep.stanford.edu/\">Center for Sleep Sciences and Medicine\u003c/a>, founded by the legendary sleep researcher William Dement, Mignot helped oversee the country’s first and largest pack of narcolepsy research dogs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The dogs – about 80 of them at the program’s peak – were mostly Dobermans and Labradors, collected over the years mostly via word-of-mouth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Narcolepsy in dogs is vanishingly rare. Mignot estimates that about one in a million dogs have the disease compared to one in 2,000 humans. In 1999, Mignot \u003ca href=\"http://news.stanford.edu/news/1999/august11/narcolepsy-811.html\">identified\u003c/a> the genetic cause of canine narcolepsy: a mutation that blocks a response to hypocretin, a brain chemical that keeps us awake.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_27149\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 416px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Watson_2-1024x683.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-27149\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Watson_2-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"(Becky Bach)\" width=\"416\" height=\"278\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Watson has a form of narcolepsy that has one of two causes and becomes apparent when he’s overly excited and then collapses. (Becky Bach)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But Mignot and others believe another, “sporadic” form of narcolpesy may be caused by an immune reaction, perhaps to the flu. He believes dogs may experience this type as well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Mignot, who was born in France, cooed French reassurances to his new companion, Watson sprang back into action, attacking the lamb chop that had been his undoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mignot told me he hopes that narcoleptic dog research – dormant for the last decade or so – might have its own revival to answer new questions about sleep disease.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>How did you find Watson?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I received an email from a veterinarian in Vermont, telling me they had a dog with narcolepsy. In this case, [an owner], seeing that the dog was collapsing and falling asleep all the time, didn’t want to keep him. So he had returned the dog to the breeder, who took it to the vet. They didn’t really know what to do with the dog.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was good timing. You probably know that I had another dog with narcolepsy before, \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/06/17/stanford-sleep-researcher-mourns-the-loss-of-narcoleptic-dog/\">Bear\u003c/a>, and he just passed away. So it was almost like a reincarnation of Bear!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I took the plane [to Vermont] and I brought him back. And I have to say he’s really adorable. I would have never thought I’d get a Chihuahua. He’s a crazy little spring on four legs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Except when he’s asleep, that is…\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yes he’s definitely sleepier than other dogs. There are times when you see he really needs to take a nap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s very cute. You see him fading, like “Oof, I fall asleep” and he kind of crumples, you know? Then he lifts his head again, like he nods, trying to stay awake. And he looks at you with his eyes half closed and you have the feeling like he’s telling you “I love you,” but in fact he’s falling asleep.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘He doesn’t fall from very high – I mean, he’s a Chihuahua.’\u003ccite>–Emmanuel MignotStanford University professor\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Falling asleep a lot is one aspect of narcolepsy. But another symptom is cataplexy, right?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yes. When Watson gets excited sometimes he becomes completely paralyzed. That happens with good food, but it has to be really good food, like a piece of chicken, or filet mignon. He gets excited and then –boom! — he’s paralyzed. Sometimes it’s just the back legs and he stumbles. Or sometimes he falls on the floor and can’t move for a few seconds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In humans [who have narcolepsy] it can happen when patients are laughing or joking, but with dogs it’s anything that he’s very happy about. For example it’s not uncommon that [I come home from work and] he’s running around, so happy to see me and then – boom! — he collapses and he can’t move for a few seconds or minutes. That’s called cataplexy. It’s a symptom that’s classic of narcolepsy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like going on the beach. We often go to the beach and he runs around and loves to run around and very often, when he’s too happy – poof! – he collapses on the sand. And he’s paralyzed for a few seconds to a minute sometimes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>You make this cataplexy sound cute and charming. But is it painful for him, or stressful?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No, I don’t think it bothers him. He doesn’t fall from very high – I mean, he’s a Chihuahua. So he doesn’t really hurt himself. When he’s down, you can sense sometimes there’s frustration, like his nose is in front of a piece of food, and he’s trying to fight it. But it lasts for only a few seconds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The best cure is to have him well rested. He has a normal life. It’s not severe enough that he needs to be treated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong> Narcolepsy is a lot more stressful for people than for dogs, sounds like.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With humans, if you can nap at any time the disease is much less severe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I know a few patients who don’t get treated and have special lifestyle where they wake up, work for an hour and a half or so, then take a nap for a half an hour, work a bit more, and so on. If you can live like this, you can almost have a normal life. But in our society it’s usually impossible. That’s why narcolepsy is a terrible disease.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong> [contextly_sidebar id=”xl2mSAc2xg8ykuvm03gR2Vadm631697Y”]\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Stanford no longer maintains a pack of narcoleptic dogs for research purposes. Is there anything you can still learn from Watson?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I think there’s still a mystery around narcolepsy that we have not solved. I mean thanks to the dogs, we found the cause of narcolepsy was this lack of this chemical in the brain, called hypocretin – a chemical produced by cells in the brain. When it’s not there you have narcolepsy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>And sometimes this happens because of a genetic mutation. But other times it’s spontaneous?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yes, we think that in these cases, it’s an immune disease, triggered by the flu. People develop a reaction to the flu that is abnormal and instead of just fighting flu they kind of confuse the flu with the cell that produced this chemical, hypocretin, and destroy it. Then you have narcolepsy. But we still don’t understand this process very well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the dogs we have probably developed narcolepsy the same way. I wouldn’t be surprised if we discover something new again that helps us understand how the immune system is killing the hypocretin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With Watson, I don’t know if it’s the genetic form with the mutation, or if it’s the sporadic kind. I have blood samples from all the dogs who were in the colony. It’ll be interesting to sequence all these dogs that have sporadic form and see if we can find something else that will eliminate the human disease.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you’re a narcoleptic dog, Mignot is the owner you want. As director of Stanford’s \u003ca href=\"http://sleep.stanford.edu/\">Center for Sleep Sciences and Medicine\u003c/a>, founded by the legendary sleep researcher William Dement, Mignot helped oversee the country’s first and largest pack of narcolepsy research dogs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The dogs – about 80 of them at the program’s peak – were mostly Dobermans and Labradors, collected over the years mostly via word-of-mouth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Narcolepsy in dogs is vanishingly rare. Mignot estimates that about one in a million dogs have the disease compared to one in 2,000 humans. In 1999, Mignot \u003ca href=\"http://news.stanford.edu/news/1999/august11/narcolepsy-811.html\">identified\u003c/a> the genetic cause of canine narcolepsy: a mutation that blocks a response to hypocretin, a brain chemical that keeps us awake.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_27149\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 416px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Watson_2-1024x683.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-27149\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Watson_2-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"(Becky Bach)\" width=\"416\" height=\"278\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Watson has a form of narcolepsy that has one of two causes and becomes apparent when he’s overly excited and then collapses. (Becky Bach)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But Mignot and others believe another, “sporadic” form of narcolpesy may be caused by an immune reaction, perhaps to the flu. He believes dogs may experience this type as well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Mignot, who was born in France, cooed French reassurances to his new companion, Watson sprang back into action, attacking the lamb chop that had been his undoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mignot told me he hopes that narcoleptic dog research – dormant for the last decade or so – might have its own revival to answer new questions about sleep disease.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>How did you find Watson?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I received an email from a veterinarian in Vermont, telling me they had a dog with narcolepsy. In this case, [an owner], seeing that the dog was collapsing and falling asleep all the time, didn’t want to keep him. So he had returned the dog to the breeder, who took it to the vet. They didn’t really know what to do with the dog.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was good timing. You probably know that I had another dog with narcolepsy before, \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/06/17/stanford-sleep-researcher-mourns-the-loss-of-narcoleptic-dog/\">Bear\u003c/a>, and he just passed away. So it was almost like a reincarnation of Bear!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I took the plane [to Vermont] and I brought him back. And I have to say he’s really adorable. I would have never thought I’d get a Chihuahua. He’s a crazy little spring on four legs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Except when he’s asleep, that is…\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yes he’s definitely sleepier than other dogs. There are times when you see he really needs to take a nap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s very cute. You see him fading, like “Oof, I fall asleep” and he kind of crumples, you know? Then he lifts his head again, like he nods, trying to stay awake. And he looks at you with his eyes half closed and you have the feeling like he’s telling you “I love you,” but in fact he’s falling asleep.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘He doesn’t fall from very high – I mean, he’s a Chihuahua.’\u003ccite>–Emmanuel MignotStanford University professor\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Falling asleep a lot is one aspect of narcolepsy. But another symptom is cataplexy, right?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yes. When Watson gets excited sometimes he becomes completely paralyzed. That happens with good food, but it has to be really good food, like a piece of chicken, or filet mignon. He gets excited and then –boom! — he’s paralyzed. Sometimes it’s just the back legs and he stumbles. Or sometimes he falls on the floor and can’t move for a few seconds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In humans [who have narcolepsy] it can happen when patients are laughing or joking, but with dogs it’s anything that he’s very happy about. For example it’s not uncommon that [I come home from work and] he’s running around, so happy to see me and then – boom! — he collapses and he can’t move for a few seconds or minutes. That’s called cataplexy. It’s a symptom that’s classic of narcolepsy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like going on the beach. We often go to the beach and he runs around and loves to run around and very often, when he’s too happy – poof! – he collapses on the sand. And he’s paralyzed for a few seconds to a minute sometimes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>You make this cataplexy sound cute and charming. But is it painful for him, or stressful?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No, I don’t think it bothers him. He doesn’t fall from very high – I mean, he’s a Chihuahua. So he doesn’t really hurt himself. When he’s down, you can sense sometimes there’s frustration, like his nose is in front of a piece of food, and he’s trying to fight it. But it lasts for only a few seconds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The best cure is to have him well rested. He has a normal life. It’s not severe enough that he needs to be treated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong> Narcolepsy is a lot more stressful for people than for dogs, sounds like.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With humans, if you can nap at any time the disease is much less severe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I know a few patients who don’t get treated and have special lifestyle where they wake up, work for an hour and a half or so, then take a nap for a half an hour, work a bit more, and so on. If you can live like this, you can almost have a normal life. But in our society it’s usually impossible. That’s why narcolepsy is a terrible disease.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong> \u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Stanford no longer maintains a pack of narcoleptic dogs for research purposes. Is there anything you can still learn from Watson?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I think there’s still a mystery around narcolepsy that we have not solved. I mean thanks to the dogs, we found the cause of narcolepsy was this lack of this chemical in the brain, called hypocretin – a chemical produced by cells in the brain. When it’s not there you have narcolepsy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>And sometimes this happens because of a genetic mutation. But other times it’s spontaneous?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yes, we think that in these cases, it’s an immune disease, triggered by the flu. People develop a reaction to the flu that is abnormal and instead of just fighting flu they kind of confuse the flu with the cell that produced this chemical, hypocretin, and destroy it. Then you have narcolepsy. But we still don’t understand this process very well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the dogs we have probably developed narcolepsy the same way. I wouldn’t be surprised if we discover something new again that helps us understand how the immune system is killing the hypocretin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With Watson, I don’t know if it’s the genetic form with the mutation, or if it’s the sporadic kind. I have blood samples from all the dogs who were in the colony. It’ll be interesting to sequence all these dogs that have sporadic form and see if we can find something else that will eliminate the human disease.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Editor’s Note: This story won a national \u003ca href=\"http://rtdna.org/content/2014_national_edward_r_murrow_award_winners#.VNVTRJ3F98E\">Edward R. Murrow Award\u003c/a> in 2014 for Use of Sound. We bring it back to you as our Valentine from KQED Science. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Love is in the air on California beaches this time of year, when northern elephant seals arrive by the thousands for breeding season. Males make plenty of noise at \u003ca href=\"http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=1115\">Año Nuevo State Reserve\u003c/a>, north of Santa Cruz, but it sounds more like a chorus of motorcycles than the sultry sounds of Annie Lennox.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, researchers at \u003ca href=\"http://www.ucsc.edu/\">UC Santa Cruz\u003c/a> are decoding this complex communication system and learning how males use it to boost their reputation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Elephant seals spend most of the year alone in the Pacific Ocean, so there’s plenty of action packed into the two months they’re on land every winter. “That’s mating behavior,” says naturalist Lisa Wolfklain, pointing at two elephant seals in a sea of hundreds of males, females and pups.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"border: 0px none;overflow: hidden;float: right;margin: 10px\" src=\"http://kqed03.streamguys.us/anon.kqed/slideshow/elephant_seals/elephantseals.html\" width=\"270\" height=\"700\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Male elephant seals are the size of an SUV — fifteen feet long and 4,000 pounds. They’re known for their proboscis, the huge, fleshy nose that hangs over their mouth. There are plenty of available females this time of year, but most males will strike out. The dating scene is controlled by alpha males.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The alpha strategy is to be dominant over a group of females, the harem,” says Wolfklain. “And they want to have the first right to mate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can spot the alpha males right in the middle of their groups of 10 to 100 females. The other males, known as betas, are on the outskirts, just watching, waiting for their chance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So this guy’s coming in,” says Wolfklain, pointing at one beta male moving quickly toward a female. The alpha male perks up and snorts a warning with customary bravado. Sometimes the fight ends there, but not this one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Ooh, now they’re hitting with their heads,” the commentary continues, as the two lunge at each others’ chests. A few strikes seem to be enough for the beta male and he retreats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These fights can be bloody and all the while, other males are taking advantage and sneaking in. It adds up to a very stressful time for male elephant seals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>It’s All About Reputation\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not advantageous for males to fight all the time,” says Caroline Casey, a researcher at UC Santa Cruz. She says fights can be risky. “Sometimes they can result in death and we’ve seen that,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Elephant seals also don’t eat while on land, so they need to conserve energy. Casey says, as with humans, one way to avoid fighting is communication. But until now, no one was really sure what the males were saying to each other. So, she and her colleagues have been studying a patch of beach with about 50 males.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Elepahant-Seal-numbers-1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-27084\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Elepahant-Seal-numbers-1-420x1024.jpg\" alt=\"Elepahant Seal numbers 1\" width=\"207\" height=\"505\">\u003c/a>“We have come up with this ranking system where we assign each male a score,” she says. It’s similar to systems used in professional sports, where the males win or lose points with every fight. Casey and her team also recorded the males’ calls and found remarkable differences.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One beta male, X579, has a call that ends in a flourish. “His call, to me, is my favorite,” she says. “He always has this really lovely note at the end of it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>X579 was a beta male with a lot of competition. “He tends to vocalize and challenge everybody right when he gets there,” Casey says. He challenged GL, an alpha male with a very short, staccato call.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That is what’s so incredible,” Casey says. “All of the animals sound completely different from one another.” What’s more, Casey’s team found that each male seems to use the same call year after year, whether he has a harem or not. It’s their signature call – and they flaunt it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A larger, more dominant animal will come up to a smaller animal, maybe beat him up a little bit,” says Casey, “call at him before and after, like, ‘Hey, this is me. I’m Bob. Don’t mess with me.'”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s all about spreading your reputation around. “That’s called associative learning and that’s very unique among marine mammals,” Casey explains. “That means that every male has the potential to be learning every other male based on their acoustic signature at that site.”\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Elephant-seal-map.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-27074\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Elephant-seal-map-721x1024.jpg\" alt=\"Print\" width=\"236\" height=\"336\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These complex communication systems have been studied in songbirds and other animals, but Casey says less is known about marine species. “I think it’s just a piece of larger puzzle in understanding how these animals breed and how they’re going to survive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A century ago, elephant seals were hunted to near extinction for their blubber. Fewer than 100 lingered off the coast of Mexico. With protective laws in place, today there are more than 150,000 northern elephant seals — and growing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s good news for Casey’s loner elephant seal X579. This year, he’s an alpha male for the first time. As for the others, there’s always next year.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Editor’s Note: This story won a national \u003ca href=\"http://rtdna.org/content/2014_national_edward_r_murrow_award_winners#.VNVTRJ3F98E\">Edward R. Murrow Award\u003c/a> in 2014 for Use of Sound. We bring it back to you as our Valentine from KQED Science. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Love is in the air on California beaches this time of year, when northern elephant seals arrive by the thousands for breeding season. Males make plenty of noise at \u003ca href=\"http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=1115\">Año Nuevo State Reserve\u003c/a>, north of Santa Cruz, but it sounds more like a chorus of motorcycles than the sultry sounds of Annie Lennox.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, researchers at \u003ca href=\"http://www.ucsc.edu/\">UC Santa Cruz\u003c/a> are decoding this complex communication system and learning how males use it to boost their reputation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Elephant seals spend most of the year alone in the Pacific Ocean, so there’s plenty of action packed into the two months they’re on land every winter. “That’s mating behavior,” says naturalist Lisa Wolfklain, pointing at two elephant seals in a sea of hundreds of males, females and pups.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"border: 0px none;overflow: hidden;float: right;margin: 10px\" src=\"http://kqed03.streamguys.us/anon.kqed/slideshow/elephant_seals/elephantseals.html\" width=\"270\" height=\"700\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Male elephant seals are the size of an SUV — fifteen feet long and 4,000 pounds. They’re known for their proboscis, the huge, fleshy nose that hangs over their mouth. There are plenty of available females this time of year, but most males will strike out. The dating scene is controlled by alpha males.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The alpha strategy is to be dominant over a group of females, the harem,” says Wolfklain. “And they want to have the first right to mate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can spot the alpha males right in the middle of their groups of 10 to 100 females. The other males, known as betas, are on the outskirts, just watching, waiting for their chance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So this guy’s coming in,” says Wolfklain, pointing at one beta male moving quickly toward a female. The alpha male perks up and snorts a warning with customary bravado. Sometimes the fight ends there, but not this one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Ooh, now they’re hitting with their heads,” the commentary continues, as the two lunge at each others’ chests. A few strikes seem to be enough for the beta male and he retreats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These fights can be bloody and all the while, other males are taking advantage and sneaking in. It adds up to a very stressful time for male elephant seals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>It’s All About Reputation\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not advantageous for males to fight all the time,” says Caroline Casey, a researcher at UC Santa Cruz. She says fights can be risky. “Sometimes they can result in death and we’ve seen that,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Elephant seals also don’t eat while on land, so they need to conserve energy. Casey says, as with humans, one way to avoid fighting is communication. But until now, no one was really sure what the males were saying to each other. So, she and her colleagues have been studying a patch of beach with about 50 males.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Elepahant-Seal-numbers-1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-27084\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Elepahant-Seal-numbers-1-420x1024.jpg\" alt=\"Elepahant Seal numbers 1\" width=\"207\" height=\"505\">\u003c/a>“We have come up with this ranking system where we assign each male a score,” she says. It’s similar to systems used in professional sports, where the males win or lose points with every fight. Casey and her team also recorded the males’ calls and found remarkable differences.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One beta male, X579, has a call that ends in a flourish. “His call, to me, is my favorite,” she says. “He always has this really lovely note at the end of it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>X579 was a beta male with a lot of competition. “He tends to vocalize and challenge everybody right when he gets there,” Casey says. He challenged GL, an alpha male with a very short, staccato call.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That is what’s so incredible,” Casey says. “All of the animals sound completely different from one another.” What’s more, Casey’s team found that each male seems to use the same call year after year, whether he has a harem or not. It’s their signature call – and they flaunt it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A larger, more dominant animal will come up to a smaller animal, maybe beat him up a little bit,” says Casey, “call at him before and after, like, ‘Hey, this is me. I’m Bob. Don’t mess with me.'”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s all about spreading your reputation around. “That’s called associative learning and that’s very unique among marine mammals,” Casey explains. “That means that every male has the potential to be learning every other male based on their acoustic signature at that site.”\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Elephant-seal-map.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-27074\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Elephant-seal-map-721x1024.jpg\" alt=\"Print\" width=\"236\" height=\"336\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These complex communication systems have been studied in songbirds and other animals, but Casey says less is known about marine species. “I think it’s just a piece of larger puzzle in understanding how these animals breed and how they’re going to survive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A century ago, elephant seals were hunted to near extinction for their blubber. Fewer than 100 lingered off the coast of Mexico. With protective laws in place, today there are more than 150,000 northern elephant seals — and growing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s good news for Casey’s loner elephant seal X579. This year, he’s an alpha male for the first time. As for the others, there’s always next year.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Great Bird Goo Mystery: Why It's Not as Easy as 'CSI'",
"headTitle": "Great Bird Goo Mystery: Why It’s Not as Easy as ‘CSI’ | KQED",
"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26995\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 642px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Gail-Cho-e1423172004910-1024x576.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-26995\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Gail-Cho-e1423172004910-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"California Department of Fish and Wildlife)\" width=\"642\" height=\"361\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Chemist Gail Cho is investigating the mystery goo and says it’s not as easy as putting a sample in a box and getting instant results. (California Department of Fish and Wildlife)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 1:00 p.m., Feb. 12:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California Department of Fish and Wildlife scientists say they’ve narrowed down the possibilities of the mystery gunk to a mixture of oils and fats. They still don’t know if the substances are natural or manmade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve eliminated some of the suspect compounds including petroleum products, fuels, lubricating oils, hydraulic fluids, things like that,” says state chemist David Crane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No word on how long it will take to make a final identification. Eight labs across the country are still working on the case and Crane says they’ll keep at it until they “hit a wall.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Original post:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Excited sea ducks and shorebirds leapt into the water Wednesday as the \u003ca href=\"http://bird-rescue.org/\">International Bird Rescue Center\u003c/a> released its third batch of water fowl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The birds started turning up San Francisco Bay in mid-January, coated in a sticky gray gunk. Three weeks later investigators are still trying to figure out what the mystery material is.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not for lack of effort. State scientists, federal agencies, and a lab in Britain are all trying to identify the substance. To get a behind-the-scenes look at the forensic science involved, I drove to the state’s Fish and Wildlife lab, to find out why it’s taking so long.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The lab’s headquarters, a half-hour east of Sacramento, are completely unassuming. One paved road winds past discreetly marked stucco buildings: Petroleum Chemistry Laboratory, Water Pollution Control Laboratory, Aquatic Bioassessment Lab.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Each lab tests for different types of chemicals and once you’re inside, it’s kind of a geek’s paradise.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘You’re basically trying to reconstruct a vase from a pile of powder.’\u003ccite>–Gail Cho,\u003cbr>\nChemist, California Department of Fish and Wildlife\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Inside, various instruments click away, running simultaneous tests on the goo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They look a little bit like a microwave oven but with a lot more buttons,” says chemist Gail Cho, who is showing me around, tossing out a dizzying stream of jargon. “And over here we’re standing in front of the gas mass-spec triple quad.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s short for \u003ca href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chromatography%E2%80%93mass_spectrometry\">gas chromatography mass spectrometry\u003c/a>. It’s a method for analyzing different substances within a test sample. The sample must be a gas and the device is able to identify trace organic compounds within the sample.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cho says, forget what you’ve seen on TV crime dramas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A typical ‘CSI’ show takes about 40 minutes minus the commercials,” Cho said. “A typical run for analyzing one compound like polychloride biphenyl takes almost an hour for one of them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are 209 \u003ca href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polychlorinated_biphenyl\">polychloride biphenyls\u003c/a>, so that’s nearly nine days just to clear all the varieties of one chemical.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Moving on to another chemical could mean another nine days. After two weeks, working around the clock, you’d only have eliminated eliminate two chemicals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_27008\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 357px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/bird-release_1-1024x683.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-27008\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/bird-release_1-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"After cleaning goo-covered birds with baking soda, vinegar and dish soap. the International Bird Rescue Center has released 101 back into the wild. (Anya Schultz/KQED)\" width=\"357\" height=\"238\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">After cleaning gunked birds with baking soda, vinegar and dish soap, responders have released more than 100 back into the wild.\u003cbr>(Anya Schultz/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>That’s the problem with an unidentified compound. Cho says investigators need some kind of starting point. Because even if they know what elements are in the compound, that’s still only marginally helpful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s a lot of things that have carbon and hydrogen but what is it?” says Cho. “Our bodies have that and most things in nature have that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before Cho and her team can even begin the tests, they have to remove foreign matter like feathers and sand from the goo. Then they have to transform it into a liquid or gas, to run through the machines.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re basically trying to reconstruct a vase from a pile of powder,” says Cho. She says in her five years at the lab, she’s never seen anything like this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/\">Environmental Protection Agency\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"http://www.noaa.gov/\">National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration \u003c/a>are also perplexed, and working on the case. After three weeks, they’ve ruled out two suspect substances.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "State scientists, federal agencies, and a lab in Britain are all trying to identify a mystery gunk that killed hundreds of sea birds in San Francisco Bay. It's been three weeks, and still no word on what the gunk is. KQED investigates why it's taking so long.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26995\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 642px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Gail-Cho-e1423172004910-1024x576.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-26995\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/Gail-Cho-e1423172004910-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"California Department of Fish and Wildlife)\" width=\"642\" height=\"361\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Chemist Gail Cho is investigating the mystery goo and says it’s not as easy as putting a sample in a box and getting instant results. (California Department of Fish and Wildlife)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 1:00 p.m., Feb. 12:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California Department of Fish and Wildlife scientists say they’ve narrowed down the possibilities of the mystery gunk to a mixture of oils and fats. They still don’t know if the substances are natural or manmade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve eliminated some of the suspect compounds including petroleum products, fuels, lubricating oils, hydraulic fluids, things like that,” says state chemist David Crane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No word on how long it will take to make a final identification. Eight labs across the country are still working on the case and Crane says they’ll keep at it until they “hit a wall.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Original post:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Excited sea ducks and shorebirds leapt into the water Wednesday as the \u003ca href=\"http://bird-rescue.org/\">International Bird Rescue Center\u003c/a> released its third batch of water fowl.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The birds started turning up San Francisco Bay in mid-January, coated in a sticky gray gunk. Three weeks later investigators are still trying to figure out what the mystery material is.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not for lack of effort. State scientists, federal agencies, and a lab in Britain are all trying to identify the substance. To get a behind-the-scenes look at the forensic science involved, I drove to the state’s Fish and Wildlife lab, to find out why it’s taking so long.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The lab’s headquarters, a half-hour east of Sacramento, are completely unassuming. One paved road winds past discreetly marked stucco buildings: Petroleum Chemistry Laboratory, Water Pollution Control Laboratory, Aquatic Bioassessment Lab.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Each lab tests for different types of chemicals and once you’re inside, it’s kind of a geek’s paradise.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘You’re basically trying to reconstruct a vase from a pile of powder.’\u003ccite>–Gail Cho,\u003cbr>\nChemist, California Department of Fish and Wildlife\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Inside, various instruments click away, running simultaneous tests on the goo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They look a little bit like a microwave oven but with a lot more buttons,” says chemist Gail Cho, who is showing me around, tossing out a dizzying stream of jargon. “And over here we’re standing in front of the gas mass-spec triple quad.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s short for \u003ca href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chromatography%E2%80%93mass_spectrometry\">gas chromatography mass spectrometry\u003c/a>. It’s a method for analyzing different substances within a test sample. The sample must be a gas and the device is able to identify trace organic compounds within the sample.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cho says, forget what you’ve seen on TV crime dramas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A typical ‘CSI’ show takes about 40 minutes minus the commercials,” Cho said. “A typical run for analyzing one compound like polychloride biphenyl takes almost an hour for one of them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are 209 \u003ca href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polychlorinated_biphenyl\">polychloride biphenyls\u003c/a>, so that’s nearly nine days just to clear all the varieties of one chemical.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Moving on to another chemical could mean another nine days. After two weeks, working around the clock, you’d only have eliminated eliminate two chemicals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_27008\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 357px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/bird-release_1-1024x683.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-27008\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/02/bird-release_1-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"After cleaning goo-covered birds with baking soda, vinegar and dish soap. the International Bird Rescue Center has released 101 back into the wild. (Anya Schultz/KQED)\" width=\"357\" height=\"238\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">After cleaning gunked birds with baking soda, vinegar and dish soap, responders have released more than 100 back into the wild.\u003cbr>(Anya Schultz/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>That’s the problem with an unidentified compound. Cho says investigators need some kind of starting point. Because even if they know what elements are in the compound, that’s still only marginally helpful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s a lot of things that have carbon and hydrogen but what is it?” says Cho. “Our bodies have that and most things in nature have that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before Cho and her team can even begin the tests, they have to remove foreign matter like feathers and sand from the goo. Then they have to transform it into a liquid or gas, to run through the machines.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re basically trying to reconstruct a vase from a pile of powder,” says Cho. She says in her five years at the lab, she’s never seen anything like this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/\">Environmental Protection Agency\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"http://www.noaa.gov/\">National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration \u003c/a>are also perplexed, and working on the case. After three weeks, they’ve ruled out two suspect substances.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Building a Better Bionic Arm by Teaching the Brain a New Signal",
"headTitle": "Building a Better Bionic Arm by Teaching the Brain a New Signal | KQED",
"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"audio-wrap\">\n\u003ch2>Listen:\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>http://www.kqed.org/.stream/anon/radio/science/2015/01/20150130ArtificiallimbsScience.mp3\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26749\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Bionic-arm-e1422650054858.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26749 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Bionic-arm-e1422650054858.jpg\" alt=\"Jason Koger, a father of three from Owensboro, Kentucky, uses a pair of high-tech bionic hands. Both his arms were amputated below the elbow after an ATV accident seven years ago. (Danny Beeler/Heart of the City Design)\" width=\"640\" height=\"358\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jason Koger, a father of three from Owensboro, Kentucky, uses these old-style hooks, and has a pair of bionic arms. Both his arms were amputated below the elbow after an ATV accident seven years ago. (Danny Beeler/Heart of the City Design)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Researchers have made dramatic improvements with artificial limbs in the last few years. Bionic hands, for example, are so dexterous they can pick up a quarter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But for prosthetics to move more naturally, they need both good engineering and a way to communicate with the brain. That’s something scientists at \u003ca href=\"http://www.ucsf.edu/\">UC San Francisco\u003c/a> are working on, and their success hinges on the brain’s ability to make new connections.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jason Koger lost both his arms in an ATV accident seven years ago. A father of three from Owensboro, Kentucky, Koger doesn’t mind showing off the high-tech bionic hands he wears now. With them, he’s able to open soda cans and work gadgets that have pressure-sensitive touchscreens – but a few things are missing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have a three year old, a little boy,” Koger says, “and I can hold his hand, and we’re fixing to cross the street. But then all of the sudden I kind of look around and I look back and he’s not even holding my hand, and I thought he still was.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not just touch that’s absent. Koger has a hard time sensing where his bionic hands are when he can’t see them. Say, for example, he tries to thread a belt through the loops in the back of his blue jeans. He has to do it before putting them on. The bionic hands lack a sense called \u003ca href=\"http://io9.com/sensing-your-own-body-is-more-complicated-than-you-real-1473461740\">proprioception\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Body’s Sense of Spatial Awareness\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26756\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 423px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Artifical-limbs-photo.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-26756\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Artifical-limbs-photo.jpg\" alt=\"Though Koger owns a pair of high-tech bionic hands, he sometimes opts for old-fashioned hooks, like when he’s planning to work outside or when he expects rain. (Danny Beeler/Heart of the City Design)\" width=\"423\" height=\"282\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Koger tosses a pitch to his daughter while wearing his hooks. (Danny Beeler/Heart of the City Design)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The human body has a built-in sense for where its various parts are in space, explains \u003ca href=\"http://profiles.ucsf.edu/philip.sabes\">Philip Sabes\u003c/a>, a professor and neurophysiologist at UC San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are sensors that live in your muscles, in your joints, even in your tendons,” Sabes says, “that tell your brain about where you body is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is why you can touch your nose even with your eyes closed; proprioception tells you where your nose is with respect to your hand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As you move, proprioception gives the brain feedback, and this feedback lets you refine your movement, moment by moment. But amputees controlling a prosthetic have to do without this sense. Generally, they rely on sight instead, which isn’t as fast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Visual feedback is much slower to get to the parts of the brain that control movement than proprioception is,” Sabes says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sabes’ research is backed by the \u003ca href=\"http://www.defense.gov/\">Department of Defense\u003c/a> research agency, \u003ca href=\"http://www.darpa.mil/default.aspx\">DARPA\u003c/a>. There are hundreds of thousands of amputees in the U.S., including some 1,500 veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sabes’ Experiment\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sabes is researching how an artificial limb might be able to send useful feedback to the brain of an amputee. What if the signal were artificial, he asked, could the brain figure out what it meant and put it to use?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sabes began with a monkey that was trained to move his hands in response to a dot on a screen, that is, a visual signal. Then Sabes added a signal to the brain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The signal went to a tiny chip, surgically implanted just inside the monkey’s skull. It delivered tiny fractions of a volt to the motor cortex — an amount of electricity so small, Sabes says, you probably wouldn’t feel it on your hand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26757\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 427px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Prof-Sabes-1024x683.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-26757\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Prof-Sabes-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"Philip Sabes is a professor and neurophysiologist at UC San Francisco, where he researches brain science and engineering in hopes of developing a better connection between man and machine. (Cindy Chew/UCSF)\" width=\"427\" height=\"284\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Philip Sabes is a professor and neurophysiologist at UC San Francisco, where he researches brain science and engineering in hopes of developing a better connection between humans and machines. (Cindy Chew/UCSF)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“And so that signalled to the monkey,” Sabes says, “that maybe there was something lightly touching his arm or his elbow or his shoulder.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The researchers paired this stimulation alongside the visual signals the monkey was already used to reading. Sabes says initially, it didn’t make much difference.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Over days and weeks,” he says, “we noticed that the monkey started to perform better and better when he had both cues.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The monkey’s brain was incorporating the new signal — putting it to use, so he had to rely less on visual cues alone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“After a few weeks, he was so good we actually let him do the task with just stimulation alone,” Sabes says. “So then he was able to sit in a dark room with no visual feedback, nonetheless he could reach from one target to the next to the next, because he could feel where those targets were, via the stimulation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>What It Means\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nThe results show that the primate brain, given an arbitrary kind of signal, can adapt to understand it as a kind of faux proprioception. Knowing that the brain can do this could someday lead to giving amputees a sense of where their artificial limbs are in space. Such signals could be delivered through feedback, Sabes says, via either the nerves or small implants in the brain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So how long until this kind of technology is far enough along it can help amputees control their prosthetics well enough to move like the real thing?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m going to be bullish,” Sabes said. “Fifteen to 20 years until it’s as natural as normal movement.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26749\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Bionic-arm-e1422650054858.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26749 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Bionic-arm-e1422650054858.jpg\" alt=\"Jason Koger, a father of three from Owensboro, Kentucky, uses a pair of high-tech bionic hands. Both his arms were amputated below the elbow after an ATV accident seven years ago. (Danny Beeler/Heart of the City Design)\" width=\"640\" height=\"358\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jason Koger, a father of three from Owensboro, Kentucky, uses these old-style hooks, and has a pair of bionic arms. Both his arms were amputated below the elbow after an ATV accident seven years ago. (Danny Beeler/Heart of the City Design)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Researchers have made dramatic improvements with artificial limbs in the last few years. Bionic hands, for example, are so dexterous they can pick up a quarter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But for prosthetics to move more naturally, they need both good engineering and a way to communicate with the brain. That’s something scientists at \u003ca href=\"http://www.ucsf.edu/\">UC San Francisco\u003c/a> are working on, and their success hinges on the brain’s ability to make new connections.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jason Koger lost both his arms in an ATV accident seven years ago. A father of three from Owensboro, Kentucky, Koger doesn’t mind showing off the high-tech bionic hands he wears now. With them, he’s able to open soda cans and work gadgets that have pressure-sensitive touchscreens – but a few things are missing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have a three year old, a little boy,” Koger says, “and I can hold his hand, and we’re fixing to cross the street. But then all of the sudden I kind of look around and I look back and he’s not even holding my hand, and I thought he still was.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not just touch that’s absent. Koger has a hard time sensing where his bionic hands are when he can’t see them. Say, for example, he tries to thread a belt through the loops in the back of his blue jeans. He has to do it before putting them on. The bionic hands lack a sense called \u003ca href=\"http://io9.com/sensing-your-own-body-is-more-complicated-than-you-real-1473461740\">proprioception\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Body’s Sense of Spatial Awareness\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26756\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 423px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Artifical-limbs-photo.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-26756\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Artifical-limbs-photo.jpg\" alt=\"Though Koger owns a pair of high-tech bionic hands, he sometimes opts for old-fashioned hooks, like when he’s planning to work outside or when he expects rain. (Danny Beeler/Heart of the City Design)\" width=\"423\" height=\"282\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Koger tosses a pitch to his daughter while wearing his hooks. (Danny Beeler/Heart of the City Design)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The human body has a built-in sense for where its various parts are in space, explains \u003ca href=\"http://profiles.ucsf.edu/philip.sabes\">Philip Sabes\u003c/a>, a professor and neurophysiologist at UC San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are sensors that live in your muscles, in your joints, even in your tendons,” Sabes says, “that tell your brain about where you body is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is why you can touch your nose even with your eyes closed; proprioception tells you where your nose is with respect to your hand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As you move, proprioception gives the brain feedback, and this feedback lets you refine your movement, moment by moment. But amputees controlling a prosthetic have to do without this sense. Generally, they rely on sight instead, which isn’t as fast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Visual feedback is much slower to get to the parts of the brain that control movement than proprioception is,” Sabes says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sabes’ research is backed by the \u003ca href=\"http://www.defense.gov/\">Department of Defense\u003c/a> research agency, \u003ca href=\"http://www.darpa.mil/default.aspx\">DARPA\u003c/a>. There are hundreds of thousands of amputees in the U.S., including some 1,500 veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sabes’ Experiment\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sabes is researching how an artificial limb might be able to send useful feedback to the brain of an amputee. What if the signal were artificial, he asked, could the brain figure out what it meant and put it to use?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sabes began with a monkey that was trained to move his hands in response to a dot on a screen, that is, a visual signal. Then Sabes added a signal to the brain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The signal went to a tiny chip, surgically implanted just inside the monkey’s skull. It delivered tiny fractions of a volt to the motor cortex — an amount of electricity so small, Sabes says, you probably wouldn’t feel it on your hand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26757\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 427px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Prof-Sabes-1024x683.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-26757\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Prof-Sabes-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"Philip Sabes is a professor and neurophysiologist at UC San Francisco, where he researches brain science and engineering in hopes of developing a better connection between man and machine. (Cindy Chew/UCSF)\" width=\"427\" height=\"284\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Philip Sabes is a professor and neurophysiologist at UC San Francisco, where he researches brain science and engineering in hopes of developing a better connection between humans and machines. (Cindy Chew/UCSF)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“And so that signalled to the monkey,” Sabes says, “that maybe there was something lightly touching his arm or his elbow or his shoulder.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The researchers paired this stimulation alongside the visual signals the monkey was already used to reading. Sabes says initially, it didn’t make much difference.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Over days and weeks,” he says, “we noticed that the monkey started to perform better and better when he had both cues.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The monkey’s brain was incorporating the new signal — putting it to use, so he had to rely less on visual cues alone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“After a few weeks, he was so good we actually let him do the task with just stimulation alone,” Sabes says. “So then he was able to sit in a dark room with no visual feedback, nonetheless he could reach from one target to the next to the next, because he could feel where those targets were, via the stimulation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>What It Means\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nThe results show that the primate brain, given an arbitrary kind of signal, can adapt to understand it as a kind of faux proprioception. Knowing that the brain can do this could someday lead to giving amputees a sense of where their artificial limbs are in space. Such signals could be delivered through feedback, Sabes says, via either the nerves or small implants in the brain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So how long until this kind of technology is far enough along it can help amputees control their prosthetics well enough to move like the real thing?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m going to be bullish,” Sabes said. “Fifteen to 20 years until it’s as natural as normal movement.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26786\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/RS8248_IMG_4424-hpf.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/RS8248_IMG_4424-hpf.jpg\" alt=\"Looking west across San Pablo Bay, a tanker crosses in front of Mount Tamalpais, showing the poor air quality in December, 2013. (Craig Miller/KQED)\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26786\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Looking west across San Pablo Bay, a tanker crosses in front of Mount Tamalpais, showing the poor air quality in December, 2013. (Craig Miller/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The federal\u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/groundlevelozone/hearings.html\"> Environmental Protection Agency is holding a hearing\u003c/a> in Sacramento on Monday, Feb. 2, to hear public comment on new smog rules the Obama Administration says could prevent tens of thousands of asthma attacks and hundreds of premature deaths from air pollution.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hearing is one of just three across the nation where the EPA will listen to input on a \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/groundlevelozone/pdfs/20141125fs-overview.pdf\">new proposal\u003c/a> to reduce ozone from sources like diesel trucks, tractors, and oil refineries. The new standard would be 65-70 parts per billion (ppb), compared to today’s standard of 75 ppb.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Certain areas of California register some of the worst ozone pollution in the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Living in the Central Valley, it’s dangerous to your health. You take risks by living here,” says Rosanna Esparza, of Bakersfield, an environmental activist with \u003ca href=\"http://www.cleanwateraction.org/ca\">Clean Water Action\u003c/a>. “The standards as they are don’t protect us. Those are minimal.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Joaquin Valley is still struggling to meet the current ozone standard, set in 2008, and an even older standard of 84 ppb from 1997. The San Joaquin Valley Air District \u003ca href=\"http://www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com/stories/001/?ID=27419\">says it would take a miracle\u003c/a> to meet the new standard; they say it would mean people all over the valley would have to swap out their cars and diesel trucks for zero-emission vehicles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A lower ozone threshold would also mean some counties, like Alameda and Contra Costa, which don’t currently violate the ozone standard, would likely be out of compliance with federal air rules. (Check out a map \u003ca href=\"http://epa.maps.arcgis.com/apps/StorytellingSwipe/index.html?appid=a3c9f378699045749a85e9c04728fc79&webmap=3b3e0960060141c7828fc93b14e3d4d2\">here)\u003c/a>. Air quality flags warning of health risks would come out on more days of the year. Regions that don’t comply with the new standards risk fines and the loss of federal transportation money, among other consequences.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The oil and gas industry strongly \u003ca href=\"http://www.api.org/policy-and-issues/policy-items/environment/economic-impacts-of-ozone-regulations\">opposes the new smog rules\u003c/a>. The \u003ca href=\"http://www.cmta.net/page/legupdate-article.php?legupdate_id=921824\">California Manufacturers and Technology Association\u003c/a> says a lower ozone standard would cost businesses – and kill jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Federal law requires the EPA to base a decision on health science alone, not on the cost of achieving a standard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you can’t make it to the hearing, you can \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/groundlevelozone/how-to-comment.html\">submit public comment \u003c/a>online through March 17th.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A lower ozone threshold would also mean some counties, like Alameda and Contra Costa, which don’t currently violate the ozone standard, would likely be out of compliance with federal air rules. (Check out a map \u003ca href=\"http://epa.maps.arcgis.com/apps/StorytellingSwipe/index.html?appid=a3c9f378699045749a85e9c04728fc79&webmap=3b3e0960060141c7828fc93b14e3d4d2\">here)\u003c/a>. Air quality flags warning of health risks would come out on more days of the year. Regions that don’t comply with the new standards risk fines and the loss of federal transportation money, among other consequences.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The oil and gas industry strongly \u003ca href=\"http://www.api.org/policy-and-issues/policy-items/environment/economic-impacts-of-ozone-regulations\">opposes the new smog rules\u003c/a>. The \u003ca href=\"http://www.cmta.net/page/legupdate-article.php?legupdate_id=921824\">California Manufacturers and Technology Association\u003c/a> says a lower ozone standard would cost businesses – and kill jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Federal law requires the EPA to base a decision on health science alone, not on the cost of achieving a standard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you can’t make it to the hearing, you can \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/groundlevelozone/how-to-comment.html\">submit public comment \u003c/a>online through March 17th.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "California parks: New funding, better accountability needed to stop decline, new report says",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26730\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 850px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/state-parks.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26730\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/state-parks.jpg\" alt=\" Monterey Pines and other trees at sunset in Asilomar State Park, which celebrated its centennial in 2013. (Leslie David/KQED)\" width=\"850\" height=\"567\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Monterey Pines and other trees at sunset in Asilomar State Park, which celebrated its centennial in 2013.\u003cbr>(Leslie David/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>California’s venerable state parks — from sunny Los Angeles beaches to towering redwoods in the Santa Cruz Mountains — are under “serious stress” and suffering from declining budgets, shorter hours, higher fees, a $1.3 billion maintenance backlog and outdated technology.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s the conclusion of a new report scheduled for release Friday by a blue-ribbon state commission made up of business leaders, government officials and park experts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Parks Forward Commission says the parks system can be fixed but that a dedicated source of new funding must be found. But first, the state parks department has to rebuild public confidence three years after Gov. Jerry Brown and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger before him threatened to close dozens of parks to save money — and former parks director Ruth Coleman resigned after auditors found her staff had not reported millions of dollars sitting in accounts to state finance officials.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Read the full story at the \u003ca href=\"http://www.mercurynews.com/science/ci_27424214/state-parks-new-funding-better-accountability-needed-stop\">San Jose Mercury News\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv id=\"ppixelP6r\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26730\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 850px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/state-parks.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26730\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/state-parks.jpg\" alt=\" Monterey Pines and other trees at sunset in Asilomar State Park, which celebrated its centennial in 2013. (Leslie David/KQED)\" width=\"850\" height=\"567\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Monterey Pines and other trees at sunset in Asilomar State Park, which celebrated its centennial in 2013.\u003cbr>(Leslie David/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>California’s venerable state parks — from sunny Los Angeles beaches to towering redwoods in the Santa Cruz Mountains — are under “serious stress” and suffering from declining budgets, shorter hours, higher fees, a $1.3 billion maintenance backlog and outdated technology.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s the conclusion of a new report scheduled for release Friday by a blue-ribbon state commission made up of business leaders, government officials and park experts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Parks Forward Commission says the parks system can be fixed but that a dedicated source of new funding must be found. But first, the state parks department has to rebuild public confidence three years after Gov. Jerry Brown and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger before him threatened to close dozens of parks to save money — and former parks director Ruth Coleman resigned after auditors found her staff had not reported millions of dollars sitting in accounts to state finance officials.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Read the full story at the \u003ca href=\"http://www.mercurynews.com/science/ci_27424214/state-parks-new-funding-better-accountability-needed-stop\">San Jose Mercury News\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv id=\"ppixelP6r\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26659\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/20150118094856_IMG_2760-1024x682.jpeg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-26659\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/20150118094856_IMG_2760-1024x682.jpeg\" alt=\"Barren shores at Fallen Leaf Lake in January. (Joanne Elgart-Jennings)\" width=\"1024\" height=\"682\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Barren shores remain in January at Fallen Leaf Lake, more than 6,000 feet above sea level in the northern Sierra. (Joanne Elgart-Jennings)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Manual surveys on Thursday confirmed concerns over the \u003ca title=\"CDEC - snowpack\" href=\"http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cdecapp/snowapp/sweq.action\">withering mountain snowpack\u003c/a> — a critical source of water for millions of Californians. Statewide, water content in the Sierra’s accumulated snows is an anemic 25 percent of the average for this time of year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s despite a really soggy December in which some California cities got nearly three times their normal rainfall — and rainfall is the operative word. But those storms weren’t cold enough to deliver much snow to the middle elevations. 2014 went down as California’s warmest year on record.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The temperature side of things should not be neglected here, says climatologist Kelly Redmond, who has been tracking patterns in the Sierra for 25 years at the Western Regional Climate Center in Reno. “It has its own consequences that sort of stack on top of the precipitation deficits.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the Lake Tahoe region, Redmond says the “\u003ca title=\"Wiki - freezing level\" href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freezing_level\">freezing level\u003c/a>” — the elevation at which temperatures dip to freezing — has hovered at around 10,200 feet, or about 3,000 feet higher than the long-term average. That means less snow stored in the high peaks for use this summer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Follow that with what is now looking like a record-dry January for most of the state — and you’re left with a snowpack that is little more than a quarter of what’s normal for this date.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The good news: we’re in better shape than we were last year at this time but still far, far behind the kind of winter that all the experts said we would need to even begin to reverse the drought. While, thanks to December’s deluge, many cities in the Central Valley remain slightly ahead of normal for the season so far a \u003ca title=\"CDEC - 8-station index\" href=\"http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/reports/PLOT_ESI\">closely-watched index\u003c/a> of eight gauges in the northern Sierra — a key indicator for some of the state’s biggest reservoirs — has slipped below its average for late January, with little indication of major storms on the horizon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So while might be tempting to say, “Hey, what’s the problem — we’re running just about average,” state water managers have said California would likely need upward of 150 percent of its average precipitation to start turning things around. And time is running out. The occasional “March miracle” notwithstanding, the rhythms of California’s Mediterranean climate are such that precipitation typically starts tapering off after February.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This video from the state Department of Water Resources shows how patchy the snow cover is, even around 7,000 feet of elevation. The “12 percent of average” that surveyor Frank Gehrke mentions is the reading from the single snow course where the video was shot, not the statewide number.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3qA3ysiHkM\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The good news: we’re in better shape than we were last year at this time but still far, far behind the kind of winter that all the experts said we would need to even begin to reverse the drought. While, thanks to December’s deluge, many cities in the Central Valley remain slightly ahead of normal for the season so far a \u003ca title=\"CDEC - 8-station index\" href=\"http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/reports/PLOT_ESI\">closely-watched index\u003c/a> of eight gauges in the northern Sierra — a key indicator for some of the state’s biggest reservoirs — has slipped below its average for late January, with little indication of major storms on the horizon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So while might be tempting to say, “Hey, what’s the problem — we’re running just about average,” state water managers have said California would likely need upward of 150 percent of its average precipitation to start turning things around. And time is running out. The occasional “March miracle” notwithstanding, the rhythms of California’s Mediterranean climate are such that precipitation typically starts tapering off after February.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This video from the state Department of Water Resources shows how patchy the snow cover is, even around 7,000 feet of elevation. The “12 percent of average” that surveyor Frank Gehrke mentions is the reading from the single snow course where the video was shot, not the statewide number.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/F3qA3ysiHkM'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/F3qA3ysiHkM'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26631\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 620px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/SMAP.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26631\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/SMAP.png\" alt=\"NASA's SMAP satellite will capture microwave radiation from the Earth to measure soil moisture. (NASA)\" width=\"620\" height=\"300\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">NASA’s SMAP satellite will capture microwave radiation from the Earth to measure soil moisture. (NASA)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Thursday morning a rocket was scheduled to lift off from \u003ca href=\"http://www.vandenberg.af.mil/\">Vandenberg Air Force Base \u003c/a>on California’s Central Coast, tricked out with instruments that could provide better weather forecasts and more clues to where the drought is headed. (Update: NASA \u003ca title=\"Yahoo News - post\" href=\"http://news.yahoo.com/nasa-calls-off-satellite-launch-minutes-liftoff-due-151253584.html;_ylt=AwrTcc1wW8pUCW8AwGEnnIlQ\">rescheduled Thursday’s launch\u003c/a> for Saturday due to high winds and technical problems).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not one of NASA’s catchier names, but the \u003ca title=\"NASA - JPL - SMAP\" href=\"http://smap.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/description/\">satellite known as SMAP\u003c/a>, for “Soil Moisture Active Passive” is designed to provide — for the first time — highly precise maps of water stored in topsoil around the world. Scientists say that’s an important cog in the planet’s water cycle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Much like when you perspire, your sweat evaporates and cools your body,” offers Kent Kellogg, the mission’s project director at the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As it evaporates it seeds the atmosphere with moisture, so that clouds can form, and then precipitation can occur.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From more than 400 miles up, SMAP will measure differences in natural microwave radiation coming off the Earth. Kellogg likens it to a big pair of night vision goggles in the sky, but measuring radiation on a much lower frequency (so, no, it doesn’t mean NASA can watch you skulking around at night). Wetter soil is cooler and drier soil warmer. From that, scientists can derive water content accurate down to about 6 square miles. Kellogg says that could improve local flood forecasting and drought management.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you know how much water is in the soil, if you think of soil as a sponge and you know how full of water that soil or that sponge is, you can have a much better prediction of the likelihood for flooding to occur,” explains Kellogg.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCBBEbKVwm4\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Currently soil moisture is mapped using a relatively sparse network of individual ground-level probes. SMAP will constantly map soil conditions globally. Record high temperatures have \u003ca title=\"Q-Sci - post\" href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/10/14/high-temps-intensified-california-drought/\">stoked evaporation from soils\u003c/a>, making California’s current drought even worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“SMAP will give us a much more accurate measurement of the rate of change of drought-prone areas,” says Kellogg. “Are they getting larger or getting smaller?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They’ve been getting larger in California lately, given the \u003ca title=\"SFGate - post\" href=\"http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Destructive-extremes-California-s-dry-January-6041530.php\">historically dry January\u003c/a> that’s just winding down, with little precipitation on the horizon. Of course, it’s hard to see clearly more than about ten days out with current weather models. NASA expects SMAP to help with that as well, possibly adding days to the range of reliable regional forecasts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Understanding soil moisture conditions in regional areas can give us a lot of insight into the likelihood for rain to form and for the regional temperatures,” says Kellogg.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But SMAP will have its limitations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We do not expect to use SMAP data at this point,” says Roger Bales, a climate scientist at the University of California, Merced, “in part because we do not expect it to provide relevant soil moisture information for the areas where we work.” Bales has spent years developing a ground-based network of sensors to measure soil and other hydrologic conditions in the Sierra Nevada, much of which is heavily forested.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“SMAP has some limitations on measurements of soil moisture when the soil is covered by canopy,” or snow in a wet year, Bales points out. “We also understand that SMAP will mainly measure moisture in a thin surface layer of soil, and our interest is more on the deeper soil profile.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But with its 20 or so ground passes per day, Kellogg expects SMAP to provide useful data on more exposed ground, such as the millions of acres of irrigated land in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>SMAP will be the fifth and final addition to a suite of recently launched earth science satellites that track attributes ranging from precipitation to the carbon cycle.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26631\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 620px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/SMAP.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-26631\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/SMAP.png\" alt=\"NASA's SMAP satellite will capture microwave radiation from the Earth to measure soil moisture. (NASA)\" width=\"620\" height=\"300\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">NASA’s SMAP satellite will capture microwave radiation from the Earth to measure soil moisture. (NASA)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Thursday morning a rocket was scheduled to lift off from \u003ca href=\"http://www.vandenberg.af.mil/\">Vandenberg Air Force Base \u003c/a>on California’s Central Coast, tricked out with instruments that could provide better weather forecasts and more clues to where the drought is headed. (Update: NASA \u003ca title=\"Yahoo News - post\" href=\"http://news.yahoo.com/nasa-calls-off-satellite-launch-minutes-liftoff-due-151253584.html;_ylt=AwrTcc1wW8pUCW8AwGEnnIlQ\">rescheduled Thursday’s launch\u003c/a> for Saturday due to high winds and technical problems).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not one of NASA’s catchier names, but the \u003ca title=\"NASA - JPL - SMAP\" href=\"http://smap.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/description/\">satellite known as SMAP\u003c/a>, for “Soil Moisture Active Passive” is designed to provide — for the first time — highly precise maps of water stored in topsoil around the world. Scientists say that’s an important cog in the planet’s water cycle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Much like when you perspire, your sweat evaporates and cools your body,” offers Kent Kellogg, the mission’s project director at the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As it evaporates it seeds the atmosphere with moisture, so that clouds can form, and then precipitation can occur.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From more than 400 miles up, SMAP will measure differences in natural microwave radiation coming off the Earth. Kellogg likens it to a big pair of night vision goggles in the sky, but measuring radiation on a much lower frequency (so, no, it doesn’t mean NASA can watch you skulking around at night). Wetter soil is cooler and drier soil warmer. From that, scientists can derive water content accurate down to about 6 square miles. Kellogg says that could improve local flood forecasting and drought management.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you know how much water is in the soil, if you think of soil as a sponge and you know how full of water that soil or that sponge is, you can have a much better prediction of the likelihood for flooding to occur,” explains Kellogg.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/GCBBEbKVwm4'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/GCBBEbKVwm4'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Currently soil moisture is mapped using a relatively sparse network of individual ground-level probes. SMAP will constantly map soil conditions globally. Record high temperatures have \u003ca title=\"Q-Sci - post\" href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/10/14/high-temps-intensified-california-drought/\">stoked evaporation from soils\u003c/a>, making California’s current drought even worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“SMAP will give us a much more accurate measurement of the rate of change of drought-prone areas,” says Kellogg. “Are they getting larger or getting smaller?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They’ve been getting larger in California lately, given the \u003ca title=\"SFGate - post\" href=\"http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Destructive-extremes-California-s-dry-January-6041530.php\">historically dry January\u003c/a> that’s just winding down, with little precipitation on the horizon. Of course, it’s hard to see clearly more than about ten days out with current weather models. NASA expects SMAP to help with that as well, possibly adding days to the range of reliable regional forecasts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Understanding soil moisture conditions in regional areas can give us a lot of insight into the likelihood for rain to form and for the regional temperatures,” says Kellogg.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But SMAP will have its limitations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We do not expect to use SMAP data at this point,” says Roger Bales, a climate scientist at the University of California, Merced, “in part because we do not expect it to provide relevant soil moisture information for the areas where we work.” Bales has spent years developing a ground-based network of sensors to measure soil and other hydrologic conditions in the Sierra Nevada, much of which is heavily forested.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“SMAP has some limitations on measurements of soil moisture when the soil is covered by canopy,” or snow in a wet year, Bales points out. “We also understand that SMAP will mainly measure moisture in a thin surface layer of soil, and our interest is more on the deeper soil profile.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But with its 20 or so ground passes per day, Kellogg expects SMAP to provide useful data on more exposed ground, such as the millions of acres of irrigated land in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>SMAP will be the fifth and final addition to a suite of recently launched earth science satellites that track attributes ranging from precipitation to the carbon cycle.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"audio-wrap\">\n\u003ch2>Listen:\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>http://www.kqed.org/.stream/anon/radio/science/2015/01/20150123ScienceResilientRidge.mp3\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26562\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Ridge-image-e1422037269149-1024x576.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26562 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Ridge-image-e1422037269149-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"Clouds dissipate over San Pablo Bay after the season’s most intense storm on December 11. There’s been relatively little rain since. (Craig Miller/KQED)\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Clouds dissipate over San Pablo Bay after the season’s most intense storm on December 11. There’s been relatively little rain since. (Craig Miller/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>You might’ve noticed a conspicuous absence lately: rain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, with a scant few days remaining in the month, much of Northern California is on track for a record-dry January. The winter storms that had us scrambling in December have largely dried up, raising the prospect of a fourth year of drought. We had two big bursts that qualify as \u003ca title=\"Q-NewsFix - post\" href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2014/12/09/our-next-storm-very-windy-and-very-wet\">atmospheric river storms\u003c/a> and then … crickets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If this sounds somewhat familiar, flash back to the beginning of 2013, when, after a similarly soggy December, almost in sync with the New Year’s ball dropping in Times Square, the tap suddenly shut off — and stayed off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It turned out that a big, bloated bubble of high pressure had parked itself over the West Coast and did not move. It caught the eye of Daniel Swain, then a 23-year-old doctoral student in climate science at Stanford University.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was going on and on, well beyond that maximum that we normally see and persisting over months,” Swain recalls. “And not only over months but then recurring essentially over the course of two consecutive winter seasons.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He started writing about it on his \u003ca title=\"Weather West\" href=\"http://www.weatherwest.com/archives/1085\">California Weather blog\u003c/a> and decided to give it a name: the \u003ca title=\"CA Wx Blog - post\" href=\"http://www.weatherwest.com/archives/1085\">Ridiculously Resilient Ridge\u003c/a>. It stuck. In fact, the “Triple-R” as it’s now known in weather geek shorthand, has become enough of “a thing” that it has \u003ca title=\"Wiki - RRR\" href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ridiculously_Resilient_Ridge\">its own Wikipedia page\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26565\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Ridiculously-Reilent-Ridge-graphic-e1422040126985-1024x629.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26565 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Ridiculously-Reilent-Ridge-graphic-e1422040126985-1024x629.jpg\" alt=\"Print\" width=\"1024\" height=\"629\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Storms headed for the California coast run into the Ridiculously Resilient Ridge, represented by the “H” in this graphic. (David Pierce/ KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Pockets of high and low pressure — meteorologists like to call them “ridges” and “troughs” — are a regular feature of California’s winter weather, moving through like waves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These pressure patterns in the upper atmosphere define wind flow,” Swain explains, “and where the wind’s coming from defines the storm track and whether California receives its wintertime precipitation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Or doesn’t. When we’re in a trough, the usual winter storm track in the Pacific is ushered right into California. But as Swain points out, “When it’s pushed farther north, as has been the case when we see these big ridges of high pressure occur, that storm track gets shifted well to the north, to British Columbia, to Alaska.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As weatherman Paul Deanno at San Francisco’s CBS-5 put it, “It’s like a bouncer in the sky. Nothing makes it here with the ridge right on top of us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Swain offers another image: “They’re like boulders in a small stream of water that deflect the flow of the water to either side of the boulder.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In this case, that stream is the jet stream, the high-level winds that are the conveyor belt for California’s rain and snow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And it’s kind of literally true,” Swain says, “because these pressure patterns in the atmosphere are actually defining fluid flow, except in this case the fluid is air in the atmosphere rather than water in a stream.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26572\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 305px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Daniel-Swain-e1422041073843-782x1024.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26572 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Daniel-Swain-e1422041073843-782x1024.jpg\" alt=\"Stanford climate scientist Daniel Swain coined the “Ridiculously Resilient Ridge” moniker. (Craig Miller/KQED)\" width=\"305\" height=\"399\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Stanford climate scientist Daniel Swain coined the “Ridiculously Resilient Ridge” moniker. (Craig Miller/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>So now, here we are again, with an obstinate ridge parked over us. Does this mean the Triple-R has returned?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No,” California State Climatologist Mike Anderson told me at a recent drought briefing. “This is very different from the pattern that set up last year, where we had a ridge that extended up into Canada, and was reinforced and lasted six weeks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The pattern we’re in now is more of a transient pattern where you may see a ridge develop but it may just as easily break down,” Anderson continued. “In this case, the patterns that we see in the jet streams and the oceans are not all moving in the same direction to create such a ridge. The jet stream is in a position where it will push through and will have an easier time than it did last year.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Swain \u003ca title=\"CA Wx Blog - post\" href=\"http://www.weatherwest.com/archives/2853\">agrees that the jury is out\u003c/a>, though the current high-pressure pattern has remained in control for more than a month now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But this is a really critical time of year,” he adds. And if this high-pressure stays parked into February? “Then we have to start thinking about the potential that we’re looking at another dry year, despite the fact that we saw so much rainfall in early December,” Swain says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some other things we don’t know: whether this is some kind of “new normal” and if it is, whether human-induced climate change is to blame.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What we do know is that winter doesn’t last all year. January is the middle leg of a three-month stretch in which California typically gets half its precipitation (in the Bay Area, December, January and February are virtually tied for the wettest months on average). And while there have been “March miracles,” at some point, time runs out.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Scientists hope a stubborn high-pressure bubble over the West Coast isn't a replay of the last two winters.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26562\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Ridge-image-e1422037269149-1024x576.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26562 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Ridge-image-e1422037269149-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"Clouds dissipate over San Pablo Bay after the season’s most intense storm on December 11. There’s been relatively little rain since. (Craig Miller/KQED)\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Clouds dissipate over San Pablo Bay after the season’s most intense storm on December 11. There’s been relatively little rain since. (Craig Miller/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>You might’ve noticed a conspicuous absence lately: rain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, with a scant few days remaining in the month, much of Northern California is on track for a record-dry January. The winter storms that had us scrambling in December have largely dried up, raising the prospect of a fourth year of drought. We had two big bursts that qualify as \u003ca title=\"Q-NewsFix - post\" href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2014/12/09/our-next-storm-very-windy-and-very-wet\">atmospheric river storms\u003c/a> and then … crickets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If this sounds somewhat familiar, flash back to the beginning of 2013, when, after a similarly soggy December, almost in sync with the New Year’s ball dropping in Times Square, the tap suddenly shut off — and stayed off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It turned out that a big, bloated bubble of high pressure had parked itself over the West Coast and did not move. It caught the eye of Daniel Swain, then a 23-year-old doctoral student in climate science at Stanford University.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was going on and on, well beyond that maximum that we normally see and persisting over months,” Swain recalls. “And not only over months but then recurring essentially over the course of two consecutive winter seasons.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He started writing about it on his \u003ca title=\"Weather West\" href=\"http://www.weatherwest.com/archives/1085\">California Weather blog\u003c/a> and decided to give it a name: the \u003ca title=\"CA Wx Blog - post\" href=\"http://www.weatherwest.com/archives/1085\">Ridiculously Resilient Ridge\u003c/a>. It stuck. In fact, the “Triple-R” as it’s now known in weather geek shorthand, has become enough of “a thing” that it has \u003ca title=\"Wiki - RRR\" href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ridiculously_Resilient_Ridge\">its own Wikipedia page\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26565\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Ridiculously-Reilent-Ridge-graphic-e1422040126985-1024x629.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26565 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Ridiculously-Reilent-Ridge-graphic-e1422040126985-1024x629.jpg\" alt=\"Print\" width=\"1024\" height=\"629\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Storms headed for the California coast run into the Ridiculously Resilient Ridge, represented by the “H” in this graphic. (David Pierce/ KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Pockets of high and low pressure — meteorologists like to call them “ridges” and “troughs” — are a regular feature of California’s winter weather, moving through like waves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These pressure patterns in the upper atmosphere define wind flow,” Swain explains, “and where the wind’s coming from defines the storm track and whether California receives its wintertime precipitation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Or doesn’t. When we’re in a trough, the usual winter storm track in the Pacific is ushered right into California. But as Swain points out, “When it’s pushed farther north, as has been the case when we see these big ridges of high pressure occur, that storm track gets shifted well to the north, to British Columbia, to Alaska.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As weatherman Paul Deanno at San Francisco’s CBS-5 put it, “It’s like a bouncer in the sky. Nothing makes it here with the ridge right on top of us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Swain offers another image: “They’re like boulders in a small stream of water that deflect the flow of the water to either side of the boulder.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In this case, that stream is the jet stream, the high-level winds that are the conveyor belt for California’s rain and snow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And it’s kind of literally true,” Swain says, “because these pressure patterns in the atmosphere are actually defining fluid flow, except in this case the fluid is air in the atmosphere rather than water in a stream.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26572\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 305px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Daniel-Swain-e1422041073843-782x1024.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26572 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Daniel-Swain-e1422041073843-782x1024.jpg\" alt=\"Stanford climate scientist Daniel Swain coined the “Ridiculously Resilient Ridge” moniker. (Craig Miller/KQED)\" width=\"305\" height=\"399\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Stanford climate scientist Daniel Swain coined the “Ridiculously Resilient Ridge” moniker. (Craig Miller/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>So now, here we are again, with an obstinate ridge parked over us. Does this mean the Triple-R has returned?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No,” California State Climatologist Mike Anderson told me at a recent drought briefing. “This is very different from the pattern that set up last year, where we had a ridge that extended up into Canada, and was reinforced and lasted six weeks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The pattern we’re in now is more of a transient pattern where you may see a ridge develop but it may just as easily break down,” Anderson continued. “In this case, the patterns that we see in the jet streams and the oceans are not all moving in the same direction to create such a ridge. The jet stream is in a position where it will push through and will have an easier time than it did last year.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Swain \u003ca title=\"CA Wx Blog - post\" href=\"http://www.weatherwest.com/archives/2853\">agrees that the jury is out\u003c/a>, though the current high-pressure pattern has remained in control for more than a month now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But this is a really critical time of year,” he adds. And if this high-pressure stays parked into February? “Then we have to start thinking about the potential that we’re looking at another dry year, despite the fact that we saw so much rainfall in early December,” Swain says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some other things we don’t know: whether this is some kind of “new normal” and if it is, whether human-induced climate change is to blame.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What we do know is that winter doesn’t last all year. January is the middle leg of a three-month stretch in which California typically gets half its precipitation (in the Bay Area, December, January and February are virtually tied for the wettest months on average). And while there have been “March miracles,” at some point, time runs out.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Scientists Still Trying to Identify Mystery Bird Goo",
"headTitle": "Scientists Still Trying to Identify Mystery Bird Goo | KQED",
"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26463\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Goo-bird-e1421799850872-1024x576.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26463 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Goo-bird-e1421799850872-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">International Bird Rescue’s Mark Russell points to the unidentified substance which induced hypothermia in this dead bird in San Leandro’s Marina. (Sara Hossaini/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>By \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/sarastrummer\">Sara Hossaini\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 11:45 a.m., Jan. 28:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today the International Bird Rescue Center released 24 birds that were found covered in a mysterious goo in San Francisco Bay. After spending ten days in captivity receiving medical treatment, the birds were well enough to return to the wild.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 6:30 p.m., Jan. 27:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scientists from the \u003ca href=\"https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/\">California Department of Fish and Wildlife\u003c/a> say they’re working around the clock to categorize the elusive substance that killed and injured hundreds of the seabirds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So far they have ruled out petroleum and polyisobutylene, or high-viscosity PIB, a synthetic rubber and marine fuel additive that was \u003ca href=\"http://www.theinformationdaily.com/2013/10/23/chemical-pib-responsible-for-mass-seabird-deaths-to-be-banned\">responsible for bird kills\u003c/a> along the coast of England in recent years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They now believe the gunk is a chemical mixture but are still trying to figure out whether it’s natural or man-made.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Environmental scientist Daniel Orr said, unfortunately, there isn’t a single instrument to test the material. “When you have a fully unknown compound, there’s no [one] tool I can put that into,” said Orr. “I certainly wish there was in this case.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, his team relies on infrared technology, mass spectrometry and nuclear magnetic resonance, sometimes testing multiple samples simultaneously.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To speed up the investigation, his team is now sending samples to laboratories at the \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/\">Environmental Protection Agency\u003c/a>, the \u003ca href=\"http://www.noaa.gov/\">National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"https://www.dtsc.ca.gov/\">Department of Toxic Substances Control\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Orr says the process isn’t as simple as TV crime dramas suggest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One of the biggest differences in the reality between ‘CSI’ and my day-to-day work is the preparation of the sample,” said Orr. Removing materials like feathers and sand prior to processing can take hours, Orr says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than 40 scientists are now working on the case, with no word on how long it might take to have results.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 10:30 a.m. Jan. 21:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The number of birds that have died from a mysterious goo has doubled since yesterday. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife says 200 birds are dead and another 315 are being treated by International Bird Rescue. The organizations still haven’t identified the sticky substance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26470\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 310px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Goo-bird__2-682x1024.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26470 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Goo-bird__2-682x1024.jpg\" alt=\"Labs are investigating the cause of the mysterious gunk which has killed at least 100 birds since Friday, including this bufflehead in San Leandro Marina. (Sara Hossaini)\" width=\"310\" height=\"465\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Labs are investigating the cause of the mysterious gunk which has killed at least 100 birds since Friday, including this bufflehead in San Leandro Marina. (Sara Hossaini)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Original Post:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wildlife officials are still seeking the source of a strange, sticky substance fouling birds around San Francisco Bay. It’s already killed at least 200 birds and injured hundreds more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“All these dead birds are my failures,” lamented Mark Russell of \u003ca href=\"http://bird-rescue.org/\">International Bird Rescue\u003c/a>, as he heaved a bag full of dead birds into his van at the San Leandro Marina on Tuesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thanks to a team of volunteers, boxes of living birds await cleanup — but of \u003cem>what\u003c/em>, they’re not sure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Non-petroleum substance has wildlife experts baffled\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not oil. That’s one reason why volunteer groups like Russell’s have been doing most of the work since the gooey substance was first reported at multiple sites on Friday, including Alameda County, the Crab Cove Visitor Center in Alameda, Hayward Regional Shoreline and the San Leandro Marina.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/\">California Department of Fish and Wildlife \u003c/a>spokesman Andrew Hughan says extra resources that might have been triggered by a petroleum incident aren’t available.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The good news, according to Hughan, is that the substance doesn’t appear to be toxic. No fish have died and residents continued to cast their poles along the shoreline on Tuesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a mystery, says Hughan, “you know, I’ve heard it described as rubber cement.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Chemical analysis may lead to source\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hughan says two labs are currently trying to pin down the nature of the substance,which gunks up feathers and leads to hypothermia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If it turns out that this is man-made, we’re going to try to find them, and if it comes to it, we’re going to file criminal charges.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hughman hopes to announce the findings as early as this week on California Fish and Wildlife’s Twitter feed: @CaliforniaDFW.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So far, the stuff is finding its way primarily onto common shoreline birds, such as buffleheads, surf scoters, and horned grebes. Meanwhile its impact has spread to the Peninsula coastline and has started to affect more fragile species, including sandpipers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"//www.wildlifeservices.org/\">Wildlife Emergency Services\u003c/a> leaders are asking for volunteers to help find distressed birds by reporting sightings to the organization at \u003ca href=\"tel:%28831%29%20429-2323\">(831) 429-2323\u003c/a>. Interested volunteers can \u003ca href=\"http://www.wildlifeservices.org/PAGES/VOLUNTEER.html\">fill out an application\u003c/a>. Untrained members of the public are discouraged from trying capture distressed birds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/187062825″ params=”color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "An unidentified substance has killed or injured hundreds of birds so far. ",
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"title": "Scientists Still Trying to Identify Mystery Bird Goo | KQED",
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"headline": "Scientists Still Trying to Identify Mystery Bird Goo",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26463\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Goo-bird-e1421799850872-1024x576.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26463 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Goo-bird-e1421799850872-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">International Bird Rescue’s Mark Russell points to the unidentified substance which induced hypothermia in this dead bird in San Leandro’s Marina. (Sara Hossaini/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>By \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/sarastrummer\">Sara Hossaini\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 11:45 a.m., Jan. 28:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today the International Bird Rescue Center released 24 birds that were found covered in a mysterious goo in San Francisco Bay. After spending ten days in captivity receiving medical treatment, the birds were well enough to return to the wild.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 6:30 p.m., Jan. 27:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scientists from the \u003ca href=\"https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/\">California Department of Fish and Wildlife\u003c/a> say they’re working around the clock to categorize the elusive substance that killed and injured hundreds of the seabirds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So far they have ruled out petroleum and polyisobutylene, or high-viscosity PIB, a synthetic rubber and marine fuel additive that was \u003ca href=\"http://www.theinformationdaily.com/2013/10/23/chemical-pib-responsible-for-mass-seabird-deaths-to-be-banned\">responsible for bird kills\u003c/a> along the coast of England in recent years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They now believe the gunk is a chemical mixture but are still trying to figure out whether it’s natural or man-made.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Environmental scientist Daniel Orr said, unfortunately, there isn’t a single instrument to test the material. “When you have a fully unknown compound, there’s no [one] tool I can put that into,” said Orr. “I certainly wish there was in this case.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, his team relies on infrared technology, mass spectrometry and nuclear magnetic resonance, sometimes testing multiple samples simultaneously.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To speed up the investigation, his team is now sending samples to laboratories at the \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/\">Environmental Protection Agency\u003c/a>, the \u003ca href=\"http://www.noaa.gov/\">National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"https://www.dtsc.ca.gov/\">Department of Toxic Substances Control\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Orr says the process isn’t as simple as TV crime dramas suggest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“One of the biggest differences in the reality between ‘CSI’ and my day-to-day work is the preparation of the sample,” said Orr. Removing materials like feathers and sand prior to processing can take hours, Orr says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than 40 scientists are now working on the case, with no word on how long it might take to have results.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Update, 10:30 a.m. Jan. 21:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The number of birds that have died from a mysterious goo has doubled since yesterday. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife says 200 birds are dead and another 315 are being treated by International Bird Rescue. The organizations still haven’t identified the sticky substance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26470\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 310px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Goo-bird__2-682x1024.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26470 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Goo-bird__2-682x1024.jpg\" alt=\"Labs are investigating the cause of the mysterious gunk which has killed at least 100 birds since Friday, including this bufflehead in San Leandro Marina. (Sara Hossaini)\" width=\"310\" height=\"465\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Labs are investigating the cause of the mysterious gunk which has killed at least 100 birds since Friday, including this bufflehead in San Leandro Marina. (Sara Hossaini)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Original Post:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wildlife officials are still seeking the source of a strange, sticky substance fouling birds around San Francisco Bay. It’s already killed at least 200 birds and injured hundreds more.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“All these dead birds are my failures,” lamented Mark Russell of \u003ca href=\"http://bird-rescue.org/\">International Bird Rescue\u003c/a>, as he heaved a bag full of dead birds into his van at the San Leandro Marina on Tuesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thanks to a team of volunteers, boxes of living birds await cleanup — but of \u003cem>what\u003c/em>, they’re not sure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Non-petroleum substance has wildlife experts baffled\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not oil. That’s one reason why volunteer groups like Russell’s have been doing most of the work since the gooey substance was first reported at multiple sites on Friday, including Alameda County, the Crab Cove Visitor Center in Alameda, Hayward Regional Shoreline and the San Leandro Marina.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wildlife.ca.gov/\">California Department of Fish and Wildlife \u003c/a>spokesman Andrew Hughan says extra resources that might have been triggered by a petroleum incident aren’t available.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The good news, according to Hughan, is that the substance doesn’t appear to be toxic. No fish have died and residents continued to cast their poles along the shoreline on Tuesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a mystery, says Hughan, “you know, I’ve heard it described as rubber cement.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Chemical analysis may lead to source\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hughan says two labs are currently trying to pin down the nature of the substance,which gunks up feathers and leads to hypothermia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If it turns out that this is man-made, we’re going to try to find them, and if it comes to it, we’re going to file criminal charges.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hughman hopes to announce the findings as early as this week on California Fish and Wildlife’s Twitter feed: @CaliforniaDFW.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So far, the stuff is finding its way primarily onto common shoreline birds, such as buffleheads, surf scoters, and horned grebes. Meanwhile its impact has spread to the Peninsula coastline and has started to affect more fragile species, including sandpipers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"//www.wildlifeservices.org/\">Wildlife Emergency Services\u003c/a> leaders are asking for volunteers to help find distressed birds by reporting sightings to the organization at \u003ca href=\"tel:%28831%29%20429-2323\">(831) 429-2323\u003c/a>. Interested volunteers can \u003ca href=\"http://www.wildlifeservices.org/PAGES/VOLUNTEER.html\">fill out an application\u003c/a>. Untrained members of the public are discouraged from trying capture distressed birds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='”100%”' height='”166″'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/187062825″&visual=true&”color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false”'\n title='”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/187062825″'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Sick Sea Lions Wash Up on California Beaches",
"headTitle": "Sick Sea Lions Wash Up on California Beaches | KQED",
"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26406\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/AA-Sea-lion-pups_Sarah-van-Schagen-e1421460550384-1024x578.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26406 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/AA-Sea-lion-pups_Sarah-van-Schagen-e1421460550384-1024x578.jpg\" alt=\"The Marine Mammal Center’s record-breaking patient load in 2014 included an influx of emaciated young sea lions. (Sarah van Schagen/The Marine Mammal Center) \" width=\"1024\" height=\"578\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Marine Mammal Center’s record-breaking patient load in 2014 included an influx of emaciated young sea lions. (Sarah van Schagen/The Marine Mammal Center)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Last year a record number of sea lions washed up on Central and Northern California beaches, according to \u003ca href=\"http://www.marinemammalcenter.org/\">The Marine Mammal Center\u003c/a>, the organization that treats wounded wild marine animals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Usually the center near Sausalito treats fewer than 20 sea lion pups a year, but in 2014 that spiked to 245. Older sea lions also stranded themselves in record numbers last year, 449 up from 176 in 2013. A neurotoxin found in algal blooms affected 34 percent of the adults.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The sea lions were sighted all the way from San Luis Obispo to Mendocino. When rescuers responded to calls, said Shawn Johnson, Director of Veterinary Science, the emaciated pups looked extremely undernourished.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s very sad,” Johnson said. “Imagine starving to death and not eating for many weeks, where your skin is just hanging off you.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why Do Pups Get Stranded?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Strandings happen when sea lion moms abandon their pups before they are ready to feed on their own. Scientists are unsure precisely what is causing these events.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26410\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 335px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Blarney-McCresty-rehab-1024x682.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26410 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Blarney-McCresty-rehab-1024x682.jpg\" alt=\"Blarney McCresty, an adult male California sea lion, was treated for domoic acid toxicity during his rehabilitation at The Marine Mammal Center.\" width=\"335\" height=\"223\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Blarney McCresty, an adult male California sea lion, was treated for domoic acid toxicity during his rehabilitation at The Marine Mammal Center. (The Marine Mammal Center)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One possibility is rising ocean temperatures. Fish live in specific temperature ranges and warmer water could change their habitat, which means sea lion moms swim father afield to find the same amount of nutrients.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scientists do know that when the adults are unable to provide for the pups they abandon them. If the infants are younger than 10 months, they don’t know how to fend for themselves and wind up on beaches throughout the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Each year the center is able to save about 50 percent of the pups that are rescued, by nourishing them back to health with a slurry of ground-up fish.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The center is working with biologists from the \u003ca href=\"http://www.afsc.noaa.gov/nmml/\">National Marine Mammal Laboratory\u003c/a> to study the health of sea lion populations on the Channel Islands, where the animals breed. They’re hoping to help predict future strandings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re bracing for another very big year in 2015,” Johnson said. “The biologists observing sea lions at the Channel Islands say the pups are underweight so we’ll likely have another busy spring.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sea Lions Have Brain Damage, Experience Seizures\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26414\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 324px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Atlas-Orbit-Caelum_release__Conner-Jay-242x162.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-26414\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Atlas-Orbit-Caelum_release__Conner-Jay-242x162.jpg\" alt=\"California sea lions Atlas, Orbit and Caelum return to the ocean at Chimney Rock in Point Reyes after receiving care at The Marine Mammal Center. (Conner Jay/ The Marine Mammal Center)\" width=\"324\" height=\"217\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">California sea lions Atlas, Orbit and Caelum return to the ocean at Chimney Rock in Point Reyes after receiving care at The Marine Mammal Center. (Conner Jay/ The Marine Mammal Center)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Since 1998, scientists have discovered sea lions with a neurotoxin that causes memory loss and seizures. Domoic acid is created by certain types of algae and passed up the food chain from fish to the animals that eat them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once ingested, the toxin enters the bloodstream, traveling to the brain where it starts causing brain damage. Scientists performing memory tests on the animals also found that the animals lost memory function.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If treated immediately, some of the sea lions survive but once the toxin accumulates the animals often experience multiple seizures and die.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This year, four sea lions have been admitted to The Marine Mammal Center that have domoic acid. Because these harmful algal blooms can be toxic to humans as well, the center alerts the health department when several animals are discovered with the toxin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When it comes to domoic acid, they literally are the canaries in the ocean or coal mine,” Johnson said. “We do what we can but some of these sea lions might not have enough memory to survive out in the wild.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26406\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/AA-Sea-lion-pups_Sarah-van-Schagen-e1421460550384-1024x578.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26406 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/AA-Sea-lion-pups_Sarah-van-Schagen-e1421460550384-1024x578.jpg\" alt=\"The Marine Mammal Center’s record-breaking patient load in 2014 included an influx of emaciated young sea lions. (Sarah van Schagen/The Marine Mammal Center) \" width=\"1024\" height=\"578\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Marine Mammal Center’s record-breaking patient load in 2014 included an influx of emaciated young sea lions. (Sarah van Schagen/The Marine Mammal Center)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Last year a record number of sea lions washed up on Central and Northern California beaches, according to \u003ca href=\"http://www.marinemammalcenter.org/\">The Marine Mammal Center\u003c/a>, the organization that treats wounded wild marine animals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Usually the center near Sausalito treats fewer than 20 sea lion pups a year, but in 2014 that spiked to 245. Older sea lions also stranded themselves in record numbers last year, 449 up from 176 in 2013. A neurotoxin found in algal blooms affected 34 percent of the adults.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The sea lions were sighted all the way from San Luis Obispo to Mendocino. When rescuers responded to calls, said Shawn Johnson, Director of Veterinary Science, the emaciated pups looked extremely undernourished.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s very sad,” Johnson said. “Imagine starving to death and not eating for many weeks, where your skin is just hanging off you.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Why Do Pups Get Stranded?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Strandings happen when sea lion moms abandon their pups before they are ready to feed on their own. Scientists are unsure precisely what is causing these events.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26410\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 335px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Blarney-McCresty-rehab-1024x682.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26410 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Blarney-McCresty-rehab-1024x682.jpg\" alt=\"Blarney McCresty, an adult male California sea lion, was treated for domoic acid toxicity during his rehabilitation at The Marine Mammal Center.\" width=\"335\" height=\"223\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Blarney McCresty, an adult male California sea lion, was treated for domoic acid toxicity during his rehabilitation at The Marine Mammal Center. (The Marine Mammal Center)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One possibility is rising ocean temperatures. Fish live in specific temperature ranges and warmer water could change their habitat, which means sea lion moms swim father afield to find the same amount of nutrients.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scientists do know that when the adults are unable to provide for the pups they abandon them. If the infants are younger than 10 months, they don’t know how to fend for themselves and wind up on beaches throughout the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Each year the center is able to save about 50 percent of the pups that are rescued, by nourishing them back to health with a slurry of ground-up fish.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The center is working with biologists from the \u003ca href=\"http://www.afsc.noaa.gov/nmml/\">National Marine Mammal Laboratory\u003c/a> to study the health of sea lion populations on the Channel Islands, where the animals breed. They’re hoping to help predict future strandings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re bracing for another very big year in 2015,” Johnson said. “The biologists observing sea lions at the Channel Islands say the pups are underweight so we’ll likely have another busy spring.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sea Lions Have Brain Damage, Experience Seizures\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26414\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 324px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Atlas-Orbit-Caelum_release__Conner-Jay-242x162.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-26414\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/Atlas-Orbit-Caelum_release__Conner-Jay-242x162.jpg\" alt=\"California sea lions Atlas, Orbit and Caelum return to the ocean at Chimney Rock in Point Reyes after receiving care at The Marine Mammal Center. (Conner Jay/ The Marine Mammal Center)\" width=\"324\" height=\"217\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">California sea lions Atlas, Orbit and Caelum return to the ocean at Chimney Rock in Point Reyes after receiving care at The Marine Mammal Center. (Conner Jay/ The Marine Mammal Center)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Since 1998, scientists have discovered sea lions with a neurotoxin that causes memory loss and seizures. Domoic acid is created by certain types of algae and passed up the food chain from fish to the animals that eat them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once ingested, the toxin enters the bloodstream, traveling to the brain where it starts causing brain damage. Scientists performing memory tests on the animals also found that the animals lost memory function.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If treated immediately, some of the sea lions survive but once the toxin accumulates the animals often experience multiple seizures and die.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This year, four sea lions have been admitted to The Marine Mammal Center that have domoic acid. Because these harmful algal blooms can be toxic to humans as well, the center alerts the health department when several animals are discovered with the toxin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When it comes to domoic acid, they literally are the canaries in the ocean or coal mine,” Johnson said. “We do what we can but some of these sea lions might not have enough memory to survive out in the wild.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "California Unveils Strictest Rules on Pesticide",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_26280\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 636px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/strawberries-e1421271793733.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-26280 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2015/01/strawberries-e1421271793733.jpg\" alt=\"Chloropicrin was introduced to replace methyl bromide but has negative health effects on workers so the California Department of Pesticide Regulation has introduced tighter regulations. (Sandy Huffaker/Getty Images)\" width=\"636\" height=\"360\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Chloropicrin was introduced to replace methyl bromide but has had negative health effects on workers and those who live near treated farms. (Sandy Huffaker/Getty Images)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>By Scott Smith\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_CALIFORNIA_PESTICIDE_REGULATION?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT\">Associated Press\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nCalifornia farmers now must abide by the nation’s strictest rules for a widely used pesticide in a change designed to protect farmworkers and people who live and work near agricultural fields but is likely to raise prices on produce.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The restrictions announced Wednesday target chloropicrin, a pesticide injected into the ground before planting crops such as strawberries, tomatoes and almond orchards. In recent years, the chemical has caused hundreds of people to suffer from irritated eyes, coughing fits and headaches, state officials said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new regulations surpass standards required by \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/\">U.S. Environmental Protection Agency\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brian Leahy, director of the \u003ca href=\"http://www.cdpr.ca.gov/\">California Department of Pesticide Regulation\u003c/a>, said Tuesday that the higher standard is needed in California, the nation’s leading agricultural producer and most populated state, where farms are often next to people. Costs are sure to rise for farmers, who will pass it along to consumers, but Leahy said it is worth it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It is burdensome,” Leahy said. “But if we’re going to use these tools, we’ve got to ensure that they’re used as safely as possible.”\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">“If we’re going to use these tools, we’ve got to ensure that they’re used as safely as possible.’\u003ccite>–Brian Leahy,\u003cbr>\nCalifornia Department of Pesticide Regulation Director\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Under the new regulation, farmers are limited to applying the pesticide on up to 40 acres in one day, a reduction of 75 percent. It also expands the distance between fields and human activity – in some cases to double the distance. Farmers who use upgraded tarps to cover their fields while applying the pesticide can follow less stringent regulations, said officials.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Farmers use about 5 million pounds of the pesticide a year, most heavily in the Central Valley counties of San Joaquin and Fresno and along the coast in Monterey, Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz and Ventura counties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state has been talking with growers for more than a year about the new standards and will immediately begin implementing them, with full compliance required by 2016.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state documented 787 people as suffering from exposure to the pesticide drifting through the air between 2002 and 2011, according to the most recent records. In 2013, 19 people picking raspberries in Monterey County were sickened, and in 2012, 15 people in their homes and two firefighters near a Ventura County strawberry field reported irritated eyes, officials said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California farmers fear that tighter restrictions will increase the costs of their fruits and vegetables, potentially driving the market out of state or the country. Almond and grape growers use chloropicrin once every 20 to 30 years when they plant a new orchard or vineyard, but California’s strawberry growers, who use it each season, may be hit hardest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California produces 88 percent of the nation’s strawberry crop, supporting a $2.3 billion industry, said Carolyn O’Donnell, a spokeswoman for the California Strawberry Commission.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It will cost the state’s strawberry growers an estimated $20 million to buy upgraded tarps to cover their crops and comply with the standards, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Farmers and their families live near their farms and work in their fields and care deeply about protecting the safety of their workers, neighbors and communities,” O’Donnell said.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"id": "code-switch-life-kit",
"title": "Code Switch / Life Kit",
"info": "\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em>, which listeners will hear in the first part of the hour, has fearless and much-needed conversations about race. Hosted by journalists of color, the show tackles the subject of race head-on, exploring how it impacts every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, sports and more.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em>, which will be in the second part of the hour, guides you through spaces and feelings no one prepares you for — from finances to mental health, from workplace microaggressions to imposter syndrome, from relationships to parenting. The show features experts with real world experience and shares their knowledge. Because everyone needs a little help being human.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch\">\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/lifekit\">\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />",
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"meta": {
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"id": "commonwealth-club",
"title": "Commonwealth Club of California Podcast",
"info": "The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. As a non-partisan forum, The Club brings to the public airwaves diverse viewpoints on important topics. The Club's weekly radio broadcast - the oldest in the U.S., dating back to 1924 - is carried across the nation on public radio stations and is now podcasting. Our website archive features audio of our recent programs, as well as selected speeches from our long and distinguished history. This podcast feed is usually updated twice a week and is always un-edited.",
"airtime": "THU 10pm, FRI 1am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Commonwealth-Club-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "Commonwealth Club of California"
},
"link": "/radio/program/commonwealth-club",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5jb21tb253ZWFsdGhjbHViLm9yZy9hdWRpby9wb2RjYXN0L3dlZWtseS54bWw",
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},
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"id": "forum",
"title": "Forum",
"tagline": "The conversation starts here",
"info": "KQED’s live call-in program discussing local, state, national and international issues, as well as in-depth interviews.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 9am-11am, 10pm-11pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Forum-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Forum with Mina Kim and Alexis Madrigal",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 9
},
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM5NTU3MzgxNjMz",
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"id": "freakonomics-radio",
"title": "Freakonomics Radio",
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"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/freakonomicsRadio.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://freakonomics.com/",
"airtime": "SUN 1am-2am, SAT 3pm-4pm",
"meta": {
"site": "radio",
"source": "WNYC"
},
"link": "/radio/program/freakonomics-radio",
"subscribe": {
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/freakonomics-radio/id354668519",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/WNYC-Podcasts/Freakonomics-Radio-p272293/",
"rss": "https://feeds.feedburner.com/freakonomicsradio"
}
},
"fresh-air": {
"id": "fresh-air",
"title": "Fresh Air",
"info": "Hosted by Terry Gross, \u003cem>Fresh Air from WHYY\u003c/em> is the Peabody Award-winning weekday magazine of contemporary arts and issues. One of public radio's most popular programs, Fresh Air features intimate conversations with today's biggest luminaries.",
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"link": "/radio/program/fresh-air",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=214089682&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/381444908/podcast.xml"
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"info": "A live production of NPR and WBUR Boston, in collaboration with stations across the country, Here & Now reflects the fluid world of news as it's happening in the middle of the day, with timely, in-depth news, interviews and conversation. Hosted by Robin Young, Jeremy Hobson and Tonya Mosley.",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510051/podcast.xml"
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},
"hidden-brain": {
"id": "hidden-brain",
"title": "Hidden Brain",
"info": "Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships.",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/series/423302056/hidden-brain",
"airtime": "SUN 7pm-8pm",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "NPR"
},
"link": "/radio/program/hidden-brain",
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"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/Science-Podcasts/Hidden-Brain-p787503/",
"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510308/podcast.xml"
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},
"how-i-built-this": {
"id": "how-i-built-this",
"title": "How I Built This with Guy Raz",
"info": "Guy Raz dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/howIBuiltThis.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510313/how-i-built-this",
"airtime": "SUN 7:30pm-8pm",
"meta": {
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"source": "npr"
},
"link": "/radio/program/how-i-built-this",
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"npr": "https://rpb3r.app.goo.gl/3zxy",
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/how-i-built-this-with-guy-raz/id1150510297?mt=2",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510313/podcast.xml"
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},
"hyphenacion": {
"id": "hyphenacion",
"title": "Hyphenación",
"tagline": "Where conversation and cultura meet",
"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Hyphenacion_FinalAssets_PodcastTile.png",
"imageAlt": "KQED Hyphenación",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/hyphenacion",
"meta": {
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"order": 15
},
"link": "/podcasts/hyphenacion",
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"spotify": "https://open.spotify.com/show/2p3Fifq96nw9BPcmFdIq0o?si=39209f7b25774f38",
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"rss": "https://feeds.megaphone.fm/KQINC2275451163"
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},
"jerrybrown": {
"id": "jerrybrown",
"title": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"tagline": "Lessons from a lifetime in politics",
"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-Political-Mind-of-Jerry-Brown-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/jerrybrown",
"meta": {
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"order": 18
},
"link": "/podcasts/jerrybrown",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/id1492194549",
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}
},
"latino-usa": {
"id": "latino-usa",
"title": "Latino USA",
"airtime": "MON 1am-2am, SUN 6pm-7pm",
"info": "Latino USA, the radio journal of news and culture, is the only national, English-language radio program produced from a Latino perspective.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/latinoUsa.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://latinousa.org/",
"meta": {
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"source": "npr"
},
"link": "/radio/program/latino-usa",
"subscribe": {
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=79681317&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510016/podcast.xml"
}
},
"marketplace": {
"id": "marketplace",
"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 4pm-4:30pm, MON-WED 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Marketplace-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.marketplace.org/",
"meta": {
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"source": "American Public Media"
},
"link": "/radio/program/marketplace",
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"rss": "https://feeds.publicradio.org/public_feeds/marketplace-pm/rss/rss"
}
},
"masters-of-scale": {
"id": "masters-of-scale",
"title": "Masters of Scale",
"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
"airtime": "Every other Wednesday June 12 through October 16 at 8pm (repeats Thursdays at 2am)",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Masters-of-Scale-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://mastersofscale.com/",
"meta": {
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"source": "WaitWhat"
},
"link": "/radio/program/masters-of-scale",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "http://mastersofscale.app.link/",
"rss": "https://rss.art19.com/masters-of-scale"
}
},
"mindshift": {
"id": "mindshift",
"title": "MindShift",
"tagline": "A podcast about the future of learning and how we raise our kids",
"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Mindshift-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED MindShift: How We Will Learn",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/mindshift/",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 12
},
"link": "/podcasts/mindshift",
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"apple": "https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/mindshift-podcast/id1078765985",
"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
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"stitcher": "https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/kqed/stories-teachers-share",
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}
},
"morning-edition": {
"id": "morning-edition",
"title": "Morning Edition",
"info": "\u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> takes listeners around the country and the world with multi-faceted stories and commentaries every weekday. Hosts Steve Inskeep, David Greene and Rachel Martin bring you the latest breaking news and features to prepare you for the day.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3am-9am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Morning-Edition-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/programs/morning-edition/",
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"link": "/radio/program/morning-edition"
},
"onourwatch": {
"id": "onourwatch",
"title": "On Our Watch",
"tagline": "Deeply-reported investigative journalism",
"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/On-Our-Watch-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "On Our Watch from NPR and KQED",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "kqed",
"order": 11
},
"link": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://podcasts.apple.com/podcast/id1567098962",
"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5ucHIub3JnLzUxMDM2MC9wb2RjYXN0LnhtbD9zYz1nb29nbGVwb2RjYXN0cw",
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"stitcher": "https://www.stitcher.com/show/on-our-watch",
"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510360/podcast.xml"
}
},
"on-the-media": {
"id": "on-the-media",
"title": "On The Media",
"info": "Our weekly podcast explores how the media 'sausage' is made, casts an incisive eye on fluctuations in the marketplace of ideas, and examines threats to the freedom of information and expression in America and abroad. For one hour a week, the show tries to lift the veil from the process of \"making media,\" especially news media, because it's through that lens that we see the world and the world sees us",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm-3pm, MON 12am-1am",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/onTheMedia.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.wnycstudios.org/shows/otm",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "wnyc"
},
"link": "/radio/program/on-the-media",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/on-the-media/id73330715?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/On-the-Media-p69/",
"rss": "http://feeds.wnyc.org/onthemedia"
}
},
"pbs-newshour": {
"id": "pbs-newshour",
"title": "PBS NewsHour",
"info": "Analysis, background reports and updates from the PBS NewsHour putting today's news in context.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3pm-4pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/PBS-News-Hour-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/",
"meta": {
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"source": "pbs"
},
"link": "/radio/program/pbs-newshour",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/pbs-newshour-full-show/id394432287?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/PBS-NewsHour---Full-Show-p425698/",
"rss": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/feeds/rss/podcasts/show"
}
},
"perspectives": {
"id": "perspectives",
"title": "Perspectives",
"tagline": "KQED's series of daily listener commentaries since 1991",
"info": "KQED's series of daily listener commentaries since 1991.",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Perspectives_Tile_Final.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Perspectives",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/perspectives/",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 14
},
"link": "/perspectives",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/id73801135",
"npr": "https://www.npr.org/podcasts/432309616/perspectives",
"rss": "https://ww2.kqed.org/perspectives/category/perspectives/feed/",
"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93dzIua3FlZC5vcmcvcGVyc3BlY3RpdmVzL2NhdGVnb3J5L3BlcnNwZWN0aXZlcy9mZWVkLw"
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},
"planet-money": {
"id": "planet-money",
"title": "Planet Money",
"info": "The economy explained. Imagine you could call up a friend and say, Meet me at the bar and tell me what's going on with the economy. Now imagine that's actually a fun evening.",
"airtime": "SUN 3pm-4pm",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/planetmoney.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/sections/money/",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "npr"
},
"link": "/radio/program/planet-money",
"subscribe": {
"npr": "https://rpb3r.app.goo.gl/M4f5",
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/planet-money/id290783428?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/Business--Economics-Podcasts/Planet-Money-p164680/",
"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510289/podcast.xml"
}
},
"politicalbreakdown": {
"id": "politicalbreakdown",
"title": "Political Breakdown",
"tagline": "Politics from a personal perspective",
"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
"airtime": "THU 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Political-Breakdown-2024-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Political Breakdown",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/politicalbreakdown",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 5
},
"link": "/podcasts/politicalbreakdown",
"subscribe": {
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"amazon": "https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/e0c2d153-ad36-4c8d-901d-f1da6a724824/political-breakdown",
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