Quirks & Quarkswith Bob McDonald
Latest
Nov 21: Microbial mining in space, baby birds get the boot, palm oil substitutes and more…
Deep sea squid says ‘g’day’, Canada’s place in space and how do fans make cool air?
Analysis
Famous Arecibo telescope was the first to send a signal to alien civilizations
Bob McDonald's blog: Damage to historic instrument means it will be dismantled
Microbes may be our miners on asteroids, moons and other planets
Microbes could be put to use in future human space settlements extracting metals and rare elements from rocks, according to a researcher who designed the world's first mining experiment in space.
Songbird parents manipulate their chicks out of the nest before they're ready to go
Parents will lure their fledglings out of the nest with food or by calling them
Canadian food scientists develop eco-friendly substitutes for palm oil
Technique involves transforming liquid oils into solid fats
Super rare deep sea squid spotted in Australian waters for the first time
Magnapinna, or bigfin squid, is the size of a hotdog bun, but with filaments up to 7 metres long.
Q&A
Canadian technological ingenuity and astronaut talent has been our ticket to space
New book tells the tale of Canada’s involvement in international space exploration, and how the Canadarm became 'Canada's space currency.'
Why do fans make the air feel cooler?
Air flow from a fan makes the air feel cooler due to convection and evaporation
Nov 14: COVID vaccine & immune durability, wallabies in the UK, ancient female hunters and more …
Humans are cooler than we used to be, Herzberg gold medal winner and how old are circadian rhythms?
Analysis
Would hyperloop transportation technology work in Canada?
Bob McDonald's blog: Travelling by hyperloop could theoretically get you from Toronto to Montreal in 1 hour, or Edmonton to Calgary in 30 minutes
COVID vaccines are on the horizon, but how long might protection last?
Reports of waning antibodies post infection not a 'death knell' for lasting immunity, says the co-lead of Canada's Vaccine Task Force
Wallabies from Australia have gained a foothold in the U.K. and may be there for good
Escapees from zoos and private collections might have given rise to two breeding populations of the small kangaroo relative in England.
In the ancient Americas, female big-game hunters were common
New study finds that in early hunter-gatherer societies, 30-50 per cent of big game hunters were female
You're cooler than your ancestors — by about a degree
Improvements in lifestyle and health care seem to be the cause of a decline in average normal body temperature
Biomedical engineer Molly Shoichet wins Canada's most prestigious science prize for 'hydrogels'
Hydrogel give cells a more realistic three-dimensional space to grow in than a standard petri dish
How far back, evolutionarily speaking, do circadian rhythms go in animals?
Circadian rhythms are part of the DNA of every complex organism and have been around for billions of years.
'Forever chemicals' can have far-reaching consequences, need more regulation in Canada, scientists say
Chemicals known as PFAS are everywhere. They can affect the environment and your health — and may even make you more susceptible to COVID-19.
Nov 7: Fast radio bursts in our galaxy, monkeys with a puberty switch and more
The black hole at our galaxy’s centre, and forever chemicals
Analysis
20 years of living in space: What's next for the ISS?
Bob McDonald's blog: It's going to come down eventually, so how? And what might replace it?
A blast of radio waves in our galaxy gives insight into mysterious 'fast radio bursts'
The observation of a fast radio burst coming from the Milky Way Galaxy means scientists can finally get some answers about these mysterious space signals.
These monkeys have a 'puberty switch' they flip when the right male comes along
Female geladas delay sexual maturation when dad runs the troop, and wait for an eligible male to take over.
Q&A
Extreme astrophysics: new Nobel laureate Andrea Ghez's work on supermassive black holes
American astrophysicist Andrea Ghez won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics for her discovery of the black hole at the centre of the Milky Way.
Oct 31: Wasps make cockroaches into zombies, water on the moon, how remoras surf whales and more…
What Spirit bears do when we aren’t watching, and why hope matters in our environmental crisis and a continental question.
Analysis
Halloween costs more than the Canadian space program
Bob McDonald's blog: Canada's contributions in space benefit science, technology and the development of true superheroes.
Forget fake vampires and ghouls; here's a real life zombie story from nature
The emerald jewel wasp turns the American cockroach into a zombie so it can be manipulated into providing a living meal for its larvae
