Episode 53: Brian Caulfield on wearable technologies and the potential of electrical muscle stimulation
Today’s interview is with Dr. Brian Caulfield, the dean of physiotherapy at the University College Dublin, where he also is one of the directors of Ireland’s largest research center, the INSIGHT Center for Data Analytics.
Brian is especially known for the work he is doing with wearable and mobile sensing technologies and how their use is opening new avenues for human performance evaluation and enhancement in areas like elite sports to rehabilitation medicine to gerontology. He also is a leader in the use of electrical muscle stimulation, also known as EMS, which is being used in health and sports.
Brian also is the principal investigator in Ireland’s industry-led Connected Health Technology Center and is the overall project coordinator for the Connected Health Early Stage Researcher Support System, which is Europe’s first networked Connected Health PhD training program.
Brian graduated with a bachelor’s Degree in Physiotherapy, a master’s in Medical Science, and a PhD in Medicine from the University College of Dublin. He has co-authored more than 180 research publications and six patents. He also has supervised more than 30 master’s of science graduate research and PhD projects to completion.
Brian was the recent recipient of the prestigious 2017 University College Dublin Innovation Award, which recognized his work in the development of a connected health ecosystem in Ireland.
Links:
https://www.insight-centre.org/users/brian-caulfield
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Brian_Caulfield
Electrical stimulation counteracts muscle decline in seniors
Show notes:
3:52: Brian talks about growing up in Dublin and how he dreamed of becoming a professional athlete rather than a scientist.
4:35: Brian explains that as a kid he started noticing on TV how a couple of therapists would run onto the soccer field whenever a player was injured. That’s what first gave him the idea of going into physical therapy.
6:08: After receiving his physical therapy degree from the University College of Dublin, Brian tells the story of how he was about to leave for a job in Chicago when the director of the university lab offered Brian a job as a research assistant, which led him to stay in school and pursue a master’s degree.
8:02: Dawn asks Brian what it was like as a 21-year-old to work in a lab side by side with biomedical engineers and scientists on a project that looked at how reflex excitability is modulated throughout the different phases of the walking cycle in stroke patients when compared to patients who have a healthy gait.
11:45: Ken asks Brian what it was like to work in the United States after receiving his master’s degree.
13:30: Dawn asks Brian about returning to Dublin to work on a doctorate and his decision to focus his research on ankle sprains, which is one of the most common non-contact injuries suffered across all sports.
18:04: Brian talks about the limitations of studying athletes in the laboratory and how accelerometers made it possible to do research in the field.
20:57: Dawn asks Brian to expand on how his collaboration with biomedical engineers and computer scientists enabled them to develop wearable accelerometers and sensors to measure human movement.
23:34: Ken asks how this technology, which was developed to improve athletic performance, led to other technologies that were applied to accessing older adults who are at risk of falls.
27:24: Dawn points out that it was this research that led Brian to be named the University College Dublin’s site director for the Insight Center, which is one of Europe’s largest data analytics research organizations with more than 450 researchers. Dawn asks Brian to talk about Insight and its structure and purpose.
29:26: Dawn talks about how much fun it was using inertial measurement units, known as IMUs, during an undersea mission with NASA to assess the technology’s future use in looking at astronaut vestibular function on return to Earth. She then asks Brian to talk about other potential clinical and fitness applications when using IMU technology?
32:11: Dawn asks Brian to talk about his recently published study investigating whether the addition of inertial sensor data can provide additional insight into the nature of postural stability deficits for post-concussion monitoring protocol.
34:34: STEM-Talk blurb
35:02: Dawn asks how it’s possible that a measure of motor performance can help predict that a player is more likely to sustain a contact injury, which, Dawn points out, seems counterintuitive.
37:02: Ken asks Brian if his work on reducing the number of concussions among rugby players could have applications in a sport like American football.
38:25: Ken asks Brian to provide an overview of the different types of electrical muscle stimulation, also known as EMS, that are being used in health and sports today.
41:08: Ken asks how popular systems such as Compex and PowerDot fit into this spectrum of devices?
41:51: Dawn talks about how EMS was used in the former Soviet block for sports training back in the 1950s, and asks Brian about the early excitement and the subsequent perspective that has emerged over the years with respect to EMS and sport training.
45:49: Ken says the comfort factor of EMS is a big deal and that he has allowed friends to borrow a PowerDot EMS unit and that when they increase the settings they often stop using the unit because it’s uncomfortable. Ken asks Brian about the need, particularly for the aging population, for a more comfortable approach.
47:39: Ken talks about the late Charlie Francis who was a strong advocate of EMS and used it with all of his sprinters, including Ben Johnson. Francis said there were four mains uses for EMS in sports: enhancement of maximum strength; as a means of facilitating recovery; as a rehabilitation tool; and as a motor learning and muscle recruitment tool. Ken asks Brian if all four uses, or just a few of them, were valid uses.
49:51: Ken mentions that exercise programs have long been based on the premise that resistance training will be largely ineffective unless it’s carried out at something like 70% of maximal voluntary force, and that it should last roughly 20 or 30 minutes. This level of intensity and duration has been seen as necessary to facilitate proteolysis, the breakdown of proteins in the muscle which is generally seen as the precursor of muscle protein synthesis. However, some training methods such as electrical muscle stimulation and blood flow restriction training are explicitly trying to avoid any extensive breakdown of proteins in the muscle. Ken asks Brian to share his thoughts on this.
52:01: Brian talks about muscle fiber types and their characteristics as Dawn mentions that one of the primary interests in EMS arises from its application in building strength in both younger and older populations.
53:51: Ken talks about how as people age, they lose power more quickly than strength, and strength more quickly than muscle mass. This age-related decrease in muscle mass is fiber type specific and involves a loss of size of the glycolytic type-two fibers rather than the slow oxidative type-one fibers. Ken mentions an interesting 2013 paper from a German and Italian research team that reported EMS produces an increase in the size of the fast-type fibers in aging humans. In particular, the researchers reported a 4% increase in the percentage of the faster fiber type after 24 sessions spread across nine weeks. Ken asks Brian for his thoughts on this.
56:05: Dawn mentions that the ideal protocol for EMS for sarcopenia should focus on an increase in muscle strength, and then improvement in type-two muscle fibers with respect to diameter and percentage. Dawn ask Brian which frequencies are best for type-two fibers with the aging population.
57:23: Because human space flight is very much like accelerated aging, Brian talks about the huge potential of EMS with respect to long-duration human space flight, and gives an overview of the work that the European Space Agency is doing in this area.
59:31: Brian talks about the use of muscle stimulation to elicit a cardiovascular exercise effect, particularly for spinal cord injured patients.
1:02:14: Dawn points out the Brian has managed to develop a protocol that elicits an aerobic exercise effect in simulating shivering, and asks Brian how comfortable that is. Brian talks about how it’s not comfortable at all.
1:03:09: Brian expands on work he’s doing to overcome the comfort issues by describing how he worked with a company to develop a multi-path approach to delivering current into the body, which essentially means using non-standard pathways for current flow that are shared between arrays of very large electrodes rather than single pairs of electrodes over individual muscles.
1:04:15: Brian talks about using the application with different populations that range from elite athletes to various clinical populations. These populations include people with type-two diabetes; chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; sedentary adults; the elderly; and people with spinal-cord injuries.
1:06:42: Dawns asks Ken if he still uses EMS and what tips he has for STEM-Talk listeners. Ken talks about how the new PowerDot system is useful on long-duration flights, but that it can cause unwanted attention from seatmates and the flight crew. Ken and Brian describe incidents that happened to them on flights.
1:09:32: Dawns asks Brian to explain arthrogenic muscle inhibition and the conditions under which it typically occurs.
1:12:51: Ken asks Brian to follow up on his answer by describing an athlete who might show up at Brian’s office with chronic interior knee pain and demonstrates inhibition of the quad complex, specifically VMO, and also shows some associated atrophy. Ken wonders what role EMS could play, and what specific order of treatments Brian might try on such a patient.
1:16:00: Dawn mentions that University College Dublin honored Brian with its 2017 Innovation Award. Brian talks about how wonderful it was that his family was there for the presentation.
1:17:37: Brian talks about how much he enjoys running and that there’s nothing he loves more than being up in the Wicklow Mountains running.
1:18:53: Interview ends.
Episode 52: Nina Teicholz on saturated fat, U.S. dietary guidelines, and the shortcomings of nutrition science
Investigative journalist Nina Teicholz joined Ken and Dawn remotely from a studio in New York City in mid-September for a fascinating discussion about the history and pitfalls of nutrition science.
Teicholz is the author of the international bestseller, “The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat & Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet.”
The Economist named it the number one science book of 2014 and the Journal of Clinical Nutrition wrote, “This book should be read by every scientist and every nutritional science professional.”
Nina began her journalism career as a reporter for National Public Radio. She went on to write for many publications, including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, The New Yorker, and The Economist. She attended Yale University and Stanford University where she studied biology and majored in American Studies. She has a master’s degree from Oxford University and served as associate director of the Center for Globalization and Sustainable Development at Columbia University.
“The Big Fat Surprise” is credited with upending the conventional wisdom on dietary fat. It challenged the very core of America’s nutrition policy by explaining the politics, personalities, and history of how we came to believe that dietary fat is bad for health. Her book was the first mainstream publication to make the full argument for why saturated fats – the kind found in dairy, meat and eggs – belong in a healthy diet.
The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Mother Jones, the Library Journal and Kirkus Review named “The Big Fat Surprise” one of the best books of 2014. The Economist described Nina’s book as a “nutrition thriller.”
Links:
— Amazon: “Big Fat Surprise” http://amzn.to/2iQemXc
— BMJ: “The scientific report guiding the US dietary guidelines: is it scientific?”
— “A Review of the Dietary Guidelines by the National Academy of Medicine”
— “Statistical Review of US Macronutrient Consumption date, 1965-2011”
— “What if Bad Fat is Actually Good for You?”
Show notes:
4:10: Interview begins with Nina talking about how her father, an engineer who also enjoyed computer science, sparked her interest in science.
5:41: Dawn asks Nina if she would share the story about her failed fruit-fly experiment in high school.
8:07: Nina talks about how an assignment to do a story on trans fats led her to become friends with journalist Gary Taubes, the author of “Good Calories, Bad Calories,” whom Dawn and Ken interviewed on episode 37 of STEM-Talk.
11:40: Dawn talks about an article Nina wrote for Men’s Health Magazine titled, “What If Bad Fat Is Actually Good for You?” It’s the article where Nina first laid out her case that saturated fats may not be bad for people’s health and might actually be good for people. Dawn asks Nina if she got pushback on that article.
14:07: Dawn asks about a paper Nina published in BMJ titled, “The Scientific Report Guiding the US Dietary Guidelines: Is It Scientific?” Dawn asks Nina to describe what happened when 180 scientists wrote a letter asking BMJ to retract the paper.
19:52: Dawn comments about how the pushback to the article seemed to violate the very process that science is supposed to follow.
21:30: Ken comments about the orchestrated effort to make Nina look bad, which leads Nina to highlight the support she received from BMJ and its editor Fiona Godlee.
22:55: Nina talks about the difficulty a journalist faces when challenging the work of scientists from institutions like Harvard and Yale.
24:16: Ken mentions how we’re seeing more and more dogma dressed up as science, which that leads to a discussion between Ken, Dawn and Nina about the shortcomings of nutrition science.
30:32: Dawn comments that Nina has been quoted as saying that institutionalized science is an oxymoron, and once institutions started adopting the principle that saturated fat caused heart disease, the scientists who knew better were silenced. Dawn asks Nina to expand on this.
35:42: STEM-Talk blurb.
36:12: Nina talks about a review of the dietary guidelines by the National Academy of Medicine that came out just the day before her interview with Ken and Dawn in September. The report concluded that the scientific rigor used for the dietary guidelines was not up to par.
39:05: With a population that is genetically and environmentally diverse, and in the current age of information where individuals can increasingly access data to personalize their own approach to health, Ken asks Nina if there is still an important role for a standardized set of national dietary guidelines?
40:52: Ken comments that he doesn’t really want the government telling him what to eat or what color to paint his house, and Nina responds that at the very least the government should stop making Americans fat and sick.
41:47: Nina comments that we don’t really know what kind of diet is optimal for the longest life, which leads to a discussion about the zealotry of dietary activists.
43:46: Dawn references a 2015 a paper titled, “Statistical Review of US Macronutrient Consumption Data, 1965–2011: Americans Have Been Following Dietary Guidelines, Coincident With the Rise in Obesity.” The paper was based partly on Nina’s work, and Dawn asks Nina how the study come about.
45:11: The title of the paper suggested that there was a connection between the dietary guidelines and obesity rates, and a back-and-forth conversation ensues between Ken, Nina and Dawn about whether it is possible to determine that.
48:11: Ken comments that the study found the total amount of fat in the diet did not significantly decrease between 1971 and 2011, but the percentage of fat decreased due to an increase in total carbohydrates, as well as total calories. Ken asks Nina if she thinks we can differentiate an effect of the carbohydrates in the diet from this data, or could the problem just be total calories?
49:62: Ken agrees with Nina on the benefits of a low-carb diet and points out that the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data used in the 2015 study have been questioned by many researchers, with some saying that the majority of participants under-reported many hundreds of calories per day. And since we don’t know what was in those missing calories, Ken wonders if we still can make inferences between population macronutrient intake and overall health?
51:07: Dawn asks Nina about Dr. Tim Noakes of South Africa, who faced a hearing in front of the Health Professions Council of South Africa after a complaint filed by the Association for Dietetics in South Africa. The organization reported Noakes for advising a mother on Twitter that she wean her child onto low-carb, high-fat foods, which Noakes described as real food.
56:04: Ken asks Nina about hecklers at conferences, social media trolling, and all manner of other bullying that is aimed at her and people like Tim Noakes.
57:09: Ken comments there seems to be an unhealthy and largely opaque intersection of money, industry influence, government grants, politics, and national nutrition policy. Ken asks, “How and why did this happen?”
59:50: Dawn comments that when the low-fat diet was officially recommended to the American public in 1961, just one in seven Americans were obese. Today, it’s one in three. It’s interesting that we started the low-fat initiative in an effort to reduce heart disease. But 40 years later, heart disease remains the leading cause of death for both men and women. Dawn asks Nina if she see any signs that the American Heart Association will revisit their recommendations?
1:02:17: Ken observes that the American Diabetes Association also seems to provide poor dietary advice. He points out that a pundit once observed that the Center for Science in the Public Interest is an organization that is neither science, nor in the public interest.
1:05:19: In speaking of a post-factual world driven by unsupported assertions and appeals to emotion, Dawn asks Nina to talk about the documentary, “What the Health.”
1:10:19: Dawn mentions how we’re seeing so many children becoming obese early in life and wonders if it could be a blend between epigenetic effects from previous generations and current food options. Dawn asks Nina if she thinks we are digging ourselves into a hole that will be tough to get out of healthwise as a population?
1:13:29: As we learn more about the gut microbiome, and how it plays a substantial role in our overall health and cognitive state, Dawn asks Nina for her thoughts about how the gut microbiome is impacted when people shift toward a low-fat diet.
1:15:14: Ken tells Nina that Gary Taubes suggested that Ken ask her about her experience spending two weeks with the Inuit in Greenland.
1:18:27: Taubes also suggested that Ken and Dawn ask Nina about the fish oil industry and how it has impacted fisheries worldwide as well as the food chain.
1:19:60: Nina talks about how there is no evidence that people should consume omega three fatty acids for good health.
1:20:59: Ken mentions reports he has seen about omega 3 to omega 6 ratios having a relationship with inflammation levels. Nina discusses the research she has done on the issue.
1:23:33: Ken talks about how giving up animal fats for cooking and shifting to vegetable oils has had a negative effect on people’s health. Nina agrees and discusses the shift and its consequences.
1:26:10: Dawn wonders how a busy person like Nina manages to keep up with the chores of life, and asks Nina how she manages to fit in good habits such as exercise and sleep.
1:28:09: Ken and Dawn thank Nina for appearing on STEM-Talk.
Episode 51: Roger Smith talks about bears, raptors, and life as a field biologist
Today’s episode features field biologist Roger Smith, the founder and chair of the Teton Raptor Center, a rehabilitation facility in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, that annually cares for more than 130 injured birds.
Roger and his wife, Margaret Creel, who also is a field biologist, established the Teton Raptor Center in 1997 as a facility committed to rehabilitating birds of prey.
Both Ken and Dawn have visited the center, which has an education outreach program that reached nearly 37,000 people in 2016. “For our listeners who have never been to the Teton Raptor Center, I can honestly say that a visit to the center and the Grand Teton National Park would be well worth your time,” says Ken at the end of episode 51.
Roger has spent his entire professional career in the natural sciences and environmental education. After high school, he headed off to the University of Montana and started his life as a field biologist researching grizzly bears in northwestern Montana in 1977.
He continued to study grizzly and black bears in Alaska, Maine and Colorado before completing his secondary science degree in 1984. After teaching high school science in Montana, he moved to Jackson Hole in 1985 and joined the resident faculty at the Teton Science School. At the school, he designed and implemented a field-oriented natural science curriculum for adults and children. In 1987, he joined the field staff at the National Outdoor Leadership School and led courses in Wyoming, Texas, Mexico and Kenya. In 1994, Roger completed his Master’s degree in Wildlife Biology and Physiology at the University of Wyoming.
Roger’s research has focused on raptors and ravens of the Grand Teton National Park. His research and papers have been published in a number of peer-reviewed professional journals.
In 1994, he helped initiate and manage the professional residency in environmental education program at the Teton Science School, and was on the faculty there until 1999. He managed all aspects of independent research, including grant and proposal writing.
Roger founded the Teton Raptor Center in 1996 and became the Resident Naturalist at 3Creek Ranch in 2002.
Links:
Teton Raptor Center: http://tetonraptorcenter.org
Raptor Center video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdTB9hcF02k
Roger’s IHMC Ocala lecture: https://www.ihmc.us/lectures/20170308/
Show Notes:
4:26: Ken and Dawn welcome Roger to the show.
4:40: Dawn asks Roger where he grew up and what kind of childhood he had.
6:56: Dawn discusses how Roger went to the University of Montana to study wildlife biology and as a freshman volunteered for a grizzly bear project, where he spent time in the wild analyzing grizzly bear scat.
8:54: Ken recalls a story Roger told him about him working on a black-bear project in 1979, which involved trapping and tagging bears in northern Maine. Ken comments on how this was an interesting time to be in the Maine woods as a young person. Ken then asks Roger if there are any adventures he would like to share from his time in northern Maine.
12:46: Ken comments on how bears are also found in the Tetons and throughout the Yellowstone ecosystem. He discusses how we often see warning signs posted to alert hikers and campers in areas where bears have been active. Ken then asks Roger if we have seen changes in activity in recent times, and if so, what drives those changes.
15:15: Ken discusses how he read a story about a grizzly bear breaking into someone’s garage to eat an elk carcass.
16:22: Dawn says that the grizzly bear is a reclusive animal and asks Roger what we know about its lifecycle.
18:07: Dawn comments that bears are opportunistic omnivores, eating a lot of berries and plants. She then asks Roger to discuss a grizzly’s diet.
20:18: Ken asks Roger to discuss bear hibernation and how it is different than other hibernators.
24:43: Ken discusses his amazement with the management of waste and kidney function, with respect to hibernation.
25:56: Ken discusses how both he and Dawn were at a meeting looking at hibernators, with respect to clues and ideas that may facilitate long duration human spaceflight.
27:31: Dawn comments on how she read that grizzlies can deposit as much as three and a half pounds of fat per day while preparing for hibernation. She then asks Roger what we know about hibernation preparation and physical adaptation in bears.
30:08: Ken asks if the bears came out this past winter when it was particularly cold.
30:34: Dawn asks what changes help bears transition back into normal activity after hibernation.
32:15: Dawn discusses how grizzlies are considered to be keystone predators and asks Roger to explain what this means and what their impact is on the surrounding ecology.
35:22: Ken comments that grizzly bears have recently become more common on the arctic islands and that we have seen grizzly bear-polar bear hybrids. He then asks Roger if we are seeing a breakdown of the species barrier here.
36:58: Dawn asks Roger to talk about how he became an avid bird watcher while he was capturing bears.
39:03: Dawn asks Roger what skills he finds necessary to be a successful field scientist.
42:07: Ken asks Roger if it seems like we have a good supply of future field scientists in the pipeline.
43:38: Ken comments that when the potential scientists find out they cannot charge their smart phones in the wild, it may cause some atrophy in the population.
44:45: STEM-TALK BLURB
45:12: Dawn asks Roger why someone decides to become a wildlife scientist.
47:46: Dawn mentions that after Roger took a few years off from school, he went back to the University of Montana to get a secondary science teaching degree. She then asks Roger what motivated him to become a teacher.
49:46: Dawn asks Roger to discuss his experience in 1985 at the Teton Science School in Teton National Park.
52:01: Ken talks about Roger’s time working with the National Outdoor Leadership School. He asks Roger what NOLS like then and what it’s like now.
53:45: Dawn asks what it was like for Roger to spend a year in Kenya teaching outdoor skills, and why Kenya.
58:10: Dawn says that when Roger came back to the States, he began working at Grand Teton National Park studying falcons. She then asks if this is how the next phase of his career started.
1:00:48: Ken mentions that Roger’s experience studying falcons led him to the graduate program at the University of Wyoming and its school of zoology and physiology. Ken asks Roger what then happened at school to lead him to focus on raptors.
1:03:44: Dawn asks Roger what a raptor exactly is.
1:07:34: Ken asks Roger what the role of raptors is generally in the greater ecosystem.
1:09:19: Dawn asks Roger what the typical lifestyle of a bird of prey is.
1:11:10: Dawn asks Roger what we know about their evolutionary history.
1:13:50: Ken says that birds are remarkably smart, even though their brains are incredibly small. He then asks Roger if he has spent any time observing ravens.
1:15:52: Dawn asks Roger to discuss raptors’ keen eyesight and other adaptations that they show.
1:17:38: Ken comments that raptors can live for a while without eating and asks Roger if we know how they do this.
1:20:06: Ken says it’s interesting how animals have evolved clever mechanisms to deal without food.
1:20:25: Dawn asks what we are seeing in respect to bioaccumulation in these species and if there are specific chemicals or contaminants that are a specific concern.
1:23:02: Dawn asks Roger to discuss an injured owl his colleague found in the woods, which ended up giving Roger the idea of spending more time rehabilitating injured birds.
1:23:42: Dawn discusses how Roger finished his thesis in 1994 and went back to the Teton Science School to help run the graduate program. At this time Roger began bringing injured birds home to live in his house.
1:24:21: Ken asks Roger if it is true that after about ten years of birds in the house, his wife said enough, and this was the start of the Teton Raptor Center.
1:25:51: Ken asks Roger to discuss his role in Three Creek.
1:27:24: Dawn says that Roger is heavily involved with raptor rehabilitation at the Teton Raptor Center. She then asks Roger how often he is treating animals and what kind of injuries he sees.
1:28:21: Dawn asks Roger to walk through what it takes to rehabilitate an animal prior to their return to the wild.
1:29:40: Dawn asks Roger what kind of raptor research studies he is involved in.
1:32:06: Ken asks Roger where new technology and engineering has influenced raptor research.
1:32:38: Ken asks Roger where the future of raptor research may be headed.
1:33:16: Ken asks Roger to talk about what comprises the greater Yellowstone ecosystem.
1:34:45: Dawn asks Roger what he likes to do in his free time.
1:35:40: Dawn and Ken thank Roger for appearing on STEM-Talk.
Episode 50: Ken Ford talks about ketosis, optimizing exercise, and the future direction of science, technology, and culture
Today’s episode features the second of Dawn Kernagis’ two-part interview with her STEM-Talk co-host and IHMC Director Ken Ford. This episode marks a milestone for STEM-Talk. It’s our 50th episode and follows Ken’s formal induction into the Florida Inventor’s Hall of Fame.
In part one of Dawn’s interview, listeners learned about Ken’s childhood and his years as a rock and roll promoter back in the ‘70s. Ken even shared an interesting story about how he went from being a philosophy major to a computer scientist. He also talked about his work in AI and the creation of IHMC and the pioneering work underway at the institute. If you missed episode 49, be sure to check it out.
Part two of Ken’s interview focuses more on his research and personal experience with the ketogenic diet, ketone esters, exercise and ways to extend health span and perhaps longevity. Dawn and Ken also discuss the nature of technical progress
As listeners learned in part one, Ken has a varied background. He is a co-founder of IHMC, which has grown into one of the nation’s premier research organizations with world-class scientists and engineers investigating a broad range of topics.
He also is the author of hundreds of scientific papers and six books. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Tulane University. He is a Fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, a charter Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, and a member of the Association for Computing Machinery, the IEEE Computer Society, and the National Association of Scholars.
In 2012, Tulane University named Ford its Outstanding Alumnus in the School of Science and Engineering. The Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence named Dr. Ford the recipient of the 2015 Distinguished Service Award. Also in 2015, Dr. Ford was elected as Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
In January 1997, Dr. Ford was asked by NASA to develop and direct its new Center of Excellence in Information Technology at the Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, where he also served as Associate Center Director. In July 1999, Dr. Ford was awarded the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal. That same year, Ford returned to private life in Florida and to IHMC.
In October 2002, President George W. Bush nominated Dr. Ford to serve on the National Science Board (NSB). In 2005, Dr. Ford was appointed and sworn in as a member of the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board. In 2007, he became a member of the NASA Advisory Council and on October 16, 2008, Dr. Ford was named as chairman – a capacity in which he served until October 201l.
In August 2010, Dr. Ford was awarded NASA’s Distinguished Public Service Medal – the highest honor the agency confers. In February 2012, Dr. Ford was named to a two-year term on the Defense Science Board and in 2013, he became a member of the Advanced Technology Board which supports the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
Links:
IHMC website:
https://www.ihmc.us
Ken Ford web page:
https://www.ihmc.us/groups/kford/
Florida Inventors Hall of Fame website:
http://www.floridainvents.org
Outside magazine story on Ken Ford and ketogenic diet:
https://www.outsideonline.com/2113406/high-carb-low-fat-ketone-diet
Blood Flow Restriction Device. 15% discount code: IHMC
https://www.gobstrong.com/what-is-b-strong/
BhB Ketone Ester
https://hvmn.com
Powerdot Muscle Stimulator
https://www.powerdot.com/products/powerdot-muscle-stimulator
Papers:
Suppression of Oxidative Stress by b-Hydroxybutyrate, an Endogenous Histone Deacetylase Inhibitor
https://www.ihmc.us/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Verdin_2013.pdf
Ketone Bodies as Signaling Metabolites
https://www.ihmc.us/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/TEM-Ketone-bodies-as-signaling-metabolites-2014.pdf
Ketogenic Diet Reduces Midlife Mortality and Improves Memory in Aging Mice
https://www.ihmc.us/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Verdin-Ketogenic-Mouse-Longevity-Cell-Metab-9-17-1.pdf
A Ketogenic Diet Extends Longevity and Healthspan in Adult Mice
https://www.ihmc.us/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Ramsey-Mouse-Longevity-Cell-Metab-9-17.pdf
Ketone Bodies Mimic the Life Span Extending Properties of Caloric Restriction
https://www.ihmc.us/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Ketone-bodies-mimic-lifespan-extending-properties-of-CR_Veech_Review_2017.pdf
Show notes:
7:06: Dawn begins part two of her interview with Ken by pointing out that some of the work IHMC is doing in terms of human performance is focused on nutritional approaches, including ketogenic diets and ketone esters. Dawn mentions that Ken was an early adopter of the ketogenic diet and that some people even refer to him as “the keto guy.” She then asks him when he first embraced a ketogenic diet and what attracted him to it.
8:06: Ken Talks about his long experience with the ketogenic diet and its effect on body composition.
10:30: Ken discusses how he became interested in ketone esters.
12:34: Dawn asks about research that seems to show that elevated levels of circulating ketone bodies have the potential to protect people from some of the diseases of aging.
12:47: Ken discusses healthspan, lifespan, and bending the aging curve.
14:04: Ken notes that, in his view, it should not be surprising that shifting something as fundamental as the fuel substrate for our metabolism would have widespread effects.
14:19: Ken talks about the epidemic of insulin resistance, diabetes, and obesity.
15:20: Dawn asks Ken to discuss the relatively newly discovered effects of ketone bodies which go well beyond their well-appreciated metabolic roles … and that might have various anti-aging effects.
16:59: Ken asserts that many of the most exciting effects of ketones are not only those arising from their role as an energy source but also that they play critically important signaling functions. Ken talks about the research showing that the ketone bodies are HDAC inhibitors and seem to link environmental cues, such as diet, to the regulation of aging.
17:23: Ken explains how HDACs inhibit BDNF and as mentioned above, ketones inhibit HDACs … thereby increasing BDNF.
18:20: Ken discusses two new papers showing a substantial extension of healthspan and lifespan in adult mice.
20:57: Dawn asks about the effect of the ketogenic diet on the maintenance of muscle and strength as people age.
24:48: Dawn asks Ken about the ketogenic diet and IGF-1.
26:45: Dawn notes that stem cells become less effective with age and asks about the implications of this phenomenon for maintenance of muscle.
27:37: Ken explains what the ketogenic diet is.
29:48: Dawn points out the Google search term “ketogenic diet” now outnumbers searches for Paleo diets. She asks Ken if he thought this would be the case back in 2006 when he first returned to a ketogenic diet.
31:18: Dawn asks Ken about what he sees as the primary benefit of blood-flow restriction training and how he uses it in his training.
34:25: Dawn asks Ken about what other exercise methods he employs in his training to optimize muscle mass and minimize potential injury.
34:38: Ken mentions electrical muscle stimulation (PowerDot), kettlebells, resistance training, Tabata sessions, and hiking in Wyoming and Maine.
35:37: Ken discusses hierarchical sets as employed in resistance training.
36:27: Dawn ask Ken if he “goes to failure” when engaged in resistance training.
37:13: Dawn asks Ken if has any thoughts on eccentric movements when engaged in resistance training.
38:50: Dawn asks Ken about NASA funded research at IHMC, led by Peter Neuhaus, aimed at developing technology to enable exercise devices for use on long-duration deep space missions.
39:41: Dawn mentions that when she first met Ken that she was doing research on apolipoprotein E in a neurocritical care laboratory. She asks Ken for his take on APOE in athletics and other approaches when it comes to harnessing people’s genetic information for optimized health.
42:03: Dawn asks Ken to describe a typical day and a typical week in the life of Ken Ford, including what his diet looks like and what he typically eats for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
44:03: Dawn wonders how many expressos, which Ken refers to as the elixir of the mind, he drinks in a day.
45:06: Dawn asks Ken about his time at NASA’s Ames Research Center.
46:06: She asks Ken to talk about his experience on the National Science Board and whether there were any stories he could share.
48:48: Dawn asks Ken to discuss his service on the NASA Advisory Council.
50:04: Dawn mentions that Ken has been a member of the National Science Board, NASA Advisory Council, Air Force Science Advisory Board, the Advanced Technology Board for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and the Defense Science Board. She asks Ken for his takeaways from serving on those boards and councils.
52:10: Dawn notes that during Apollo, NASA annually accounted for roughly 4% of Federal spending and asks Ken if he knows the percentage currently?
52:55: Ken laments that public service is becoming increasingly unpleasant … and that the best people invariably leave as a result.
54:05: Dawn asks Ken to talk about the accelerating rate of technological progress and its effects on society and the individual.
54:25: Ken distinguishes between “technological change” and “progress.”
57:11: Dawn asks, if taken from a purely technological perspective, are we not advancing faster than ever before?
1:00:54: Dawn plays an audio clip of Ken talking about the zombie apocalypse, which she describes as one of her favorite stories, and asks him to expand upon on it.
1:04:20: Dawn thanks Ken for sitting down for an interview.
Episode 49: Ken Ford talks about AI, its critics, and research at IHMC
On the eve of Ken Ford’s induction into the Florida Inventor’s Hall of Fame, co-host Dawn Kernagis convinced IHMC’s director and CEO that it was the perfect time to have the chairman of STEM-Talk’s double secret selection committee take a turn as a guest on the podcast.
Today’s show features part one of Dawn’s two-part interview with her STEM-Talk co-host Ken Ford. Listeners will learn about Ken’s childhood and background; his early work in computer science and research into AI; as well as the creation of IHMC, which, as our regular listeners know, is a “not-for-profit research lab pioneering groundbreaking technologies aimed at leveraging and extending human cognition, perception, locomotion and resilience.” In this episode, Ken will share some of the pioneering work underway at IHMC. Dawn also asks Ken about highly vocal critics of AI such as Elon Musk.
Episode 50, the second part of Dawn’s interview with Ken, will transition to a conversation about Ken and IHMC’s research into human performance. Their conversation will cover exercise, the ketogenic diet and ketone esters with the goal of extending health span and perhaps longevity.
In terms of background, Dr. Ken Ford is a co-founder of IHMC, which has grown into one of the nation’s premier research organizations with world-class scientists and engineers investigating a broad range of topics.
Ken is the author of hundreds of scientific papers and six books. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Tulane University. He is a Fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, a charter Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, and a member of the Association for Computing Machinery, the IEEE Computer Society, and the National Association of Scholars.
In 2012, Tulane University named Ford its Outstanding Alumnus in the School of Science and Engineering. The Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence named Dr. Ford the recipient of the 2015 Distinguished Service Award. Also in 2015, Dr. Ford was elected as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
In January 1997, Dr. Ford was asked by NASA to develop and direct its new Center of Excellence in Information Technology at the Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, where he also served as Associate Center Director. In July 1999, Dr. Ford was awarded the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal. That same year, Ford returned to private life in Florida and to IHMC.
In October 2002, President George W. Bush nominated Dr. Ford to serve on the National Science Board (NSB). In 2005, Dr. Ford was appointed and sworn in as a member of the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board.
In 2007, he became a member of the NASA Advisory Council and on October 16, 2008, Dr. Ford was named as chairman – a capacity in which he served until October 201l.
In August 2010, Dr. Ford was awarded NASA’s Distinguished Public Service Medal – the highest honor the agency confers. In February 2012, Dr. Ford was named to a two-year term on the Defense Science Board and in 2013, he became a member of the Advanced Technology Board which supports the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
Links:
IHMC website:
https://www.ihmc.us
Ken Ford web page:
https://www.ihmc.us/groups/kford/
Florida Inventors Hall of Fame website:
http://www.floridainvents.org
Outside magazine story on Ken Ford and ketogenic diet:
https://www.outsideonline.com/2113406/high-carb-low-fat-ketone-diet
Bulletin Atomic Scientists 2014
Show notes:
6:41: Dawn welcomes Ken to the show.
7:04: Dawn asks Ken to talk about his childhood
8:12: Dawn points out that Ken moved around a lot because his father was in the Navy and asks him what that was like.
8:20: Dawn mentions that Ken lived in Guantanamo, also known as GITMO. She asks him what it was like to live there as a young child.
8:56: Dawn talks about how when Ken started high school, he became passionate about wrestling and began shaving off weight by cutting back on carbs. She asks Ken what drew him to wrestling in the first place.
9:48: Dawn asks Ken to discuss the mental aspect of wrestling.
10:33: Dawn asks Ken if he was always interested in science.
11:15: Dawn asks Ken if he had any influential teachers in high school.
13:56: Dawn discusses how before Ken became a scientist, he was a rock and roll promoter. She then asks Ken how this happened.
16:06: Dawn asks Ken if it was during this time that he met Jeff “Skunk” Baxter, previously interviewed on STEM-Talk.
16:37: Dawn shares a funny story about how her sister used to work with Richard “Paco” Zimmer, one of the best in the business.
17:25: Dawn discusses how Ken enlisted in the Navy after promoting rock and roll. She goes on to say how this is what led to Ken becoming interested in computer science, even though he thought computers were about the most “unfun thing that the Navy could assign him to do.” She then asks Ken to talk about how the Navy pushed him into computer science.
21:38: Dawn discusses how Ken did his Masters in System Science, while in the Navy, at the University of West Florida. He then went to Tulane for his doctorate. Dawn asks Ken how an ex-athlete and philosophy major decides to get a doctorate in computer science, and whether or not people thought he was crazy.
22:46: Dawn says that after Tulane, Ken returned to the University of West Florida in 1988 and became the assistant professor in computer science, and then rather quickly became a full professor. She then asks Ken what research in AI looked like at the time.
23:57: Dawn asks Ken what the focus of his AI research was back then.
28:55: STEM-Talk Blurb
29:21: Dawn discusses how Ken is not a fan of the term artificial intelligence, and that he says that amplified intelligence is a better way to refer to AI. She then asks Ken to talk about this.
30:54: Dawn says that Ken and his colleague, Pat Hayes, have said that the Turing test has misdirected the ambitions of people working in AI and has confused the public, particularly the media. She then asks Ken to describe the Turing test and talk about why it has become problematic.
33:38: Dawn discusses how AI techniques like machine learning are now used for many other applications. She then asks Ken if he could have ever imagined this kind of future when he began working with AI in the 1980s.
35:54: Dawn references a story from the New York Times that discusses a meeting Elon Musk had with governors, where he said that they should adopt AI legislation before “robots start going down the street and killing people.” He also tweeted that AI going rogue was more of a risk than North Korea. Dawn asks Ken his opinion on this.
39:21: Dawn reads Ken a quote from the co-founder of the Center for Complex Systems Research at the University of Illinois. She then asks Ken what he thinks about the comment.
41:50: Dawn then discusses a story from David Fries about the brilliancy of the name Institute for Human and Machine Cognition. Dawn asks Ken if he intentionally placed the word human before machine in the institute’s name.
42:42: Dawn comments on how impressed she is by the range of research done at IHMC. She asks Ken to give listeners an overview of the work.
43:44: Dawn shares an audio clip about self-reinvention from a video produced for Ken’s induction into the Florida Inventors Hall of Fame.
44:22: Dawn asks Ken to talk about how he has constantly reinvented himself.
45:13: Dawn discusses how Ken has created a supportive framework at IHMC that is flexible enough so that the researchers and scientists there can also reinvent themselves. She then asks Ken how he came up with this concept.
48:04: Dawn comments how one of the things that makes it possible is the flat structure of IHMC and asks Ken to elaborate on this.
49:18: Dawn discusses how IHMC has begun doing research on human performance in extreme environments. She then asks Ken what brought about the interest in human performance in extreme environments, and that evolved into an arm of IHMC.
Episode 48: Dr Tommy Wood, part 2, discusses insulin resistance and the role of diet in athletic performance
Today’s episode features the second of our two-part interview with Dr. Tommy Wood, a U.K. trained MD/PhD who now lives in the U.S.
Part one covered Tommy’ background and education and what led him spend most of his academic career studying multiple sclerosis and ways to treat babies with brain injuries.
Part two of our interview focuses on Tommy’s other passions: nutritional approaches to sports performance and metabolic disease.
But before we get into Tommy’s background, we want to take a moment to thank our listeners for helping STEM-Talk win first place in the science category of the 12th Annual People’s Choice Podcast Awards.
The international competition featured more than 2,000 nominees in 20 categories. STEM-Talk also was a runner-up in the People’s Choice Award, the grand prize of the competition.
As we mentioned earlier, Tommy is U.K. trained MD/PhD who received an undergraduate degree in biochemistry from the University of Cambridge before attending medical school at the University of Oxford. He recently completed a PhD in physiology and neonatal brain metabolism at the University of Washington. He is now a senior fellow at the university researching neonatal brain injury.
In part one of his STEM-Talk interview, Tommy also talked about how he is the incoming president of the Physicians for Ancestral Health, an international organization of physicians, healthcare professionals and medical students that specializes in ancestral health principles for the prevention and treatment of illness.
Tommy’s interest sports performance stems from his background as an experienced rowing, endurance, and strength coach who combines evolutionary principles with modern biochemical techniques to optimize performance. He primarily performs this work with Nourish Balance Thrive, a functional medicine clinic based in California that works largely with athletes, where he is the chief medical officer.
Links:
Physicians for Ancestral Health – http://ancestraldoctors.org
Physicians for Ancestral Health – http://ancestraldoctors.org
Nourish Balance Thrive – http://www.nourishbalancethrive.com
NBT automated performance analysis: http://nbt.ai
Primal Endurance podcast (ketogenic diets, athletic longevity, etc.): http://primalendurance.libsyn.com/101-dr-tommy-wood
2) High Intensity Health podcast (ketogenic diets and gut health): http://highintensityhealth.com/tommy-wood-keto-diet-endotoxin-gut-health-bacterial-diversity/
Show notes:
3:37: The interview resumes.
3:43: Ken discusses how many, perhaps even most, adults are now insulin resistant to some degree, which negatively impacts many aspects of both health and performance, and is associated with most modern chronic diseases. Ken then asks Tommy if there are any underlying processes that he can see that tie these diseases together.
7:27: Ken comments on how in 1927 they had the sensible practice of starting a diabetic patient on a low-carb diet, which is still not current practice now in many places.
8:04: Tommy discusses how it is good to have symptom control with diabetes. Ken and Tommy discuss the many advantages of donating blood.
10:16: Ken asks Tommy if he has any issues giving blood in the United States given that he is from the UK which experienced mad-cow disease.
11:40: Ken asks Tommy if he checks his athletes’ ferritin levels and tries and keep them in a certain range, and if so, if he has a preferred range.
12:17: Dawn discusses how in addition to Tommy’s academic work at the University of Washington, he is also very active as the Chief Scientific Officer of Nourish Balance Thrive (NBT), an online company using advanced biochemical testing to optimize performance in athletes. Dawn asks Tommy to discuss Nourish Balance Thrive, and how the company works to optimize the health and performance of athletes.
14:41: Ken comments on how Tommy has a relatively homogeneous population if he is focused on endurance athletes, making it particularly interesting because people often confuse athletic performance with health.
15:37: Dawn mentions how Chris at NBT has been training machine-learning algorithms to predict biochemical patterns in athletes. She then asks Tommy to talk about how this fits in with his current work and why he thinks it is an important approach for the future of medicine in general.
17:52: Ken comments on how Chris is using XG Boost, a well-regarded open-source software library, as the machine learning tool. Ken mentions that XG Boost is an implementation of gradient boosting which is a form of supervised learning which has enjoyed broad success. Another nice feature of XG Boost is that its open source, allowing one to integrate it with a variety of other software packages.
19:25: Ken says how a sensible next step may be to identify another relatively homogeneous population and do it again.
20:48: Dawn comments on how over-training, under-recovery, nutrient deficiencies, or hormonal imbalances seem to be much more prevalent today. She then asks Tommy if this is because we can spot or diagnose these more regularly, because athletes are training at a higher intensity and volume, or because of changes in the environment.
22:39: Dawn asks Tommy how NBT’s biomarker panel was developed in the first place, and how he chose the specific markers and data that he is collecting for the panel.
25:16: Dawn discusses how she has done a fair amount of work looking at biomarkers of different disease processes and injury, and how one topic that arose several times was variability. She then asks Tommy how he can address this potential for variability, and if he is collecting data for long-term analysis.
27:14: Ken and Tommy briefly discuss the ŌURA Ring.
28:32: Dawn asks Tommy if he sees genetic testing playing a larger future role in his work with athletes.
29:47: Ken comments on how this is going to be a growing area. It was initially over-hyped, such as people looking at a particular gene that would determine effectiveness in a sport. However, more variants of specific genes are being validated with respect to human performance and resilience.
31:33: Dawn notes that it is sometimes difficult to get actionable results from genetic testing.
32:03: Dawn asks Tommy how he might use carbohydrate restriction in his work with athletes, and if there are any contexts where the low carbohydrate diet could be detrimental.
34:33: Ken comments on how the discussion reminds him of Jeff Volek’s phrase, “well-formulated ketogenic diet.” Ken also stressed the importance of blood testing for ketone levels.
35:58: STEMTALK BLURB
36:29: Dawn comments on how Tommy and Chris have developed a product called Phat Fibre. She then asks Tommy to discuss why he prefers it to other MCT oils and powders found in the market.
38:34: Ken comments how he is a huge fan of Phat Fibre, and how he shared the product with his friend who is a cyclist.
38:57: Dawn asks Tommy to discuss another product he and Chris created, Hormetea.
42:10: Dawn asks Tommy to talk about Nourish Balance Thrive’s podcast.
43:05: Ken discusses how ketogenic diets naturally bring insulin down in many athletes, and as a result, they experience a decrease in electrolyte retention. Ken then asks Tommy if he has also seen this decrease in electrolyte retention and the need for many athletes to supplement electrolytes.
44:23: Ken asks Tommy about carnitine supplementation for those on a ketogenic diet.
45:21: Ken asks Tommy if he usually recommends both common forms of carnitine supplementation for his athletes.
45:40: Dawn asks Tommy if he has any thoughts on the supposedly ‘lifespan” or “healthspan” enhancing supplements, such as NAD or nicotinamide riboside to increase NAD+ levels?
48:11: Dawn comments on how there are now ketone salts on the market and there will soon be ketone esters also. She then asks Tommy what his thoughts are on exogenous ketones in the context of human performance, health span, and disease.
51:47: Ken comments on how it would be surprising if the effects of ketogenic diets and exogenous ketones are identical. He goes on to assert that this is an area where the research needs to happen soon and asks Tommy about his thoughts on this.
54:02: Dawn discusses how Tommy has mentioned that exercise is a key trigger for longevity and yet there are people who assert that exercise is detrimental to lifespan. She then asks Tommy what he would say to those people and if there are any types of exercise that have the upside without the negatives associated with some forms of exercise.
56:40: Dawn asks Tommy what he would propose as an approach for investigating whether an intervention has an impact on human longevity.
1:00:56: Ken says there may be a placebo effect for someone who is convinced that they exercise more than their peers.
1:01:13: Ken asks Tommy about ruinous empathy.
1:03:06: Ken says that he would note that context is important when engaging in radical candor.
1:03:42: Ken asks Tommy if he thinks there is a dogma displacement inertia problem in science and medicine, and if so, whether there anything to do about it other than be patient.
1:06:19: Ken and Dawn thank Tommy for joining them.
Episode 47: Dr. Tommy Wood talks about neonatal brain injuries and optimizing human performance
Dr. Tommy Wood is a U.K. trained MD/PhD who now lives in the U.S. He has spent most of his academic career studying ways to treat babies with brain injuries, but has also published papers on multiple sclerosis, as well as nutritional approaches to sports performance and metabolic disease.
Today’s conversation is the first of a two-part interview we did with Tommy. Part two will upload to iTunes on Oct. 10.
Tommy received an undergraduate degree in biochemistry from the University of Cambridge before attending medical school at the University of Oxford. He recently completed a PhD in physiology and neonatal brain metabolism at the University of Washington. He is now a Senior Fellow at the university researching neonatal brain injury.
He also is the incoming president of the Physicians for Ancestral Health, an international organization of physicians, healthcare professionals and medical students that specializes in ancestral health principles for the prevention and treatment of illness.
Tommy is also an experienced rowing, endurance, and strength coach who combines evolutionary principles with modern biochemical techniques to optimize performance. He primarily performs this work with Nourish Balance Thrive, a functional medicine clinic based in California that works largely with athletes, where he is the Chief Medical Officer.
Links:
Physicians for Ancestral Health – http://ancestraldoctors.org
Nourish Balance Thrive – http://www.nourishbalancethrive.com
NBT automated performance analysis: http://nbt.ai
Primal Endurance podcast (ketogenic diets, athletic longevity etc): http://primalendurance.libsyn.com/101-dr-tommy-wood
2) High Intensity Health podcast (ketogenic diets and gut health): http://highintensityhealth.com/tommy-wood-keto-diet-endotoxin-gut-health-bacterial-diversity/
Show notes:
03:30: Ken and Dawn welcome Tommy to the show.
03:48: Tommy talks about growing up in the U.K. and also spending time in Iceland, Germany and France.
04:43: Ken asks Tommy if he was more interested in science or sports as a youth.
05:48: Tommy talks about his time the captain of a rowing club and how he became interested in ultra-endurance sports and Crossfit training.
07:33: Dawn points out that Tommy follows a Paleo style diet, but understands that wasn’t the case when he was on a rowing team at Cambridge. She asks Tommy what caused him to change his diet.
09:51: Tommy worked as junior doctor in central London for two years after medical school before moving to Norway to get a PhD in physiology and neuroscience at the University of Oslo. Dawn asks Tommy what motivated him to change his field of work?
11:39: Dawn asks Tommy why he has devoted so much of his research looking into multiple sclerosis.
13:23: Dawn mentions that Tommy is the incoming president of Physicians for Ancestral Health and asks him how he came involved with the organization.
15:40: Physicians for Ancestral Health work to identify natural dietary, nutritional and environmental interventions that complement standard medical therapies. Dawn asks Tommy to describe examples of natural interventions.
17:11: Tommy’s PhD focused on the physiology of hypoxic-ischemic brain injury in newborn babies using a rat model. Kens asks Tommy to talk about the disease and how it is studied in the lab.
19:25: Dawn points out that the current treatment for infants with brain injuries is therapeutic hypothermia. Dawns asks Tommy to talk about the treatment and how it works.
23:00: STEM-Talk blurb.
23:24: Considering that hypothermia was already standard of care by the time Tommy started his PhD, Ken asks what made Tommy want to focus on studying hypothermia further during his PhD.
24:45: Dawns asks Tommy how he would research the optimization of hypothermia treatment in humans?
28:29: Ken asks Tommy how he became a senior fellow in the Pediatrics Department at the University of Washington.
29:53: Tommy’s postdoc work at the University of Washington involves developing a ferret model of brain injury in premature babies. Ken asks Tommy why he chose ferrets.
32:52: Ken talks about Xenon, a noble gas that has many applications from headlights to spacecraft propulsion to biological aspects. Dawn points out that while Ken was at NASA, that Xenon was used as a fuel for a spacecraft called Deep Space 1. Ken then asks Tommy to talk about the use of Xenon in helping people suffering hypoxic-ischemic brain injuries.
36:12: Ken points out that Xenon’s activation of HIF-1alpha makes Xenon potentially ergogenic and, in some circles, regarded as a performance-enhancing substance. The Russians admitted to using Xenon in their athletes up until WADA banned it and Argon. Ken asks Tommy for his thoughts on Xenon’s effectiveness in enhancing performance.
40:06: Dawn mentions that Xenon has been shown to increase heart and lung capacity, reduce muscle fatigue, boost testosterone and cause an improvement in mood.
40:32: Dawn talks about how Tommy has been involved in collaborative work with people in a number of fields using what Tommy has referred to as a “systems analysis approach” to look at the etiology of disease processes in multiple sclerosis and insulin resistance, as well as the application of nanotechnology to drug delivery in neurological diseases. Dawn asks Tommy to expand upon that.
42:29: In reviewing some of Tommy’s work, Ken says it seemed as if Tommy was employing a “systems approach” to avoid the dangers of reductionist thinking in medicine. Tommy agrees, and then shares a story about aliens coming to Earth and discovering the game Angry Birds to illustrate his point.
45:37: Part one of Tommy’s two-part interview ends. Part two will upload to iTunes on Tuesday, Oct. 10.
Episode 46: NASA’s Chris McKay talks about the search for life in our solar system and travel to Mars
Today’s guest on STEM-Talk is Dr. Chris McKay, a leading astrobiologist and planetary scientist with the Space Science Division of the NASA Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley.
Chris’s interview covers a diverse range of topics ranging from the origins of life to the possibility of manned missions to Mars.
For the past 30 years, Chris has been advancing our understanding of planetary science. He graduated from Florida Atlantic University in 1975 with a degree in physics and earned a doctorate in astrogeophysics at the University of Colorado in 1982. He was a co-investigator on the Huygens probe to Saturn’s moon Titan in 2005, the Mars Phoenix lander mission in 2008, and the current Mars Science Laboratory mission.
His research at NASA has focused on the evolution of the solar system and the origin of life. He also has been heavily involved in NASA’s Mars missions including the current Mars rover — Curiosity. In addition, Chris has thought deeply about the human exploration of Mars.
He has spent considerable time studying polar and desert environments to better understand how humans might survive in Mars-like environments. His research has taken him to the Antarctic Dry Valleys, the Atacama Desert, the Arctic, and the Namib Desert.
In 2015, the Desert Research Institute named Chris the Nevada Medalist, which is the highest scientific honor in the state.
Links:
STEM-Talk Episode 33, interview with NASA’s Natalie Batalha – https://www.ihmc.us/stemtalk/episode-33/
Chris McKay’s NASA profile page – https://spacescience.arc.nasa.gov/staff/chris-mckay/
Show Notes
3:53: Ken and Dawn welcome Chris to the show.
4:05: Dawn asks Chris if it is true that the television series Star Trek inspired him to take up science and start studying planets as a kid.
4:34: Dawn comments on how Apollo happened almost 50 years ago when Chris was a teenager and asks him where he was for Apollo 11 and what it meant to him.
5:24: Ken asks Chris how he learned about Florida Atlantic University, as it was a relatively new university at the time, and asks Chris why he chose it.
6:54: Dawn asks Chris if he was thinking about becoming an astronaut when he decided to major in physics.
7:27: Ken asks Chris what it was like to be a summer intern in the Planetary Biology program at the NASA Ames Research Center around 1980.
8:52: Dawn asks Chris how he chose the University of Colorado, where he earned a PhD in astrogeophysics.
10:42: Dawn asks Chris to discuss his transition from mechanical engineering to astrogeophysics.
12:11: Ken discusses how Chris ended up back at NASA Ames as an astrobiologist and planetary scientist after graduate school.
13:53: Dawn comments how Chris’s research is taking him to extreme places, and asks him to explain what extremophiles are and what their relevance is in the search for life beyond Earth.
17:26: Dawn comments on her experiences searching for extremophiles while working on cave diving projects.
18:12: Dawn asks Chris what his most recent search experience for extremophiles on our planet was.
19:49: Dawn asks Chris what he takes to be the most exciting extremophile discovery out of all of the work he has done.
22:40: Dawn asks Chris to talk about his favorite and least favorite aspects of field research.
24:06: Ken asks Chris to define some terms related to the search for life beyond Earth. Specifically, whether we have a definition for life itself and if not, what exactly we are searching for when we say we are searching for life. He also asks Chris to talk about alien life and how it differs from life on Earth.
26:21: Ken asks Chris how tough it would be to recognize alien life if it is based on fundamentally different chemistry than life on Earth.
29:16: Ken asks Chris where NASA’s secret alien life storage room is.
31:03: Ken asks Chris what the scientific importance of discovering life in another world is.
32:49: Dawn asks Chris where the most likely environment to hold life beyond Earth in our solar system is.
33:47: Dawn asks Chris what makes Mars an ideal candidate for life beyond Earth.
36:47: Ken discusses how we have been searching for life on Mars for decades, but how Chris questions the way we have been going about this. Chris was quoted to say, “If we are going to search for life, let’s search for life.” Ken asks Chris to explain what he means by this.
39:07: Dawn asks Chris what he thinks would happen if we did discovered life on Mars, and whether he thinks there would be a profound societal reaction.
40:57: Ken asks Chris if it is likely that life on Earth may have seeded life on Mars, or perhaps vice versa.
42:57: Dawn asks Chris what motivated his interest in the atmospheres of Titan.
45:14: STEMTALK BLURB
45:39: Ken asks Chris to talk about the search for life on Europa.
47:06: Ken comments that Chris has noted that life chooses, chemistry does not. He then asks Chris when we will be able to send capable robots to examine the chemistry of Titan or the other frigid satellites mentioned.
50:23: Ken asks Chris if the evidence for life on Titan is compelling enough to devote the resources to actually send a mission to look for it.
53:04: Dawn discusses how Chris has spent a lot of time over the past 30 years looking into the origin and evolution of life. She then asks Chris how his understanding of the origin of life has changed over these three decades.
54:46: Dawn asks Chris which place he thinks has the highest probability of having life beyond Earth.
56:19: Dawn asks Chris how returning samples from Mars would fit into human exploration.
58:18: Ken comments on how it makes sense that more experience with entry, descent, and landing on Mars would make the astronauts more comfortable.
58:29: Dawn asks Chris which he believes is going to happen first: discovering life elsewhere in the solar system or receiving a message from an extraterrestrial civilization.
1:00:12: Ken asks Chris to briefly discuss the Drake equation, a probabilistic argument used to estimate the number of active communicative extraterrestrial civilizations in our galaxy.
1:02:19: Ken discusses how he interviewed Chris’s colleague, Dr. Natalie Batalha, about the Kepler mission, exoplanets, and the possibility of life on STEM-Talk episode 33. He then asks Chris what he sees as the prospects for finding life on extra solar planets.
1:04:46: Dawn asks Chris if he has a favorite book about the search for extraterrestrial life.
1:05:56: Dawn comments on how Chris is an advocate of human exploration of Mars and asks him to discuss his reasons for that position.
1:07:18: Dawn asks Chris what his thoughts are on planetary protection, particularly the controversy regarding humans “contaminating” the surface of Mars.
1:09:19: Ken discusses how he believes that it is unfortunate that some regard any human expansion into the solar system as being an undesirable human infestation of previously pristine places.
1:11:40: Dawn asks Chris if humans were to live elsewhere in the solar system, where he thinks would be the most promising destination.
1:12:40: Ken comments on how Chris has given the notion of terraforming Mars a lot of thought and asks him to explain the concept of terraforming.
1:14:41: Ken asks Chris what it will take to terraform Mars, and whether or not Chris sees this as a realistic possibility.
1:17:03: Dawn discusses how Chris has nurtured an entire generation of students and asks him what it has been like for him to work with them.
1:18:32: Dawn asks Chris to explain what Mars Underground is, as he is one of the cofounders.
1:19:45: Dawn asks Chris what he would propose if he were in charge of NASA’s Mars strategy.
1:20:21: Ken and Dawn thank Chris for joining them on the show.
Episode 45: David Spiegel talks about the science of hypnosis and the many ways it can help people
Today’s interview features one of the nation’s foremost hypnotists who is also the associate chair of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Stanford University Medical School.
In this episode, Dr. David Spiegel talks about how hypnosis can help people not only quit smoking and lose weight, but also relieve chronic pain and reduce people’s dependency on medications.
David earned his Bachelor’s at Yale College and graduated from Harvard Medical School in 1971. His mother and father were psychiatrists and his father started practicing hypnosis just before World War II.
David now has more than 45 years of clinical and research experience studying psycho-oncology, stress and health, pain control and hypnosis. In addition to his role as the Willson Professor and associate chair of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Stanford, he is also the director of the Center on Stress and Health and the medical director of the Center for Integrative Medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine.
David has published 12 books, including one with his father. He has written more than 380 scientific journal articles and 167 book chapters on topics ranging from hypnosis to psychosocial oncology to trauma to psychotherapy.
Last year David was featured in Time magazine about the therapeutic uses of hypnosis. In terms of the nation’s escalating opiate problem, David has gone on record saying that hypnosis can and should be used instead of painkillers in many cases.
“There are things we could be doing that are a lot safer, cheaper and more effective,” said David, “but we’re not because as a society we have the prejudice that hypnosis is voodoo and pharmacology is science.”
David’s research has been supported by the National Institute of Mental Health, the National Cancer Institute, the National Institute on Aging, the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Dana Foundation for Brain Sciences.
David is the past president of the American College of Psychiatrists and the Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, and is a member of the National Academy of Medicine.
Links:
David Spiegel Stanford profile page
“Group Therapy for Cancer Patients” — http://amzn.to/2wd7c39
“Living Beyond Limits” — http://amzn.to/2vlTzzZ
Show Notes
3:42: Ken and Dawn welcome David to the show.
3:56: Dawn comments on how both of David’s parents were psychiatrists, and how his father started practicing hypnosis just before WWII. She then asks David if it was always his plan to follow in his parents’ footsteps.
4:53: Dawn discusses how David got his Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy and then decided to attend Harvard Medical School. She asks David why he decided to specialize in hypnosis.
7:26: After graduating from medical school, David made news for refusing pain medication after his operation. Ken asks David to describe what he did.
8:51: Dawn asks David to give an overview of hypnosis.
11:48: David talks about how hypnosis and mindfulness are similar and different.
13:48: Ken asks David if people who are easily hypnotized are also more likely to be able to successfully practice meditation or mindfulness.
14:44: Dawn discusses how she has colleagues that are interested in studying mindfulness for conditions such as PTSD or pain management, but they have had trouble finding funding on these topics. She then asks David who typically funds the work that he does.
15:31: Dawn comments on how David has written about how hypnosis is the oldest western conception of psychotherapies and asks him to give a short historical tour of hypnosis.
20:35: Dawn discusses how David has had more than 40 years of clinical and research experience studying hypnosis, psycho oncology, pain control, psychoneuroendocrinology, and the use of hypnosis in the treatment of PTSD. Specifically, David was involved in two studies that showed that Vietnam veterans with PTSD had higher than normal tendencies to be hypnotized. Dawn then asks David to discuss these studies and the utility of hypnosis as a treatment for stress and physical trauma.
24:09: Ken asks David if he has found hypnosis to be an effective treatment for PTSD.
24:35: Ken asks David about using hypnosis to treat phobias.
26:32: Ken asks David if hypnotherapy can be used to reveal suppressed or impaired eyewitness memories and whether the courts raise questions about it.
29:17: Ken discusses a landmark study, published in the late 1990s by Pierre Rainville, looking at hypnotized people who placed their hands in really hot water. Many have said that this study changed the whole landscape of hypnosis. Ken then asks David to discuss this study and its importance.
31:06: Ken comments on how not everyone can be hypnotized, and how David has used functional MRI scans to figure out why some people are not susceptible to hypnosis. In 2012, David shared results of a study that showed hypnosis changes the way blood flows to different areas of the brain. Ken asks David to share the importance of this finding and what it revealed to him.
34:02: Dawn discusses how David has also found research that shows that hypnotizability correlates with dopamine levels in the brain. Dawn then asks if that means that dopamine is a key driver of the ability to be hypnotized, and if so why.
35:08: Dawn asks if the effect of dopamine is linear, with those with the highest levels of dopamine being the most hypnotizable.
37:04: STEMTALK BLURB
37:27: Ken asks David to talk about Parkinson’s in the context of hypnosis.
39:09: Ken asks David if there is a practical way to gauge whether someone will be receptive to hypnosis.
40:07: Ken asks David if it is possible to change people’s susceptibility to hypnosis.
41:38: Dawn asks if someone who does not believe in hypnosis can be hypnotized.
42:21: Dawn comments on David’s work in a children’s hospital and asks him if it seems like children are more susceptible to hypnosis than adults.
43:16: Dawn asks David how effective self-hypnosis is and if there are any notable limitations.
44:41: Ken asks David if response to the placebo effect is associated with hypnotizability, and if so, if people who are easily hypnotized are more likely to benefit from any placebo effects of hypnosis.
46:12: Dawn comments that the placebo effect is unable to directly change underlying physiology, and asks if there is any evidence that hypnosis can directly alter disease states themselves.
48:00: Dawn discusses how Robert Sapolsky would say that dopamine is produced to provide motivation to achieve a goal, and that it is even greater when the result is uncertain. She then asks David how this view of dopamine ties into the ability to be hypnotized, and whether there are physiological effects that are related.
49:48: Ken asks David if there are environmental factors that might make it easier to achieve a hypnotic state, and whether hallucinogens and other drugs have a role in hypnosis.
52:11: Dawn comments on how acupuncture can be blocked with opioid receptor blockers and asks David if there are any receptor blockers that inhibit hypnosis.
53:06: Dawn asks David which technique with hypnosis is generally most effective or whether it depends on the individual.
54:40: Ken asks David if there are any notable potential hazards associated with hypnosis or its practice.
56:04: Dawn asks David if there have been any studies looking at molecular level changes that have been associated with hypnosis and if he has an animal model equivalent that can be used for studies of brain tissue specifically.
57:04: Ken asks David if we see a true hypnotic effect in animals other than humans.
57:55: Ken discusses how over the years David has worked with hospital physicians on ways to use hypnosis in addition to anesthesia in the operating room. Ken then asks David to talk about his findings on hypnotized subjecting using less medication, experiencing less pain, and feeling less anxious than other groups who were not hypnotized.
1:00:22: Dawn comments on how radiologist Elvira Lang at Harvard’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Lang has gone on to continue these studies on hypnotized patients having better results.
1:01:11: Dawn asks David why many physicians remain skeptical of hypnosis, despite David’s research findings.
1:03:44: Ken asks David if there has been any research done on the efficacy of hypnosis in the context of elite sports or tier-one military units, with respect to recovery or overtraining.
1:06:04: Ken asks David whether heart rate variability could be improved via hypnosis.
1:06:51: Dawn asks David to talk about some of the ongoing areas of research in his field.
1:08:16: Dawn asks David if there are any large scale clinical trials that address hypnosis as a potential therapeutic approach.
1:10:33: Ken comments on how there appears to be a renaissance on medicine built from two metaphorical houses. Ken then asks David what might be the evolutionary imperatives that brought about the ability to experience hypnosis, and what its purpose is.
1:14:15: Ken makes a comment about his own research in AI in regards to the belief in machines replacing physicians.
1:15:14: Dawn asks David what his thoughts are on the likelihood of insurance companies starting to support hypnosis therapy.
1:17:10: Ken and Dawn thank David for joining them on the show.
Episode 44: Jerry Pratt discusses the evolution and future of humanoid robots and bipedal walking
Today’s podcast features Ken Ford and Dawn Kernagis interviewing their colleague, Dr. Jerry Pratt, a senior research scientist at IHMC who heads up the institute’s robotics group. In 2015, Jerry led an IHMC team that placed second out of 23 teams from around the world in the first-ever DARPA Robotics Challenge. IHMC also placed first in the competition which featured humanoid robots that primarily walked bipedally and first among all U.S. teams.
Jerry is a graduate of MIT, where he earned a doctorate in electrical engineering and computer science in 2000. As a graduate student at MIT, Jerry built his first robot which was also one of the first bipedal robots that could compliantly walk over rough terrain.
As you will learn in today’s interview, it was called “Spring Turkey” and is on display in MIT’s Boston museum. The second robot he built as a graduate student was called “Spring Flamingo,” and is on display in the lobby of IHMC’s Fred Levin Center in Pensacola.
After graduation, Jerry and some MIT colleagues founded a small company called Yobotics, which specialized in powered prosthetics, biomimetic robots, simulation software and robotic consulting.
He joined IHMC in 2002 and has become a well-known expert in bipedal walking. His algorithms are used in various robots around the world. Recent work on fast-running robots has resulted in ostrich-inspired running models and robot prototypes that are currently believed to be the fastest running robots in the world.
Jerry has six U.S. patents and was inducted into the Florida Inventors Hall of Fame in 2015. He lives in Pensacola with his wife Megan and their two children. He and he wife founded a science museum called the Pensacola MESS Hall, which stands for math, engineering, science, and stuff. The MESS Hall is a hands-on science museum for all ages that just celebrated it’s five-year anniversary.
Show notes:
4:37: Ken and Dawn welcome Jerry to the show
4:54: Dawn asks Jerry to talk about the time he once stole a science book from school.
5:45: Dawn asks Jerry to discuss his first invention, the knockout keyless door lock, that he came up with for his tree fort when he was a teen.
6:21: Dawn asks Jerry if he recalls his first computer program he wrote on the Commodore 64.
6:47: Ken comments on how in addition to writing computer programs, Jerry had an interest in electronics, particularly Heathkits.
7:08: Dawn discusses how Jerry played a lot of sports as a kid, going on to run varsity track and cross country at MIT.
7:46: Dawn asks Jerry if it was as an undergrad or a graduate student that he first became interested in robotics.
8:20: Ken discusses the first two robots Jerry put together: Spring Turkey then Spring Flamingo. He then asks Jerry to talk about the machines and how he came up with the names.
9:16: Dawn comments on how a few of Jerry’s colleagues have mentioned that much of our understanding of dynamic walking is still based on some of the original work Jerry did at MIT, and she then asks Jerry to talk about that work.
10:03: Ken asks Jerry to talk about how he and his wife, Megan Benson, met.
10:54: Ken asks Jerry to discuss the experience of co-founding Yobotics, which specialized in powered prosthetics, biomimetic robots, simulation software, and robot consulting, with his colleagues at MIT.
11:36: Dawn discusses the growth of robotics at IHMC since Jerry joined the team. She then asks Jerry to give a summary on the types of robots that he and his colleagues have been working on over the last 14 years at IHMC.
13:55: Dawn asks Jerry to talk about the books he often reads on organizational culture and teambuilding.
15:08: Dawn comments on how she has heard that Jerry is one of the worst motivational speakers ever and asks if it is true.
15:28: Ken comments on all of the work that Jerry and the IHMC team put into the DARPA Robotics Challenge, where they placed second in the world and first among the United States teams. He then asks Jerry to describe the experience.
16:24: Ken asks Jerry what it would look like if he were designing a new challenge focused on robotic mobility.
17:03: Dawn comments on a story about Jerry’s daughter Annie telling her kindergarten teacher that her daddy builds robots that fall down.
17:42: Dawn discusses how Jerry has spent most of his career thinking about how humans balance themselves to keep from falling, and how we use these strategies to help balance robots. She then asks Jerry to walk through that process.
18:35: Dawn asks Jerry what happens when a robot recovers its balance.
19:13: Dawn comments on how Jerry’s focus has been on bipedal walking. She then goes on to ask why engineers design robots with legs, and even more specifically, two legs.
20:03: Ken states that one of the advantages of a humanoid robot or bipedal robot is that the physical built world was built assuming our human form factor.
21:02: Ken comments on how Jerry mentioned that walking can be thought of as modeled by an inverted pendulum and asks Jerry when this approximation is valid and under what conditions this simplification breaks down.
21:47: Dawn asks Jerry which is a more limiting factor in having a bipedal robot perform as well as a human: the software or the hardware.
22:29: Dawn comments on how bipedal robots are able to walk but asks Jerry what the challenges are in getting them to run.
23:22: Ken discusses how our robots are comprised of lots of actuators and sensors and perform many complicated hundreds and perhaps thousands of calculations per second. He then asks Jerry how practical and robust this approach is in the real world and how their fundamental research into open-loop running robots such as the planar elliptical runner could be leveraged into advances in humanoid robots, or whether they are distinctly separate tracks with no cross talk.
24:54: Jerry talks about how his group is looking at how to use robots to do other things in the real world than just walking, such as going up to valves, turning valves and flipping switches. And because this needs to be done super reliably, the group is using more mathematically reliable techniques to create systems and controllers that exploit natural dynamics.
25:18: Dawn asks Jerry to explain some of the potentially practical applications of bipedal robots.
25:49: Ken comments that he has noticed that Jerry and others have been working to get a humanoid robot, Atlas, to walk across a plank of wood that seesaws up and down. He then asks Jerry why he is doing that.
26:37: Dawn asks what some of the most efficient gates are as far as different animals go and how bipedal walking and programmability compare to some of those gates in terms of efficiency.
28:49: STEM-TALK BLURB
29:16: Ken discusses how Jerry has been spending a lot of time thinking about how robots can help us explore Mars. He goes on to comment that the robots currently on Mars are all wheeled or tracked machines, and asks Jerry if he sees the need for robots with legs on Mars, and why.
30:16: Ken asks Jerry how walking and running differs on Earth versus different gravity environments like Mars.
31:24: Ken asks Jerry if we would walk on Mars or hop, or if it would partially be a function of the spacesuit design.
32:52: Ken comments that as far as sensory input goes, the skin is our largest sensory organ that we have as humans. He then asks Jerry if he sees the ability to integrate things like synthetic skin with robots to improve their interaction with the environment.
34:22: Dawn discusses how in undersea robotics one of the major issues is developing a hand with dexterity that simulates a human is very difficult. She then asks Jerry the challenges in this and where the field stands with respect to developing a good hand.
35:57: Ken comments that understanding robotics and AI doesn’t seem to diminish our appreciation for humanity, but rather seems to elevate it.
36:21: Dawn states that when Jerry and his wife Megan moved to Pensacola 14 years ago they had a dream of creating a science museum. She then asks how he managed to make this happen.
38:36: Ken asks Jerry in what ways mechanical mobility is starting to surpass human mobility, and where Jerry sees the next breakthroughs coming in machine mobility.
40:27: Dawn comments on how about 10 years ago researchers set a goal that we would have a robot soccer team that would beat a human team by 2050, and she then asks Jerry if he thinks that this is still possible.
41:50: Ken discusses how Jerry’s team also works on powered exoskeletons for people with paralysis, but all of the balance is provided by the user. He then asks if there are ways to utilize Jerry’s work on walking and balancing algorithms in powered exoskeleton developments, so that the exoskeleton itself can be a more active partner in balance.
42:51: Dawn asks Jerry what his advice is to a race walker who wants to do well without cheating.
44:56: Dawn asks Jerry about the role of AI techniques in helping to advance mobility.
45:25: Jerry talks about how the deep reinforcement learning community may start looking at bipedal walking as one of its next big challenges.
46:45: Ken comments how deep learning algorithms are an ideal for bipedal walking because one doesn’t have to explain how the capability to walk was arrived at.
48:03: Jerry agrees but talks about how deep learning might someday help us understand walking in a new way and afford new insights.
48:37: Dawn asks Jerry what he sees as the emerging commercial opportunities for robotics.
50:02: Dawn asks Jerry about opportunities for entertainment.
50:43: Ken asks Jerry to give a quick update and sketch on IHMC’s role in the MegaBot adventure.
51:17: Dawn asks Jerry to talk about his pleasure in puzzles and games, and proving the odds of them.
52:00: Ken and Dawn thank Jerry for joining them.
Episode 43: Jeff Volek explains the power of ketogenic diets to reverse type 2 diabetes
Today’s episode features an important interview with Dr. Jeff Volek, a researcher who has spent the past 20 years studying how humans adapt to carbohydrate-restricted diets. His most recent work, which is one of the key topics of today’s interview, has focused on the science of ketones and ketogenic diets and their use as a therapeutic tool to manage insulin resistance.
In 2014, Volek became a founder and the chief science officer of Virta Health, an online specialty medical clinic dedicated to reversing diabetes, a chronic disease that has become a worldwide epidemic. The company’s ambitious goal is to reverse type 2 diabetes in 100 million people by 2025.
Earlier this year, The JMIR Diabetes Journal published a study coordinated by Volek and Virta that showed people with type 2 diabetes can be taught to sustain adequate carbohydrate restriction to achieve nutritional ketosis, thereby improving glycemic control, decreasing medication use, and allowing clinically relevant weight loss. These improvements happened after just 10 weeks on the program that Virta designed for people.
In addition to his role at Virta, Volek is a registered dietitian and full professor in the department of human sciences at Ohio State University. He is a co-author of “The New Atkins for a New You,” which came out 2010 and spent 16 weeks on The New York Times best-seller list. The book is an updated, easier-to-use version of Dr. Robert Atkins’ original 1972 book, “Dr. Atkins’ Diet Revolution.”
Volek has co-authored four other books, including “The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living” and “The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Performance.” Both books are co-authored with and delve somewhat deeper than “The New Atkins” did into the science and application of low-carb diets.
Volek received his bachelor’s degree in dietetics from Michigan State University in 1991. He went on to earn a master’s in exercise physiology and a PhD in kinesiology and nutrition from Pennsylvania State University. He has given more than 200 lectures about his research at scientific and industry conferences in a dozen countries. In addition to his five books, he also has published more than 300 peer-reviewed scientific papers.
Although numerous studies have confirmed the validity and safety of low-carb and ketogenic diets, Volek and others who support carbohydrate restriction are often criticized for being so one-sided that their work comes across as more advocacy than science. But in “The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living,” Volek writes:
“What is the proper response when three decades of debate about carbohydrate restriction have been largely one-sided and driven more by cultural bias than science? Someone needs to stand up and represent the alternate view and science.”
As Volek explains in episode 42 of STEM-Talk, this has become his mission.
Links:
“New Atkins for a New You” — http://amzn.to/2uOjLkF
“The Art and Science of Low-Carbohydrate Living”– http://amzn.to/2hh1W9k
“The Art and Science of Low-Carbohydrate Performance” — http://amzn.to/2f2oPMV
New York Times article:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/11/well/live/tackling-weight-loss-and-diabetes-with-video-chats.html?_r=0
JMIR DIABETES paper:
http://assets.virtahealth.com/docs/Virta_Clinic_10-week_outcomes.pdf
Show notes:
3:016: Ken and Dawn welcome Jeff to the show.
3:32: Dawn asks Jeff when and how he first became interested in science.
5:24: When Jeff was studying to be a dietitian, he was looking at a low-fat, high-carb diet. But when he began to work with diabetics, something did not seem right. Dawn asks Jeff if that is what led him to begin studying low-carb diets.
6:39: Ken comments on how diabetes is perhaps the greatest healthcare challenge we face as a society, which drives costs to more than $300 billion a year.
7:59: Dawn asks Jeff about the effectiveness of traditional treatment and management approaches for people with diabetes.
8:27: Dawn asks Jeff to talk about Virta Health, a company Jeff helped found, and a recent paper and JMIR Diabetes Journal. The paper reported on the results of a study that looked at whether sustained carbohydrate restriction and nutritional ketosis could be part of a comprehensive intervention that would allow people with type 2 diabetes to improve their health.
11.54: Dawn asks Jeff why this approach would work at the cellular level, whether it is the reduction in glucose alone or if the ketone bodies are playing a role.
14:13: Ken asks Jeff why he thinks some patients respond so remarkably and others not as much.
16:27: Dawn discusses how Virta’s mission is to reverse diabetes for 100 million people by 2025. She asks Jeff if this is a realistic number or a stretch goal.
18:28: Ken asks Jeff to briefly talk about the business model of this process and how he sees it shaking out.
20:09: Dawn asks Jeff how he and Sami Inkinen, founder of Trulia and another co-founder of Virta, crossed paths.
22:00: Dawn asks Jeff what his thoughts are on the possible epigenetic effects of the ketogenic diet, with respect to general health and wellness.
25:46: Dawn talks about an athletic friend of hers with Crohn’s disease and how she had positive health outcomes from following a ketogenic diet. She then asks Jeff if anyone has seen improvements to conditions like Crohn’s disease or rheumatoid arthritis when considering the inflammatory nature of these diseases processes.
27:54: STEMTALK BLURB
28:23: Dawn comments on how she has been a vegetarian for more than 20 years, and how it is difficult to be on a ketogenic diet with no meat as a fat source. She then discusses how “The New Atkins for a New You,” has a chapter devoted to a low-carb diet for vegetarians and asks Jeff if he has any tips to share for vegetarians or vegans.
29:59: Ken discusses a conversation he had with a woman about the difficulty of a ketogenic diet for someone who is fat-phobic. She has the idea that if she eats fat it will soon be on her. Ken then asks Jeff if this “fat fear” is something that he finds in working with patients.
32:30: Ken comments on how Rob Wolff reports that lipidologists are quite wary of the LDL-P, the particle numbers that they see in some people trying the ketogenic diet. As a result, these people have to increase their carb intake. Ken then asks Jeff what his thoughts on this are.
35:33: Ken discusses how LDL-P is more strongly correlated with heart disease than LDL cholesterol in the literature.
41:02: Dawn asks Jeff if he thinks that someone on a ketogenic diet would need a different amount of fiber per day compared to what has been recommended by the Institute of Medicine.
41:44: Dawn discusses how for decades recreational and competitive athletes have religiously consumed a diet rich in carbohydrates to fuel their performance, and the conventional wisdom has been to avoid fatty foods. However, in recent years these beliefs have been questioned. Dawn asks Jeff to give an overview of this trend.
44:58: Dawn asks Jeff to expand on why he thinks there was no difference in muscle glycogen between the two groups.
47:56: Dawn discusses a recent paper published in The Journal of Physiology where Louise Burke looked at elite race walkers while on the ketogenic diet. The team found that this diet impaired performance in elite endurance athletes “despite a significant improvement in peak aerobic capacity.” Her primary point was that race walkers showed increased oxygen demand for a given speed. Dawn then asks Jeff to share his thoughts on this paper.
49:40: Ken asks Jeff to briefly explain the role of PDH, and whether Jeff looked at this enzyme in his studies on athletes who were keto-adapted.
51:40: Ken discusses how in contrast to endurance sports, some more power-oriented athletes have reported that when on a ketogenic diet they experience low energy levels during the most demanding moments in the sport, but others do not experience this at all. Ken asks Jeff if he has any thoughts on power athletes on a ketogenic diet.
56:29: Dawn discusses how Jeff has spent a good amount of time studying keto-adapted elite ultra-runners, such as the western states 100 record holder, Tim Olson. Dawn asks Jeff what he learned at this event with regards to a low-carb endurance athlete, and how this informs recommendations he would make to athletes when they are fueling for a competition of this kind.
59:07 Dawn asks Jeff if he sees more athletes shifting towards a low-carb diet.
1:00:37: Ken discusses the use of exogenous ketone esters in the Tour de France races. He then asks Jeff for his opinion on this and to briefly address the confusion on this topic
1:04:01: Ken comments on how Jeff wrapped up the confusion nicely.
1:05:14: Ken and Dawn thank Jeff for joining them.
Episode 42: Tom Jones discusses defending Earth against the threat of asteroids
Frequent STEM-Talk listeners will more than likely recognize today’s guest, veteran NASA astronaut Tom Jones, who joins us today to talk about the threat of near-Earth asteroids.
Tom occasionally helps co-host STEM-Talk. But for episode 42, regular co-hosts Ken Ford and Dawn Kernagis turn the microphone around to interview Tom about his days as an astronaut, planetary defense and asteroids.
It’s a topic, as you will hear, that Tom is quite passionate about. He also has a great deal of expertise in the field. Before he became an astronaut, Tom earned a doctorate in planetary science from the University of Arizona in 1988. He’s also a graduate of the United States Airforce Academy. His research interests range from the remote sensing of asteroids to meteorite spectroscopy to applications of space resources.
He became an astronaut in 1991 and received the NASA Space Flight Medal in 1994, 1996, and 2001. He also received the NASA Exceptional Service Award in 1997 and again in 2000. In 1995, he received the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal.
Tom logged 52 days in space, including three space walks totaling more than 19 hours. He is the author of several books, including Sky Walking: An Astronauts Memoir, which the Wall Street Journal named as one of the five best books about space. His latest book is Ask the Astronaut: A Galaxy of Astonishing Answers to Your Questions about Space.
Below are links to Tom’s books as wells the STEM-Talk interview with Pascal Lee, which Ken refers to while interviewing Tom.
Links:
Pascal Lee interview: https://www.ihmc.us/stemtalk/episode-17/
New Yorker article: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/02/28/vermin-of-the-sky
TFPD Report: https://www.ihmc.us/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/TFPD-FINAL-Report-to-NAC-10-6-10_v2.pdf
Tom Jones books:
“Sky Walking” – http://amzn.to/2t8dSQn
“Ask the Astronaut” – http://amzn.to/2vhUxZD
“Complete Idiots Guide to NASA” – http://amzn.to/2uWZHun
“Planetology” – http://amzn.to/2unXgnP
Show notes:
3:36: Ken and Dawn welcome Tom to the show.
4:11: Ken comments on the interesting path that Tom has travelled throughout his life and asks Tom to give a synopsis of his path of reinvention.
6:56: Dawn asks Tom to talk about the goals and highlights of the four shuttle missions he went on.
3:39: Dawn welcomes Tom as a guest on STEM-Talk.
9:23: Dawn comments on how Tom no longer flies in space, but he and some of his colleagues are now involved in another space mission that could save the Earth or a large part of it from destruction. Dawn then asks Tom how he became interested in planetary defense from asteroids.
11:30: Ken asks Tom to explain the differences between asteroids, comets, meteoroids, meteors, and meteorites.
13:37: Ken asks Tom how he would define a near-earth asteroid.
14:06: Dawn asks Tom how frequently asteroids strike the Earth.
16:27: Dawn asks Tom how likely she is to die in an asteroid catastrophe, statistically speaking.
18:27: Dawn discusses an article on planetary defense titled, Vermin of the Sky, published in The New Yorker in February of 2011. She comments on how Ken is quoted in the article as saying, “The very short perspective we have as humans makes the threat of asteroids seem smaller than it is. People of all sorts find it easier to kick the can down the road and hope for a mystical solution.”
20:04: Ken comments on how in the same article Clark Chapman notes that “Unlike Hurricane Katrina, we can do something about an asteroid, the question is whether we would rather be wrong in overprotecting or wrong in under protecting”. Ken then points out that one can imagine a near societal collapse should it be announced that, with high confidence, an asteroid was on a collision course with Earth, and that as a society we have no means to deflect it. Humans, Ken adds, would come to envy the dinosaurs who had no time to ruminate about their fate. Ken asks Tom if he can even imagine the societal disruption of such an announcement.
21:50: Dawn discusses how in January of this year the U.S. Government released a strategy for preparing for a Near-Earth Object (NEO) impact. She then asks Tom if he thinks the strategy is on the right track.
23:29: Dawn asks Tom to give a sense of how NASA deals with the asteroid hazard today.
25:04: Dawn asks Tom if he thinks that as NASA’s interests in asteroids has increased, if it is striking the right balance between science, exploration, and planetary defense.
26:59: Ken discusses how Tom and Rusty Schweickart co-chaired the NASA Advisory Council’s Ad Hoc Task Force on planetary defense, and how in October of 2010, their task force made five primary recommendations. Ken asks Tom to review them and briefly discuss what has transpired in the years since in a lightning round. Recommendation number one: organize for effective action on planetary defense.
28:17: Recommendation number two: acquire essential search, track, and warning capabilities.
29:10: Recommendation number three: investigate the nature of the impact threat.
29:41: Recommendation number four: prepare to respond to impact threats.
30:39: Recommendation number five: lead U.S. planetary defense effort in national and international forms.
32:05: Ken praises Tom on the successful lightning round.
32:08: Dawn asks Tom what the current score card is on our detection of NEOs and how the percentage of the NEO population discovered is.
33:49: Dawn asks Tom why we do not get more notice of the approaching objects.
34:53: Dawn comments on how Tom talked about the limitations of the ground-based detection. She then asks Tom to discuss why ground-based detection has these limitations.
36:10: Dawn asks Tom to talk about some of the cons of these space-based detection missions and whether or not there are solutions to these cons.
38:16: STEMTALK BLURB
38:42: Dawn asks Tom what we learned from the Chelyabinsk impact in 2013.
40:36: Dawn asks Tom how much it will cost to deal with the asteroid threat effectively.
41:55: Ken comments that clearly these relatively modest preventive costs would be entirely dwarfed by several orders of magnitude for any significant impact on Earth in a populated area.
42:57: Ken states that to put it in perspective, the initial annual cost estimated in the report is essentially the cost of a single, frontline jet fighter.
43:27: Dawn discusses Tom’s role as a science advisor for the B612 Foundation that is now creating a new asteroid institute at the University of Washington. She then asks Tom what his take is on the new activities that this institute will be enabling, aside from searching for NEOs.
45:05: Dawn comments on how Tom is associated with the Association of Space Explorers and asks why they are interested in planetary defense.
46:16: Ken asks Tom to imagine that we have detected an NEO that seems to be on a collision course with Earth. He then asks Tom to review the leading proposed ideas on how humanity might deflect it sufficiently for it to actually miss the Earth.
49:45: Ken asks Tom if once we divert an asteroid collision whether or not it is gone for good. More specifically, how we can prevent an asteroid on its elliptical orbit from passing through a gravitational keyhole and returning to threaten Earth again.
52:37: Dawn comments on how ESA and NASA have been discussing a joint-asteroid deflection demonstration mission. She then asks Tom what the prospects are for that mission.
54:36: Dawn asks Tom if he thinks that the UN is the best organization to plan for a public safety hazard of this magnitude.
56:32: Ken asks Tom to talk about the natural uncertainty associated with projecting the exact place of impact on Earth and the implications for planning a deflection mission.
59:30: Dawn asks why it is that the topic of NEOs seems to fly under the radar and be of so little interest in comparison to other threats of much less gravity.
1:01:20: Ken comments on how he believes that this topic suffers from the sky is falling syndrome, evoking the story of Chicken Little. Also, that political leaders tend to think in terms of best election cycles and that it is hard to get them excited about potentially cataclysmic events that are nearly certain to happen in the long run.
1:02:50: Dawn discusses how NASA’s 2017 budget eliminates funding for the asteroid redirect mission, which is to return a boulder from a Near-Earth Asteroid and put it on the moon. She then asks Tom if this cancellation affects our planetary defense efforts in any real sense.
1:04:10: Dawn asks Tom how we can use Near-Earth Asteroids and their resources to aid our human space flight exploration efforts.
1:05:13: Ken comments on how he finds Phobos and Deimos, moons of Mars, absolutely fascinating. He goes on to state that these may in fact be asteroids. He then asks Tom to talk about Phobos and Deimos and why they are of such great interest.
1:07:56: Ken recommends that the listeners interested in Phobos and Deimos check out an earlier STEM-Talk podcast with Pascal Lee. (See link above.)
1:08:14: Ken asks Tom what he sees as the role and timing of the lunar activity in the larger scheme of human space exploration.
1:09:53: Ken asks Tom what he sees as the best way for government to conduct its programs so as to help enable the success of commercial space products and service providers without directly subsidizing them.
1:11:39: Dawn comments on how Tom has had a very impressive career path and asks him what advice he would give to others who would like to someday work in space or explore the solar system.
1:14:03: Dawn discusses the four books Tom has written on space flight: “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to NAS;” “Sky Walking: An Astronauts Memoir;” “Planetology: Unlocking the Secrets of the Solar System,” and “Ask the Astronaut: A Galaxy of Astonishing Answers to Your Questions about Space Flight.”
1:15:23: Dawn asks Tom if he deals with the asteroid hazard or planetary defense in any of these books.
1:16:19: Ken comments that Tom should heavily distribute The Complete Idiot’s Guide to NASA in certain quarters of D.C.
1:16:46: Dawn asks Tom what other interests he pursues in addition to space.
1:17:31: Ken and Dawn thank Tom for joining them.
Episode 41: Dr. David Diamond talks about the role of fat, cholesterol, and statin drugs in heart disease
Dr. David Diamond is a University of South Florida professor in the departments of psychology, molecular pharmacology and physiology and director of the USF Neuroscience Collaborative.
He is well known for research that looks at the effects of stress on brain, memory and synaptic plasticity. A primary research project over the past few decades has been the study of treatments for combat veterans and civilians with PTSD.
Although his academic specialty is neuroscience, recently he has been closely examining the role of fat and cholesterol in heart disease. He began looking into lipids after test results showed his triglycerides were through the roof. He also launched a critical look into the effectiveness of statins, a class of drugs doctors frequently prescribe to help people lower cholesterol levels in their blood.
Dr. Diamond’s findings contradicted the low-fat, high-carb diet that he, as well as many Americans, had been advised to follow. This led him to explore ways for people to optimize their diet for cardiovascular health.
He eventually created a graduate and undergraduate seminar entitled, “Myths and Deception in Medical Research.” A lecture he gave at the university entitled “How Bad Science and Big Business Created the Obesity Epidemic” is now a YouTube video with nearly 200,000 views. The lecture focused on how “flawed and deceptive science demonized saturated fats and created the myth that a low-fat, plant-based diet is good for your health.”
Dr. Diamond received his B.S. in biology from the University of California, Irvine in the 1980. He continued his post-graduate work at the university and earned a Ph.D. in biology with a specialization in behavioral neuroscience.
From 1986 to 1997, Dr. Diamond was an assistant professor in the Department of Pharmacology in the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center in Denver. He then moved to University of South Florida and since 2003 has been a professor in the departments of psychology, molecular pharmacology and physiology.
In addition to directing USF’s Neuroscience Collaborative, Dr. Diamond also is the director of the university’s Center for Preclinical and Clinical Research on Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. His research projects at the university have ranged from “The Effects of Stress on Brain, Memory and Synaptic Plasticity” to “The Cognitive and Neurobiological Perspectives on Why Parents Lose Awareness of Children in Cars.”
Dr. Diamond has served on federal government study sections and committees evaluating research on the neurobiology of stress and memory and has more than 100 publications, reviews, and book chapters on the brain and memory. He is a fellow in the American Institute of Stress and in 2015 he received the award for Outstanding Contribution to Science from the Riga Diabetes and Obesity World Congress. In 2015, Diamond also received the University of South Florida International Travel Award.
Links:
USF lecture: “How Bad Science and Big Business Created the Obesity Epidemic” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vr-c8GeT34
IHMC lecture: “An Update on Demonization and Deception in Research of Saturday Fat, Cholesterol and Heart Disease —https://www.ihmc.us/lectures/20170531/
Show notes:
4:31: Ken and Dawn welcome David to the show.
4:42: Dawn comments on how David has always been interested in science and even wanted to be a physician as a child. She also asks him about majoring in biology and receiving his PhD from the University of California, Irvine.
5:41: Dawn asks David about his varied research topics at the University of South Florida, including cognitive and neurobiological perspectives on why parents lose awareness of children in cars.
7:00: Ken asks David what led him to research cardiovascular disease and statins, since he has such an extensive background in memory and PTSD research.
7:46: Dawn mentions David’s lecture he gave at the University South Florida entitled, “How Bad Science and Big Business Created the Obesity Epidemic”.
9:51: Dawn comments on how David and one of his colleagues recently published a review paper showing that statins have failed to substantially improve cardiovascular outcomes, yet so many doctors continue to prescribe this drug.
10:39: Dawn asks David what additional risks he sees with statins.
11:44: Ken asks David to discuss relative risk versus absolute risk calculations, as there is much confusion around that topic.
13:41: Dawn asks David if there are any ongoing trials looking at the degree of cholesterol lowering and clinical outcomes using absolute risk statistics.
14:39: Dawn discusses the two interwoven stories: one of possible statistical deception and describing the putative benefits of statins, and the other issue of whether there are instances where it makes sense for physicians to prescribe statins. Dawn asks David if there are any subsets of patients that he would recommend treating with statins, and asks about patients with hypercholesterolemia.
16:24: Dawn asks David if there are any other subgroups where the use of statins may be defensible.
17:39: Dawn notes that increased LDL is common in people who start a ketogenic diet while their other biomarkers tend to improve. She asks David to comment on this observation.
18:45: Ken comments on how cholesterol has been so demonized that a lot of people are not aware that our bodies need cholesterol to synthesize the naturally occurring steroids in our systems. Ken then asks David to give an overview of the role that cholesterol plays in our bodies.
19:42: Dawn asks David to talk about some of the dangers of low LDL.
20:54: Ken comments on how an often overlooked aspect of lipoproteins is their role in the innate immune system. Ken then asks David if the medical community should look at lipoproteins from a bit of a broader perspective than simply looking at them as lipid shuttles and a source of cardiovascular disease risk.
22:24: Dawn asks David what actually causes heart disease and what people can do to reduce the risk of having a heart attack.
24:44: Dawn asks David what types of diet or exercise approaches would be optimal for improving cardiovascular health.
29:34: Dawn asks David what an ideal ratio of Omega-6 to Omega-3 is in our diets, and whether or not David thinks this is important.
31:03: Dawn comments on how they have discussed David’s diet and personal routine and asks him what else he incorporates into his personal health regimen.
32:13: Ken asks David what kind of pushback he has received in response to his research findings and lectures.
33:37: STEMTALK BLURB
34:06: Dawn discusses the London Daily Telegram’s story about a group of international experts, including David, who claim that cholesterol does not cause heart disease in the elderly and how trying to reduce it with drugs like statins is a waste of time. The story also points out that these experts’ claims drew immediate skepticism from other academics. Dawn then asks David how he thinks the public deals with conflicting messages like this.
36:25: Ken asks David that assuming his analysis is correct, if he has any thoughts on why errors this large and pervasive continue to persist.
37:14: Ken comments on how we do not often see stories like this in other professions, such as engineering. Ken then asks David what it is about medical research that amends itself to this process.
40:16: Ken comments on how doctors have very prescribed standards of care that they are expected to follow.
41:06: Ken asks David if perhaps the modest benefits of statins could be associated with their recently touted anti-inflammatory properties, rather than primarily their cholesterol lowering effects.
43:07: Dawn comments on how people seem conditioned to think that they can find good health in a pill. She then asks David if this is his experience.
44:00: Dawn notes that in the past people did not place great trust in medicine, however this has certainly changed over time. Dawn then asks David to speculate on why he thinks this is.
45:17: Dawn asks David if it is the right approach when people have an illness or a biomarker that seems wrong and they immediately want to tackle that specific symptom instead of looking at what is causing it.
47:09: Ken asks David if there is any evidence that prescribing statins changes people’s perception of their risk of cardiovascular disease, and thereby changes their behavior in ways that might increase their risk.
48:43: Dawn asks David what he would recommend to patients when their physician says that he or she is going to prescribe statins.
50:10: Dawn asks David what his thoughts are on the effects of statins for exercise performance and muscle strength, in particular how it relates to the aging population.
51:24: Dawn discusses how there seems to be a recent trend to take low doses of a statin drug two to three times a week coupled with zetia. Dawn then asks David what his thoughts are on this, in particular regards to a recent study completed by Johns Hopkins.
53:50: Dawn comments on how there is a greater discussion around precision medicine. She then asks David if there are studies that integrate genetic testing prior to the administration of statins.
55:18: Dawn asks about the Ascot LLA study, the results of which have been promoted extensively through advertising. Dawn asks David to talk about what the results of this study demonstrate and why the study was terminated early.
56:58: Dawn asks David to expand on the Jupiter Study that he discusses in his publication.
57:59: Ken discusses a very new paper titled, Statins for Primary Prevention in Physically Active Individuals: Do the Risks Outweigh the Benefits? The paper examines the potential benefits and adverse events of statins among physically fit individuals, in particular the association of statin use with beneficial cardiovascular outcomes and adverse effects in active duty military personnel. Ken asks David if he has any comments on this paper and its findings.
1:00:51: Ken comments on the new category of drugs called PCSK9 inhibitors. He asks David to talk about this.
1:04:24: Ken asks David to explain how he has been very critical of drug companies in their promotion of statins, yet his neuroscience research has been funded by drug companies.
1:05:25: Dawn asks David what interests he peruses outside of science.
1:06:15: Ken and Dawn thank David for joining them.
Episode 40: Allan Savory talks about the global importance of restoring the earth’s grasslands
Joining us for this special edition of STEM-Talk is Robb Wolf, who will co-host today’s show with Ken Ford, STEM-Talk’s regular co-host and chairman of the Double-Secret Selection Committee which selects all the STEM-Talk guests.
Wolf is the New York Times best-selling author of “The Paleo Solution” and “Wired to Eat.” He’s also a friend of today’s guest, Allan Savory, a world-renowned ecologist who advocates for the restoration of the earth’s grasslands.
“I’ve known Allan for years as a passionate advocate for restoring the health of the earth, especially grasslands. So when Ken invited me to join him and co-host the podcast with Allan, I jumped at the chance,” said Wolf, who is filling in for regular STEM-Talk co-host Dawn Kernagis.
Grasslands take up a third of the earth’s land surface. And, as you will learn in today’s podcast, they are in serious trouble.
Seventy percent of grasslands have been degraded by global trends ranging from deforestation to droughts to agricultural and livestock practices. As more and more of earth’s fertile land rapidly turns into deserts, Savory travels the world promoting holistic management as a way to reverse thousands of years of human-caused desertification.
Savory is an ecologist, international consultant and the president of the Savory Institute, which promotes large-scale restoration of the world’s grasslands. Desertification, which Savory says is just a fancy word for land that’s turning to desert, directly affects more than 250 million people worldwide and has placed another billion people at risk, according to the United Nations.
Savory was born in Southern Rhodesia, which is now the nation of Zimbabwe, and went to college in South Africa where he majored in zoology and biology. He went to work as a research biologist and game ranger in what was then known as Northern Rhodesia, but is now the nation of Zambia. Later in his career, he became a farmer and game rancher in Zimbabwe.
As a game ranger in the 1960s, Allen made a significant breakthrough in understanding what was causing the degradation of the world’s grassland ecosystems and became a consultant who worked with groups on four continents to develop sustainable solutions.
Most of his time as a game ranger was spent in the country’s savannas and grasslands among antelopes, elephants and lions. It was then that Allan started to notice that the healthiest grasslands were those in which large herds of wild grazers stayed bunched together and were constantly on the move because of predators that hunted in packs.
It was this insight that led Savory to develop what he refers to as a “holistic management framework,” a planning process that mimics nature as a means to heal the environment. Once an opponent of livestock, he grew to believe that increasing the number of livestock on grasslands rather than fencing them off for conservation was the way to stop desertification.
But when civil war broke in Rhodesia in the ‘60s, Allan ended up leading an elite military squad to fight communist guerrillas. In the latter days of the civil war, Allan became a member of Parliament and the leader of the opposition to the ruling party.
He was exiled in 1979 as a result of his opposition to the ruling party and immigrated to the United States.
In 1992, Savory and his wife, Jody Butterfield, formed the non-profit Africa Centre for Holistic Management and donated a ranch that serves as learning site for people all over Africa. He and Butterfield then co-founded the Savory Institute in 2009, whose mission is to promote restoration of the world’s grasslands through holistic management.
The couple lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and have co-authored books together, including “Holistic Management: A Commonsense Revolution to Restore Our Environment,” which came out last year.
In 2003, Allen received Australia’s International Banksia Award for the person or organization doing the most for the environment on a global scale. In 2010, he received the Buckminister Fuller Institute’s Challenge award for work that has significant potential to solve humanity’s most pressing problems. The Savory Institute also is one of 11 finalists in the Virgin Earth Challenge, a $25 million initiative for the successful commercialization of ways to take greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere.
Links:
Savory Institute – http://www.savory.global
“Holistic Management: A Commonsense Revolution to Restore Our Environment” – http://amzn.to/2sHBkmm
“Holistic Management Handbook – http://amzn.to/2sI0Is7
Show notes:
4:51: Ken and Rob welcome Allan to the show.
5:01: Ken comments on how Allan has travelled an incredibly varied path through life and asks Allan to discuss his experiences as a biologist and park ranger in Africa.
8:23: Ken discusses the time Allan spent fighting communist guerrillas when civil war broke out in Zimbabwe in the 1960s and comments on the elite military group that Allan hand-picked and trained. Ken asks Allan to talk about how and why he was selected to lead this unit and about his methods of selection and training.
10:43: Rob asks Allan about the significance of the herds of wild grazing animals, that Allan observed when he spent time in the savannahs and grasslands as a game ranger and solider.
14:38: Rob discusses how in the later days of the civil war Allan served as a member of parliament, but in 1979 ended up being exiled and emigrated to the United States. Rob then asks Allan to talk about this part of his life.
17:50: Ken comments on how Allan has led an interesting life and taken on numerous difficult positions, never shunning a painful choice or controversy.
18:35: Rob discusses Allan’s frame of reference, now called holistic management, that he began developing. Holistic management mimics nature and also draws on organizational skills learned in the military and is considered by Allan as a legitimate option to heal the environment and reverse desertification. Rob asks Allan to clarify what holistic management is and when and how it developed.
22:09: Rob asks Allan to describe the desertification and the impact it’s having on the earth.
30:31: Ken asks Allan to discuss how he met his wife, Jodi Butterfield, and how the two of them created the Savory Institute, which works to promote preservation of the world’s grasslands through holistic management.
32:25: Ken asks Allan to share the activities and goals of the Savory Institute.
36:37: STEMTALK BLURB
37:04: Rob comments on how the world seems to always bifurcate into two ideological camps. On one hand there are malthusiasts, or folks who have predicted a number of collapse scenarios, resource depletion, mass starvation, etc., and although extremely convincing at times, their predictions are usually wrong. The other ideological group may be referred to as rational optimists, who make the case that markets and innovation will always save the day. Today, it is generally argued that rational optimists win the debate, but Rob has a gut sense that this may not go on indefinitely. Rob asks Allan what his views on this topic are, and whether he is a malthusiast or rational optimist.
44:06: Robb talks about advances in evolutionary medicine and how traditional medicine often chases symptoms in lieu of finding solutions. Robb asks Allan if he sees a parallel with sustainability in food production, and if this evolutionary framework could inform our approach to a sustainable future.
48:18: Ken comments on how many people are surprised to learn about the predator-prey interaction in the holistic management process and asks Allan to talk about this interaction.
51:41: Rob asks Allan to expand upon the constant battle of the topic of holistic management and properly managed grazing animals.
54:30: Ken remarks that many people have jumped on Allan’s claims regarding the potential of carbon sequestration, both supportive and critical. Ken then asks Allan to elaborate on his views of the efficacy of carbon sequestration in the framework of holistic management.
56:23: Rob asks Allan what the largest benefits are for the farmer adopting the practice of holistic management.
57:54: Ken comments how Joel Salatin of Polyface Farms is a large proponent of holistic management, and how he credits the approach as a key element in transforming Polyface Farms from an uneconomic farm into a prosperous operation, which serves as a model for many other diversified farm operations around the world. https://youtu.be/4dq8vsVvvOc
59:13: Rob asks Allan if there are any specific conditions that he could see the adoption of holistic management in agriculture proceeding either faster or slower around the world.
1:02:05: Ken asks Allan how new technology, such as robotics, may help holistic management practices.
1:04:41: Rob asks Allan to discuss his new book, Holistic Management: A Common Sense Revolution to Restore Our Environment, released in 2016 by Allan and his wife, Jodi. This book is a revised third edition of Allan’s book published in 1990: Holistic Management: A New Framework for Decision Making. Rob comments on how the new book’s subtitle has a more urgent message and asks Allan to talk about why he chose to revise the subtitle.
1:05:47: Rob asks Allan if down time exists for him and what he does for fun in this time.
1:07:03: Allan ends the interview by talking about how it’s important that people take a position and stop sitting on the fence.
Episode 39: Suzana Herculano provides a new understanding of how our brains became remarkable
Prior to Dr. Suzana Herculano-Houzel’s research, scientists assumed that the brains of all mammals were built in the same way and that the overall brain mass as compared to body mass was the critical determinant of cognitive ability.
It was to resolve these conundrums about brain mass, body mass, and intelligence that Herculano-Houzel turned to chainsaws, butchers’ knives, and kitchen blenders to concoct what she refers to as brain soup.
As STEM-Talk co-hosts Ken Ford and Dawn Kernagis point out during their interview with Herculano-Houzel, epsisode 39 of the podcast turned out to be not only an enlightening conversation, but also one of the most fun STEM-Talk interviews to date.
Herculano-Houzel is a Brazilian neuroscientist who devised a way to count the number of neurons in human and animal brains. She writes about this in her book, The Human Advantage: A New Understanding of How Our Brain Became Remarkable. Her method of counting the neurons of human and other animals’ brains allowed her to study the relation between the cerebral cortex and the thickness and number of cortical folds in the brain.
She is currently an associate professor of psychology and biological sciences in Vanderbilt University’s psychological sciences department and the Vanderbilt Brain Institute. She grew up in Brazil and received her undergraduate degree in biology at Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. She went to Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, to get her masters in neuroscience, and completed her Ph.D. in visual neurophysiology at the Max Planck Institute for Brain Research in Frankfurt, Germany.
After completing her doctorate, Herculano-Houzel returned to Rio and went to work for the Museum of Life where she designed children’s activities. In 2002 she returned to her alma mater and began researching how human brains compared to other animals.
In 2004, she devised a way of reducing brains to liquid as a means to count the number of neurons in them. It is technically known as the “isotropic fractionator.”
In 2004 she won the Jose Reis Prize of Science, and in 2010 she received the James S. McDonell Foundation’s Scholar Award in Understanding Human Cognition. She is also the author of a biweekly newspaper column on the neuroscience of everyday life for Folha de São Paulo, the major newspaper in Brazil. Going into its 11th year, the column has appeared more than 270 times since 2006. In addition to “The Human Advantage,” Herculano-Houzel is also the author of six books in Portuguese that focus on the neuroscience of everyday life. She also has a popular blog called “The Neuroscientist on Call,” which she describes as not-so-random thoughts about brains, the universe and everything. She lives in Nashville, TN, with her husband, son and two dogs.
Links you may be interested in:
“The Human Advantage”: http://amzn.to/2rtvNOY
The Neuroscientist on Call blog: http://www.suzanaherculanohouzel.com
Show notes:
5:32: Suzana talks about growing up in Rio and how she became interested in science.
7:07: Ken asks Suzana about her work at Rio’s Museum of Life.
12:55: Dawn asks Suzana when she firsts became interested in neuroscience.
16:00: Dawn follows up with a question about the composition of cells in the brain.
29:21: Suzana talks about how the brain represents just 2% of the average human mass, yet requires 25%of person’s energy.
33:14: Dawn tells Suzana she’s curious about Suzana’s method of counting neurons and asks her to talk about how she came up with the idea of brain soup.
38:58: Break
39:24: Dawn reads a portion of a book review that described how Suzana turned to chainsaws, butcher knifes and blenders to concoct brain soup and asks her to elaborate.
42:03: Suzana talks about some of the difficulty she had in locating brains for her research.
53:07: Suzana shares some of the lessons she’s learned from analyzing the brains of more than 100 species.
58:52: Ken asks if the cerebral cortex is the best overall predictor of cognitive ability across species.
59:50: Dawn wonders about whales and asks Suzana what we know about the intelligence of aquatic life.
1:05:41: Ken asks if there are neuronal differences in humans.
1:09:33: Suzana talks about how cooking helped homo erectus, the first modern human species, to double its brain size.
1:14:49: Ken reads an excerpt from an excellent review of “The Human Advantage” that ran in The New York Review of Books.
1:18:35: Ken and Dawn thank Suzana and sign off.
Episode 38: Dr. Mark Lupo discusses thyroid nodules and cancer
Thyroid cancer is one of the fastest growing cancers in the United States, especially among women. In Florida, thyroid cancer trails only melanoma skin cancer as the state’s fastest rising cancer.
Today’s guest on episode 38 of STEM-Talk has made it his mission to not only treat thyroid cancer, but also raise awareness about the disease.
Dr. Mark Lupo is founder and medical director of the Thyroid and Endocrine Center of Florida which is based in Sarasota. A graduate of Duke University, he went on to earn his medical degree at the University of Florida where he worked with the world-famous thyroid expert, Dr. Ernie Mazzaferri. Dr. Lupo also did his internship and residency in internal medicine at Florida and then won a fellowship in endocrinology, metabolism and nutrition at the University of California San Diego and the Scripps Clinic.
Dr. Lupo’s research and practice are particularly focused on thyroid nodules, which are abnormal growths of thyroid cells that form a lump within the thyroid gland. Although the vast majority of thyroid nodules are benign, a small proportion do contain thyroid cancer. His practice is centered on diagnosing and treating thyroid cancer at the earliest stage and helping people avoid unnecessary surgeries.
He also is very involved in teaching neck ultrasound, thyroid cancer and general thyroid disease to other physicians at the national level. He has published book chapters and several articles on thyroid disease and thyroid ultrasound. In addition to his work as the medical director of the Thyroid and Endocrine Center of Florida, he also is a clinical assistant professor on the faculty of the Florida State University College of Medicine.
Dr. Lupo also was named the 2017 recipient of the Jack Baskin Endocrine Teaching Award, which is annually presented by the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists.
You can learn more about the Thyroid and Endocrine Center of Florida by visiting http://www.thyroidflorida.com.
Show notes:
3:21: Ken and Dawn welcome Mark to the show and ask him what led him to study medicine at Duke.
4:52: Dawn asks Mark how he ended up choosing endocrinology with a particular interest in thyroid nodules and cancer as a specialty.
6:40: Dawn asks Mark how he found the time to go on incredible adventures, such as climbing Mount Kilimanjaro as he worked to establish a practice.
8:40: Mark provides an overview of the thyroid.
9:46: Dawn asks Mark to clarify about whether a thyroid nodule is the same thing as a goiter.
10:25: Ken comments on how thyroid nodules and cancer seem to be epidemic and how there has been an increase of instances in the United States. He asks Mark if there is a greater incidence of disease or if there is just better detection or a combination of both.
14:33: Dawn asks if we know why thyroid nodules and cancer seems more prevalent in women.
15:01: Dawn inquires about the survival rate for those diagnosed with thyroid cancer, and whether or not it has changed over the years.
17:45: Dawn comments on how she has been looking forward to this interview as a result of a thyroid scare she had in graduate school where there was an inconclusive biopsy. She asks Mark how common it is to have an inconclusive finding and unclear results about a sample.
20:52: Ken comments on his personal experience with thyroid nodules that led to surgery and a positive outcome, and how he met Mark early in this experience after hearing him on a podcast discussing fine needle aspiration. After hearing this podcast, Ken concluded that he most likely needed this procedure. Ken asks Mark to talk about this.
23:37: Dawn asks Mark how often the thyroid nodules are discovered incidentally.
27:34: Dawn asks if there are certain characteristics you can see by ultrasound that give you an idea as to whether you are looking at a benign or malignant nodule.
29:53: Dawn asks what the histological differences are between a benign adenoma and a malignant nodule.
31:16: Ken brings the discussion back to the topic of indeterminate diagnosis, and comments that more of the biopsies are being read as being indeterminate, which leads to more surgeries. Ken asks Mark to discuss this phenomenon.
39:28: Dawn asks which institutions are doing specialized tests.
41:11: Break
41:38: Dawn asks Mark to go into further detail about what we are looking at when we do testing for molecular subtypes.
44:48: Dawn asks Mark if there is a genetic predisposition to any types of thyroid cancer.
48:13: Since positron emission tomography has been helpful in diagnosing metastatic disease in hurthle cell carcinoma, Ken asks if it makes sense to use a ketogenic diet as a supplemental approach to managing the cancer.
52:26: Dawn asks Mark what his thoughts are on the current interest and understanding that cancer is at least partially a metabolic disorder.
53:21: Dawn asks Mark to discuss the different treatment options for thyroid cancer.
1:04:20: Dawn asks Mark to describe the treatment of immunotherapy and how it relates to thyroid cancer.
1:05:56: Dawn asks Mark if thyroid cancer metastasizing varies by subtype.
1:06:58: Mark talks about how lifestyle and environmental exposures might impact the prevalence of thyroid nodules and cancer.
1:09:48: Dawn comments again about her thyroid scare, and the doctors believing that it may connect to her soy intake as a result of her being a vegetarian.
1:10:43: Ken asks Mark about the impacts of dental x-rays.
1:12:20: Ken comments on how thyroid shields should be used in dental x-rays.
1:12:39: Dawn asks Mark what, if any, prophylactic measures we can take to minimize our risk of thyroid nodules or cancer.
1:13:41: Ken asks Mark to talk about the correlation, and possible causation, between insulin resistance and the development of nodules.
1:15:27: Dawn asks Mark about his thoughts on screening individuals for thyroid cancer, since roughly 50 percent of the population has thyroid nodules.
1:18:21: Ken asks Mark if observation should be the standard care for non-palpable thyroid nodules under ten millimeters.
1:20:07: Dawn asks Mark what the quality of life consequences are for patients who are unnecessarily treated for thyroid cancer.
1:21:38: Dawn asks Mark to talk about the options for people who end up with benign nodules.
1:23:52: Dawn asks Mark if the ionization of salt backfired and contributed to the increase in thyroid nodules, cancer, and autoimmunity.
1:27:20: Ken discusses a New York Times article about doctors reclassifying a thyroid tumor, where they reported that noninvasive follicular thyroid neoplasms with papillary-like nuclear features are no longer considered a type of cancer. Ken asks Mark to discuss this shift in categorization and its consequences.
1:31:46: Dawn asks Mark about his work travelling around the country teaching surgeons and endocrinologists how to use clinical features to minimize unnecessary surgeries and about using ultrasound to risk stratify the nodules.
1:33:15: Ken asks Mark about receiving the 2017 Jack Baskin Endocrine Teaching Award from the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists.
1:34:20: Dawn asks Mark what else he likes to do in his spare time other than his mountain adventures.
1:35:09: Dawn and Ken thank Mark and sign off.
Episode 37: Gary Taubes discusses low-carb diets and sheds light on the hazards of sugar
The front pages of Gary Taubes’ new book on sugar feature a blurb excerpted from the magazine Scientific American:
“Taubes is a science journalist’s science journalist who researches topics to the point of obsession – actually, well beyond that point – and never dumbs things down for readers.”
Gary’s most recent obsession is documented in “The Case Against Sugar,” a book that argues that increased consumption of sugar over the past 30 to 40 years has led to a diabetes epidemic not only in the United States, but an epidemic that’s now spreading around the world.
Episode 37 of STEM-Talk features a more than two-hour conversation with Gary about his latest research as well as a look back at other nutrition and science topics that have dominated Gary’s journalistic investigations since the 1980s.
Gary first burst onto the national scene in 2002 with an article in the New York Times Magazine titled, “What If’s It’s All Been a Big Fat Lie?” Gary made the point that Robert Atkins and his high-fat, low-carb diet had a better history and scientific record of helping people lose weight than the low-fat diet that was and remains the centerpiece of the nation’s health policy and food pyramid.
The article had an immediate impact. As Michael Pollan pointed out in the introduction of “The Omnivore’s Dilemma,” in the fall of 2002 bread “abruptly disappeared overnight from the American dinner table.” Virtually overnight, wrote Pollan, Americans changed the way they eat.
Gary did not set out to become a science journalist. He graduated from Harvard College in 1977 with an S.B. degree in applied physics and went on to earn an M.S. degree in aeronautical engineering from Stanford University. But while at Stanford, he realized he wasn’t that passionate about becoming an aeronautical engineer and decided to enroll in the Columbia School of Journalism to become an investigative reporter.
In the ‘80s, Gary became fascinated with flawed science and started writing a series of magazine articles about bad science. That eventually led to a pair of books: “Nobel Dreams” in 1987 and “Bad Science: The Short Life and Weird Times of Cold Fusion” in 1993. After “Bad Science,” Gary turned to nutrition reporting and that resulted in the 2002 article in the New York Times Magazine.
He followed up on his research for the article with two books: “Good Calories, Bad Calories” in 2007; and “Why We Get Fat” in 2010. Both books detailed how refined carbohydrates are largely responsible for America’s rising obesity rate and a primary cause of heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and other chronic diseases of the Western diet. His new book, “The Case Against Sugar,” takes this argument a step further and shows how the explosion of sugar consumption and sugar-rich products in the United States has led to a global diabetes epidemic.
Dan Barber, author of “The Third Plate,” wrote in a New York Times review of Gary’s book, “Comparing the dangers of inhaling cigarettes with chowing down on candy bars may sound like a false equivalence, but Gary Taubes’s “The Case Against Sugar” will persuade you otherwise. Here is a book on sugar that sugarcoats nothing. The stuff kills.”
Below are links to Gary’s books:
“The Case Against Sugar” http://amzn.to/2ps8Qbl
“Good Calories, Bad Calories” http://amzn.to/2qTwJJ6
“Why We Get Fat” http://amzn.to/2qKuv2u
“Bad Science” http://amzn.to/2qTjyrI
“Nobel Dreams” http://amzn.to/2pXpRgK
Show notes:
4:41: Ken and Dawn welcome Gary to the show and ask him to talk about how a Harvard physics major ended up going to journalism school to become an investigative reporter.
12:53: Dawn asks Gary to tell the story behind his 2002 article in The New York Times Magazine, “What If It’s All Been a Big Fat Lie?”
21:13: Gary shares how his work for “What If It’s All Been a Big Fat Lie?” led to additional research and the book, “Good Calories, Bad Calories.”
31:00: Gary explains how his study of physics gave him a passion for understanding the history of theories, and how that passion has helped him over the years as an investigative reporter.
43:44: Dawn asks Gary to share lessons he learned from the Nutrition Science Initiative (NUSI).
50:06: Ken refers to reports about Kevin Hall, a researcher at NIH, who essentially claims he’s disproven the carbohydrate-insulin hypotheses of obesity, and asks Gary for his thoughts.
1:02:40: Dawn asks Gary if he thinks there are specific populations where it would seem less appropriate to be on a low-carb diet?
1:06:44: Ken asks if elevated LDL-P should be a concern for people on low-carb diets since it’s a concern for people on normal diets.
1:13:17: Gary talks about the history of sugar in America.
1:18:08: Ken asks Gary to provide the background on how diabetes is now becoming a worldwide pandemic.
1:31:31: Gary elaborates on the sugars found in cane sugar and high fructose corn syrup.
1:34:43: Dawn asks Gary, “If you could remove sugar from the modern environment, but keep everything else the same, do you think we would have an obesity epidemic?”
1:37:21: Gary talks about what brain scans reveal about the addictive effects of sugar.
1:41:53: Dawn asks Gary to share the background on a 2015 report in The New York Times that Coca-Cola initially subsidized the Global Energy Balance Network.
1:46:55: Gary talks about the role of the microbiome.
1:51:31: Ken asks Gary to share his thoughts about the possible effects of artificial sweetners.
1:54:33: Dawn asks Gary how his personal dietary approach has changed over the years.
1:59:01: Dawn and Ken thank Gary and sign off.
Episode 36: Jeff “Skunk” Baxter Discusses His Life in Rock ‘n’ Roll and the U.S. Intelligence Community
In a rare departure from interviews with scientists and engineers, STEM-Talk Host Dawn Kernagis and IHMC Director Ken Ford interview Jeffrey “Skunk” Baxter about his life as a musician and founding member of Steely Dan, and how he went on to become a defense consultant on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
The two fields seem completely different, but Baxter explains the similarities between them and talks about how improvising in jazz is a skill that can carry over into defense analytics and tactics.
Baxter’s bio includes playing with a number of well-known bands, such as Steely Dan and The Doobie Brothers. As a studio musician for 35 years, Baxter recorded with Donna Summer, Dolly Parton, Ringo Starr and Rod Stewart. He was a record producer for Carl Wilson, the Beach Boys and Stray Cats. He also composed music for movies and television.
He has achieved a certain renown in Washington as an advisor and consultant for multiple agencies and defense technology companies. He chaired a Congressional Advisory Board on missile defense and was a senior fellow at the Potomac Institute.
Baxter also holds a unique affiliation with IHMC as “senior thinker and raconteur.” He and Ken go way back—to Ken’s own days in the rock ‘n’ roll business, which the two discuss in the interview.
Baxter’s IHMC bio is available at https://www.ihmc.us/groups/jbaxter/. More information on him is at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Baxter or https://www.facebook.com/skunkbaxter/.
In 2009, Baxter gave an IHMC lecture entitled “The Revolution in Intelligence.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GRkCyvIz70
2:12: Dawn reads a five-star iTunes review.
3:04: Dawn reads Baxter’s bio and introduces Jeff and Ken.
4:38: Baxter talks about musicians who influenced him growing up, from Beethoven and Chopin to Thelonious Monk and Ella Fitzgerald.
5:05: Baxter was five years old when his mother gave him a great gift: “She taught me to read.”
6:04: Baxter read a lot of military history because of his father, who spent five years in active duty and 20 years in the reserves.
7:00: Baxter describes his beginnings as a musician.
8:00: His love of the complexity and improvisational nature of jazz helped prepare him for work in the intelligence community.
10:25: Ken asks Baxter to talk about his days in the ‘70s as a founding member of Steely Dan.
11:15: Baxter shares his insights about studio recordings.
12:27: Baxter notes that a long time ago Ken was very involved in rock ‘n’ roll as an agent who booked and managed bands.
15:30: Baxter talks about Steely Dan and the unsung hero of the band, Roger Nichols, who was the engineer.
17:30: Baxter describes his transition from Steely Dan to The Doobie Brothers.
21:11: Ken comments that the evolution of The Doobie Brothers was remarkable. He asks Baxter about bringing Mike McDonald to the band.
23:20: Dawn asks about Baxter’s transition from full-time rock musician to advisor on missile defense.
23:30: Baxter quips: “A radar is just an electric guitar on steroids.”
25:35: Writing a paper on converting the Aegis system to do theater missile defense on a mobile platform led Baxter to a position as a missile defense consultant on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
26:28: Baxter describes D.C. as “a whole new world to me” filled with “unbelievably talented, smart patriotic men and women.”
27:25: How Baxter used Beethoven, Bach, Jimmy Hendrix and Pink Floyd to teach radar at the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency.
28:50: Edward Teller, the Hungarian-American theoretical physicist, was also a concert pianist. Baxter talks about how he began to realize that more and more physicists he met were also musicians.
29:48: Dawn asks how Baxter was received by the defense community in D.C., given his rock band background.
31:33: Baxter talks about his first ‘brutal” press conference on missile defense (not considered back then by the press as a worthy endeavor).
32:48: Ken adds, “It’s important to be disliked by the right people.”
33:00: Baxter describes how the people in Washington that he worked with in government, industry, military and intelligence communities were talented and patriotic people and, for the most part, unsung.
33:43: Baxter sees a connection between creativity in music, which involves problem solving in a non-linear approach, and the way talented people in government work.
34:05: Commercial break.
34:47: Baxter describes how the organizational chart of a symphony orchestra looks frighteningly like the government’s organizational chart.
37:00: The organization of a jazz quintet, however, is the opposite of an orchestra.
38:30: Baxter recalls a magazine article by William Nolte, who teaches intelligence at the University of Maryland, that made a case for teaching analysts to improvise the same way musicians do.
40:15: Baxter talks about how Pachelbel’s Canon has the same chord pattern as “Let It Be Me” by the Everly Brothers, or “When a Man Loves a Woman” by Percy Sledge.
43:25: Dawn asks about war games and the role of improvisation in what might happen next.
43:45: Baxter says war games are table-top exercises where there is a blue team (good guys) and red team (bad guys), a white team (overseers of the game) and various other teams.
45:48: In terrorism, Baxter says, “the improvisational part is important because terrorists don’t have the weapons, capabilities or resources, so they have to improvise.”
47:00: Dawn asks about the transition from analog to digital recording in the music industry back in the 1980s, and how it parallels with the evolution of defense technology.
49:28: Dawn reminds Baxter about his 2009 IHMC lecture that addressed ways to improve the U.S. intelligence gathering.
51:43: Baxter says it’s amazing how quickly the intelligence community has caught on to new technologies and leveraged them.
52:10: Ken notes this is in contrast to a time when Baxter once compared the name of the Steely Dan album “Pretzel Logic” to some aspects of the intelligence community.
52:30: Baxter describes how the electron is now the horse of the 21st century.
52:54: Dawn reminds Baxter that he once said the U.S. beat the Soviet Union because of our soft power (culture). Dawn asks if the U.S. can still play that card in places that are trained to reject U.S. culture.
53:11: Baxter recalls playing concerts in the Soviet Union where every song was illegal, yet thousands of people in the audience knew the lyrics, which is why he believes music is a way to bring people and entities together.
54:55: Baxter describes how missile defense as well as blue jeans, French fries and Elvis Presley helped bring down the Soviet Union.
55:42: Baxter explains how the British saved rock ‘n’ roll.
56:26: Baxter stresses the cultural influence of the U.S. and raves about Japanese rock bands. He also notes that Tito Puente won the Latin salsa competition several years in a row with an all-Japanese band.
58:22: Baxter has been working on a solo recording project for more than 15 years, which he says has been on his bucket list.
58:58: Baxter talks about doing jingles for Lays potato chips, Budweiser and Ford.
1:01:21: Ken mentions that Baxter scored the music for the popular animated TV show “King of the Hill.”
1:002:06: Ken asks Baxter about a 1968 meeting with Richard “Paco” Zimmer, a legendary concert promoter and road manager.
1:05:32: Dawn thanks Jeff for being a guest on STEM-Talk.
1:06:31: Ken says “this interview was especially fun for me; and it stimulated a lot of great memories.”
1:06:55: Dawn and Ken sign off.
Episode 35: Stuart McGill explains the mechanics of back pain and the secrets to a healthy spine
Back pain has become the world’s leading cause of disability.
Stuart McGill has been at the forefront of non-surgical approaches to addressing back pain for many years. His 2015 book “Back Mechanic: The Secrets to a Healthy Spine Your Doctor Isn’t Telling You” is a wonderfully accessible account of his methods and perspectives.
McGill spent 30 years as a professor of spine biomechanics at the University of Waterloo in Canada. His laboratory has become a renowned destination for everyday people as well as Olympic and professional athletes from around the world who are struggling with back pain.
He is the author of more than 300 scientific publications and 3 textbooks that address issues such as lumbar spine function and injury mechanisms, patient assessment, corrective exercise prescription, and performance training. McGill also consults for many medical management groups, governments, corporations, legal firms, and elite sports teams.
He has won numerous awards, including the prestigious Volvo Bioengineering Award for Low Back Pain Research.
He released his landmark text, “Low Back Disorders: Evidence-Based Prevention and Rehabilitation,” in 2002. It changed the way coaches, bodybuilders, athletes and non-athletes approached core training. His new book, “Back Mechanic,” is written for a lay audience and addresses common misperceptions about back pain. It also provides a step-by-step guide of the McGill Method to fix back pain.
Backfitpro.com is a web site also geared for a lay audience and is dedicated to providing access to evidence-based information and products that assist in preventing and rehabilitating back pain. Products featured on the website have been tested in McGill’s lab at the University of Waterloo.
McGill and his staff have also produced a video, “The Ultimate Back: Enhancing Performance,” that synthesizes McGill’s approaches for avoiding back injury and enhancing athletic and physical performance. It is available for purchase on Vimeo.
4:23: Stuart talks about how he was more interested in becoming a plumber than a scientist until his high school football coach asked him to return to school and earn his high school degree. That led him to college where he met professors who got him excited about mathematics and physics, and eventually the study of spine biomechanics.
7:00: Ken asks Stuart to describe the remarkable research atmosphere Stuart was able to create at the University of Waterloo.
8:08: Stuart explains that he did not go to medical school, but that he learned he had a unique talent of assessing and relating to people with back pain.
11:00: Ken shares his experience of back pain and traveling to Canada to visit Stuart as a patient, which prompts Stuart to describe his process of assessing people.
14:53: Dawn asks Stuart to talk about his motivation for writing “The Back Mechanic.”
19:53: Although back pain is the world’s leading cause of disability, Dawn asks Stuart why back pain is underappreciated by so many people in the medical community.
22:04: Stuart explains some of the most mechanisms for back injury and ways to prevent them.
26:22: Ken asks Stuart to talk about a study he did several years ago on firefighters with the Pensacola Fire Department.
30:36: Stuart talks about how heavy weightlifting will probably shorten the careers of modern golfers like Rory Mcllroy, and how the great golfers of old who had wonderful long careers – Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player – weren’t weightlifters.
33:53: Stuart talks about the great strikers in mixed martial arts and the UFC are the leaner ones who can unleash muscle. The same is true of the great sprinters, the great golfers, and the great home run hitters, who are the ones who can create a very brief muscle power pulse, and let it go.
34:33: Dawn asks Stuart about reports that the rate of back surgery in the U.S. is five times higher than in other developed countries.
39:31: Stuart provides an overview of the how to about a self-assessment of pain triggers.
46:29: Dawn asks Stuart to explain the McGill method to fixing back pain.
55:03: Ken asks about the technique of power breathing and the implications for spinal disability.
57:15: Ken mentions that he and Stuart are fans of kettlebells, and that power breathing is what a a person does when swinging a kettlebell. Ken asks Stuart to talk about the exercises that he sees as most beneficial with kettlebells. Ken and Stuart discuss the relative benefits of kettlebell swings, farmer’s walks, and bottoms-up carries.
1:06:49: Stuart talks about measuring competitors in the World’s Strongest Man competition, the NFL, heavyweight UFC fighters, and then asks Ken to guess who had the strongest core Stuart had ever measured. Ken says it was probably a kettlebell dude like Pavel. Stuart confirms that yes it was Pavel Tsatsouline.
1:10:29: Dawn asks if it is true the spine is weaker and more vulnerable to injuries in the morning.
1:14:30: Stuart talks about sciatica, which is usually caused by narrowing of the discs and a little bit of arthritic activity in the vertebra.
1:18:35: Stuart talks about what he describes as silly stretches and exercises, which includes sit-ups and crunches.
1:21:19: Ken asks Stuart to run through the McGill Big Three exercises for spinal stability.
1:30:41: In American training culture, Stuart says there’s too much emphasis on time under the bar, and not enough emphasis on pushing heavy stuff around. He goes on to explain how pulling a slid is a tremendously strengthening and athletically enhancing activity.
1:37:35: Ken talks about friends who’ve sustained back injuries, and points out that was often after they had joined certain training programs focused on Olympic style lifts with high reps. She asks Stuart if he is seeing increased number of spinal injuries with the increased popularity of those type of training programs?
1:43:38: Dawns asks if there’s a direct correlation between back pain or injury and a person’s ability to brace.
1:45:29: Ken asks Stuart to comment on a 2016 study showing that taken as a whole young men today have much less grip strength than their fathers.
1:50:39: Stuart talks about the kinds of back injuries that are associated with sex and ways to mitigate spinal pain associated with sex.
1:52:02: Stuart talks about how his lab was the first to measure orgasm.
1:55:16: Ken and Dawn thank Stuart and sign off.
Visit backfitpro.com to learn more about the approaches and back pain exercises that can rehabilitate and prevent spine injury.
Episode 34: Jim Stray-Gundersen explains how blood flow restriction training builds muscle and improves performance
Blood-flow-restriction training is a topic of growing interest. But as IHMC director and STEM-Talk co-host Dr. Ken Ford points out, there’s also a great deal of misinformation about the training.
Episode 34 of STEM-Talk addresses some of that misinformation with our interview of Dr. Jim Stray-Gundersen, who helped pioneer blood flow restriction training and leads the Live Hi/Train Low program for the US Athletic Trust.
Since receiving his board certification in general surgery in 1985, Jim has focused his work and research on maximizing human performance, health and resilience. He pioneered the Hi-Low training protocol and played a key role in the development of the anti-doping test, SAFE, which stands for Safe And Fair Events. It is considered the most aggressive blood-profiling test in the fight against doping.
He has worked with numerous Olympians in various sports and has an ongoing relationship with world renowned long-distance runner Alberto Salazar, who also is a coach and director of the NIKE Oregon Project. Jeff has been an official physician and consultant of the United States, Norwegian and Canadian Olympic teams. He is an official member of 15 world championships.
Jim completed post-doctoral fellowships in cardiovascular physiology and human nutrition at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School. He received appointments as an associate professor of orthopedic surgery and physiology. He spent 20 years on the faculty of UTSW and helped build and direct two human-performance centers at St. Paul and Baylor University hospitals.
He has served on international medical committees that include the International Olympic Committee, FIFA, International Biathlon Committee, International Ski Federation and the International Skating Union.
Jim also is the sports science advisor for the US Ski and Snowboard Association (USSA), and continues to lead human performance and altitude camps for Olympic athletes, masters athletes, as well as Navy SEALs. He runs The SG Performance Medicine Center and Sport Technologies for Maximal Athletic Performance, overall fitness, weight loss, and recovery in Frisco, Texas, and now the new center in Park City, Utah, located inside The Center of Excellence USSA Building.
As if that isn’t enough, he also is the chief medical officer of B STRONG (www.goBstrong.com)., a Utah -based company he co-founded in an effort to make blood flow restriction safe, effective, and affordable for the general public. B STRONG is a patent-pending exercise method based on blood-flow restriction exercise.
During the interview, Jim refers to several studies and articles. Below is a link to those studies and papers, and two suppliers of blood flow restriction gear. Be sure to also check out the US Athletic Trust, an organization that supports American Olympic hopefuls, that Jim talks about toward the end of the podcast.
Studies:
— Repetitive restriction of muscle blood flow enhances mTOR signaling pathways in a rat model
— Use and safety of KAATSU training: Results of a national survey
— Blood flow-restricted exercise in space
— Applications of vascular occlusion diminish disuse atrophy of knee extensor muscles
Gear:
Kaatsu Global, to get 15% discount use discount code: IHMC
Go B Strong, to get 15% discount use discount code: IHMC
Show notes:
:30: Dawn welcomes Ken, who talks about how he has been using blood flow restriction training for the past several years and what a fascinating fellow Jim is.
2:00: Ken reads the winning five-star iTunes review, titled, “I feel my brain making more connections while I listen.”
3:00: Dawn and Ken review Jim’s background and career.
5:00: Dawn welcomes Jim to the podcast.
5:30: When Dawn asks Jim how he first became interested in science, Jim talks about being a hellion in elementary school and how his mother and teacher worked together to find out what interested Jim. Turns out, it was bugs, and Jim started collecting insects.
8:00: As a child, Jim also was interested in sports and talks about how his father came to the United States from Norway on a track scholarship.
10:50: Dawn points out that Jim studied ethology and animal behavior as an undergrad, and asks him why he decided to jump from that to medicine.
16:11: Dawn follows up by asking Jim how he transitioned into sports medicine.
19:21: Jim gives a general definition of blood flow restriction exercise, followed by a more technical description.
23:51: Ken points out that it’s called blood flow restriction training, and not blood flow occlusion training. Ken then asks Jim for his thoughts on the degree of restriction stimulus necessary to safely achieve very strong or close to optimal results.
27:51: Break. STEM-Talk is an educational service of the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition, a not-for-profit research lab pioneering groundbreaking technologies aimed at leveraging and extending human cognition, perception, locomotion and resilience.
28:11: After Dawn asks Jim if he has different protocols for different applications, Jim explains that he uses the protocols established by Dr. Yoshiaki Sato, a Japanese sports scientist who developed the technique.
30:21 Jim gives an overview of how 50 years ago Dr. Sato came up with blood flow restriction training, which is referred to as Kaatsu.
32:20: Jim explains the origins of the word Kaatsu, which in Japanese is two words: “Ka,” meaning additional, and “atsu,” meaning pressure.
36:51: Jim talks about a study in Japan involving more than 12,000 people that looked at the incidence of deep vein thrombosis in individuals doing Kaatsu.
40:21: Jim points out that through trial and error, Dr. Sato and his colleagues found safe ways of doing blood flow restriction training.
44:36: Ken asks Jim to comment on blood flow restriction and the use of light weights in tandem.
48:51: Jim talks about how most of us were taught that if you wanted to get a muscle stronger, you had to exercise that muscle. The big secret of blood flow restriction is that using some muscles that are distal to the band can stimulate growth in all muscles used during the exercise.
52:45: With respect to the efficacy of blood flow restriction training, Ken asks Jeff to identify three of the most important positive effects people see in blood flow restriction training.
57:51: Ken points out that as baby boomers continue to mature, there is a growing interest in fending off sarcopenia, the age-related loss of lean muscle mass, strength and functionality.
59:11: Jim goes into detail about how blood restriction training for seniors and baby boomers is a God-send as a way to address sarcopenia.
1:00:57: Jim talks about exciting work being done by his colleagues in Scandinavia where they have shown that they are getting stem cell activation as well as conversion of IIx fibers into IIa fibers.
1:01:27: Dawns asks Jim to address speculation that blood flow restriction training might also have an effect on ligament bone strength.
1:03:17: Jim talks about how blood flow restriction is being used to avert the atrophy normally associated with ACL tears.
1:05:02: Jim talks about his experience working with Todd Lodwick, a Nordic skier who tore his rotator cuff and broke a couple of ribs just before the Sochi Olympics. Todd started doing blood flow restriction twice a day and was able to compete in his sixth Olympic games 40 days after his injury.
1:06:57: Ken and Jim talk about how blood flow restriction training is especially useful when traveling and how to turn your hotel room into a workout room.
1:10:17: Jim explains how exercise and nutrition are critical for specific outcomes for all kinds of exercise, but especially blood flow restriction training.
1:11:23: As NASA contemplates long-duration space flights, Ken asks Jim for his thoughts on the potential of blood flow restriction in the context of human space flight.
1:13:09: When Dawn asks if there’s a particular sport or type of athlete who seems best adapted to blood flow restriction training, Jim says that pretty much everybody can benefit from correct instruction in blood flow restriction.
1:14:30: Jim says that blood flow restriction training particularly has a place in middle schools and high schools in terms of introducing young athletes to strength training.
1:15:35: Jim talks about working with the Olympic skier Bode Miller, who had chronic back problems, and how he used blood flow restriction training to bounce back and compete in the Vail World Championships in 2015.
1:19:29: Dawn asks Jim to explain his role in the US Athletic Trust.
1:22:10: Dawn and Ken thank Jim for appearing on STEM-Talk.
1:22:23: Dawn and Ken say that they enjoyed the interview with Jim so much, that they will appeal to the Double Secret Selection Committee to have Jim back on the podcast.
1:22:45: Dawn and Ken encourage people to take a minute to go to iTunes to rate the podcast, and then sign off.