Earth's 1-ms Day, Baby Solar Systems, Record Black Hole, CRISPR Hack & AI Indiana Jones

0:00So, we're going to do the rundown. Uh, first story of the day, Earth just had one of its shortest days ever. So, the summary on this headline is yesterday, July 22nd, 2025, Earth completed a rotation in less than 24 hours. >> Yeah. Uh, it was shorter by like >> a millisecond. A >> a millisecond. But, you know, the new news people need some something to write about in science. So, >> So, is this the end of the world or what? No, no, it's it's really not. Um, even if you believe in auras and chakras, right? It's a millisecond out of a 24-hour day. That's 86400 seconds in a day. So, 86 million milliseconds in

0:44a day. So, it's one part in 86 million. So, your chakra has changed by one part in 86 million. So, it's really it's really not that bad. So what's interesting about this is there's actually some interesting fundamental science going on here. >> Yes. Like like why is that happening? >> Yeah. So that is actually a really cool fundamental physics question >> cuz I thought it was just 24 hours and that's it. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you know if the earth was in a void all on its own and there's nothing around it then if it spins for 24 hours it'll spin at exactly that speed because of the conservation of angular momentum and the conservation of energy. Basically, it's got some rotational energy. It's got some angular

1:26momentum. >> It's not going to go anywhere, right? But we live in the real world where we've got the moon going around the Earth. We've got the sun tugging on the planet. We've got Jupiter tugging on the planet. So, we have all of these like little forces that are tugging on it, right? >> Yep. >> And so, what's going to end up happening is you have something called tidal friction, right? The moon creates tides. >> What are those tides? Those tides are basically like friction from the ocean as the ocean moves around the earth as it's pulled by the moon. >> Oh, >> does that make sense? Okay. >> And so you're losing energy to that friction, >> right? >> Because the moon is pulling you. >> Yeah. The moon is pulling the earth while we're trying to go this way. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> And so you have this like this like kind

2:07of this this tidal friction happening. And that friction means you're losing energy to heat. >> Ah. And if you're losing energy to heat, you're the energy has to come from somewhere. And so that slows the the rotation of the Earth a little bit, right? Like way before Earth used to have a day of about 19 hours. >> Now it's 24. Yeah. Way way way way back. Like millions of years ago. Okay. >> But now it's like now it's like 24 hours and it's going to keep growing. Now this particular one, >> it's a little like unclear what it is. Okay. This one it could be the title friction. >> What do you mean unclear? Well, it's it's a millisecond, >> right? And um >> which is which is really small.

2:48>> Okay. >> It's not just the moon that's doing that. For example, like a lot of things on Earth can change its rotational capability. Like dude, like like China, >> okay, China on its own changed the rotation of the Earth. >> Okay. >> Back when it made Yeah. Back when it Okay, I I guess that's not a single entity. It's like a billion people. But like when they made the three gorgeous dam on the Yang River, >> that was a massive massive dam. >> It creates a reservoir. Yep. Right. It creates this massive water >> lake. Yep. >> And what does that do? Just like um just like when you have a figure skater that's like >> like twirling and then when they like

3:29put their arms out, they slow down. When they when they put their arms in, they speed up, right? That's because of um again conservation of angular momentum. you're doing is you're you're decreasing what's called a moment of inertia >> or increasing it. And when you do that, it's kind of like an inertia of rotation. So the bigger you make yourself in terms of the radius, >> the slower you'll go. >> Mhm. >> Right. >> And so when when when China damned up this river, >> the earth made itself a little bigger >> because there's like all this water now at this high elevation. Right. >> Right. >> Right. And so all of this water that used to just keep flowing now becomes a lake. That it's kind of like the earth as a figure skater went like this

4:10>> and then it it slowed down the rotation of the earth but that was only by like a microcond. That's >> so this is a millisecond which is like a thousand times bigger >> which so the idea >> but the thing is like things happen the Sumatra earthquake in 2004 also a microcond because the earth's plates shifted just enough that it changed the moment of inertia of the earth and then and then you know the day changed. >> This is this is so crazy because >> I I never in a million years thought about like the 24-hour day being a dynamic variable. >> Yeah. Yeah. And it's, dude, I was actually doing I went on a deep dive on this and it was actually like kind of crazy because now you start asking

4:50yourself, you know, on first principles. Yes. You start asking yourself, well, how do we measure a day, >> right? >> Okay. How do you measure a day? It used to be that you could just like measure, okay, the sun is going to be here and then like 24 hours later it's going to be back at the same spot >> in the sky, right? Like if there's like imagine there's a mountain in the distance and you're at exactly the spot and then like the sun like grazes the mountain and then the next day it's going to graze the mountain 24 hours later. But that's not quite right because in those 24 hours if the sun is here the earth has moved a tiny bit. >> Right. >> Right. So it's a little bit shorter because the earth has moved and so you're looking at the sun from a different angle. So it's actually like a little bit less than 24 hours by almost

5:306 minutes. So then you're like okay so how do you make >> Wait a minute. First it was a millisecond. Yeah. Yeah. Now it's six minutes. >> Yeah. Because the Earth to to to point at the sun, the Earth doesn't have to do a whole rotation if it's going along >> if it's moving. Yeah. Because it's rotating around the sun at the same time that it itself is rotating. Your angle like your like your line of sight >> like like in terms of being directly in line with the sun is constantly shifting. >> Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. >> As you rotate. >> Yeah. Isn't that crazy? >> It is. So like so like you can't actually reliably say so there's a difference between the solar day right and the real day. Okay. >> Okay. So now okay what's the real day?

6:12All right. >> Or or is the solar day the real day and we're living in fake news day? >> Yes. Where the earth is flat and the sun is revolving around us. That's certainly um not what is happening. >> But it's it's certainly uh cool to think about. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I could like in terms of you know >> this is just shooting this is actually kind of mind-blowing because >> I just it's so there's so much detail about >> because I remember seeing this this like little animation >> because when we were growing up as kids they showed the solar system >> as a flat plane. >> Yeah. >> Sun in the middle and everything just

6:54doing >> Yeah. >> Is this an orbital? >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You can call it Yeah. It's an orbit. an orbit around on a flat plane. >> Yeah. But no, really, we're doing this >> as if it was also static in space. But we're like flying. Yeah. >> And we're actually like going around it all like this while we're going that way. >> Yeah. And it's And that actually causes the next problem, right? Because you could be like, okay, so before we were like, okay, the sun goes to the same spot in the sky. Yes. >> But now we we've just figured out that the Earth is moving. But now the sun is moving. >> Yeah. So like if we were to say okay what if like we pick a star that's far away and then we ask okay when is the star going to come back to the same spot. Well that's better than the sun

7:35cuz the star is like many light years away the sun is only like 8 minutes 8 light minutes away. So sure that's better but still the sun is moving through these stars. The stars themselves are moving. So to really like so dude as humans we're incredible like we are so incredible with precision and accuracy. What we've done is what so what we do is we point radio telescopes at quazars. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Quazars are like these incredibly distant objects. Okay. Like like >> edges of the universe, right? >> Okay. We're we're talking edges of the universe. They release these massive radio um signals. So you can point a radio telescope at it and reliably be like, "Oh, the quazar is in the same

8:16spot." Right. >> And because it's so so so far away, you can you that's like our best metric of Yep. the Earth has spun a full 360°. >> Interesting. >> Cuz if we if we use anything local to our galaxy, then the sun's movement and those movements get confounded. So you want something so far away that it's literally infinity, right? And then and then you know for all intents and purposes and then so that's what we actually do and that's where we can measure something as small as a microcond and be like yeah the earth literally >> slowed down by a microcond when the three gorgeous dam went up or when the Sumatra earthquake happened >> and it's going to continue to do so. >> Yeah. from non-manmade

8:59like yes like impacts which is kind of why at least until proven otherwise July cuz to go from the three gorgeous damn >> level of impact which is >> yeah which is a microcond to a millisecond >> a thousandx >> we don't probably don't have that it's probably not us >> no no this is probably like either like polar ice caps melting or something or like the interior of the earth is rearranging itself like cuz the interior of the earth is liquid. It's like a very viscous honey like liquid. Great word, >> right? So >> it it could be like rearranging itself in some way that like >> then makes the rotation change.

9:41>> This is this is this is really fascinating. >> It's incredible that we can measure like that >> to that level to that degree of accuracy that's also like verifiable by other people, but it's also a reminder that we know so much and so little at the same time. >> It's really incredible. Yeah. >> So, for our next story, um, so we just talked about, uh, we're going to stick with >> We just talked about the Earth's fastest spin, uh, on July 22nd. >> Y, >> but now, uh, a baby shower, no gender reveal, but astronomers apparently have witnessed a baby solar system, >> that's right, >> forming. And is that like a a first time

10:22thing? Is this like what is the significance here? This is so we've seen stars being born before and we've seen like stars we've seen stars being born before. We've seen solar systems sort of being born before, but this is the first time that we're seeing >> earthlike planets form. Okay, that's the big one. Got it. >> Okay, Earthlike planets are really hard to image because they're small, right? And um and far away. >> You got to get like really the right conditions in order to image this thing. Okay. And so what what these scientists did was they used the Alma, which is the um Adakama um large microwave array. >> It's basically like high on top of the Atakama desert in Chile, 17,000 ft above

11:02sea level, so there's barely any atmosphere. You've got this array of telescopes that measures in the microwave, a little bit shorter than microwave um wavelength. And they observed um the star called Hops 315. >> Mhm. >> Um no no Hops. Yeah. Astronomers, not a local brewery. >> Yes. Yes. Although that's a great name for a uh an IPA that I'm never going to drink. Um but you know, for for there's a lot of scientists who were like, "Yeah, you tried the IPA. It's [ __ ] amazing." Okay. Anyways, uh this this star is 1300 light years away. >> Okay. >> And closer or farther than Andromeda? Farther? >> No, no, no, no. Way closer.

11:42>> Way closer. >> Way closer. Andromeda is like like millions of light years. >> Okay. Okay. >> It's like 2 million lighty years. Yeah. Anything that's 100,000 lighty years or less is within our galaxy. >> My fault. >> Milky Way is like Yeah. 100,000 200,000 light. That makes sense. >> And then you got the And >> it's in the neighborhood. >> It's not from the other block. >> No, it's not from the other block. This is our this is our star. >> Um it's it's a star kind of like our sun. >> Okay. >> And this thing was imaged around 200,000 years old. >> Okay. This this star system is 200,000 years old, which sounds like a lot. For I was going to say for reference, how old is the earth? >> The earth is 4.6 billion years. The sun, you would say, let's say five let's say five billion years. Okay. So, if we want

12:24to compare 200,000, >> right, >> to 5 billion. I did a I did a real quick back of the envelope calculation. So, if the sun were a year old, >> Yeah. >> This is us taking a photo at 20 minutes. >> Oh, sure. >> After birth. Yeah. Yeah. This is >> like this is January 1st, >> 20 minutes after New Year's. >> We're still in the hospital. >> Yeah. Like we're we're like like we're still like panicking about is everything okay? Right. Right. >> Like why did she leave the room kind of, you know? Like so yeah, this is 20 minutes old compared to the sun's one year. >> Got it. >> All right. >> Extremely extremely new solar system. Um what they did was and what's exciting is

13:06they they observed traces of silica. Okay. Silicon and silicate min minerals. Yep. Like rocks. Yep. Okay. Like rocks are made out of silicon. Um >> no the only thing made out of anyway. >> Yeah. Yeah. We Well, we'll talk about that later. But um >> so so they they they found these traces of silicut which means that you know there's a rocky planet forming right in this protolanetary disc. Yep. Um the region that they found it is like basically somewhere if like the the sun is there then it's like Mars and Jupiter some some region between Mars and Jupiter which is like where the asteroid belt is right so you know getting farther inside that orbit is really hard

13:47because the sun the the new star has a lot of radiation that's that's being pushed out and there's a lot of like gas that absolutely obscures you. Um, this thing was like the reason why we could see this is because that star was at exactly the right angle and there was exactly the right hole in the the protolanetary cloud for us to see inside. Again, it's like with astronomy, there's this game of like >> there's so many things to see, but they're like not the right condition for our particular planet on Earth to see. like we're just not at the right angle to see it and we can't really move where we are to see it cuz we're stuck on Earth.

14:27>> The farthest we've gone is like Pluto, right? >> Which is really not that far compared to like 1300 light years, right? Pluto is like maybe like some hours, >> right? >> Compared to years >> years >> like so yeah. So we're stuck on this planet and so every once in a while we get really lucky, right? and we see a star at exactly the right angle, at exactly the right time with exactly the right telescope to be like, "Oh [ __ ] like there's an Earth forming there, right?" And like, so that's why this is the first time that we've seen something like a rocky planet form in in like a inner part of the solar system. It in so not only is it close, not only is this newly forming solar system close to us, >> it is also forming rocky planets.

15:10>> Yeah. And by an act of who knows whoever, we just happen to be pointing in the right direction. Yeah. In the vastness of space. >> That's right. >> At the right time, in the vastness of time >> to to see through a a a pinhole. >> Yeah. >> And it's like, oh, look, >> baby Earth. >> Yeah. >> That's it's insane. >> I think >> like the the luck that we get, you know? >> Right. >> And and like Yeah. We we just we need to we need to like put out more telescopes to see more of the sky. And there's there's there's efforts right going into doing exactly that. But you know but but NASA's being defunded. >> NASA's being defunded. NSF is being

15:52defunded. >> The new telescopes are being defunded. >> But Golden Dome >> but but but Golden Dome >> that's that's it's golden, >> right? Yeah. So >> and it's a dome like like a rocky planet 1300 light years away. So, >> so it's the same thing, >> you know. It's this. Yeah. Let's just point my binoculars at it and then maybe we'll see some aliens. >> Fascinating. >> Right. Our next story, we're going to stick with space. Uh, this one has a BBH. It's the biggest black hole. >> Oh, got it. Okay. Right. I was like, yo, this is not in my notes.

16:32>> This is not in the show notes. >> Yeah. So, we have a BBH uh biggest black hole collision ever. >> Yes. Uh so, this is like when you have a crossover episode, you know, with your classic TV show. The most recent one's probably uh Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Abbott Elementary. That's a It's a big >> Did they do a crossover? >> They did a crossover cuz they're both in Philly. >> Oh, right. Right. It was >> Dude, I got to watch that. I love both of those shows. >> It's It's actually pretty funny. >> Okay. Yeah. >> So, this is the the deep space version of that crossover. So the headline reads, "Two monster," cuz monster is a scientific term. >> Two monster black holes collided and

17:14physics is nervous. >> Uh detected by LIGO, Virgo >> and Kagra, I'll let you correct me. Uh this merger involved black holes of 50 to 96 solar masses >> much larger than typical stellar remnants raising questions about how they formed. It sounds like an immigration conversation. >> It does and we are experts at those kinds of conversations. So um stay tuned folks >> but it it actually is causing a stir in the physics community. >> Okay. It's not just headlines. It's not just headlines. This is actually a really cool story. There's there's a lot

17:56going on and um you know, we still don't know exactly how this event happened. >> Okay, so here's what's going on. >> There's a there's a solar mass 140 solar masses. So this is a black hole that's 140 times the mass of the sun. It combines with um something like 100 solar masses. There's a giant air bar with these things because they're >> Is an air bar a chocolate? An error bar is kind of like a chocolate that tells you >> um how off you can possibly be >> in your number. Like I said 140 solar masses, right? That means it could be like 80. >> Okay. >> Or like 90 or it could be like 180.

18:36>> Okay. >> Right. It's like I I'm not sure. >> But not zero. >> But it's not zero. Right. It's it's And those arrow bars are quite big because like you know the like let's be honest here. What? How are we How are we How are we seeing this? Okay, >> this is a black hole >> colliding with another black hole. So, there's no light. >> Yep. >> There's no light coming from these things. >> What's happening is they're >> spinning spinning spinning spinning spinning. They crash into each other and become a bigger black hole. >> That spinning >> stretches the fabric of spaceime. Stretches and squishes the fabric of spaceime. >> I've watched I've watched Interstellar. >> Right. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly that. And so like literally when

19:17that happens, you get these waves in spaceime called gravitational waves, right? And they literally like they they make a meter or a foot a little bit longer and a little bit shorter and a little bit longer and a little bit shorter time. >> And they make the clocks go a little bit faster and a little bit shorter. Like time itself is distorted, right? Like the the fabric of spaceime meaning like both of these things are interrelated and they're both like getting kind of >> wiggled. Yeah. Right. But how how much are they getting wiggled? It's like one part in like 10 the 22. So one divided by one with 22 zeros to to tell you how. So in order to observe this we have

19:57these observatories called LIGO. They were funded by the NSF back in the '90s. It was our big like you know high-risisk high reward. And let me tell you it was a really good reward. >> I was going to say back when we used to fund fundamental scientific. >> Yes. This was this this was this is such an amazing like story of American exceptionalism. Um the NSF was like >> National Science Foundation. >> Yeah, that's the National Science Foundation which just got gutted. By the way, I want to note that the National Science Foundation is the number one resource for investment and funding towards basic and fundamental science research. That is not like uh it does not need profit in order to to be

20:39successful. And it's it's the substrate by which the government really does a lot of these basic science and and early frontier research things and then they hand it to the private sector to go make billions of dollars. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's because because the the frequently fundamental science like you can't have a horizon of like 10 20 years even 50 years sometimes >> or quarterly for that matter. >> Yeah. You can't like you can't expect corporations like way back in the day like if you if you told like any of these pharma corporations like hey why don't you go um put in some research to like discover how bacterial immune systems work >> like how does a bacteria defend against

21:19viruses >> right >> right any of these pharmaceutical companies these private sector would be like no because I don't know why would I do that >> the NSF said yeah that sounds pretty interesting why don't you do it. Out came Chrisbar. Out came all of the gene technologies that we have today >> which are going to literally revolutionize every aspect of human life. >> Yes. Yeah. Save millions of lives, make millions of lives better, maybe also be kind of bad, but like that's what science is, right? And and you have to like the point is like in order to like in order to actually have the ability to ask these questions and and say like, okay, how are we going to apply this technology? We need to have the technology in the first place. And the

22:00NSF is incredible. And it's like it's like America's secret weapon for why we've been ahead since postwar. >> And this is and this is >> postw war like World War II. >> Whoever wins physics wins wins the planet. That's a whole another conversation. >> That's a whole another conversation we can have. But what's interesting is the only part of the reason we're even able to have the story we're talking about here about the biggest black hole collided collision ever is because we have these tools >> instruments >> that that were funded by these programs. >> Yeah. Yeah. We have we have these two observatories called LIGO >> large interpherometer gravitational observatory something like that. Yep. >> Um >> maybe it's a light interferometer. I'm not sure. But um it's it's basically

22:42these these giant giant um underground facilities in one in Washington state, one in Louisiana um that measure the distortion in length of a 3 kilometer long tunnel. Okay? So you got a tunnel that's 3 km long and we want to measure whether that tunnel shrunk by 10 - 18 km. So, we got a 3 km tunnel and we want to see if it got shorter by a little bit bigger than a proton. >> This is so insane. >> You know, just imagine it's not even a little bit bigger than an atom, >> right? The the the thingies the tunnel

23:22is made out of atoms, >> right? And we're trying to measure if it's off by one atom. >> It's like it's like we're making like a thing out of Legos. >> Yeah. And then we're trying to And then we're trying to measure like >> way smaller than I don't know how to say it. Way smaller than a Lego. Yeah. Like like the thing is made out of atoms and we're measuring less than like like a thousand thousandth of an atom >> and whether it's moved or not. And I guess the idea here is is gravitational waves impact us on Earth at that small of a like that's how >> Yeah. Because these things are like at the edges of the universe, right? like this collision is happening at the edge of the universe and um when these

24:02collisions happen so this particular one right 140 solar masses plus 100 solar masses the remnant was 225 solar masses so let's >> mean after they collided >> after they collided they became a 225 solar masses now you might be think >> right >> uh solar masses though >> I might need to head back >> yeah yeah you might need to well you need to become a black hole probably I'm halfway there. >> Yeah. Yes. You got the first part. >> I just need the whole part. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um but 140 plus 100 is 240. >> Yep. >> And then you're left with 225. >> Where did the >> Where did the 15 go? The 15 became pure energy in these gravitational waves.

24:44Okay. And to tell you like 15 solar masses just gone in the fraction of a second. >> Okay. That I actually did the calculation here. That is 250 times the brightness of all the stars in the universe. The power output, >> bro. No, we're not doing this. >> Yeah. No, no. In a second. That's what this thing that we captured with LIGO. Like, we're seeing an experience. >> Oh, we have the data. >> Yeah, we have the data to show that like that happened. We measured it as human beings. We could we we we could say that that happened. This is so in the universe. Isn't that

25:24like >> it's it's like it's like godly >> power and knowledge to be able to like say, "Yep, it happened and it happened over there and it happened this far away >> and we're looking back in time and like someone turned the lights on really quick on the whole universe >> like that >> and we and it's like it's like when they said Muhammad Ali could turn the lights off and get into bed before the lights turned off." >> Yeah. And it's just >> this puts that to shame. That's an in an incredible amount of brightness. >> Yeah. >> Which means like part of the thing to our point earlier when we were talking about how we have tools, but we have to kind of get lucky because of the vastness of space. But this is one of

26:04those things. >> This is where Yeah. This is where the gravitational wave just comes and we will see everything. >> We will see it. Like it's we're not going to miss this one. >> We're not going to miss this. >> We don't need a pinhole and to be looking at the right place at the right time. >> No. Yeah. This one is like it's coming from everywhere. This thing's going to stretch >> and it hits us >> unless even actually no no there's it's not possible for us to miss this really >> right it could it like if we only had one >> then if if the gravitational wave is coming this way then like both arms would stretch the same amount cancel each other out but the earth is curved it's not flat >> so we've got two at two different angles so we'd see it yeah >> we're >> but it's incredible that we get to we get to like observe these things right

26:45that are Like it just makes you feel so so good that like humans were able to do this. >> One of the things I find so interesting about this is as you're like talking to me about these things, this is kind of feels a little bit left field, but like these are when people talk in religious context about God or any derivative any other version of the naming convention you want to put on it based on what book your parents read. Like this is the power. Yeah. The level of literal power like literal measurable >> power. Yeah. That we like ascribe to these concepts of a deity that's higher in the higher. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. This is this is that 250 times the brightness of all the

27:27stars in the universe. That's the amount of energy that was released. >> Let there be light. >> Right. It's insane. >> I mean that's literally like that's it. That's >> I just >> in this case it's like let there be gravity >> like gravitational waves. Yeah. >> Right. >> But it's still energy at the end of the day and like in the language of physics they're kind of the same >> which again you know like tune in next week >> for the detail. >> Yeah. It's it's insane. So this I think one of the things that's so interesting about all these stories is every single one of these stories is like based on instruments. I think people miss like sometimes uh forget that uh the tools because we have the ability to create

28:07tools that is kind of the mechanism by which we are acquiring knowledge. >> Yeah. >> Over time and we get better at making tools, we get more precise, we get more clever and we come up with better experimental design and then we get these interesting science headlines. I mean as a perfect example of us building tools. Yeah. Sometimes they're like really big tools and physical and we're measuring. Sometimes they're really small tools and we use them to like do stuff. >> Yeah. >> And this next story is uh we're we're going to have uh the the pronunciation brigade decide is it crisper or crisp. >> Yeah. I don't actually I I say crisp R,

28:50>> right? Cuz it's crisp >> and then cuz then there's a dash with a capital R. So then I'm like, >> but then people have crisper and a brown like you're >> But what's what's interesting? So there's the next headline is about >> um crisper uncovers crisp r uncovers anti-cancer vitamin D gene. So, the sort of the title is uh the gene that supercharges vitamin D and kills tumors found. Now, I know there's a lot of people here in LA who are big vitamin D supplement uh uh

29:30advocates and have really been pushing for this. Uh but the the the the story goes apparently crisper screening revealed a gene that boosts vitamin D's ability to suppress tumor growth especially in pancreatic and chloretical >> cancers colon cancer. >> Yeah. >> Um but I don't know what any of that means. >> Yeah. Okay. So, ChrisPar is this technology that we've built tool. >> It's it's another tool. This was built with NSF funding. It started out being like people were like, "Hey, how does a

30:12bacteria defend against viruses?" Basically, what's the bacterial immune system? >> Seems kind of like a random research question like why would we spend money on that? A lot of people are asking why do we spend money on fundamental science? Well, this is why. Because out of that bacterial immune system came, which is this gene editing mechanism. What it can do is basically snipe DNA at any custom point that you give it. You can program a scissor to search for a specific um sequence of DNA, cut it at that point, and then we've got other types of of enzymes that'll actually stitch it back together. So now you can just play God and like take DNA and be

30:53like, I don't like this part. Cut it out, put something else in, stitch it back together. >> I I would love some some uh some uh I don't know, maybe like 2 in of height. Uh a little bit more intelligence. >> Yeah, it's too late for us. >> Oh, that's unfortunate. >> Yeah, >> but the kids >> But the kids >> maybe. >> Yeah, the kids love it. >> The Chinese are doing it. >> Yeah, they already have. >> Yeah, literally. >> Yeah, literally. Literally. That's another >> That's a story for another day. >> That's a whole Yeah. So we figured out how to cut the the gene sequence >> the gene sequence with crisp bar. And so what they did was they targeted this particular gene called SDR42E1. Okay, it's a gene that basically um lets

31:34um cells use vitamin D to create um this these hormones hormones like um cal calcitrol sorry yeah calcitriel that's the hormone. It's it's a cholesterol type hormone. Um, this is super important for like bones. It's how they re-uptake calcium, potassium. It's really important for our immune system. Basically, all the things that vitamin D is important for. >> Um, this particular gene helps vitamin D do that. >> Okay. >> Okay. >> Now, what people have noticed earlier is that this particular gene is really active in cancer cells. >> Okay. >> Okay. Like cancer cells like make a like

32:16express this gene a lot. >> Okay. Yeah. >> Okay. So perhaps it's important for cancer cell survival. So what these guys did was they went and they got a a culture of these cancer cells. They went in with Chrisbar and they said, "I'm going to cut these >> this gene out. >> The gene out that does the violence. >> Yeah. I'm just going to silence this gene. It's no longer going to work for these cancer cells. >> Censorship regime on the gene. >> Yeah. It killed the cancer cells. >> Oh, >> but it not only did that. >> Okay. >> Okay. I when I was reading this, it killed the cancer cells. That's great. Okay. What was really surprising to me is that it then modified 4,000 other cancer related genes that were downstream. So this particular gene acts like a

32:59switch that like controls a bunch of other genes downstream. >> So it's not just like it's not just doing like one thing, right? It's like this this kind of like like overseer. >> It's an air traffic controller. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And when you cut that off, the cancer cells are nowhere to be found, right? And then they like all of these other genes are gone. The cancer cells are basically dead. >> Yeah. >> And now you can have these like targeted immune therapies, >> right? These targeted like cancer therapies where you can like >> target a specific tumor, >> make the crisp part go into just those cells, cut those out, >> and then you know you can get rid of the cancer that way. >> This Okay. Um Wow.

33:41>> Yeah, it's pretty crazy. that and again uh quick shout out to NSF. We wouldn't be having this as an option for people who are cancer patients and or andor who have family and friends who are cancer patients. This is why fundamental science research investment matters because >> this I didn't realize that this was what that was about because effectively like >> and correct me if I'm wrong. We're not we're not saying we're cancer experts here but one of the biggest challenges is how to solve for this. Yeah, both from like a therapeutics like an after the fact and also from a preventative context. And this seems to be the case in a most high impact way that for

34:22people who already have tumors, there is now another among many research avenues, another option to explore >> that has a level of precision. >> That's right. >> That might have been missing from previous iterations of cancer treatments. >> Exactly. Yeah. Like it's not like radiology where you're just blasting that whole thing with with radiation, right? Or even chemo. Chemo like for the whole body. This you can like target it into a specific area. Um the other cool thing is like so here, you know, you want to cut off um vitamin D from cancer cells and then basically starve cancer cells from vitamin D. Also make all of these other genes go haywire and then

35:03you kill it, right? What you could also do is with gene therapy, now that we've identified this gene that's so important for vitamin D, you can like up it for people who are vitamin D deficient or have like other kinds of disorders that aren't necessarily cancer related, >> right? It opens up whole new avenues of medical research. >> And I imagine that there are learnings from this that then can be extrapolated to a variety of other we're talking about vitamin D in this context. >> Yeah. But you can I mean the you know genes are in incredibly powerful tools right right like the genetic code is incredibly powerful this is one of the

35:43ways that Chrisar is being used but there's like so many other different ways that Chrisar can be used not just to like make designer babies but also like actual like health things you know that are much less I think ethically >> concerning >> concerning right like this is not eth ethically concerning to me >> right right we don't need birkin babies. But but this would be nice. >> But maybe solving cancer at scale without hair loss, chemo, destroying the body in these other ways >> and much more efficient. >> Yeah. >> Potentially if you scale it up, also much more cost effective. >> That's right. >> Which corporations might not like, but that's a whole another story. >> But that's a whole another story. Of course, >> this is fascinating. Again, the power of

36:25our ability to build and create tools and come from first principles. >> Yeah. uh to understand the fundamentals and I think again this is what like we should never underestimate right like the power of like fundamental knowledge when you can then extra I mean this is why the US government has understood when you think about warfare that physics is the starting point >> yeah physics is physics is the starting point and then like getting everywhere like funding all levels >> levels >> is is huge rightuge like it's like a national security issue >> issue that we're not funding science, >> right? >> Yeah. I don't understand it, dude. >> So, so that's okay. This again, that's

37:07their fourth story today >> with an perfect example of how some of our existing like really deep scientific tools and research are providing like real world value. It might not be making groceries cheaper, but it's going to help you not get killed by by them. Um, so we're going to pivot back to space for our second to last story uh before we end on our wonderful AI is here uh story of the day. And the title on this article is uh a star that died and then died again but not three days later. So this isn't the

37:47second coming of Jesus. >> It's like a Jon Snow. >> Oh Jon >> like a Jon Snow star. >> Okay. Shout out to the Game of Thrones fans. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The the this is the star, the prince who was promised >> before they um they they totally >> shot the bed with the last season. >> Look, you know, I don't want to be a a TV or movie producer, and I don't envy that job. But basically, the story is saying that we have the first visual confirmation of a quote double detonation. >> Yeah. uh type of it's a supernova where a helium shell explosion triggered a core blast uh in a white dwarf. Now, this

38:28sounds like some adult contemporary, >> right? Right. Right. >> You know, literature. >> Yes. >> Double detonation. >> Double detonation of a white dwarf. No, we're not talking about Snow White. >> We're talking about deep space. >> No, we're talking about deep space. We're talking about a star that's about the size of the Earth >> but has the mass of the sun. Imagine that. Oh, super dense. >> Super dense. Yeah. So, this this is what this is what would happen to our sun when it dies in about 5 billion years when it runs out of >> fuel >> and the gravity just collapses it. >> Um, the sun is not big enough to become a supernova >> which is like when the gravity is so fast that it just goes >> it just explodes. This is kind of like

39:08the it's going to like shed its outer layers and the core is going to remain and become a white dwarf. It's it's going to be about the size of the Earth, but about the same mass as the sun. >> Um, these white dwarfs are the stellar remnants of these stars, right? They're like the the corpses, you can you can say, but sometimes they can come alive again, especially in binary star systems. So, if you've got a white dwarf that like from a star that died >> and it's got a companion, get your head out of the gutter, Lester. >> Binary white dwarf. I know it's got a the white dwarf has a companion and it's stealing from its companion cuz that's what it's doing. Okay, the white dwarf is stealing

39:49>> gas from its companion. I'm not making this up. This is what's happening. >> Okay, >> this is not we're not here to push the agenda of the alphabet. >> No, no, no. This is this is science. This is there's a star revolving around another star. Okay, it's just physics, guys. Right. Like that there's no there Okay. Okay. But Okay. So, so the the white dwarf starts stealing mass, >> okay, >> from its companion. And when it does that, it starts like getting fatter and fatter >> and at some point it's going to the traditional thinking is it's going to reach this thing called the Chundra Shaker limit. It's named after my boy Subramanyam Chundra Shaker, Nobel Prize

40:30winner from India. Um, it's basically the maximum mass a white dwarf star can have before weird physics starts happening, before the electron degeneracy pressure goes away and like like it starts collapsing on itself and all this other stuff. So, usually the mass go grows to that length and then it like explodes. >> Okay, but this one had like a subdetonation. Okay. Where it was like it was like amassing a bunch of gas and then the helium shell that that from all the gas that it was getting detonated and then that triggered another detonation inside because the shock wave went inside and outside and then the shock wave detonated the star itself. >> What's cool about this story to me was

41:12how they discovered it. Okay. How do they how do we know that there was a double detonation? Right? What would you expect to see? >> What you'd expect to see because this thing would happen like many years ago, right? Yeah. So, what you'd expect to see is one shell, like imagine a double detonation, right, out in empty space. There'd be like a shell of expanding gas and then there'd be another shell inside, >> right? There'd be a double shell, so to speak. So, you want to what you need to do is you need to image this double shell. >> It's incredibly hard to do. Okay? Because this is a pretty recent eruption, I think, within the last thousand years. So, the shell is not that big, >> right? So, you're trying to image something really small. you they used the very large telescope

41:52the VLT which is kind of like the VA that you visited recently in New Mexico except in New Mexico those are a bunch of radio telescopes these are for optical telescopes so it's much harder to synchronize >> the um the >> versus >> Yeah exactly and in in the radio telescopes like the the the frequency of light is pretty slow >> right so in order to get this giant picture with high resolution you need to synchronize all of the signals from the radio telescopes, but because the frequency of the light is slow, the clocks are like the, you know, you can synchronize them as long as you're shorter, like much shorter than the the time it takes for a single, right? But

42:33in optical, >> the clocks need to be extremely extremely fast. So, building this VT is like a feat of engineering in its own right. And and they actually don't even use like digital synchronization. They have like underground mirrors that like manually synchronize all the light >> using light. Yeah, because it's cuz it operates at the as close to the speed of light as fire like literally as >> So they literally have underground mirrors that are like on like trains that Yeah. It's it's it's an insane engineering project. But what they did was they used this VT in Chile. They pointed it at this system and over 2 years they imaged it for 39 nights. And whoever tells you that like science

43:14isn't romantic, like this is this is like astronomy is probably the most romantic of sciences because you've got to synchronize this so that there's no full moon. There's no moon in the sky. It's got to be extremely dark to see this thing. It's extremely faint, right? Like what you're trying to see, you got to synchronize over 39 nights over two years. Point this telescope at the same spot to image the same thing over two years. You're like borderline stalking it at this point, right? hoping that there's no clouds that are in in the between and all this other stuff. And finally, you get this amazing picture and hopefully we can put it up. >> Yeah, we'll picture of these like calcium shells

43:56moving >> out at near the speed of light away from this explosion, right? >> And so, yeah, it's it's a very clear sign of this like two >> like two shells moving out and you can see the double detonation >> and it's being captured over time. So you can see its movement through space such that you can sort of then back calculate. >> Yeah. Like in 10 years you can go back and like actually see them and like maybe one of the one of the things is moving faster than the other. Like there's there's all sorts of possibilities for how we can like better understand these kinds of explosions because understanding this explosion is very important for us from a fundamental science perspective because these explosions help us chart out the

44:38distances to galaxies. >> Oh, >> and help us chart out the expansion of the universe. >> It's we're we're Christopher Columbus. We're building the map of the new world. >> Yes, we're and this is like our meter stick, >> right? This this is our Maria Pinto Santa Maria. What were the ships called? >> Oh, I forget. >> The P the Pinto. Anyway, >> they made me learn this in America. >> Someone's going to put it in the comments and they're going to be like, you Yeah. America America's education system. >> That's what's important apparently, knowing the [ __ ] ship name of Christopher Columbus's, >> you know, the genocidal maniac who killed all the Native Americans. But like, that's fine. Um, so this is the first time we've seen a double kill in space. Double kill.

45:18>> Shout out to all my Halo people. And like again is I just one of the things I keep wanting to come back to is how extremely clever the humans who build these instruments are that enable us to gather data >> that then we can make conclusions about the beautiful world around us. And we can't do that without enabling these brilliant people to have creative freedom to like build. Yeah. And like again, you're like, imagine someone coming up to, hey, I want to build a giant telescope and I want to build a series of underground mirror systems. >> Yeah. I'm going to build four of them. >> I'm I'm I tuned out like 15 minutes ago.

46:01It's just But I It's so I the wonder I've always loved space. We know we're so infantestimally small in a sea of everything. Yeah. And there's so much interesting stuff going on around. And the wonder >> I think this is kind of what you were saying there. The the romance in astronomy is is uniquely interesting in the sciences. >> Yeah. >> Um you know, in a way where it's like the wonder is constantly there because you kind of never know >> what you're going to find. >> What you're going to find. Uh, and sometimes you might be looking at the right place at the right time like several of our stories. >> I think our last story of the day and

46:41this is one I have no this is this is so we always do an AI story. AI is going to be something that's going to impact all of our lives on a daily basis whether we like it or not uh forever for the rest of our lives until the planet ends or we all die or something. Yep. >> And so as long as we don't give them the access to nuclear and solar power and they can self-replicate, but that's a whole another story. >> But you have an interesting AI story. >> Yes, it's an optimistic one. >> We love an optimistic AI story for our listeners today. >> So we're going to have Dr. Krishna Chowy walk us through >> the optimistic story of the day on AI. >> Yeah. It's a it's a new AI from Google's deep mind. Yep.

47:22>> Called Anias. >> Anias. >> Anias. Yeah. Do you know who that is? I need another Anias because my current one is is struggling a little bit. I'm not familiar though. >> This is uh Anias is basically like the uh Roman version of Odysius. >> Got it. >> Like um he uh he apparently like was he fled Troy with the sword of Troy and then he did a journey very much like Odysius and um ended up in Rome, founded Rome. So Virgil wrote uh a poem called the Aniid and it's one of the great classical works of literature and the Google deep mind AI is called Anias because it is basically a generative AI

48:02model that helps epigraphers and like like is like a AI Indiana Jones. It's like basically trying to decipher Latin and date it and tell you where the Latin is from. It's got three jobs. It's gonna it's going to decipher Latin. And frequently a big problem with antiquity, right, is like the incompleteness of what we find. You've seen like the statues, there's an arm missing, there's a head missing, and there's still like a nose missing, and like there's still like in these museums, and they're priceless, right? Because they're these incredible works of art. Um, same thing happens with inscriptions, right? you go to like the

48:44parthonon or like any of these other ancient Greek or ancient Roman temples, >> the half the marble is gone. So the the Latin is going to be like this and then it's going to be cut off, right? And so we don't know what the rest of the Latin says. Well, this is something where generative AI can do something, right? >> This actually sounds perfect for LLMs because they're basically next token generation. So it's almost literally the core function >> the core function >> of these models is kind of purpose >> to like fill in >> fill in the gaps with limited information. >> Fascinating. >> Yeah. So and that's exactly what this thing does. It so it does three things. It fills in missing text. >> It provides providence which is like where did this thing come from? And it

49:25uses basically like context clues or like did they abbreviate certain Latin terms to figure out like what the dialect is and then figure out where in the classical, >> you know, world it came from. And then also tells you gives you an estimate of the date based on again like context and like >> vernacular, grammar, things like that. Um, so it's trained on 176,000 Latin inscriptions. >> Only some of them have images, okay? But most of them are like like actually translated like stuff. Um anywhere from 7th century BC all the way to 8th century AD. So giant thousand years span of um of stuff.

50:06>> Um and >> it's it's an incredible tool now because >> so what they did was they tested it on this temple on some inscriptions from the temple of Augustus which is in Anara, Turkey. Um, it's also called the queen of inscriptions because there's so many inscriptions that are on this temple. But again, a lot of these inscriptions are cut off and like they don't have it, right? So, um, they tested it between that. The thing completed it. A bunch of historians actually said, "Okay, that's actually a pretty good inscription." The inscription itself is from the emperor Augustus. It's like an autobio biography of like I did this, I did this, you know, that's that's what the emperor >> both the biggest Yeah. and the bestest

50:46>> basically like Yeah. Yeah. Right after killing Caesar. Oh, no. Wait, I don't think he did. He No, that's that's a different Augustus. Um I'm I'm confusing my Shakespeare with the real world. Um but and the other thing is it gave um it gave like two date ranges. So it was like 10 to 20 CE or 10 to 1 BC. It said that this is the date range that this inscription is on. And that corresponds exactly to what current historians are debating over whether it's this or that. that sort of independent because I think part of with AI people always talk about well when you do these AI models and

51:26they do these benchmark tests people are saying well if you feed them the test while you're training >> no this is not in the training >> it's not in the training data set because it was just those inscriptions without the interpretations of modern day historians as x y or z it just had structured data around it like we know this incription is from we like that's as a fundamental entry point but I think that's an important distinction because the natural reaction will be Well, okay. But it also took all the feedback and interpretation of these historians and that's why it lined up with what they already said. But the point is that it didn't have that. >> It didn't have that. This was completely test case, right? And so it becomes this incredible tool that now epigraphers and historians can use. >> Obviously, it's going to like make some

52:07stuff up, but like this is having this tool is much better than not having this tool, right? Because then you can like reduce the amount of effort that you're doing. You can you can like cross check, you can verify. There's there's a lot of new inscriptions that are coming out as archaeological digs are happening, right? I was just in Pompei the other day. There's an active dig happening in Pompei. They're going to find new inscriptions, right? And then they'll be able to feed it into the Salm if obviously there's going to be stuff that's cut off because the volcano everything, right? So like it's it's it's I think I think it gives a lot of hope for what AI can do for human beings like in this case

52:48>> you know a lot of people talk about like AI is a is a way we're like losing humanity right and into certain respect I think that is true like if we're not careful we might lose our ability to be human >> or like our sense of what it means to be human but in this case like it's giving us more connection to our human past, right? It's telling us like >> what the same humans were like 2,000 years ago, >> you know, and so like it's it's helping us connect in in in ways that I think are very good. And so like if AI can be used for more things like this and less for like, you know, surveillance or like

53:31trying to like addict me to video games or apps, like I think that'd be nice. I I I I I think what's so fascinating is AI is both a a lens into our past that allows it to interpret it with greater clarity and like the spectre like hanging over the future because it's like or the guillotine that hangs over our future where we actually have the ability to pull it. >> Yeah. >> But we don't understand >> that we have that >> we're constantly like Yeah. Like if we go after like what is easy, >> right, >> and what is profitable, >> right? >> Then all we're doing is just like loosening our grip on this. >> Correct.

54:11>> You know, and and that's not good. This is why it's so important I think these conversations where we try to talk about these topics from first principles because the way we can retain our humanity is by always having that frame of reference and mindset uh whether it's from a media literacy perspective whether it's from a science literary perspective social interpersonal interaction it when you're flooded with information everywhere all the time >> uh being able to have a framework to build up what the world the worldview that you have that is not simply just intaking

54:51information and outputting it without processing is like increasingly and so so important and it's why I love being able to talk to you about these >> stories it's it's a it's a good time it's a good time I also like thanks for sending me these stories because like the more I the deeper I don't it's like every single like science story just has like so many layers to it and and you you you get such a a kick out of like knowing how we did things. At least I do. >> No, I I do. I do too. And that's why we are very excited for next week's installment of firm first principles.

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