Fungus Among Us

Who’s pulling the strings behind… Zombie Ants! This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Some carpenter ants get infected by a fungus called Ophiocordyceps that hijacks their behavior. The ants climb leaves, and lock into a creepy “death grip.” Then the fungus sprouts and releases spores.

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Frozen and Furious

Think zombies are scary? What about awakening ancient frozen monsters?! This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Imagine being on a research dig in the Arctic, where you discover thirteen viruses… from fifty thousand years ago!  That’s what happened to Jean-Marie Alempic and team at France’s

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Snooze School

Can we REALLY learn new vocabulary in our sleep? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Franziska Schmidig and her team in Bern investigated! They tested twenty volunteers to see if sleeping brains could learn new words. They used nonsense pairs, like “tofer–bird,” so only new

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Velcro for Cancer

Is the cure for cancer… a pair of strappy new shoes?! This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Pancreatic cancer is sneaky – it hides until it’s too late. Doctors hunt for clues in blood: a marker called CA19-9. But current tests? Pricey, slow, and very

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Nano-Bob the Builders

Here comes snowman season… in your cells?! This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Our cells are like tiny cities, running on little factories called organelles. What does this cellular architecture look like?  Ask Amirrasoul Tavakoli and team at NIH, Bethesda.  They used a tool that

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