Did playing doctor just get real? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. What if you could diagnose viruses – like Zika – from home? This may be possible very soon! Right now, a Zika diagnosis requires a blood test. This can be challenging and expensive
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Don’t have a date? Or a mate? No problem! This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Animals sometimes go solo. Why? Because they can reproduce without mating: virgin birth! Technically, it’s called “parthenogenesis.” Instead of DNA from mom and dad, offspring just have mom’s DNA. So
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It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s… SUPER RICE? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Fertilizers are mostly made of NITROGEN. Plants needs it to grow. But, too much nitrogen SLOWS growth for some plants! Other plants grow BIG and TALL with lots of it.
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What’s Batman’s REAL super-power? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Viruses take energy and nutrients from their hosts. BUT it also takes energy to FIGHT viruses! In us humans, eventually, either the host or the virus dies. But, BATS can carry viruses for YEARS. How?
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Autocorrect is great for our phones. But what about our DNA? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. DNA is made of building blocks called bases. These bases spell out the blueprints for our cells! Sometimes, mistakes are made, and the wrong base gets swapped in.
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Where did the mysterious, pre-Roman Etruscan people come from? Ask the cows! This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Thanks to a wealth of Etruscan artifacts, archaeologists know this: The civilization flourished in the first millennium BC in what is now Tuscany. But nobody ever figured
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Do you have imported genes? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science, talking about DNA, not denim. Researchers from the University of Cambridge say humans certainly have genetic imports. The reason? “Horizontal gene transfer.” That’s when genes jump from one species to another. Like from viruses
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How many four-letter words do you know? This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Let’s take “drat.” Rearrange the letters, and you can also make dart, and that’s about it. My point? There’s a limit to how many words you can make with those four letters.
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Lost in space? You might be right at home! This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science. Genetic testing – it’s all the rage! But what if your lineage was intergalactic? ! We used to think all of the matter in our Galaxy was formed in-house. But
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