Why Do We Sing? Musicologists and Neuroscientists Seek an Answer

Last year Science Quickly looked across disciplines to piece apart the science of singing. To understand why humans sing, musicologists collaborated on an international study of folk music. To understand how we sing, neuroscientists differentiated how our brain processes speech and singing. Music enthusiast and associate mind and brain editor Allison Parshall takes us through some hallmark 2024 studies that, taken together, piece together the evolutionary origins of singing. Recommended reading: Hidden Patterns in Folk Songs Reveal How Music Evolved https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/hidden-patterns-in-folk-songs-reveal-how-music-evolved/  Why You Can’t Get That Song Out of Your Head https://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/why-do-songs-get-stuck-in-your-head/  E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter.  Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was hosted by Rachel Feltman with guest associate mind and brain editor Allison Parshall. Our show is fact-checked by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sick coral reefs are visually striking—bleached and lifeless, far from the vibrancy we’ve come to expect. But what does an unhealthy coral system sound like? In this rerun, conservation bioacoustics researcher Isla Keesje Davidson tells Science Quickly all about the changing soundscape of the seas.  Recommended reading: 84 Percent of Corals Impacted in Mass Bleaching Event https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/worst-coral-mass-bleaching-on-record-caused-by-warming-oceans/ How Corals Fight Back against Warming Seas https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-corals-fight-back-against-warming-seas/  E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter.  Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was hosted by Rachel Feltman. Our show is fact-checked by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ten months ago Science Quickly made space history by conducting the first-ever live interview from the cupola of the International Space Station (ISS). Astronaut Matthew Dominick spoke with Rachel Feltman about his work on the ISS and the stunning space photography that first caught our attention. Watch a video of the interview See more stunning space photographs from Matthew Dominick E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter.  Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was hosted by Rachel Feltman. Our show is edited by Jeff DelViscio with fact-checking by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Protests around the construction of the now complete Dakota Access Pipeline brought national attention to Energy Transfer, the company that built and owns the pipeline and funded private security against the protestors. Energy Transfer sued the nonprofit Greenpeace for hundreds of millions of dollars. The company claimed that the Standing Rock movement was not Indigenous-led environmental activism but a conspiratorial effort by Greenpeace. Reporter Alleen Brown is spending this season of her podcast, Drilled, looking into the lawsuit and the message that legal actions like this send to activists.  Recommended reading: Listen to Drilled Read Alleen Brown’s newsletter E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter.  Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Naeem Amarsy and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was hosted by Rachel Feltman. Our show is edited by Alex Sugiura with fact-checking by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck.  The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dairy cattle have become an intermediary between avian influenza found in wild birds and the handful of recorded H5N1 bird flu cases in humans. Senior news reporter Meghan Bartels took a trip upstate to Cornell University’s Teaching Dairy Barn. Early last year Texas dairy farmers noticed lethargic cows producing off-color milk. One of them sent Cornell researchers a sample, which genetic sequencing determined to contain a strain of H5N1. That strain traces its roots to the H5N1 virus that emerged in China in the late 1990s—which spread around the world thanks to migrating wild birds, such as those found on the beach that associate health and medicine editor Lauren Young visited in episode one of our three-part series about bird flu. And outbreak of H5N1 has been running through poultry farms since the early 2020s. Poultry farmers have been forced to cull flocks, reinforce biosecurity protocols and change the prices of eggs as a result. Dairy farms were less prepared for the spillover and its unexpected transition into raw-milk-drinking barn cats. While pasteurization makes milk safe for human consumption, there’s no easy way to prevent the spread between herds of cattle. In the next episode, multimedia intern and producer Naeem Amarsy looks at how the virus made yet another hop—this time into humans. Recommended reading: How the U.S. Lost Control of Bird Flu, Setting the Stage for Another Pandemic https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/bird-flu-has-spread-out-of-control-after-mistakes-by-u-s-government-and/  Bird Flu Vaccine for Cows Passes Early Test https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/bird-flu-vaccine-for-cows-passes-early-test/  E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter.  Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Naeem Amarsy and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was reported and hosted by Meghan Bartels. This series is reported and produced by Lauren Young, Meghan Bartels, Naeem Amarsy, Fonda Mwangi and Jeff DelViscio. Special thanks to Becka Bowyer and Kaitlyn Serrao at Cornell University and to Kimberly Lau, Dean Visser and Jeanna Bryner at Scientific American. Our show is edited by Alex Sugiura with fact-checking by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bird flu outbreaks in poultry and cattle have caused concern for public health officials. There have been few reported cases of human transmission, but the growing risks of H5N1 avian influenza have virologists on alert. Researchers at the St. Jude Center of Excellence for Influenza Research and Response take an annual visit to Delaware Bay to collect samples of bird poop for analysis. These samples give the researchers a look at emerging avian illnesses. While spillover of H5N1 into domestic birds has been known for a while, the first case of spillover into humans was only identified during a 1997 outbreak in Hong Kong. Since then H5N1 has gone global and moved from transmitting from bird to bird to spreading from bird to mammal and from mammal to mammal. Associate health and medicine editor Lauren Young takes a sample collection walk on the beach and speaks with virus detectives about how H5N1 evolved in episode one of our three-part series about bird flu. Join us on Wednesday to learn how bird flu jumped from poultry to cattle. Recommended reading: RFK, Jr., Wants to Let Bird Flu Spread on Poultry Farms. Why Experts Are Concerned https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/rfk-jr-wants-to-let-bird-flu-spread-on-poultry-farms-why-experts-are/  Bird Flu Detected in Humans in the U.S.: What We Know So Far https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/bird-flu-detected-in-a-person-in-texas-what-we-know-so-far/  E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter.  Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Naeem Amarsy and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was hosted by Rachel Feltman with guest Lauren Young. This series was reported and produced by Lauren Young, Meghan Bartels, Naeem Amarsy, Fonda Mwangi and Jeff DelViscio. And special thanks to Kimberly Lau and Dean Visser at Scientific American for making it possible and to Michael Sheffield at St. Jude for assistance in the field. Our show is edited by Alex Sugiura with fact-checking by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Testosterone replacement therapy (TRT) is exploding in popularity among men. TRT has been touted online as a cure-all for everything from low energy to poor mood and even as a way to increase masculinity itself. But how much of the buzz is backed by science? Host Rachel Feltman talks with journalist Stephanie Pappas about the realities behind the trend. They explore who truly benefits from TRT, the overlooked risks—including fertility loss—and the rise of private clinics offering testosterone. This episode was made possible by the support of Yakult and produced independently by Scientific American’s board of editors. Recommended reading: What Most Men Don’t Know about the Risks of Testosterone Therapy Email us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new everyday: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for our daily newsletter.  Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Naeem Amarsy and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was edited by Alex Sugiura. Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck fact-check our show. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Most mammalian dads are pretty absent from their offspring’s lives. That sets the Djungarian hamster apart from its fellow fathers. These hamster dads are involved in the birth of their pups, care for them in infancy and even provide food during weaning. They also let the mother hamster go on cooldown walks outside of the burrow, which professor of veterinary medicine and hamster expert Katherine Wynne-Edwards thinks could be essential to the survival of the species in its superharsh environment. But there’s also some familiar mate selection at play: female Djungarian hamsters choose to mate with males who will provide quality parental care. Follow guest host Elah Feder’s work Recommended reading: Why Don't Bees Celebrate Father's Day? Men Are More Prepared for Fatherhood Than We Think E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter.  Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Naeem Amarsy and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was reported by Elah Feder and co-hosted by Rachel Feltman and Elah Feder. This episode was edited by Jeff DelViscio with fact-checking by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Animals’ lifespans can be far shorter or much longer than those of humans. Scientists are researching creatures such as “immortal” jellyfish and long-lived tortoises and digging deep into genetic codes to figure out why animals age—and what we can do to improve longevity in humans. João Pedro de Magalhães, chair of molecular biogerontology at the University of Birmingham in England, lays out the state of aging science.   Recommended reading: Follow de Magalhães’s lab: https://rejuvenomicslab.com/ See our animal lifespan infographic: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-some-animals-live-for-only-days-and-others-live-for-thousands-of-years/  E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter.  Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Naeem Amarsy and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was hosted by Rachel Feltman. Our show is edited by Alex Sugiura with fact-checking by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

New simulations suggest the Milky Way’s long-predicted collision with Andromeda might be less of a cosmic certainty than we thought. A massive marine heat wave in 2023 sent North Atlantic temperatures soaring—equal to two decades’ worth of typical warming—with weak winds and climate change largely to blame. And researchers reveal that the planet’s most abundant animals—nematodes—may use teamwork and tower-building to hitch rides to new homes. Recommended reading: This ‘Tower of Worms’ Is a Squirming Superorganism  E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new everyday: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for our daily newsletter. Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Naeem Amarsy and Jeff DelViscio. Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck fact-check our show. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices