ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
Time now for our science news roundup from Short Wave, NPR's science podcast. And I am joined here in the studio by the show's two hosts, Regina Barber and Emily Kwong. So good to see both your faces.
EMILY KWONG, BYLINE: So good to see you, too.
REGINA BARBER, BYLINE: It's so nice to be...
KWONG: Hi, Ari.
BARBER: ...Here with you, Ari.
SHAPIRO: Well, as usual, you've brought us three science stories that caught your attention this week. What are they?
BARBER: A newly identified deep-sea creature.
KWONG: The benefits of exercise for healing our nervous system.
BARBER: And science-backed tips for holiday eating.
SHAPIRO: Let's start by going deep. What's down there?
KWONG: So much stuff. You don't want to know. No, we're going to talk about this...
BARBER: I do want to know.
KWONG: ...Mysterious creature - yeah - discovered in 2000 and now, for the first time, described in detail in the journal Deep Sea Research Part I by scientists at MBARI. That's the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California.
SHAPIRO: I love Monterey Bay. It's an amazing place.
KWONG: Yes.
BARBER: Agreed.
KWONG: Yes. And they call this creature off their shores Bathydevius caudactylus.
SHAPIRO: How devious is it?
KWONG: We're going to get into that 'cause for a long time, they called it the mystery mollusk.
SHAPIRO: Mystery...
KWONG: The mystery mollusk.
SHAPIRO: ...Mollusk (laughter). What's so mysterious about it?
BARBER: Yeah, well, one of the researchers, Bruce Robison - he said that, at first, he and his colleagues couldn't figure out what it was.
BRUCE ROBISON: It's a pretty funny-looking animal, if you get right down to it. It sort of looks like it was made up from spare parts left over from making a bunch of other animals.
SHAPIRO: Oh, like a sphinx or a gryphon. No, I'm guessing that's not what it actually looks like.
KWONG: Picture a jellyfish crossed with a slug...
SHAPIRO: Whoa.
KWONG: ...Adorned with this cape-like hood. And the whole thing is transparent. So you can see right through it. And it can glow in the dark - this creature - because it's bioluminescent.
SHAPIRO: I think I'm in love.
KWONG: You want to see a picture?
SHAPIRO: I would love to. Ooh. Cool. It's got, like, little things in the middle of it. What's going on there? Can you just describe what this looks like?
BARBER: It's kind of see-through. There is these, like, three pops of color inside of its body.
SHAPIRO: Yeah.
BARBER: The thing that looks like a dried-up orange is its...
KWONG: (Laughter).
BARBER: ...Digestive gland. And the bright red stomach looks like a cherry. And that white patch - that's its brain.
SHAPIRO: Wow. And researchers had no idea what it was?
KWONG: But now they do. Through much observation and also DNA sequencing, they were able to confirm that this is a nudibranch.
SHAPIRO: Oh, I actually - from tide-pooling as a kid in Oregon - I am obsessed with nudibranchs. They're like the punk rockers of the sea - sea slugs, basically, right?
BARBER: Yeah, but this creature, like, it didn't look like any other nudibranch they'd ever seen.
SHAPIRO: No, it doesn't.
BARBER: (Laughter).
KWONG: This is the only nudibranch we know of so far that swims in the deep water of the midnight zone. That's the middle zone of the ocean, between the sunlit shallow waters and the sea floor. This creature goes deep.
SHAPIRO: I'm so glad to learn about this creature.
KWONG: Yeah, I know. Bruce told us it's a testament to how much we don't know about the deep sea, despite it being the largest ecosystem on the planet, and why it's so important to do this kind of work.
ROBISON: If we're ever to live in harmony with our planet, we'd better understand all that's out there and how it all works. Otherwise, we're liable to screw it up.
SHAPIRO: All right. From the deep sea, let's pivot to exercise. What is the new discovery about exercise?
KWONG: It's so good for us.
BARBER: (Laughter).
SHAPIRO: That doesn't seem like...
KWONG: That's the end of the story.
SHAPIRO: ...A new discovery.
KWONG: That's the end of the story. We can end, then we can wrap this up...
BARBER: We're done.
KWONG: ...Right here. But it's good for us in ways we're uncovering even yet. Like, it's good for our brain, our immune system, our bones and muscles, but also our nervous system.
SHAPIRO: So what does that mean, actually?
BARBER: So specifically our, like, motor neurons - the cells in our body that attach to your muscles and control your movement. A research team at MIT wanted to know how muscles and neurons talk to each other, specifically during exercise.
SHAPIRO: How did they measure that?
KWONG: They created a mini muscle factory. They took a petri dish, and they popped in some muscle fibers from mice, grew them, and generated this small sheet of tissue about the size of a quarter.
BARBER: The team then stimulated the muscle over and over again, mimicking, like, what happens during exercise. And when the muscles contracted, they released this soup of biochemicals called myokines.
KWONG: The team, led by Ritu Raman, then collected these delicious myokines...
BARBER: (Laughter).
KWONG: ...And fed them to motor neurons.
RITU RAMAN: And what we saw is that the neurons grew four times faster and farther when they had this chemical soup versus when they didn't.
SHAPIRO: So is the takeaway here that exercise helps promote nerve growth - is that what they found?
KWONG: Yes. In this experiment, that chemical soup created by those muscles helped with these motor neurons. In a separate experiment, Ritu jiggled the motor neurons, like (imitating whirring sound)...
(LAUGHTER)
KWONG: ...Using magnets, kind of simulating exercise, and just the physical forces helped the neurons grow just as well - no chemicals required.
SHAPIRO: I'm picturing, like, those '80s exercise machines where a strap just kind of wobbles you back and forth, and it's supposed to have some...
BARBER: Yes.
SHAPIRO: ...Positive impact.
BARBER: I totally remember those commercials.
SHAPIRO: Yeah.
KWONG: Yeah. They kind of did that to these neurons, proving that exercise really is medicine, helping to promote nerve growth, which ultimately could improve mobility.
BARBER: Yeah, and that's important to human health. There are so many situations where communication between muscles and motor neurons breaks down from a traumatic muscle injury to a neurodegenerative disease like ALS.
KWONG: So Ritu hopes that this study, published in the journal Advanced Healthcare Materials this week, adds to a growing body of knowledge on how these cells interact and how mobility can be recovered.
SHAPIRO: OK, we've discussed exercise. Now let's get to feasting.
BARBER: Yes.
SHAPIRO: Tips for getting through the holidays - what do we need to know?
BARBER: Yeah, well, first, let's start with the findings of a poll that sparked this reporting. Last month, this hospital group in Florida called Orlando Health surveyed over a thousand Americans nationally and found that, during the holidays, some people try to counteract eating big meals in unhealthy ways. So tips today that we're going to talk about are about promoting healthy thinking and eating instead.
SHAPIRO: Take it away.
(LAUGHTER)
BARBER: All right.
SHAPIRO: What are the tips?
BARBER: OK.
KWONG: Ari, like, scooted forward to the table a little bit more.
SHAPIRO: I'm ready.
BARBER: Let's do it.
KWONG: All right. Come up to our science-backed holiday eating buffet table. Tip No. 1 - don't skip meals before the big holiday feast.
SHAPIRO: I actually don't have that problem.
KWONG: OK.
SHAPIRO: I'm not one to skip meals.
KWONG: Well, Ari, 1 in 4 people surveyed thought that was a good idea.
SHANA MINEI SPENCE: OK, I'm just going have coffee or I'm not going to eat until dinner. And that's really counterproductive to what we should be doing.
BARBER: That's Shana Minei Spence, a registered dietitian not involved in the survey, but she suggests eating small meals with protein and fiber throughout the day and says that that will keep you from overeating, like, during the big meal.
SHAPIRO: Overeating I thought was the whole point of the holidays. OK, what's tip No. 2?
KWONG: Tip two - ditch those detoxes you see online. You know the ones I'm talking about because you can be thankful for your kidneys and liver - those organs for detoxing and filtering out stuff your body doesn't want. Shana and the dietitians at Orlando Health made it clear. You don't need any sort of over the counter or home remedy. They don't live up to the true detox promise, and they're a waste of money and can sometimes even be harmful.
SHAPIRO: No bingeing on celery juice and chili pepper, huh?
BARBER: No. She calls...
KWONG: No.
BARBER: ...It spicy water. But...
SHAPIRO: (Laughter).
BARBER: ...Shana also warns that...
KWONG: It's a scam.
BARBER: ...Like, anyone can call themselves a nutritionist. But to be a dietitian in many states, you need credentials. So she advises to, like, be wary of advice from TikTok or Instagram.
SHAPIRO: Noted. OK, what's your final tip?
BARBER: Tip No. 3 - dig into those holiday foods and just enjoy yourself, Ari, and everyone else.
SHAPIRO: That one I can take on board.
BARBER: Shana wants to stress self-compassion. Like, these meals are social, and they bring us joy.
SPENCE: Please don't let it overconsume you or make you feel guilty, like you're this horrible person or that you have no self-control. Take a deep breath. It's OK.
KWONG: 'Cause, in reality, one rich meal is not going to affect your health significantly. Just like one healthy meal isn't going to suddenly make you a Greek god.
SHAPIRO: Or a Greek yogurt for that matter.
KWONG: Absolutely.
BARBER: I love Greek yogurt.
KWONG: You can have that the morning after.
SHAPIRO: Yeah - with the cranberry sauce stirred in.
BARBER: Ooh.
KWONG: Ooh.
SHAPIRO: It's really delicious.
BARBER: Smart (laughter).
SHAPIRO: That's Emily Kwong and Regina Barber from NPR's science podcast, Short Wave. You can subscribe now for new discoveries, everyday mysteries and the science behind the headlines. Thank you both.
KWONG: Thank you, Ari.
BARBER: Thank you.
(SOUNDBITE OF LOLA YOUNG SONG, "CONCEITED") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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