Double-Blasted

Summary

Radiolab Episode Summary: "Double-Blasted"

Introduction

In the episode titled "Double-Blasted," hosted by Lulu Miller and Latif Nasser of Radiolab, the narrative delves into the harrowing yet resilient story of Tsutomu Yamaguchi, a Japanese ship engineer who uniquely survived both the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings in August 1945. Through investigative journalism and evocative storytelling, the episode explores the profound human and scientific implications of nuclear warfare, particularly focusing on the effects of radiation on DNA and subsequent generations.

Background: Introducing Tsutomu Yamaguchi

[00:25] Latif Nasser introduces the episode, highlighting the significance of Tsutomu Yamaguchi's experience:

"The story you are about to hear is one of the most vivid and... haunting. In a way, beautiful tellings of a singular human experience."

Yamaguchi, a ship engineer for Mitsubishi, had been stationed in Hiroshima for months and was preparing to return home when the first bomb was dropped.

The First Bombing: August 6, 1945

On the morning of August 6th, Yamaguchi realizes he forgot his incon (a seal used to stamp documents) and returns to his boarding house. After a brief tea with the owners, he resumes his journey home, walking through nearby farms. At approximately 8:15 AM, he notices a small speck descending from a plane, recognizing it as a bomb. Following air raid protocols, he drops to the ground and shields himself.

[04:06] Sam Kean explains the immediate impact of the bomb:

"The light is filled with gamma rays... they knock electrons right off the water molecules and... form these very reactive molecules called free radicals... they start ripping electrons off [DNA], cutting it at various points."

Yamaguchi is approximately a mile away from the blast. The intense flash of gamma rays causes immediate and severe damage to his DNA, leading to long-term health repercussions. Despite this, he survives the initial blast and begins to navigate the devastated Hiroshima, witnessing widespread destruction and loss.

Surviving Hiroshima and Moving to Nagasaki

[07:23] After the first bombing, Yamaguchi decides to return to work at Mitsubishi, seeking normalcy amidst chaos. However, upon arriving, he finds the plant in rubble and his coworkers dead. Determined to reunite with his family, he embarks on a perilous journey to Nagasaki, navigating destroyed infrastructure and treacherous conditions.

[12:25] On August 9, 1945, three days after Hiroshima, Nagasaki is bombed. Yamaguchi experiences a second exposure to gamma rays, once again damaging his DNA:

"Yamaguchi's thought while this was happening was, oh, my God. He thought the mushroom cloud had followed him from Hiroshima. In a sense, it had sort of followed him there."

Health Implications and Genetic Concerns

[14:36] The episode delves into the scientific fears of the time regarding radiation's potential to cause long-term genetic damage. Herman Mueller, a pioneer in studying radiation effects, speculated that the bomb's impact could create a "thousand-year curse" affecting future generations.

[15:04] Sam Kean contrasts this fear with the actual scientific findings:

"There is no evidence that the next generation of people really suffered. The children of atomic bomb survivors in Japan didn't have a higher incidence of birth defects or cancer or anything like that."

This revelation challenges the initial fears, highlighting the resilience of DNA and the body's mechanisms for repairing radiation-induced damage.

Yamaguchi's Legacy: A Life After the Bombings

Yamaguchi and his wife, despite severe health issues stemming from radiation exposure, chose to have children. They had two daughters who, initially healthy, later experienced various health problems, including immune deficiencies. However, extensive studies in Japan found no significant increase in birth defects or cancer rates among the children of atomic bomb survivors, suggesting that the feared genetic curse did not materialize as anticipated.

[19:05] Sam Kean reflects on this outcome:

"Somehow just didn't get passed on to the next generation, it seems."

Scientific Insights: DNA Repair Mechanisms

[19:33] The episode explores the intricate DNA repair mechanisms that likely prevented the transmission of radiation-induced damage. The p53 gene, known as the "guardian of the genome," plays a crucial role in identifying and repairing DNA damage or initiating cell suicide to prevent cancerous mutations.

[20:26] Sam Kean elaborates on the DNA structure and repair:

"DNA is a double helix... if you've got A and C on one side, you know, you need T and G on the other... it's an ingenious system."

These biological safeguards ensure that even severe DNA damage can be corrected, mitigating the risk of hereditary genetic defects.

Conclusion: Resilience and Legacy

[22:19] Tsutomu Yamaguchi lived until 2010, reaching the age of 93, a testament to human resilience despite experiencing two atomic bombings. His story underscores the body's remarkable ability to repair DNA and challenges the initial fears of long-term genetic repercussions from radiation exposure.

[22:53] Latif Nasser closes the episode by expressing admiration for Sam Kean's work and briefly mentions Kean's new book, emphasizing the enduring impact of Yamaguchi's story.

Notable Quotes

• Latif Nasser [00:25]: "The story you are about to hear is one of the most vivid and... haunting. In a way, beautiful tellings of a singular human experience."

• Sam Kean [05:04]: "DNA is a very thirsty molecule... gamma rays... form these very reactive molecules called free radicals... they start ripping electrons off [DNA]."

• Sam Kean [19:05]: "Somehow just didn't get passed on to the next generation, it seems."

Key Takeaways

• Tsutomu Yamaguchi's Unique Experience: Only a few individuals, including Yamaguchi, were exposed to both the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, providing unique insights into the effects of nuclear weapons.

• Radiation and DNA: The episode elucidates how gamma rays from atomic bombs cause immediate DNA damage but also highlights the body's efficient repair mechanisms that prevent long-term genetic defects.

• Debunking the Genetic Curse Myth: Contrary to early scientific fears, extensive research indicates that radiation-induced genetic damage from the bombings did not adversely affect subsequent generations.

• Human Resilience: Yamaguchi's life exemplifies human resilience in the face of unimaginable devastation, surviving two atomic bombings and living a long life thereafter.

Conclusion

"Double-Blasted" is a poignant exploration of one man's survival through one of history's darkest moments and the scientific journey to understand the true impact of nuclear radiation. Through meticulous storytelling and expert insights, Radiolab not only honors Tsutomu Yamaguchi's legacy but also provides a nuanced understanding of radiation's effects on human DNA and future generations.

Transcript

[Latif Nasser]

Radiolab is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. You chose to hit play on this podcast today. Smart choice. Make another smart choice with Auto Quote Explorer to compare rates from multiple car insurance companies all at once. Try [e-mail] Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy.

[Sam Kean]

Latif.

[Latif Nasser]

Hey, it's Latif Nasser. This is Radiolab. Now I'm about to play for you an episode about an event that you know about, that you've read about a hundred times in textbooks, on Wikipedia pages. No shortage of accounts of this event. And yet the story you are about to hear is one of the most vivid and. And in a way haunting. In a way beautiful tellings of a singular human experience. It sort of tells this compelling story on two levels. On a human level, and then on a. Literally on a cellular level, even smaller than a cellular level, on a DNA level. I think it's a tremendous piece of work and I had nothing to do with making it, so I feel like you can take my word on that. We first aired it in 2012. Here it is, double blasted. Wait, you're listening.

[Unknown]

All right. Okay. All right.

[Sam Kean]

You're listening to Radiolab Radio Lab from wnyc.

[Unknown]

Rewind.

Sam, are you there?

[Sam Kean]

I am here. Hello?

[Unknown]

Okay.

Hey, Sam.

[Sam Kean]

Hello. How are you?

[Unknown]

Good. How are you?

[Sam Kean]

Good.

[Unknown]

So, to begin with, we're talking to author Sam Keane, Radiolab regular, and he has just written a wonderful new book called the Violinist's Thumb. And in it he tells a story which is actually kind of encouraging, I think. Yeah.

To get to that part, though, you have to make it through the worst.

Luck imaginable and a thousand year curse. Yeah, well, I don't even know where to begin with you, but maybe just.

Tell us the fellow's name.

[Sam Kean]

The fellow's name is, I hope I'm pronouncing it right. Tsutomu Yamaguchi.

[Unknown]

He is Japanese, of course.

[Sam Kean]

Story takes place in Japan, specifically on August 6, 1945.

[Unknown]

What is his job, this fellow?

[Sam Kean]

He's a ship engineer. He designed big military and shipping boats for Mitsubishi.

[Unknown]

And Mr. Yamaguchi had spent the last couple of months working in Hiroshima.

But now, finally, he's about to leave.

[Sam Kean]

The next day to return home.

[Unknown]

And on the morning of August 6th, what's happening with him?

[Sam Kean]

He gets partway to work and he realizes that he has forgotten his incon.

[Unknown]

What's an incon?

[Sam Kean]

It's a seal that they use to stamp documents.

[Unknown]

Oh.

[Sam Kean]

That was his signature, which, you know.

[Unknown]

Was important for his work.

[Sam Kean]

So he goes back home to his boarding house, gets waylaid by the owners of the boarding house he's at, and they say, would you come to have tea with us? And he's very polite. So he sits down for tea for a while with them. Then finally they let him go. He grabs his ink on, hops back on the bus, takes his bus to a streetcar, gets off the streetcar, and he starts walking. And at this point, it's about 8:15 in the morning, he's got about a.

[Unknown]

Mile to walk to get to the Mitsubishi plant. So he's walking by some farms to get to the city, when all of.

[Sam Kean]

A sudden he hears something overhead. He looks up in the sky and.

[Unknown]

He sees a plane way, way up above him.

[Sam Kean]

And he can just see a very tiny speck descending from the belly of the plane.

[Unknown]

And he knows right away that's a bomb. I mean, Japan is at war after all.

[Sam Kean]

He's been drilled in air raid tactics.

[Unknown]

So he drops to the ground, covers.

[Sam Kean]

His head, and he plugs his thumbs into his ears and he waits for the big bang to go off.

[Unknown]

But this time, before there's even a.

[Sam Kean]

Sound, there was a very hot flash of very bright white light that sort of bathed over him. Then after that came the roar. It actually picked him up off the ground and threw him. He could feel the air sort of raking over his belly, and it threw him down and he landed unconscious.

[Unknown]

Okay, before we move forward with Satomu's day, and it does not end here, let's just rewind the story about a fraction of a second back to that moment when he's on the ground, crouching with his fingers in his ears, and that light comes. Well, the thing about that white light.

[Sam Kean]

Is that it is filled with gamma rays, which are basically like really high powered, intense X rays.

[Unknown]

And in that instant, the light hits him. Those gamma rays shoot through his skin into the cells of his body where his DNA is, where they slam into water molecules that are clustered around the DNA.

[Sam Kean]

DNA is a very thirsty molecule. It has lots of water nearby it. And gamma rays, when they come crashing in, they knock electrons right off the water molecules and it forms these very reactive molecules called free radicals, which become.

[Unknown]

Like hungry little beasts.

[Sam Kean]

And they start to go after DNA. They're very greedy for electrons because they're missing an electron at this point, and they see this big molecule nearby, DNA, they go right after it and they start ripping electrons off. They basically cut it at various points.

[Unknown]

All of which is to say that the moment the light Hit him. Tsutomu Yamaguchi's DNA got shredded.

Where did the bomb land? In proximity to him, like right near him, or was it miles and miles away?

[Sam Kean]

He was about a mile or so away. It's a little hard to judge, but he was about a mile or so away and he just remembers waking up lying in the potato field.

[Unknown]

So then what happens?

[Sam Kean]

He wakes up and he has no idea how long he was unconscious because the bomb sucked up so much dirt that it sort of made the entire area dark. It was like storm clouds over the entire city. So he couldn't tell how long he'd been unconscious. But he got to his feet and sort of started staggering through this potato field.

[Unknown]

And he looks down at his arms.

[Sam Kean]

It looked like he had this horrendous sunburn on both of his forearms, especially his left forearm, which was closer to the bomb. But he's walking by people who are torn open and bleeding or staggering. They're clearly not going to make it. And he's just sort of wandering through this field before he realizes that he should go report to work.

[Unknown]

He's going to go to Mitsubishi.

[Sam Kean]

He didn't know what to do. He was sort of dazed. That was the only thing he could think of to even try to do. It was the only real anchor he had to the city.

[Unknown]

But when he gets to the Mitsubishi plant, it isn't there. It's just rubble. His co workers are dead. So he decides what he's got to do is he's got to find a way to get home and back to his family.

[Sam Kean]

And he starts hearing a rumor that there are going to be trains leaving Hiroshima to go south, which is where he's from. And he decides he's going to get to the train station no matter what. The unfortunate part is that he has to cross over rivers to get to the train station. And most of the bridges have been knocked out.

[Unknown]

At this point, he finds himself walking along one river, literally filled with bodies that are beginning to pack together.

[Sam Kean]

And he's desperate enough where he actually starts crawling over this bridge of bodies in the river because he had no other way of getting across. And they were clogging the river at a lot of points. So he starts crawling over them. But he gets to a gap in the river, so he has to turn back. He goes a little bit downstream and he finds that there's a railroad trestle across the river at this point, and there's one beam of it intact. So he climbs up this little tower and basically, like a tightrope Walker starts walking across this railroad trestle to get to the other side.

[Unknown]

Eventually he does find the train station.

[Sam Kean]

And there's predictably kind of a mob waiting to get on these trains. But he pushes his way through, gets to the train and he sits down.

[Unknown]

And the train leaves to take him home to Nagasaki.

Go away.

He's Nagasaki.

He's going from Hiroshima a day later to Nagasaki.

[Sam Kean]

He's going to Nagasaki the next day.

[Latif Nasser]

That's right after the break. Radiolab is supported by Audible Can AI predict the source of the next global pandemic? Or at least help convince a Hollywood studio to buy a new screenplay from Scott Z. Burns, the writer of Contagion? With special guest appearances from director Steven Soderbergh, Laurence Fishburne and Jennifer E. Lee, check out what Could Go Wrong, A deeply thoughtful, occasionally frightening and often hilarious Audible Original podcast, the series delves head and heart first into one of today's burning questions. Can humankind and AI work hand in hand? Featuring an extraordinary collection of minds, both skeptics and optimists across academia, sciences, journalism and the entertainment industry, what Could Go Wrong? Follows Scott as he slips deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole with an ever expanding cast of AI generated partners, including Lexter, his extraordinarily gifted, sharp tongued collaborator. They co write and pitch Hollywood execs the Contagion sequel. In this brave new world of human AI collaboration, one question looms large. What could possibly Go Wrong? Listen to what Could Go Wrong now on audible. Go to audible.com whatcouldgowrong to learn more. Radiolab is supported by Capital One Banking with Capital One helps you keep more money in your wallet with no fees or minimums on checking accounts and no overdraft fees. Just ask the Capital One bank guy. It's pretty much all he talks about in a good way. He'd also tell you that Radiolab is his favorite podcast too. Oh really?

[Unknown]

Thanks.

[Latif Nasser]

Capital One Bank Guy what's in your wallet? Terms apply. See capitalone.combank Capital One NA member FDIC.

[Unknown]

Radiolab is supported by Factor. As summertime is gearing up, schedules may look a little more touch and go. Whether it's an upcoming family vacation or kids summer camp that has you leaving work earlier than usual, so meals might take a hit. And Factor is here to help. Thanks to the menus crafted by chefs with options like Calorie, Smart, Protein plus and Keto, Factor offers fresh, never frozen meals. Plus they're dietitian approved and ready to eat in just two minutes. You can feel nourished and ready to roll no matter what life throws at you. Perfect for any active, busy lifestyle. With 40 options across eight dietary preferences on the menu each week, it's easy to pick meals that are tailored to your eating goals. Factor can help you feel your best all day long with wholesome smoothies, breakfast grab and go snacks and more add ons. Eat smart with Factor get started at FactorMeals.com Radiolab and use code Radiolab to get 50% off your first box plus free shipping. That's code [e-mail] RADIOLAB to get 50% off plus free shipping on your first box.

[Latif Nasser]

Radiolab is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game? Well, with the name your price tool from Progressive, you can find options that fit your budget and potentially lower your bills. Try [e-mail], progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Not available in all states. Just before the break, our main character, Yamaguchi, had left Hiroshima to go find his family.

[Unknown]

He's going from Hiroshima a day later to Nagasaki.

[Sam Kean]

He's going to Nagasaki the next day.

[Unknown]

I don't, I don't like where this is going.

Does he find his family?

[Sam Kean]

He gets to them. He finds them at home.

[Unknown]

Spends a day swimming in and out of consciousness.

[Sam Kean]

And the next day, August 9, he gets up, gets to Mitsubishi headquarters. He's bandaged up, not looking very good, and he starts telling his boss and his fellow engineers about this enormous bomb that had exploded and devastated the city. And after a minute or so, his boss cuts him off and he says that this is complete baloney. You're an engineer. Calculate it. How could one bomb do? Destroy an entire city? And as soon as he finished saying that, Yamaguchi felt the same flash that he'd felt in Hiroshima, followed by that.

[Unknown]

Same roar for a second time.

[Sam Kean]

Yamaguchi's thought while this was happening was, oh, my God. He thought the mushroom cloud had followed him from Hiroshima. In a sense, I guess he was right. It had sort of followed him there.

[Unknown]

And again in that flash, gamma rays flood his body.

[Sam Kean]

They would have created free radicals again, and it would have attacked his DNA a second time.

[Unknown]

A second time he pulls himself up, staggers out of the building.

[Sam Kean]

It didn't collapse this time.

[Unknown]

And he climbs up a hill nearby.

[Sam Kean]

And he starts looking over at Nagasaki.

[Unknown]

Which is burning just like Hiroshima was three days before. And the sky is black with clouds again.

[Sam Kean]

And he could see where his neighborhood was. And it looked like his neighborhood was Completely burnt out, too.

[Unknown]

He does eventually find his family. They made it into an air raid shelter. And they do try to restart their lives. But within a short time, his health.

[Sam Kean]

Starts sinking pretty quickly. His hair fell out. He had boils erupting on his body. He kept throwing up. His face swelled. He lost hearing in one ear. His arm, he reported, looked like whale meat. This sort of bright red raw meat because he'd had sort of this blackened crust over it. And when the second bomb came, it incinerated that and fell off.

[Unknown]

Now, the really scary thing for scientists at the time who, you know, had begun to study the effect of radiation on the body was that it seemed like all that physical trauma, that was just the beginning of. Of the nightmare. Because, remember, these gamma rays attack the DNA that makes you you. And that's not just a problem for you. That's the same DNA that you pass down to your kids and their kids and their kids kids.

What if those genes stay broken down through time?

[Sam Kean]

There was a famous quote from Herman Mueller, the person who first figured out that exposing genes to radiation could cause a lot of damage to them. And he told the New York Times, if the bomb survivors could foresee the results a thousand years from now, they might consider themselves more fortunate. If the bomb had killed them, he thought that it would propagate like a biblical curse through the generations.

[Unknown]

And when the actual damage was done, how long did that take?

[Sam Kean]

It's over within a millisecond. The gamma rays coming in, that is over in a millionth of a billionth of a second. That happens pretty much instantaneously. And the free radical doing their damage is over after about a millisecond.

[Unknown]

Wow. So a millisecond creates this in Mueller's forecasting thousand year curse.

[Sam Kean]

Exactly. It's over at that point.

[Unknown]

And here was a guy who got.

[Sam Kean]

Blasted twice within the span of three days.

[Unknown]

How many people on Earth were in both blasts?

[Sam Kean]

There's only a handful of people that they know of who were in what they call the blast zone, about a mile or a mile and a half zone in both cities. And Yamaguchi was one of those few people.

[Unknown]

So the question was, was Mueller right? Did these bombs create some kind of genetic curse that would echo through time? How long would it last?

For the next 40, 50 years. Scientists both in Japan and in America began to track birth defects, incidence of cancer in the children of those who had been hit or blasted by the bomb.

Which brings us back to Mr. Yamaguchi.

[Sam Kean]

Couple years later, Yamaguchi and his wife did decide that they did want to have children.

[Unknown]

So he recovers.

[Sam Kean]

He does recover. He goes back to work at Mitsubishi again. She's been so good to him. He had to go back there.

[Unknown]

I mean, it's not their fault, Right.

[Sam Kean]

Anyhow, so he gets back on his feet, his health returns, and in the early 1950s, he and his wife decide that they want to have some more children. As you can imagine, there was a lot of anxiety about this kind of throughout the world. People really didn't know what was going to happen, especially because the initial blast of radiation really hit pregnant women hard. There were a lot of birth defects. It ended up producing a lot of babies with very tiny heads called microcephaly, and they had very low IQs. They couldn't do anything for themselves.

[Unknown]

Nonetheless, Mr. Yamaguchi and his wife decide they're gonna go for it.

[Sam Kean]

And they do have children.

[Unknown]

Children, plural?

[Sam Kean]

Yeah, they had two daughters after that. And the two daughters initially are fine. They don't have any noticeable birth defects or any birth defects. But they ended up starting in their teenage years and then, especially as adults, having a lot of health problems. They had a lot of immune problems. And they quite naturally blame it on the fact that their father got exposed to the nuclear bomb twice and their mom got exposed once, but still no.

[Unknown]

Cancer, no birth defects.

And roughly 60 years later, as far.

[Sam Kean]

As I know, they're still alive.

[Unknown]

Really?

[Sam Kean]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

Now, here's the amazing thing.

[Sam Kean]

In Japan generally, though, there's really no evidence that the next generation of people really suffered. The children of atomic bomb survivors in Japan were really didn't have a higher incidence of birth defects or cancer or anything like that.

[Unknown]

Now, of course, the people who were directly exposed to radiation, obviously they had a ton of health problems, but it.

[Sam Kean]

Somehow just didn't get passed on to the next generation, it seems.

[Unknown]

Seriously, I find that so surprising.

[Sam Kean]

Yeah, I just assumed that the next generation of children would have reported a lot of health damage, a lot of birth defects, a much higher rate of cancer, but that didn't happen.

[Unknown]

Why not? I mean, like, how could it not affect the next generation? I mean, given the way that the gamma rays attack the DNA, it just seems like it would have to.

[Sam Kean]

Well, there is evidence that people.

[Unknown]

Sam says there's a couple of things that might have happened here. First of all, if you're talking about damage getting passed down through generations, the key thing for DNA is what's going on inside your sperm and your egg cells. Those are the sex cells.

[Sam Kean]

That's the only DNA that gets passed to the next generation.

[Unknown]

And he says, maybe these sex cells are just hardier than we thought.

[Sam Kean]

And probably even more importantly, it turns out that after 4 billion years, DNA can do a pretty good job of repairing itself. There's one gene in particular called the p53 gene, and that's sometimes called the guardian of the genome. And it looks for DNA damage wherever it can.

[Unknown]

It's sort of like our guardian angel embedded in our genes. And there's a lot of different ways that DNA can get messed up.

[Sam Kean]

DNA is a double helix, which means.

[Unknown]

It'S got these two strands of chemicals.

[Sam Kean]

The A, C, G and T letters.

[Unknown]

That all fit together sort of like a zipper, so that the letters always.

[Sam Kean]

Match, A always matches with T, and C always matches with G. So if you can read one side of the DNA strand, you know what has to appear on the opposite strand.

[Unknown]

So when one of the two strands gets damaged, this p53 gene, it sort.

[Sam Kean]

Of whistles over these certain handyman proteins, and they come over, they'll basically cut that strand out, throw it away, and.

[Unknown]

Pop in a new one. Because if you've got A and C on one side, you know, you need T and G on the other.

[Sam Kean]

Pretty simple. It's an ingenious system. Other times, both strands get snapped, and that is kind of an emergency for your body.

[Unknown]

When that happens, this little guardian gene.

[Sam Kean]

Will basically force the cell to commit.

[Unknown]

Suicide, because it can't afford to have that cell turn cancerous.

Now, I don't think we want to leave the impression that, you know, you can stand in a bomb blast and your children will not be affected. For sure. For sure. Because I don't think we're that sure.

[Sam Kean]

No, there is evidence that people from Chernobyl, for instance, did show higher signs of birth defects, but there was different kinds of radiation that got into the food supply. And when radiation gets in your body, it's kind of like a bazooka at short range, and it does a lot more damage to your DNA.

[Unknown]

Which is why, in 2011, with the reactor meltdown, the Japanese government immediately quarantined all contaminated food and animals. But still, what's sort of beautiful here is that something that seems so unbelievably intricate and fragile, like a strand of DNA, that little tiny flame that we pass into the future, that. That can be so surprisingly resilient, that we can be so resilient.

What happened to Mr. Yamaguchi?

[Sam Kean]

What was he actually lived all the way until 2010.

[Unknown]

2010.

[Sam Kean]

He lived 65 years after that.

[Unknown]

How old was he?

[Sam Kean]

He was let me look up to make sure he was 93 years old when he finally died.

[Unknown]

Oh, my God.

[Latif Nasser]

Big thank you to Sam Kean, whose work we always and forever love. He actually has a new book out. I mean, every book that Sam Keane has ever wrote is like, is worth your time. This new one is called Dinner with King. How Rogue Archaeologists are Recreating the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of lost civilizations. We'll be back next week. Thank you for listening.

[Unknown]

Hi, I'm Natalie and I'm from Brooklyn, New York. And here are the staff credits. Radiolab was created by Jad Abumrad and is edited by Soren Wheeler. Lulu Miller and Latif Nasser are our co hosts. Dylan Keefe is our director of sound design. Our staff includes Salmon Adler, Jeremy Bloom, Becca Bressler, W. Harry Fortuna, David Gable, Rebecca Wax, Maria Paz Gutierrez, Sindhu Yanansambundam, Matt Kielty, Annie McEwen, Alex Neeson, Sarah Carey, Sarah Sandbach, Anissa Vitze, Arianne Wack, Pat Walters, Molly Webster, and Jessica Young, with help from Rebecca Rand. Our fact checkers are Diane Kelly, Emily Krieger, Anna Pujol Mazzini, and Natalie Middleton.

Hi, I'm Daniel from Madrid. Leadership support from radelab.

[Latif Nasser]

Science programming is provided by the Simons foundation and the John Turpent Foundation. Foundational support from Radiolab was provided by.

[Unknown]

The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

[Latif Nasser]

How many discounts does USAA Auto Insurance offer? Too many to say here. Multi vehicle discount, Safe driver discount, New vehicle discount, Storage discount, Legacy.

[Unknown]

How many discounts will you stack up? Tap the banner or visit usaa.com autodiscounts restrictions apply.

This is Ira Flato, host of Science Friday. For over 30 years, the science Friday team has been reporting high quality science and technology news, making science fun for curious people by covering everything from the outer reaches of space to the rapidly changing world of AI to the tiniest microbes in our bodies. Audiences trust our show because they know we're driven by a mission to inform and serve listeners first and foremost with important news they won't get anywhere else. And our sponsors benefit from that halo effect. For more information on becoming a sponsor, visit sponsorship.wnyc.org.