).png)
The Science Pawdcast
The Science Pawdcast breaks down the latest science happening in the human world AND the pet world.
Each episode will also bring you a guest to enthral you with their area of knowledge.
You'll learn, be captivated, and laugh along with host Jason Zackowski.
Pets and Science, it's the pawfect mix.
You'll also get episodes of PetChat which are the live shows from social audio.
PetChat is a live community gathering updates about the animals in our life, but also the animals in the wonderful community that supports us!
Heart and Hope.
Science and Shenanigans.
The Science Pawdcast
Season 5 Episode 44: Daydreaming Mice, Wooly Dogs, and Teaching Science with Heart with guest Skylar Stevens
Ever found yourself marveling at how even the tiniest creatures might wander off into their own little worlds?
We sure have, and we bring that sense of wonder to our season finale!
Our special guest, the inspiring Skyler Stevens from UNM Gallup campus, joins us to chart the intersection of daydreaming studies in mice and her vibrant journey in the realm of science, from biology to infectious disease research. Imagine, if you will, mice reflecting on checkerboard patterns – it's a delightful thought that might carry a deeper evolutionary purpose, much like the paths that led Skyler from the deserts of the Southwest to the academic thralls of New England and back again.
The conversation takes a practical turn, revealing the behind-the-scenes of nurse education and anatomy management. Skyler's experiences in teaching anatomy, complete with the hilarious trials of dealing with unexpected pig uteruses, are bound to bring a chuckle. And if you're an animal lover, you're in for a treat! We share laughs over pet antics, highlighting how these loyal companions weave themselves into the fabric of our lives. Skyler's tales from the classroom and her service dog Missy May's escapades offer a glimpse into the human side of science and education.
As we close the book on the year, we reminisce about the Christmas cheer spread among students by Dad and the family dogs, Bunsen and Beaker. The joy of the festive season intermingles with heartfelt stories from our own lives, leaving you with a warm, fuzzy feeling as we head into the holidays. We're incredibly thankful for the "pot pack" community's support and hope to leave you smiling as you await our return in February. So, snuggle in with a hot cocoa, and let's send off the year with a blend of science, laughter, and good old holiday spirit!
Bunsen and Beaker Links:
30% off the first month at Zencastr - use the code in the show!
https://zen.ai/3LXIX2UYb1RLXwtWHHjryXAutdr3HS5EpVHMW80BOKg
Save 10% at Bark and Beyond with the coupon code BUNSEN!
The 2024 Bunsen and Beaker Calendar is ready to order!
The Ginger Stuffie is on presale so check the link here!
Join The Paw Pack to Support The Show!
https://bunsenbernerbmd.com/pages/paw-pack-plus-community
Our Website!
The Bunsen and Beaker Website has adorable merch with hundreds of different combinations of designs and apparel- all with Printful- one of the highest quality companies we could find!
www.bunsenbernerbmd.com
Sign up for our Weekly Newsletter!
Bunsen and Beaker on Twitter:
Bunsen and Beaker on TikTok:
Bunsen and Beaker on Facebook
For Science, Empathy, and Cuteness!
Being Kind is a Superpower.
https://twitter.com/bunsenbernerbmd
Hello science enthusiasts. Ho ho ho, welcome to the last Science Podcast episode of 2023. My name is Jason Zekowski, I am the dog dad of Bunsen Beaker, the Science Dog's on social media, and I am the host of the Science Podcast. We hope you have a merry Christmas, happy holidays and spend some time with family and friends. Alright, let's get on to the show. Okay, what did you guys think? That was a little silly intro.
Speaker 2:I liked it.
Speaker 1:It's a little different and, yeah, it is the last show of 2023. We take a bit of a break. I meant to have a break for myself. It's a lot being a full-time teacher and doing the podcast week, week, week, week, week on week. So the last bit of December and all of January I take off from podcasting. Get a little bit of a holiday. So after this episode, we'll see you back in February, but we have a good show today.
Speaker 1:On the Science Podcast and Science News, we're going to be looking at a study about daydreaming and in Pet Science, we're going to be looking at an extinct dog that the Salish Tribal Nations in Washington State and British Columbia had. It's kind of interesting. Our guest and ask-and-expert is lecturer Skyler Stevens and she's going to be talking to us about her role as educating nurses with some general science and she's a hoot. So the interview is amazing. Okay, the bad joke? Well, daydreaming. I started having an imaginary argument with Chris, who's my wife, guess what. I still lost the argument. Ha, ha ha. There's not a lot of daydreaming puns. Okay, let's get on with the show, because there's no time like science time. This week in Science News, we're going to talk about daydreaming.
Speaker 1:Are you a daydreamer? Is that something that you can just like, let your mind wander and minutes go by? I'd have to say I'm not much of a daydreamer. I can sometimes get obsessed and focused on the wrong stuff, like maybe I'm supposed to like, maybe I'm supposed to record the podcast and I get obsessed with a video game. Like I don't play a lot of video games, but maybe I'm obsessed with one. Or I get I get obsessed with cosplay. I don't know if that's daydreaming or just like. Just like getting obsessed with the thing and everything else melts away.
Speaker 1:Daydreaming is not really well understood by science, but a recent study published in Nature, led by Harvard Medical School researchers maybe nudged the needle towards progress in unraveling the mysteries of daydreaming by looking at mice. So they weren't looking at people, they were looking at mice. Well, the study focused on tracking activity in the brain neurons, specifically in the visual cortex of mice, while they were in a quiet waking state. So they were awake, but they were very quiet, they weren't doing anything, and the idea was is the most daydreaming at this point? Those neurons occasionally would fire in a pattern that represented the same kind of pattern that an actual image would make in the mouse brain. The mouse sees cheese and that is like the neurons fire to make a pattern that oh, it's cheese. And what the study found was the neurons were making an imaginary image because the mice were potentially thinking about it or daydreaming about the image. Now how did they test mice on this? Okay, so these were repeatedly shown checkerboard pattern images and then had their neuronal activity in their cortex recorded. So they were shown a picture and the thinky, thinky parts in their brains were checked and they were recorded to see what was the mouse doing when they were shown those checkerboard pattern images and from that you get the neuron firing distinct patterns.
Speaker 1:When the mice looked at those checkerboard images and the idea was is that you know they showed the mice this image so often? Maybe the mouse would think about that image like why did the human show me that image? And they would daydream and think why? Why did the humans, these weirdo humans, show me this image? And ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, their brain made that image in their head because they were thinking about it or daydreaming about it. The mice had to be relaxed, they had to be calm and their pupils had to be small in order for this to occur and the idea is that's very similar to humans. When a human daydreams, you can't be rushing about, you can't be, you can't be full of anxiety, your mind can wander.
Speaker 1:The team found the mice daydreamed more about their most recent image and they had more daydreams at the beginning of the day. I think this is opposite for me. I'm super, super focused in the morning and maybe, maybe I do daydream it in the afternoon. It's like I'm tight, I'm tired, I have to maybe like mark stuff after school and I just waste time. So no, I don't daydream, I just waste time.
Speaker 1:Now back to the mice. They looked also at different parts of the brain that were firing when the mouse was quote, unquote daydreaming, and they found that there was activity in the hippocampus that sort of suggests there was a communication between the two brain regions. There's a lot of implications here for something that's called brain plasticity. Brain plasticity or neuroplasticity is the ability of networks in the brain to change through growth and reorganization. So your brain can actually like file stuff away and move it to a different part or reorganize it into something that makes sense. They found that there was some shifting going on. The patterns originally made by daydreaming, sharpened as the as the mouse saw the image more often, so their daydreaming became more and more focused. Their brain was able to change a bit. Is there an evolutionary reason why it'd be good to daydream? That's what the researchers kind of put at the end of the study.
Speaker 1:When you're daydreaming about something that is important to you or it's part of your life like for the mice, that is, those checkerboard images it may give you, the mouse, an ability to discriminate between different images, because while they were daydreaming their brain was becoming a laser sharp, focused on that image. Should we make time to daydream? And the answer is probably. There's some good evidence that it's great for your mental health to let your mind wander and not be constantly thinking all the time. I struggle with that. As soon as I've got downtime, my brain is like what can I do? What can I make? What can I do? So I probably need to let my my mind wander a bit and daydream. I think we've lost a little bit about that. I was talking to a lot of my students the other day when I was a kid you you probably daydreamed a lot more because you just didn't have a device. You had didn't have a phone, you didn't have video games or something to do, and on car rides, if you didn't have an activity book, you were looking out the window and thinking about things. Daydreaming is a big part of what humans do when we're calm and we're quiet, so probably warrants further exploration.
Speaker 1:That's science news for this week. This week in pet science we're going to travel back in time and look at a breed of dog that has gone extinct. It always makes me a little sad when I learn about a breed of dog that went extinct. You know we'll never get the pettit, we'll never get to see it. It's just gone, and I guess this hits very close to home, because Bunsen is a Bernice mountain dog and the Bernice mountain dogs literally almost went extinct. When the dogs weren't needed to haul heavy things because of mechanized vehicles, there wasn't a need to breed them anymore and those dogs felt a dangerously low numbers before they were basically resurrected by teams breeding the dogs back up again.
Speaker 1:This news item on dogs comes from the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and they conducted an analysis on the ancestry and genetics of woolly dogs. That's what they're called woolly dogs. They were a breed that were a big part of an indigenous coast Salish communities in the Pacific Northwest, so that would be both in the United States and Canada. Now the study focused on taking those genetic clues preserved in a pelt. So the museum has a pelt and the pelt belonged to a dog named Mutton and it's the only known one in the world. This is the only piece of a woolly dog fleece anywhere. This study was published in Science on December 14th. Let's get some perspective on this dog breed.
Speaker 1:The Salish tribal nations in Washington State and British Columbia bred and cared for these dogs for thousands of years. This wasn't a flash in the pan type dog. This dog has been around for a while. There are pictures of the Salish woolly dog but to give you an idea, as this is not a visual medium, the dogs had a thick undercoat and they were sheared like sheep. They would grow their coat and they would take their coat off like sheep, and that coat was used by the Salish weavers for making blankets and ceremonial items. So their good boys and good girls also made great clothing when they were sheared. The dogs also held special spiritual significance and they were treated like beloved family members, just like we treat our dogs. In fact, there are art forms in Coast Salish communities honoring the woolly dogs.
Speaker 1:Sadly, in the mid 19th century that the woolly dog tradition was in decline. Folks were able to get their quote unquote wool from cheaper supplies and a naturalist named George Gibbs cared for a woolly dog named Mutton. Mutton died in the 1850s and his pelt was sent on to the Smithsonian and it was the only one they had and it was largely forgotten about until the early 2000s. A lot of stuff in museums just sits in the back. Lots and lots of storage. What you see at a museum is a fraction of what they have in the back.
Speaker 1:So after this pelt was found, the team of researchers were like let's, let's take a look at what kind of genetic code that we have in there. And they sequenced the woolly dog genome and compared it to modern dog breeds to identify some of the features that are similar. They also looked at chemical signatures in Mutton's Pelt to determine what the dog ate. So the history goes like this Because of this genetic analysis, the woolly dogs diverged from other breeds of dogs about 5,000 years ago and that aligns with the archaeological remains of the region when we when they looked at the genetic similarity to pre-colonial dogs. So this is like the First Nations dogs from Newfoundland and British Columbia that there's an 85% fit. So they do link to that timeline and this ancestry persisted despite the Europeans and other nations bringing their dogs to North America, and that indicates that the Coast Salish communities really didn't want their woolly dogs breeding with anything else but the woolly dogs that they loved. There wasn't any mixed breeds. There were no woolly dog doodles. Within the genome there are 28 genes linked to hair growth and follicle regeneration, and this is kind of fun. That same gene is associated with woolly hair phenotypes in humans, like what humans have, and curly hair in other dogs, very similar to genes in woolly mammoths.
Speaker 1:So why did they go extinct? Well, as I mentioned, they didn't need the wool as much anymore. There are machine made blankets that were a lot faster. So it was more became more of a hobby than something that you needed to do to provide for your family. There were diseases and displacement and sadly, a big one was forced assimilation. So the Salish people were pushed out of their land and they were forced to settle places they did not normally live and perhaps the dog was something they sacrificed. The disappearance of the dog occurred rapidly. Within a couple of generations. The dog lives maybe 12 year, 12, 13 years. You're looking at under 30 years for the complete extinction of the woolly dog. So we can't bring the woolly dog back as part of history. I think it's really interesting to learn about these types of creatures and a reminder that the coastal Salish society still has memory of the woolly dogs. It's embedded in their culture, it's embedded in their art and when you, when they talked to the folks and interviewed them who were the elders in the Salish community, the woolly dog is embedded in their hearts.
Speaker 1:That's pet science for this week. Hello everybody, here's some ways you can keep the science podcast free, number one in our show notes. Sign up to be a member of our pop hack plus community. It's an amazing community of folks who love pets and folks who love science. We have tons of bonus Bunsen and beaker content there and we have live streams every Sunday with our community. It's tons of fun. Also, think about checking out our merch store. We've got the Bunsen stuffy, the beaker stuffy and now the ginger stuffy. That's right, ginger, the science cat, has a little replica. It's adorable. It's so soft, with the giant fluffy tail, safety glasses and a lab coat. And number three, if you're listening to the podcast on any place that rates podcasts, give us a great rating and tell your family and friends to listen to. Okay, on with the show. Back to the interviews. It's time for ask an expert on the science podcast, and I have Skyler Stevens with me today, a lecturer at UNM Gallup campus. Who did I get that right?
Speaker 3:Yes, and that's New Mexico. I know it's a people here that acronym and get confused.
Speaker 1:UNM what you know. Like if I said you have a, you probably wouldn't know where that is because that's in Canada. So it's probably all relative to where you live in the world.
Speaker 3:Yes, I would think you were talking about Arizona.
Speaker 1:Exactly, exactly, yeah, so do you live in New Mexico, or is this like one of those places that's the the New New Mexico, but it's in a different state, cause some of those are like that.
Speaker 3:No, I live in New Mexico, so Gallup is in the kind of the northwest corner, 20 miles from the border with Arizona and about about 30 minutes from window rock, which is the capital of the Navajo nation. It's a really cool area.
Speaker 1:Are you? Are you okay with desert living? That sounds like a hot area of the world to live in.
Speaker 3:Um, it is, it can be, and I am a total desert rat. Um, I I'm from the desert in West Texas, I'm from the Chihuahuan Desert, and, um, I was living in New England before this, where I went to school and there were so many trees and it was very wet. So, um, when I got a chance to move back to the Southwest, I just jumped off and jumped on it.
Speaker 1:Nice, you're like, you need the, you need, I need the dry heat. I need that dry heat. Is that what you folks call it?
Speaker 3:Okay, yeah, but but Gallup is actually, uh, we're at 6,500 feet in elevation, so we are at the high, very high desert. Um, so we actually have pretty good winters. Um, you mentioned Alberta. My best friend lives in Alberta and we're often at the same temperature during the winter, but she just has a lot more snow.
Speaker 1:Oh, more precipitation, I see.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Well, that would be good. That's good. That's what I like, because I, if it's going to be cold, I'd like there to be lots of snow, because I'm a skier and snowshoer. Um, but I imagine there's gorgeous places to hike and, just like you know, just explore around there, be so cool oh yeah, it's, it is a really pretty area, very remote, um, very kind of different and desolate.
Speaker 3:It's not the desert people picture, like you know, the snore and desert with big suaro, cactuses and things. Um, it's can be very barren, um, but I but I really like that, that kind of harshness, Um, it's really pretty.
Speaker 1:That's cool. That is so cool. Um, Skyler, I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about your training in science.
Speaker 3:Um, yeah. So, um, I have two master's degrees, um, I and a bachelor's in biology Um, and then I. So I got a bachelor's in biology from Sul Ross State University, which is a little school in Alpine Texas, which West Texas, um, and then I stayed there for a master's in range and wildlife management Um, I got to study mountain lions and black bears and other carnivores and big bins national park, cool it was. Uh, they, they offered me I wasn't sure what I wanted to do for the for my masters, if I was going to stay there or not, and they said, would you like to study mountain lions and big bend? And I was like, yes, um, just immediately as um, and then um, but I've always had an interest in disease and so I wanted to kind of get more disease training. To put that together with my ecology background, um, so I did a second master's in infectious disease and global health at Tufts University in Massachusetts, um, so that's my educational background. Um, but um kind of always loved science, so yeah, that's what I was going to ask.
Speaker 1:Like, when you were young, were you like were you reading science books, watching science shows, catching lizards, like that kind of stuff?
Speaker 3:Uh, oh yeah. Um, and my dad's a veterinarian and I grew up with my dad and, um, he is, uh, I was always like a big reader and he was kind of let me read whatever I could could read, whether it was probably age appropriate or not.
Speaker 1:Um, you got some Stephen King in when you were like seven Cause that's what happened to me.
Speaker 3:Yes, well, mine was like books on Ebola and, um, okay, all right.
Speaker 1:When I was in fifth, grade.
Speaker 3:I remember when I was in like I think it was either, it was an elementary school and people asked what I wanted to be when I grew up and I would say a virologist. And they would just be like, oh, this kid is weird. And uh, he, I mean, he, let me read science journals. Like I mean, I couldn't understand these medical journals. Um, I couldn't fully understand them, but I liked the pictures and I I would get what I could out of it. So, um, I was an extremely nerdy kid, um, but, but surprisingly, it actually took me a while to figure out that I should just study biology and school. Um, I started school for welding. Um, when I first started college, I wanted to build off-road jeeps.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. I love it.
Speaker 3:So and then I did literature for a little while, um, and I loved, because I loved to read but hated it, um, and then took a Iraq, a biology of the arachnage class over the summer one year, um, and it was a senior level or graduate level class at Angelo State University, from it was just in San Angelo, texas, um, but I kept tarantulas as pets and um, so a friend of mine from the tarantula hobby knew the, the arachnologist, um, who was or well, really entomologists, who was teaching the class, and that professor just needed his class filled Um, so I, so he let me in even though I had no biology credits, um, and he called me a spider petter and um, I kind of, but like I just I mean not to brag, but I kind of blew the rest of the class out of the water because I had knew all this stuff about all these arachnids already.
Speaker 3:And um, did all this and had done a lot of just fieldwork on my own, like, just you know, going and catching scorpions, and, um, he sat me down and he was like this is what you, you need to be doing. And I was like, yeah, I, I realized that now.
Speaker 1:So you imagine the other students. They're like who is this lady? How?
Speaker 3:what it was very funny the first day we caught a scorpion on campus and we were, we were in junction, texas, and so we catch the scorpion and there's this graduate student and a senior or two seniors and me and I'm like, well, I mean, it's centroid is batatas, and they're like cause, they're all like what is this? And I was like so I tell them what it is. And they're like, well, we better check. You know our little like dichotomous key. And I was like I can, I can already tell you what it is. And I kept being like don't you all know this, don't you all know this? And uh, and then a lot of the class.
Speaker 3:It was really funny. I mean I had no idea. I just cause I hadn't been in this round academics, really, um, so I just assumed they're in this class, they're, you know, they're smarter than me, they must know all this stuff. Um, and it never occurred to me that someone who was a hobbyist could, could really be good at it. So it was awesome, I mean it. It was so affirming to me. I mean, not not that I got to, you know, rub their faces in it, but just the just the fact that I would say it lost connection. Anyway, just the fact that like I was actually good at something and was like a dull moment and such a like light bulb moment at the same time and so, um, that was kind of it was. It was really great as a hobbyist to to just realize my hobby could be like what I do, and so that was it was. I mean I keep saying this, but it was so great I love it.
Speaker 1:You know, don't sell. We should never, ever sell like folks who are hobbyist short Um. On the podcast we had a guy that works at um like uh, it's in between a museum and a store, uh, harry, and he is a dinosaur like know it all. The guy is a genius with dinosaurs, um, and he doesn't have any advanced training. He's not a paleontologist, he's just a guy that loves dinosaurs Um that's really cool.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's so cool.
Speaker 1:I had goosebumps the whole time I was talking, just like listening to you, because I can hear. I can hear the passion in your voice. Um, uh, skylar, so you did you do some work with like infectious disease stuff with your masters? Um, I did.
Speaker 3:So a little bit of both. So at Tufts it was a one-year master's program so it was more class-based than research. But I because I'd already done research and had a lot of GIS experience I got to work with a lab on an avian influenza project looking at avian influenza in goal species. So three species of goals herring goals, ringback goals and greater blackback goals and we were looking at how movement of different age classes and interaction of these species could drive transmission of the virus. So when I was on the project I was just doing GIS and kind of exploratory with the data, the capture data and then the re-site data, because they just it's public data from banded goals from the USGS. So I was just kind of mapping that out and seeing how viable this was to kind of connect with the rest of the project and then actually testing samples.
Speaker 3:And then after I left Tufts that lab finished kind of the rest of the project. But I still got to be involved. I'm still. I got to be on the paper which was, you know, great for me as a scientist because I had done the original GIS work. So I did that. I did some work at the University of Connecticut on Rana virus and that was like in mesocosms and that was incredibly interesting.
Speaker 1:But that's the what's the Rana virus. I'm sorry, I have no idea.
Speaker 3:Okay, so I just assume people know things. Sorry, my dog is pawing at my computer, sorry so. Rana virus is a hemorrhagic virus of amphibians.
Speaker 3:So, it's really frogs mostly and so we were studying it in wood frogs and looking at how temperature and salinity levels so salt levels in the water could impact infection. This was in New England where they salt the roads and then that runs off into the nearby wetlands and that's a major kind of topic of concern for conservation of amphibians is those salinity levels and then so I was curious about how that would impact their ability to survive this virus and then temperature, obviously with changing temperature and maybe warming climate or just different weather conditions. So I was there at the start of the project it's kind of an ongoing project and but I got to kind of help build that first year and collect data and it was fascinating.
Speaker 1:Very cool, because the studying how infectious diseases spread within the animals around us I mean that's that helps explain how infectious disease could potentially get to humans. Is that sort of with avian flu? I don't know, that's not my area of expertise, but that is a concern, or is a concern that it can jump to humans.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and that with our goal research. That was kind of the one of the questions is which age class? Because goals move differently for age classes, which is going to come maybe in contact with urban environments more especially as humans kind of spread out. And you know, as people know, goals are very attracted to humans for food. So not just using landfills but coming into other areas like boardwalks, where there are people and they're holding food or dropping food or leaving trash. Goals are phenomenal at using those environments.
Speaker 3:So there is concern especially well, this was data prior to the current outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza, h5n1. So it kind of it was. I'm sorry, I'm kind of trying to find my right words, but so the goal is like how do we surveil better? So which age classes of goals and where and like any of the species do we need to be looking at? And so with that they found that juvenile goals as they leave the nesting colonies, they're very susceptible to the virus. They haven't encountered it before, so they're more susceptible. They can also be around other birds like shorebirds and ducks that also contribute to spreading this virus. So surveying juvenile goals is very important for catching active infection. So that was and then that will hopefully you know inform how we surveil to keep people safe.
Speaker 1:Gotcha, yeah, that latest outbreak of avian flu it's taken out like huge flocks of because we live in Alberta there's people with chicken farms right Like it. There was a huge concern that you know a duck or a random bird who has it could infect your entire operation. So yeah, like that's been in the news for sure.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's a, you know, obviously serious concern. It's devastating to the poultry industry because it can wipe out massive flocks of birds, but it also has, you know, real implications for human health. H5n1 doesn't seem to be able to transmit from human to human, just so just bird to human, but it is very severe. So it is quite a bit, you know, more pathogenic than the average flu. I think percentages is like 60% mortality, but that's varies. But so the concern is that it would be able to, you know, go from person to person and, as we can see, you know, respiratory pandemics having lived through one now they're, you know, they're scary and they can go very fast. So it's really important that we monitor this and react appropriately, which is sometimes a big reaction. But then in public health sometimes you have to overreact to keep people safe and then people complain that you overreacted, but they don't realize, you know that's on purpose.
Speaker 1:So yeah, yeah, the whole thing was let's just not have it happen again. So I'm glad there's folks like you and other researchers that are watching our backs as best we can right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's some incredible science being done out there to keep people safe, so I'm just very proud that you got to even have a little part of it.
Speaker 1:That's right From there. You know our a lecturer. You teach anatomy. How did that come about?
Speaker 3:So when I left UConn I was looking for jobs and I loved teaching and I had taught as a teaching assistant, as an or I was gonna say as an undergrad, but in grad school in Texas and I just really, really enjoyed it. So I looked for teaching jobs and got hired at UNM Gallup to teach anatomy and physiology. Most of my students are headed for nursing programs, so a couple of some of them are just biology students, but most of them are headed for careers in healthcare. So it was yeah, it was kind of a weird jump, I guess, but because I'm not doing research anymore, which I do miss, but I love, I really love my job, I love teaching.
Speaker 1:There, I'm a teacher as well and, yeah, I wake up, I tell this to kids and I tell this to people like if you could find a job that you just I'm excited every day, skip out of bed to get to work. And there's hard days like I teach. Not every kid is super excited to see me, not every kid wants to learn what I'm about to throw down, but I really like my job, so it's cool to hear you say that too.
Speaker 3:And I and that kind of. I kind of have a slightly different experience because I'm a little like spoiled in that our nursing program is so competitive Cause for students out here. 80% of our students are native and I mean we're not a primary white institution and so, but these are students who are really going to school to change their lives and they're insanely dedicated and so like I'm very spoiled because I almost never have students who don't want to be there.
Speaker 1:They are paying some money to go, as opposed to like kids in public school for me, so Well, we have.
Speaker 3:I mean we. So New Mexico has, as pass, free tuition for college students and there are a lot of programs. So I'm just putting this out there. New Mexico is an awesome state, but yeah, they're just they're really fighting for to make their lives better, to help their families to get good paying jobs, and so it's very serious and they take it very seriously. And so it kind of makes my job easier, cause I'm I almost never have to hound people to, like, you know, do your homework. They're on top of it, and I mean they're so on top of it. I my online class this semester. I let them do self-paced and I had a student finish the entire lab semester in three days and like everything. I mean like and it was incredible. And so I mean I'm, I'm sitting here and I have like 40 things to grade, and it's the third week of the semester, second week of the semester, and so I, yeah, it's, they are incredibly on top of it.
Speaker 1:You're like that's amazing, but then you're like the marking, so yeah.
Speaker 3:I joke. But I I tell them. I was like don't worry, like cause I I get, let them have multiple chances on the homework so they can get everything and learn everything. And I was like, don't worry, I'm going to be sitting at home watching like the Batch Threat and grading, and so they always kind of crack up. That that's that's my routine is watch dating shows while I grade.
Speaker 1:Do you find your mark? Your grading gets harder as your favorite contestants get kicked out.
Speaker 3:Uh, no, I'm pretty, I try to be.
Speaker 1:He's teasing I use the mark while watching Game of Thrones, and I'll tell you that last season everybody failed. No, just kidding, just kidding, I'm not kidding about that. Last season game of Thrones, it was awful. Anyways, this Skyler do you have any like? Are there some lessons from anatomy that you love teaching, or some goofy stories, or even some the stories you could share with us? That would be interesting.
Speaker 3:Um, oh gosh, I'm trying to think. Well, I I mean my favorite lessons. If, for anybody who's seen me, I'm covered in tattoos, so I mean from my neck to my fingers and I have lots of skulls and bones, so I love teaching the skeleton and so that's always fun. And and then I love teaching about the skin and we always have to talk about how tattoos work. Um, and, and I love that because it ties into also to the immune system, which is my favorite thing to teach as a disease person, and because it's actually it's macrophages which are a type of immune cell and that's what holds the ink in place in your skin when you get a tattoo. So I love that, like I'm a huge nerd, as I have said, and I love looking at my tattoos and being like, oh you, good little macrophages and but it's really like, it's really fun.
Speaker 3:I love teaching the immune system and Like seeing them when they get.
Speaker 3:Didn't they get it, you know? And we talk about how like Actines work and stuff like that, and and they really light up because I think, I think for a lot of systems, people know some kind of basic stuff about it, but the immune system has this like mystique and it's never covered. Well, like in the media and Things like that, people are always kind of getting things wrong. So I kind of like to be the one that we go through and we actually look at some Things that people have said in the media and on social media and and go through why it's wrong. But I try to make it at like a non-judgemental space because, you know, people are often wrong just because they don't know and they didn't get the training and so not everybody just automatically knows everything. So we go through it kind of like that. Like I want you to know this and be able to examine what you see and know how to find resources, and they're really great about it, so that's always really fun, hmm.
Speaker 1:Cool, cool, that's a cool, that's a cool kind of thing to say. I'm just trying to wrap up my thoughts here. It's one thing yeah, I tell that to, I tell that to the to my students as well Like you cannot know something and that's that's okay, like that's not your fault that you don't know something. Or you thought something Because somebody you trusted told you and you're like, oh, that's got it, that somebody I thought I trust told me that that's what I thought was true, and that's that's a very open way to discuss different, different things. For sure, yeah, where, where I think you probably get a little frustrated and maybe I do as a teacher or a science communicator Is when you've been told and you've been shown and you just disregard that. You're like no, I'm good.
Speaker 3:Okay, all right we definitely talk about, like you know, when an amazement, this is probably even outside of my purview as an A&P teacher but like, when someone is saying something to you, like, think about why they're saying it and their motives. And like, if they're selling something like Ivermectin or some other you know thing, like what or why are they promoting this? And and then like, what are the you know and what makes an expert? So we talk about, like, what is actual research? And the students out here are very receptive to that and I think they really appreciate the lessons, because there is, you know, a lot of misinformation and they, they want to be good health care providers, you know, good nurses. I've had a couple students go on to med school and they want to be good at that, and so they, they really take that to heart. Like, like, think about the motive, who is benefiting from this? And like, why is this, why are they saying this? And then, and especially, like, looking for the experts and who is an actual expert. Is is so important.
Speaker 1:Yeah, believe what I say. And here's a might take my 20 week course kind of thing like oh, wait, a second. Okay, this is a little sketchy. What are you selling me?
Speaker 3:This is probably good for your podcast. This is really funny story. Um, something happened and an order got mistaken with with our supplier for for for anatomy lab and I got 12 buckets of Pregnant pig uteruses sent to me and I ordered this three.
Speaker 1:This is the photo of you holding. The caption is huge and you've got like all manner of nonsense coming out of a bucket. Is that what that?
Speaker 3:is, that's a single pregnant pig uterus. Oh, my god, and that's one, and there's one to two per bucket and I got 12 buckets.
Speaker 1:And and this is a good deal for you like you were, you're very happy about this. It looks in the phone.
Speaker 3:I'm laughing because we didn't. I don't know, I should have maybe done a little bit more research, but they're, these are from commercial bread pigs and so they're, they can have like 20 embryos and like. They're Huge. And I did not expect, and I and I and I grew up in a hunting family and I do my own, like butchering and everything, and I've seen pregnant Animal uteruses and I was not expecting it to be the size of me and it was the size of me. I was cracking up, okay, and then the 12 buckets were where I only ordered three individual uteruses and and then, like, all of a sudden, 12 buckets showed up and we do not know Like, and I asked the secretary, who does all of our ordering, and she was like, I don't think I paid for those, but we got them and I'm. So I've been trying to figure out how we can use Smithy uteruses in class.
Speaker 1:Can you imagine somebody, somebody somewhere in the United States. They're like I wonder what happened to my 12 buckets of pig. And you're like. You're like Tee hee, hee ha in New Mexico.
Speaker 3:I walked into our there's three of us that to me, then biology and then microbiology and actually chemistry we all use the same tiny prep room. We're not a very big campus. So I walked in and these buckets are just filling the prep room and I was like, oh god, everyone's gonna kill me. Like what do I do with these? And I had to move stuff around and like and like. But like our whole lab is just buckets of organs because I, I and the pig uteruses were an accident. But I did over order on, like some other things we have. We have a lot of buckets of stuff. So I wasn't, I just chose this semester. I was like I'm not gonna order anything and we're gonna use what we have and I'm gonna stop hoarding organs.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness well. I guess I know what your students are gonna be looking at for the next like decade.
Speaker 2:Uterus and embryos.
Speaker 1:Okay, that is a very cool. Like that's one of the dissections our school does is a fetal pig. Yeah, I mean like some of the kids. Obviously they get a little squeamish about it, but for most of them it's just so engaging it's so again, you see all the organs that you talk about, All of that. And pigs aren't exactly human but they're kind of close and so some regards.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, very. We do fetal pigs for the class and then I actually we have a high school on campus so for recruiting, to try to get them to take my class in college, I invite them in finals week to just come in and do a fetal pig dissection for fun. And then I've had a couple of students ask if they could bring their kids in for it. So, like last semester, the end of the semester we were done and one of my students was like, oh man, my 13 year old would have loved this. And I was like, well, she can come in. And so she went and actually brought her daughter and her niece and they came in and those two little girls like completely dismantled that pig and they loved it and like they wanted to see everything.
Speaker 3:We went through every single organ, we took the brain out and I mean they were just like enthralled and I was like, well, this is great job security for me and it was so fun. I mean they were more into it than some of the college students. It was great. I identified with those kids a lot. I was like you were just like me when I was little.
Speaker 1:That's amazing, and the spark that they have now to continue is you can. You'll never know what ripples have happened because of that too Like who knows.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I hope they. I mean I love that they went into science. But even if they don't, they know more. Now you know, and that'll change how they think. Hopefully you know forever.
Speaker 1:We have some standard questions on the podcast. We ask our guests every interview and one is for a pet story. You mentioned one of your dogs is kind of like right around you right now. I was wondering if you could share a pet story from your life.
Speaker 3:Oh man, so I have a lot. So I have two dogs at home. Right now I have my dog she's a lab mix, a black lab mix named Missy May. She's my permanent dog. And then I have two fosters. One is named Song. She looks like a coyote Like she really looks like a coyote. We actually I actually got her DNA tested because I was a little concerned and she's not any. She's not a drop of coyote blood. But she's named Song because then the West we call coyotes Song Dogs that's a nickname for them. And then she is a puppy named Oliver, and so Oliver is actually staying with a friend tonight so he can get some socialization and also give her a break, because he loves to play. He needed a night off.
Speaker 3:But Missy is like my I don't know we have a very, maybe unhealthy, codependent relationship. She's my PTSD dog, so my service dog, and she travels with me to help us meet, travel. But she's also just my best friend. But I also joke that, like I'm her PTSD animal as well, because she had she has some severe separation anxiety. She was abandoned and I don't judge. She was abandoned at a Labrador rescue, so whoever had her, they took her to the right place. So I really commend them for that.
Speaker 3:But I like to joke that like there is nobody that loves food as much as Missy May, and her motto is you won't know if it's edible unless you try, and everything is edible if you try hard enough. Missy is kind of notorious for like the things that she, the outrageous things she eats. I had to wonder that I haven't spent more on vet bills than I have. She's eaten like for those of you who live in New England and up North like she's eaten four pairs of spary duck boots, which they're like it's not cheap, and when I lived in Connecticut like I mean it was it was a pain not having my duck boots in the winter. But yeah, so they're rubber and they're kind of leather on top and they're like the like classic New England winter boot and they usually only go a little above your ankle but they're perfect for slush and snow and yeah, and so she eats the leather, of course. So just, but probably the funniest thing about Missy, the things that she ate and I think I can claim that I have the dog who's eaten the weirdest thing of all time, and so I collect some oddities, and so I grew up in this hunting family we had taxidermy everywhere. My dad's a vet. He would have like horse legs at home. So just to set the stage, like I have some weird stuff.
Speaker 3:And so I saw on Etsy this preserved Shetland pony leg and it's so trees dried and on a stand, this beautiful pony leg from Pony the Died like ethically harvested whatever but, and so I bought this for myself. And then I had a 14 hour work day and Missy ate it. And I got home and I found the hoof and just the long hair from the Fetlock and the ribbon that had been tied around the top of it and that was it. She ate an entire freeze dried. But also there was some formalin, like preserved pony leg.
Speaker 3:And so I called poison control and the woman at poison control was like giggling and like this is the weirdest thing she's heard in her career. And I mean it had been hours and Missy was fine and I asked the woman who preserved the pony leg like how much formalin was used and it was very little and it was dried and I was like well, I don't have a lot of money, I'm just gonna like watch and see what happened and like if she has any starts to have any you know issues, and she was completely fine, like it wasn't even a blip, and so she ate everything but the hoof and just the long, that long hair like huh.
Speaker 1:That is, you have now topped us as the weirdest. You tapped our stories. Cause Bunsen, I don't know if you follow us on social media.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes.
Speaker 1:Bunsen has a thing for moose legs. So yeah, but a Shetland pony freeze dried leg probably is a little more weird than a moose leg.
Speaker 3:Oh, yeah, you win. She also ate molder and skully. Once I had she ate a set of X-Files pins like those pins you put on like a backpack or you know your clothing and one was molder space and one was skully space and an X-Files logo earring. And so the emergency vet snort, laughed when I told him what she ate and like described it, and so he was like oh my God, labrador's, yes, she's the truth is out there.
Speaker 1:The truth is out there.
Speaker 3:I'm staring at her. She's asleep right now and then song the foster dog is up here. She's the one who's been coming and pawing at my computer. She is a little bit of Husky DNA and it shows in like she's very handsy and she comes up and like puts her paw on you and she'll also kind of sing at you when she wants you to pet her. It's very cute.
Speaker 1:That is an amazing pet story. Thank you for sharing. Yeah, okay, so, oh, sorry, go ahead, skylar.
Speaker 3:Oh, I just was saying, Missy's a special dog.
Speaker 1:But the memories will last forever. That's the amazing thing about dogs. Like you know, I don't like to think about the end of our time with Bunson, but I will remember him finding 13 moose legs for my entire life.
Speaker 3:That's impressive, that's very impressive.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's more than three moose. I've done the math. Like there's some three-legged moose out there, or maybe he hasn't found the remaining. We'll see.
Speaker 2:That's the whole thing.
Speaker 1:Skylar, thank you so much for being a guest on our show. This was an amazingly entertaining. It was an entertaining discussion, it was informative and I hope our listeners got to know you a little bit better. I really appreciate you giving up your time.
Speaker 3:Well, thank you so much. I really enjoyed it. I had fun. I am a giggler, so I'm sure everybody has noticed at this point, but I really really did enjoy this. I was a little nervous and it was a blast.
Speaker 1:Skylar, are you on social media Like, is that something you'd like people to know about, that they could connect with you, or is that kind of a more private area of your life?
Speaker 3:Yeah, twitter is my like an Instagram or more public, so I'm happy if people want to have my Twitter handle. I don't know if you want me to say it, because it's a weird spelled word. It's a scientific name.
Speaker 1:Probably we just link it in the show notes, because I can do that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's a good idea. So we don't have to spell the scientific name of a rattlesnake. All right, thank you again, hey everybody.
Speaker 1:I just want to tell you a little bit about this amazing website we've been using since almost the start of the science podcast called Zencaster. Here are the three reasons why we love Zencaster so much. Number one it's so easy Log into your browser and start recording right away. It's studio quality sound and up to 4K video with your guests. That's right. You can do audio only or you can select a video as well. There's also so many backups to ensure you always have your recordings and they aren't lost, even if the connection is unstable. Number two you'll sound great.
Speaker 1:Have you ever worried what you're going to sound like when it's a recording? Zencaster has great post-production processes to make you sound really smooth and it automatically removes those ums and ahs in your recording. And lastly, it's everything you need all in one From Zencaster. You can distribute it to Spotify, apple and other major destinations. Go to zencastercom backslash pricing and use my code Bunsen burner, and you'll get 30% off your first month of any Zencaster paid plan. I want you to have the same easy experiences I do for all of my podcasting and content needs. It's time to share your story. Check out the link in our show notes and it'll take you right there to checkzencastercom out.
Speaker 4:Thanks everybody. Okay, it is time for Storytime with me, adam. If you don't know what Storytime is, storytime is when we talk about stories that have happened within the past one or two weeks. I will start. I don't know if mom kept it in or if mom edited it out with editing magic, but one time I was coming home while she was doing the advent with Ginger and I walked through the door and I opened the door right as she was recording and right as Ginger was about to play with a toy, and then Ginger stopped and just stared at me. She didn't move, she didn't like come and say hi to me. She wasn't excited to see me, it didn't seem like. But she stopped everything and just like stared at me and just looked at me and and she she wouldn't do anything and mom was like throwing the toy at her and then she just looked at me like she wouldn't do anything and then I walked away and then she started playing with the toy again. So she wasn't expecting me, because there's one story that I have and another story that I have. I have two little stories, I guess. Another story that I have is Beaker has been following me into rooms that she's not really allowed into, like.
Speaker 4:One time I was going into the bathroom and she just walked in with me and she never. She doesn't go into the bathroom when you're walking into the bathroom, she just waits outside. But she walked. She followed right behind me and walked in with me and I had to instill her to get out because I don't want her in there while I'm going to the bathroom. But she's funny doggy. She's right here, she's looking at me. She thinks I'm mad at her, but I'm not. I love you, beaker. But she followed me into the bathroom and then she followed me. I don't remember what room she followed me into. That she wasn't really allowed into, I forget, or she doesn't know. It was the laundry room. She doesn't, she doesn't usually come into the laundry room ever. She just like stands out and looks in. There's like two, the bathrooms and the laundry room. She doesn't go into like at all and I don't know, I don't know why, but she, she followed me in there. She was excited to see me. But yeah, bunsen didn't do the same thing.
Speaker 4:But yeah those are my two stories. Is ginger looking at me and then beaker walking into rooms that she doesn't usually walk into? Dad, do you have a story?
Speaker 1:I do. I have an exciting story and it happened today. This morning I took Bunsen and beaker to my school for half a day and they got to hang out with my period one class and then I have a period period three spare for marking, planning and and being department head and I took the dogs around to give Christmas cheer to a bunch of classes. By the time we got to that they were both very, very tired. My block one class loved them. Beaker just charges into everybody wanting pets and Bunsen's may be a little bit more wary of big groups of kids but in the classroom they loved all of the kids. They went from kid to kid to kid to kid.
Speaker 1:Bunsen kind of picks a couple of favorites, which is maybe a little sad for some of the other kids if you're not his favorite. He picks a couple favorites that he just goes to and sits by or lays by or tries to knock them over, whereas beaker goes to see everybody over and over and over again. It was pretty cute and anyways, when we were, when I was taking them to give Christmas cheer, I put a GoPro on beaker's back so we could get what happened to the kids when they saw the dogs and they were. It's pretty cute. They in one of the videos you can hear puppy and one kid just like loses their ability to speak. They're like it's just a bunch of gibberish because they're so excited to see the dogs. So, their duty done, I took them home. It's it's a lot of an emotional work being a dog with that many kids, so they were off the clock. I took them home and got back just in time were the afternoon and that's my story all right, mom, do you have a story?
Speaker 2:I sure do. Advent with the dogs is continuing just for a few more days, and then I think they're going to be very sad that Advent is over. Some days they're more behaved than others, and the last couple days they've been pretty good, waiting for their Advent treats, but after Jason did it they weren't listening and now I have to get them back into shape again. But they love it and ginger loves it, and it's been a really great, rewarding time with the dogs, and that's my story all right.
Speaker 4:Thank you so much for listening to my section of the podcast and thank you for sticking around to the end of the podcast episode bye, bye.
Speaker 1:Well, that's it for this week show and that's it for this year. We'll see you in February. I want to thank everybody who has been listening to our show all this year, and to Skyler Stevens, our guest, but also to the pot pack. They support us. If you want to join the pot pack, one of the perks is you get your name read at the end of the podcast. We'll see everybody in February. Have a happy new year. Take it away, chris. Let's hear those names.
Speaker 2:Bianca Hyde, mary Raider, tracy Domingu, susan Wagner, andrew Lynn, helen Chinn, tracy Halberg, amy C, jennifer Smathers, laura Stephenson, holly Birch, brenda Clark, anne Yuchita, peggy McKeel, terry Adam, debbie Anderson, sandy Breimer, tracy Linebaugh, marianne McNally, fun Lisa, shelly Smith, julie Smith, diane Allen, brianne Haas, linda Sherry, carol McDonald, catherine Jordan, courtney Proven, donna Craig, wendy, diane Mason and Luke Liz Button, kathy Zercher and Ben Rathart for science, empathy and cuteness.