Science Friday - 2 Private Lunar Landers | Cervical Cancer Deaths Plummet, Experts Credit HPV Vaccine

Episode Date: January 17, 2025

The SpaceX rocket carries lunar landers from companies based in Texas and Japan. They could arrive at the moon in the coming months. HPV can cause a variety of cancers, including cervical. New mortality data for women under 25 point to the success of the HPV vaccine.Rocket Launches With Lunar Landers From 2 Private CompaniesOn Wednesday, a SpaceX rocket launched carrying payloads from two separate private companies hoping to achieve lunar landings. The pair of landers—one from Japanese company ispace, and one from Texas-based Firefly Aerospace—will take months to reach the moon. Firefly’s lander is scheduled to arrive first, in March, with ispace’s lander planned for a touchdown in late May or early June.Another SpaceX launch on Thursday, a test flight of the company’s Starship system, had mixed results. The booster returned to earth and was successfully “caught,” but the spacecraft exploded over the Caribbean shortly after launch. That explosion is under investigation.Jason Dinh, climate editor at Atmos in Washington, D.C., joins Ira to talk about the Wednesday launch and plans for private lunar exploration. They also discuss other stories from the week in science, including the ban of Red Dye #3 an AI approach to snake antivenom, and a study predicting a rise in US dementia cases by 2060.As Cervical Cancer Deaths Plummet, Experts Credit HPV VaccineIn 2006, a vaccine for the human papillomavirus (HPV) became widely available to adolescents. HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection, and it can cause cancers of the mouth, throat, and sexual organs. It’s also the cause of nearly every case of cervical cancer.Now, almost 20 years after the HPV vaccine was introduced, a study published in JAMA noted a 62% drop in deaths due to cervical cancer in women under 25 in the US: from 50 or 60 deaths per year to 13. This follows earlier research that noted a decrease in cervical precancer and cancer since the introduction of the vaccine.With HPV vaccine uptake at about 60% for adolescents aged 13-15, a higher uptake could virtually eliminate cervical cancer, experts say. However, childhood vaccination rates have dwindled since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, sparking concerns about the spread of preventable disease.Joining Flora Lichtman to talk about this latest study is lead author Dr. Ashish Deshmukh, professor of public health sciences and co-leader of the Cancer Prevention and Control Program at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, South Carolina.Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

This is Science Friday. I'm Ira Flato. And I'm Flora Lichten. First, a quick look at the news this week. Ira, what caught your eye? Yeah, there was something really hard to believe that I discovered, and that is out of every 10 new cars sold in Norway, nine are electric. Wow. Yeah, and they're aiming to make it 100% electric by the end of this year. I mean, and this isn't the country that's known for its oil and gas production. So how did they pull it off? It's the old story of slow and steady. They set a goal back in 2017, and they didn't ban gas cars. No, but they did tax them, gas and diesel fuel. And this is the good part.

They offered a bunch of incentives to buy electric cars. They gave you free parking, discount on tolls, even waived the VAT and import taxes. And the best part, you could even drive in the bus lane on the high. I'm sold. So if you put it all together, that comes to about one third of all the cars on the road are electric. And I think that's pretty impressive. So what impressed you this week, Flora? Well, a story I really liked came from our friends at the show Radio Lab.

So they teamed up with the International Astronomical Union, and they ran this contest to name one of Earth's quasi-moons, which I learned is apparently not a moon, but also not a moon? It's like a hunk of rock that orbits the sun, but it's close enough to a planet to seem like a moon. So anyway, they picked one near Earth that has a name that is not so catchy. It's like a string of a bunch of digits. And they held this contest,

and they got thousands of name submissions from people across the world. And this week, their panel picked a winner. And drum roll, please? Cardia. Cardia, which is the Roman goddess of doorways and transitions, a kind of guardian of thresholds and protection, which I love. It seems like a perfect fit.

That is cool. That's a very creative choice. And speaking of moons, what a segue. Joining us now for even more space news and other stories of the week is Jason Dinn, climate editor at Atmos in Washington. Welcome back, Jason. Thanks for having me. Let's get right into the news about moons.

This was a very busy week in spaceflight on Thursday. a SpaceX test of its starship system exploded shortly after launch, and that explosion is still under investigation, but it's believed to have been caused by a propellant leak. But another really exciting launch, also from SpaceX, was a rocket carrying not one but two moon missions. Tell us about that. Yeah, SpaceX launched this rocket carrying two landers that are headed to the moon. One belongs to a U.S. company, and another belongs to a Japanese company. They took off from the NASA Kennedy Space Center in Florida, early Wednesday morning. And after about an hour, the two separated and are now taking different paths to the moon.

The Japanese lander from a group called IceSpace is going to gather soil, test the system that would cultivate food using algae, and test another system that splits water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen. And the American lander from a group called Firefly Aerospace is doing science with NASA. Some of the technologies they're testing include satellite navigation, computers adapted to radiation, and self-cleaning glass that wipes away sharp, abrasive lunar debris. Oh, that's cool.

So are these like competitors on the same vehicle? No, they're not competitors. They don't see it that way. They're actually doing very different things. They're landing on different spots in the moon. They just shared this rocket to kind of save costs. Yeah, they hitchhiked. Okay, what's the timeline here?

When did they actually get the moon? The American lander is scheduled to touch down in early March, and the Japanese one expects to touch down in late May or early June. And once they're there, Bo's plan to spend about two weeks operating. Okay, let's go back to Earth for a moment for big food news. The FDA is moving to ban a common food dye. Tell us about that. Yeah, this happened on Wednesday. The FDA banned the use of red dye number three in food, beverages, and drugs. What this means is that starting in 2017, companies are going to have to start removing Red 3 from their products. Now, this is a petroleum-based food coloring that's used in all sorts of products you might have in your pantry, including certain candy corn, strawberry ice cream, and even bacon bits. And some companies have already started replacing Red 3 with more natural dyes from eats or insects. Health advocates say that this decision was really long overdue. The ban comes more than three decades after Red 3 was first found to cause cancer in male lab rats. And the FDA banned Red 3 from cosmetics and topical drugs

way back in 1990. Other places like Europe, Australia, and New Zealand have banned it from food, too. But these countries did make one kind of amusing exception, which are maraschino cherries that are candied or used in cocktails. Oh, Marichino cherries. So how solid is the evidence here? Do we really know if this dye is potentially harmful? It would seem so. So the FDA is obliged to not approve any food additives that are cancerous to humans or non-human animals, which is why that rat study is important. They did downplay the risk to humans in their announcement. So while there is a known cancer risk in male lab rats, they said that they haven't found that in any other animal, including humans. Some critics and advocates do argue that maybe the only reason there's no known

cancer risk in humans is that food safety research has been historically underfunded. So just because there's no known risk doesn't necessarily mean that that risk doesn't exist. It's possible that it's just been undiscovered. Yeah, I'm reminded of other food colorists and colorations and dyes that have been banned in the past. All right, let's go on to other health news this week. There's a new study outlooking at potential cases of dementia in the future. Tell us about that one. This paper was published in the Journal Nature Medicine, and it projected that by 2060, new cases of dementia will double to a million new cases per year. And among black Americans, it's going to triple. If the projections bear out, that would mean 12 million Americans with dementia in 2016, which is up from

6 million Americans now. There are a few reasons for this. So the first and more minor one is that dementia risk from this study was higher than the previous estimates. The study found that After turning 55, the risk of developing dementia at some point in your life is 42% and that risk increases with age. But the real main driver of this trend is that our population is aging. By 2060, some of the youngest baby boomers are going to be in their 90s and many millennials are going to be in their 70s. So a huge portion of our population are going to be at the old ages where the risk of dementia is greatest. So are they talking about anything people can do to lessen their own risks of dementia? Totally. There are ways to manage risk factors. The researchers suggest

improving heart health through medicine or lifestyle changes, preventing and treating strokes, and wearing hearing aids once you need them, you know, being able to hear keeps you socially and cognitively engaged. Cool. This next one, I know there's AI in everything these days, but now it appears it's in snake anti-venin design. Wow. Who knew? Yeah, this is a really cool study. It was published in Nature this week. And these researchers used AI to design proteins that could be used in antivenoms. These proteins were designed to latch on to specific toxins in the venom and prevent them from harming cells and tissues. The way the process worked is that the AI designed a protein, the researchers manufactured it, and then they injected it into mice that were given otherwise lethal

doses of venom toxins. And these AI proteins ended up saving those mice's lives. It's a proof of concept that the researchers say could one day be applied to devise a new treatment for snake bites. And that's actually quite important because while snake anti-venoms exist, the technology is pretty archaic. They literally milk a snake for venom, inject it into a horse or another large animal, and then harvest the antibodies that that animal produces. These AI design proteins are in theory, quicker and more cost-effective to produce, they circumvent the need to use animals. And some researchers even told reporters that they think the proteins might not need to be refrigerated, which means that they can be stored and used in remote, hot, tropical places

where snake bites still pose significant health risk. Wow, that's a win, win, win. I mean, now if you can use this to design proteins for the antivenin, could you also use it to design other kinds of drugs or pharmaceuticals? 100%. This is all part of a larger movement to use AI to predict protein structures and functions in ways that we couldn't have fathomed even years ago. It builds off of the AI protein research that won last year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry. And David Baker, who was one of those Nobel laureates, is actually the senior author of this paper. The authors very explicitly say in their paper that

beyond snake fights, these results show how AI could be used to democratize, drug discovery, especially for places that are strapped for resources and for diseases that have been historically neglected. All right. We're going to end with something, you know, one of our famous Science Friday stories we like to talk about on a Friday night. And this one is research into tattoos of ancient mummies. Am I getting this right? You're totally right. Researchers just apply the technology used to study dinosaur fossils to visualize tattoos on a thousand-year-old mummies in Peru. I don't know if any of you have ink like I do, but if you do, you're probably aware that your tattoo fades and bleeds over time. And that's a real challenge for scientists trying to

visualize ancient skin art. The technique these researchers use allowed them to see these tattoos through that fade and through that ink bleed. It's called laser stimulated fluorescence. Essentially, they shine a laser on the mummy so the skin glows. And that creates a sharp contrast with the black ink. They used that technology to look at a wide range of tattoos, some that were geometric shapes, some that were based on nature like vines, animals, and scales. And the big surprise was that the tattoo lines were shockingly thin. They were 0.1 to 0.2 millimeters wide, which is finer than the lines that most modern tattoo needles lay down today. The authors think that they were laid down using a very fine instrument like a cactus needle or a sharpened animal bone, but there's still

disagreement from outside experts on that. The bigger picture here is that by learning who was tattooed, what those tattoos depicted, and how they were laid down can reveal the deeper cultural meaning of skin art. So whether it's aesthetic, therapeutic, ritual, or a class signal, the smaller picture is that all of us with tattoos can now hope that we become mummified. So a thousand years from now, scientists can gape at a really cool skin art. Well, there's no way to top that ending, Jason. I hope you get your wish on that one. Me too.

Me too. ...climate editor at Most in Washington. Thank you for being with us today. Thanks for having me. Always a pleasure. We have to take a break and when we come back some good news about the HPV vaccine. We have a vaccine that prevents against six skin. cancer types. To me, it's a public health revolution. Stay with us. A new study found that cervical

cancer deaths in young women have plummeted since the introduction of the human papillomavirus vaccine. HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection and it can cause cancers of the mouth, throat, and sexual organs. It's also the cause of nearly every case of cervical cancer. The vaccine for HPV was introduced in 2006, now, almost 20 years later, cervical cancer deaths and young women are down 62%. And researchers say there is only one reason this could be the HPV vaccine. Joining me now to talk about this is Dr. Ashish Deshmuk, professor of public health sciences, and co-leader of the Cancer Prevention and Control Program at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston.

Welcome to Science Friday. Thank you so much for having me. Let's talk about your study, Ashish. So just so I have my mind around it. Your study looked specifically at women under 25. Is that right? Yes. Okay.

And in that group, you are seeing this big drop in deaths from cervical cancer over the last decade or so. And that drop correlates to when you would expect to see a drop in deaths because of the introduction of the HPV vaccine. Is that right? That's absolutely like. Because the way the tree vaccination works, it first prevents, in fact, infections, HPV, they will then after observe decline in cervical cancer incident late and then drop in cervical cancer deaths. Got it.

Okay, so this is a correlation study. Did you look at whether there are other possible explanations for why you see deaths from cervical cancer dropping? It's unlikely because we know that sexual behaviors have not changed in the United States. We know that the three vaccination rates are increasing. we speculate that there are two possible reasons, both attributable to HB vaccination. So individuals who received HB vaccine,

they are likely to have benefited. But in addition to that, there may be substantial herd protection attributable to HB vaccination. Did you see changes in cervical cancer rates or pre-cancers as well? We did. Because in our previous research,

we observed that, so the HPA vaccination was introduced in 2006. and our speculation of hypothesis for this study was that we will observe decline in cervical cancer deaths and this hypothesis was driven by the fact that we published previous studies a few years ago we published another study in Jama where we observed that among youngest age group cervical cancer incidence rate are occurrence of new cases of cervical cancer dropped 62% again 12% per year and what we observed in this study is that the decline in mortality followed decline in incidence. Tell me a little more about HPV. There are multiple strains, right?

Yes. So it's the most common sexually transmitted infection. There are more than 200 types of HPV. But types 16 and 18, they're responsible for causing most cancer types. And does the vaccine cover 16 and 18? It does. So the first iteration of vaccine, it covered HPV types 611, 16, and 18. And the most decent version of the vaccine, there wins nine HPV infection. types. Does the vaccine give you lifelong immunity? From what we have seen so far, from the observational studies and studies from other countries, is that as a result of vaccination, there has been substantial decline. Now, lifelong immunity, it's area of current research. But again, speculation is that it would prevent infection, at least causing infection over substantial duration

of time. So your study looked at young women under 25, and the changes were profound, but we're also talking about a relatively small group. I mean, the drop was from 50 to 60 deaths a year to 13. Is that, is that right? Yes. So when does cervical cancer usually onset in women? Sure. So cervical cancer is still fairly rare in this age group. The peak age at cervical cancer onset is among women's were in the 30s and 40s, but most cases of cervical cancers are observed. That's interesting that it's 30s and 40s. That seems still relatively young. It is.

Cervical cancer is the type of HPV-associated cancers that occurs among young individuals. When might we expect to have data on whether we're going to see the same drops in cervical cancer in this older cohort? I think we'll have to wait for at least 10 to 15 years. and what we speculate is that in future years, we will see even greater decline because the birth cohort as the age and the burden of HPV-associated cancer

or number of cases are higher in women who are in the 30s and 40s. So if the effect that we see persist in the consecutive age groups, we will see substantial drop in cervical and other HPV-associated cancers in next 10 to 15 years. Do you think that cervical cancer could be eradicated with this vaccine? It can.

So there are two ways we can prevent cervical cancer through HIV vaccinations. So we call it primary prevention or primary prophylaxis and screening for cervical cancer. So if we ensure that HIV vaccination rates are adequately achieved, we have a goal in front of us, 80% of HIV vaccination coverage. And if we ensure that nearly all women are adherent to cervical cancer screening guidelines, It's possible that we completely eradicated HPV-associated cervical cancers. That's amazing. It is amazing.

And I think what's most amazing about cervical cancer and other HPV-associated malignancies is that these are types of cancers that are completely preventable. Through HIV-vaccination, we have a vaccine that prevents against six cancer types. To me, it's a public health revolution. Well, I was going to say, are there other cancers that could be eradicated through vaccines, or is there something special about this group of HPV-related cancers? I think it's special about HIV-vaccination because of the fact that it's infection-driven malignancy. And this is the only vaccine which has been shown to be highly efficacious for all six cancer types. It's special about a tree vaccine that it has the potential

to eliminate all six cancer types. So you've been studying HPV and related cancers for many years. Why does this interest you? So I started studying HPV-associated malignant. Since my doctorate's program, I went to my mentor, and he suggested I have several projects, and one of those was focused on anal cancer. I was intrigued by anal cancer because I lost my grandmother to anal cancer. At that time, I had no idea that anal cancer is caused by HPV. And that's how I got into HPV research. Well, yeah, it's personal. It is. You know, I was thinking, too, women's health, you know, as we know, has not historically been given as much attention. And of course, these HPV cancers can affect both men and women, but, you know, for cervical cancer, obviously

only affects people with a cervix. And I was wondering if for you was a conscious choice to sort of spend your time on this when sometimes women's health can be overlooked. It is, and it is area of major concern. I mean, not just cervical cancer. If we look at HPV-associated anal cancer among women, it has been recognized as one of the fastest rising causes of cancer incidence and mortality. Anal cancer is rising among women at 3 to 5% per year and there's nothing we can do except

HVU vaccination. It is potentially preventable similar to cervical cancer and we are trying our best to ensure that we identify ways to prevent anal cancer, again, both through primary prevention and secondary prevention. So I feel that for HPV associated cancers and when we think of women's health,

it's imperative that we focus on HB associated malignancies. when the HPV vaccine was rolled out in 2006. I was too old at the time to be eligible, but I remember distinctly some opposition, especially from parents, because HBV is a sexually transmitted infection, and parents are like, well, my kids aren't sexually active, so they don't need this. Do you still encounter that mindset? We do. I think there is still a strong hesitancy towards a free vaccination. And again, I think this hesitancy is driven by the fact that the vaccine has been always perceived as something that prevents sexually transmitted infection.

I think we need to change the way we talk about HIV vaccine and think of this as a cancer prevention vaccine and infection prevention vaccine. I think that may help change parental perception, but in our research, we do see substantial vaccine hesitancy. In fact, in one of our recent studies, we observed that among parents of unvaccinated adolescents, 60% still lack intent to initiate HB vaccination, which is a major barrier in the U.S. Wow, 60%. So it just needs a rebrand. Right.

How old can you be to and get the HBV vaccine and have it still be effective? Sure. So the vaccine eligibility is up to age 45 and it is covered by insurance. So, you know, we've been reading, seeing everywhere that childhood vaccination rates have been dropping since the COVID pandemic. Are we seeing the same thing with HPV? Yeah. So in the most recent birth cohort, HIV vaccination rates have dropped. And this drop is, I think, up to 4%.

What we're also observing is in last three to four years collectively, HPV vaccination rates have stagnated across age groups. What about in other countries? So we don't have seminar evidence in other countries. I know in other developed nations like Australia, vaccination rates have been high and they have been able to achieve or that closer to achieving 50% vaccination vote. Is that our goal too? What's your goal? What do you want to see?

So we need to ensure that we vaccinate all that adolescents were eligible. 100% is your goal. 100% is our goal. I'm going to give you. Ira's blank check question. Ashish, if you had a blank check, you could do what you wanted, resources were no issue. Where would you take your research? What would you do? So I will ensure, and I'll try my best to ensure that both primary and secondary intervention is possible. There are several countries, India, China, for instance, where there's substantial burden of cervical cancer.

But we don't have adequate supply of HIV vaccination. Things are changed. now in recent years. So worldwide, we'll ensure that HPB vaccination is adequately administered for cancers such as anal cancer. We don't have screening infrastructure, which is a steep client for us because it's also driven by the fact that we don't have enough providers while adequately claimed to perform anal cancer screening. So if we have resources, we'll ensure that screening is available, particularly in communities

that I'd marginalize and deserved. Ashish, thank you so much. Thanks a lot. That's about all the time we have. For now, Dr. Ashish Deschmook, Professor of Public Health Sciences and co-leader of the Cancer Prevention and Control Program at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston.

That's all the time we have for today. Lots of folks help make this show happen, including Sandy Roberts, George Harper, Annie Niro, Jason Rosenberg. I'm Ira Flato. Thanks for listening.