Science Friday - Fusion Advance, Cancer Clinical Trial, Christmas Trees And Climate, Best Video Games. December 16, 2022, Part 1

Episode Date: December 16, 2022

Scientists Reach Breakthrough In Nuclear Fusion This week, researchers announced a big breakthrough in the field of nuclear fusion. Scientists have been slamming atoms into each other for decades in the hope that they will fuse together, and release more energy than was put in. And for the first time ever, scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory did just that in early December, using very powerful lasers. But just how quickly will the mission to develop scalable nuclear fusion become a reality? Ira talks with Casey Crownhart, climate reporter at MIT Technology Review, about that and other top science news of the week, including an uptick in methane, an investigation into telehealth data sharing practices, and the newly-identified snake clitoris.   A Promising New Treatment Emerges For Multiple Myeloma Multiple myeloma is an incurable blood cancer that affects cells inside a patient’s bone marrow. Nearly all multiple myeloma patients will relapse at some point in their treatment, becoming resistant to first one, then another frontline intervention. But a new kind of therapy, a bispecific antibody called Talquetamab, has been showing promise in clinical trials—both in treating the cancer, and keeping patients in remission longer. A bispecific antibody works as a kind of bond between a T-cell that might otherwise not be doing its job and the myeloma cell itself, forcing the T-cell to attack the cancer. Ira talks to Dr. Ajai Chari, who is leading the clinical trials of Talquetamab, about the historic difficulty of treating multiple myeloma, and why this new therapeutic approach may lead to more patients living longer lives.   Growing Christmas Trees In A Warming World For those who celebrate Christmas, the decision over a Christmas tree can be hotly debated. For those who hold out for a real tree, there are dozens of species available for American consumers—catering to Douglas fir aficionados, Fraser fir fans, and Noble admirers. But climate change could soon affect the selection at a tree lot near you. Chal Landgren, a Christmas tree specialist at Oregon State University, manages a program that for decades has bred and developed seedlings raised to become Christmas trees. Oregon is responsible for growing 25% of all Christmas trees in the country, but heatwaves and drought have made this future tenuous. “My kind of anecdotal information is that between this summer and the heat dome, we probably lost 50% of the seedlings that were planted,” Landgren told Science Friday. Read more at sciencefriday.com.   Ready, Set, Play: 2022’s Best Science Fiction Games There were many exciting science fiction and science gaming titles released this year. Whether you enjoy video games, board games, learning about mendelian genetics, getting immersed in hard tactical sci-fi, or just want to be a cat wandering around a gorgeous cyberpunk city, we have you covered. Joining us to discuss our favorite sci-fi and science-y games this year (and the slightly recent past) are Maddy Myers, Deputy Editor of Games at Polygon and co-host of the gaming podcast Triple Click, and Mandi Hutchinson and Suzanne Sheldon of Salt And Sass Games.   See the full list at sciencefriday.com. Transcripts for each segment will be available the week 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. A big breakthrough this week in the field of nuclear fusion. Scientists have been superheating hydrogen atoms for decades in hope that when they fuse together, more energy will be released than was put in. And now scientists announced that they have finally done that, using very powerful lasers. At a press conference, U.S. Department of Energy officials celebrated the work of scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, also known as the LLNL. Here's the lab director, Dr. Kim Boudel. Indeed, people often say that LLNL stands for lasers, lasers, nothing but lasers. But I think our motto sums up our approach nicely, science and technology on a mission.

On a mission, but how quickly will the mission to develop scalable nuclear fusion become a reality? Joining me now to talk about this fusion breakthrough and other top science news of the week is my guest, Casey Crownheart, climate reporter at MIT, Technology Review based in New York. Casey, welcome back. Thanks so much for having me back, Ira. Well, you're welcome. Let's talk about this. This involves a whole bunch of laser beams, right? Yes, no fewer than 192 laser beams. Lawrence Livermore actually has the world's largest and most energetic laser system. So it's really big science going on there. And so they shot the laser beams at a fuel pellet. Yes, yeah. And they got more energy out than they put in. Yep. So it's a really big milestone for fusion research. This experiment lasted just a few billionths of a second, and they used the lasers to put about two megajoules of energy into this fuel pellet, and they got about three megajoules back, which, like you mentioned, has never been done before in fusion research. But there's a little fly in the ointment here, because if we look at the whole setup, I mean, wasn't there more energy used to power the lasers that came out during the reaction?

Yeah, so that's a really big fly in the ointment, if you want to call it that. So this laser wasn't designed to be very efficient. So in order to make that two megajoules of energy, it actually pulled about 300 off of the grid. So as far as the whole system goes, it's still taking a lot more energy to power these reactions than what we're getting out, which is kind of one of the big things that a lot of people are saying this week, this is really exciting, but we're still pretty far from actually being able to generate energy using fusion. They were talking about, well, we used to talk about fusion always being three decades away. Maybe it's only two decades away. Now, because sites have been trying and failing to make progress for decades. So what's so promising about the potential of fusion energy that it's worth trying and trying and trying again? That's a really good question. I mean, I think that the energy community has always been so interested because fusion energy could, you know, produce a ton of energy without all those greenhouse gases that cause climate change. And in theory, it could use,

you know, pretty small amounts of a somewhat widely available fuel. You know, a lot of fusion uses isotopes or types of hydrogen. So it's absolutely something that's fascinated researchers for decades. Yeah. And it's, and as we say, it's decades away, so it's not going to solve our reducing fossil fuel emissions problem right now. Probably. So this is, it depends on who you ask as far as the fusion timeline goes. This approach to fusion that Lawrence Livermore National Lab is using isn't really the one that people think is the most likely to be commercialized. There are different ways to do fusion energy. Some startup companies are doing things a little bit differently in a way that they say could come about a little bit quicker, you know, maybe having some reactors going in a decade or so,

but I think we're still a long ways off and there's a ton of science still to go and a ton of engineering work and innovation that still needs to happen to turn this from science into technology, I would say. Yeah. Okay, let's move on to some other energy news, and this is pretty important. This week, the Department of Energy released some additional details from last year's infrastructure bill, talking about the kinds of projects that are eligible to receive carbon capture and removal funding. This is kind of important, is it not? Yeah, this is really big news for what is a pretty developing field. So this is funding that, like you said, was included in the infrastructure law that was passed last year. And this includes about $3 billion for direct air capture funding.

And this is a technology that basically pulls carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, kind of in an attempt to reduce the climate pollution that we've already emitted. But this is really a developing technology, and there's a long way to go to make it work kind of efficiently and economically. So it's really interesting to see how the federal government is kind of going to be spending this money. And environmentalists, though, are kind of upset by this, are they not? Yeah, this is pretty controversial. I think some people see direct air capture as something that, you know, some groups are using in order to justify continuing emissions. But in particular, some of these projects that are going to be technically eligible for funding are particularly controversial.

The rules included projects that use the captured carbon dioxide for what's called enhanced oil recovery. Basically, you take that carbon dioxide that you capture and you pump it underground to get more fossil fuels out, which kind of goes counter to this idea of trying to cut emissions. Yeah, I can see why they're a bit upset. Let's move on to our last energy story because there's some interesting new research about how methane levels actually went up during the 2020 lockdown. How is that? Yeah, this is a really fascinating story. So methane, it's a powerful greenhouse gas.

You might be familiar with it because cows often get blamed for it. But there are a lot of different sources of methane. And they found that these researchers found that during the 2020 lockdowns, human sources of methane went down because, you know, a lot less people were moving around, industries shut down. But natural sources of methane actually saw an increase in emissions. And it's sort of a complicated reason why. Partially it's because we're seeing, you know, higher temperatures and a lot of wetlands and other kind of natural sources give off more methane when

temperatures go up. But then there's also this weird kind of effect where other kinds of pollution that we emit can chemically react with methane to pull it out of the atmosphere. So when we stopped emitting those other kinds of pollution, that kind of deterrent effect on methane stopped. Wow, that is kind of, it's kind of complex there, isn't it? I think that's why I really am fascinated by these kinds of stories. It really shows how complicated, you know, climate change and pollution are. And there's a lot of, you know, kind of effects that we don't even totally understand yet. Right. Let's move on to next story.

Our next story is about digital privacy. An investigation by stat news and the markup looked into 50 major telehealth platforms, data sharing practices, and they found what? They found that all of these companies, almost all of the telehealth companies that they looked into, are sharing customer data with large tech companies like meta or Facebook, Google, Twitter, LinkedIn. And it was really, really widespread. And these are companies where, you know, users can log on and get telehealth appointments and get access to, like, medications or, you know, different kinds of medical treatment.

And this investigation found that these companies are sharing things like, you know, your personal information or even your answers to questionnaires that you might be answering about, you know, your mental health or kind of your past medical history. And they're sharing that with big tech companies. Yeah. And what I found interesting about the story is that the only company they looked at that wasn't sharing data was Amazon, Amazon Clinic, which is a big tech company. I know. That just that absolutely killed me because I was wondering they kept saying 49 of 50 and I was like, what's the 50th one? Yeah, it's Amazon.

And listeners might be thinking, isn't this personal medical data that should be covered by HIPAA? I mean, HIPAA likes privacy, does it not? It does, but this is kind of a legal gray area when it comes to health-related data sharing. But in a lot of cases, HIPA doesn't really apply, even if these companies kind of make it seem. unlike the data is private and protected by HIPAA, it's really messy. All right. Let's go to space and then back again in this next story because this is news about the Artemis 1 Moon mission. The Orion capsule landed back on Earth, right? Where do we go from here with that project?

Yeah, finally. So after, I don't know if you remember or if listeners remember that, you know, this is the launch that got delayed a few times, but the Orion capsule just returned to Earth. It got picked up and sent to San Diego. So this mission was really kind of a baseline. And researchers at NASA were hoping to learn a lot from this mission that would help inform future missions, you know, testing the heat shield on the return capsule and kind of all of these things. So, you know, Orion went all the way to the moon, about 269,000 miles away,

and deployed 10 small satellites and came all the way back. And some of those satellites didn't really get. their job done, did they? Like half of them. Yeah. So the team lost contact with quite a few of the satellites, I think three or four, including one that was going to map solar particles and another one that was headed out to kind of check out some asteroids. So it's not totally lost from here. It's possible that NASA could, you know, get contact back with those satellites. But it sounds like, you know, some of these issues were because of all those launch delays. You know, some of these satellites had batteries that weren't able to be recharged during all.

of those delays. So we'll have to kind of see what we're able to learn from this mission. And we're really not going to get people on the next mission to the moon for another couple of years, right? Yeah. So there's another mission that's supposed to launch in a couple of years, but that's another uncrewd launch. The mission with people on it is scheduled to launch in 26. There you go. Finally, I want to end with some exciting animal news, and this is something different. Scientists have finally discovered that snakes have clitorises. Yes. How did it Take us till 2022 to figure it out. There's, I mean, there's a few reasons that it took a while.

I think part of it is, you know, there are these kind of smaller organs. They're fragile. But honestly, there's a big part of this that has to do with representation in science. You know, a lot of females of species just don't get studied as much as males do. And I think as we've seen more women come into scientific research, we're starting to figure out a lot of things about the females of a lot of species, which is, really exciting. And it's not just one clitoris per snake, right? Yes. Yeah. So this is, the organ is called a hemiclitoris, which is kind of a pear or a bifurcated clitoris, which is really, really interesting. So do they know, do they know, the scientists know the role of the snake hemicliterus in reproduction?

So they're not totally sure yet. Based on, you know, what they were able to figure out about this organ, you know, they have nerve endings and blood vessels suggesting that they can kind of of swell up with blood and that they can feel things similar to how the clitoris works in other animals like mammals. And we also know that, you know, snakes rub their tails together before mating. But we don't totally know yet. So that's kind of the next thing that scientists are going to try and figure out is what role these organs play in reproduction and mating and snakes. Well, I think we've given our listeners some real good icebreaker conversation for this weekend. I'll be talking about it at all my holiday parties for sure.

Thank you, Casey. Thanks so much, Ira. Casey, Crown Heart, climate reporter at MIT Technology Review based in New York. We have to take a break, and when we come back, we're going to look at a new kind of antibody, and it's promised for a so-far incurable blood cancer. Great results here. Stay with us. This is Science Friday.

I'm Ira Flato. Multiple myeloma is the second most common blood cancer in the U.S., and so far, it's incurable. Patients may live years on treatments, but also, almost all relapse and may no longer respond to a treatment that was previously working. Researchers are looking for more effective treatments, ones that may increase the time patients are in remission or even avoid relapse entirely. And now a new experimental treatment is getting good numbers in clinical trials. Called talquidamab, it's been achieving positive results in over 70% of patients overall

in phase one and phase two clinical trials so far, and achieving remissions of months longer than existing treatment. Here to explain more, plus why multiple myeloma is such a tricky cancer to treat is Dr. Ajay Chari, Director of Clinical Research for Multiple Myeloma at Mount Sinai's Icon School of Medicine in New York. Welcome, Dr. Chari. Thank you so much, Ira. A pleasure to be here. Nice to have you. So you've gotten data from both phase one, phase two, of this drug so far. What to you is the most encouraging part of the results? Yeah, the phase one just got published in New England, and phase two we just presented at our annual meeting. And I think the most exciting thing is that these are patients, some of whom

have exhausted all available therapies, and we're still seeing response rate of 70 percent, and those responses occur as quickly as one month, and their deepest remissions can actually be achieved within two months. So imagine if you're a patient who's exhausted all therapies to be having one of the deepest, most durable remissions you've had in recent years on this new therapy. So it's incredibly gratifying for our entire healthcare team to be seeing these patients doing so well. As I mentioned, multiple myeloma is considered incurable. Why is it so common for patients to have a relapse? That's the million-dollar question.

I guess part of it is who gets myeloma? These typically are patients in their 60s and 70s, and we think perhaps everybody might have a little bit of an abnormal plasma cells. So the culprit cell in myeloma is known as a plasma cell, which normally makes antibodies. But when this cancer becomes cancerous or malignant, rather than making all the antibodies we need to fight off infections, it overproduces one antibody. One possible hypothesis is that if we have the small levels of these abnormal cells, when we're younger, our immune system is able to survey and get rid of them. And then perhaps that gets laser as we get older. And there's a lot of genetic complexity to myeloma and immunologic complexity.

So between the age, the disease, the immune microenvironment, those are probably all factors as to why every treatment works for a while, but then it stops working. Yeah. Well, tell me then what is there about this treatment that works so differently from existing treatments? It's really remarkable because historically to get a new drug approved and this, what we call unmet needs, if you take a patient that's exhausted all available therapies at that time. The benchmark was a 20 to 30% response rate lasting three to four months. And now we never thought we'd be attaining these results, but between this mode of action called bi specifics and a separate one called CART,

we're saying 70 to 100 is the new 20 to 30. And those are the responses we're seeing. Even though we wouldn't even have expected these T cells, which are basically the sniper cells here that we're actually activating, in these patients who've had, you know, up to five, six different types of chemotherapy cocktails or lines of therapy over, say, the last six years, in spite of having been beaten up by all of these regimens in terms of the immune system, we're getting these outstanding responses, and it probably just speaks to this kind of untapped potential.

A lot of our treatments have been targeting the cancer and maybe some parts of the immune microenvironment, but this really is harnessing probably one of the most important sniper cells, if you will, the T-cell, and presumably that's a big part of why 70 to 100 is the new 20 to 30. Well, that's what I'm trying to understand. What does this drug do, you know, with the T-cells that the other drugs are not doing? So, you know, it's actually an interesting, if we go back a little bit in medical history, every human monoplane antibody, whether it's for COVID, autoimmune diseases, cancers, it's all due to myeloma. Back in the 80s, the Nobel Prize was given to somebody who decided to use a myeloma cell to a spleen,

cell and that fuse cell called a hybridoma cranked out antibodies. And so you can kind of genetically and in the laboratory manipulate these cells and make different antibodies that we need, whether it's to treat COVID or other things. The first antibody for myeloma didn't get approved till 30 years later, and that was considered a naked antibody. It has this Y-shaped structure and the two parts of the Y bind to whatever your target is, typically the myeloma. Here, the innovation is it's a bi-specific antibody. So the Y-shaped body. So the Y-shaped structure, and the Y-shaped structure. One part is binding to the myeloma and the other side is binding to the T-cell, the Sniper cell. So depending on what somebody's into, you can consider them handcuffs or you can

consider double-sided tape. But basically, these T-cells that are existing within each patient are being trafficked to exactly where the cancer is. And then these T-cells come alive. They realize, hey, this is an enemy. They release chemicals and those chemicals poke holes in the cancer membrane and these cancer cells wither away rapidly. So it's a remarkable feat of accomplishment, but these bi-specific antibodies, there was one approved many years ago or several years ago for acute lymphocytic leukemia, but it's a rare condition and only given in academic centers here, these bi-specific antibodies, myeloma is the first. One just got approved a few weeks ago. This one probably would be second, but there's other diseases, including lymphomas, leukemia,

this is a broad approach to treating cancer. It's kind of, you know, a designer antibody, not just the original antibody that we've had for 30 years, but the next generation. So what I hear you saying is that the drugs help the T-cells, help the immune system find the cancer and then attack it. Correct. Would that be right? Exactly.

Because cancer usually evade the immune system, but you have found a way of getting around that. Yeah, and what's particularly striking, these are in patients with the median age of 67, with many prior chemotherapy. So this is what's so remarkable that, you know, the 70 to 100 in such heavily treated patients. And of course, it begs the question of how might these do even in less heavily treated patients. Can we see a future where can we put an end to chemotherapy? Because no chemotherapy drug is giving this kind of response rate as a single agent. We certainly combine drugs. And I don't want to dismiss, you know, we've made a lot of progress on the backbones of those

agents, but this is kind of potentially a logarithmic improvement in terms of outcomes. So there's a lot of excitement. We're just at the cusp of this type of treatment, and this is single agent therapy, but both combinations and in less heavily treated patients is really exciting as well to think about the future. Dr. Let's talk about the side effects. Are they manageable?

Yes. I think, and you don't have, you know, I always think it's important to take the patient experience, especially as we get more choices, you know, and doctors and nurses can say one thing, but ultimately it's a patient who votes with their feet. So the number of patients that came off this study, which is about 288 patients, was 5%. So 5% came off due to adverse events, which is relatively low. And I think the remaining 95% stayed on treatment as long as it was benefiting them. So I think that's amazing. That speaks for itself. That is. We've talked about Cartee therapy on the show before, which is another way, and you mentioned it, to get T cells to work more effectively,

could your bi-specific antibodies be better than CAR-T and more affordable? So when I was asked a similar question at our national conference, my response was what I'm going to tell you now. I think these are all like our children, right? We have to love them all, and different kids have different strengths. And that's what I would say here as well. And one way I would kind of translate this is I was actually assigned by specifics as a topic recently at a European Hematology Association. And the debate was CAR-T versus bi-specific.

And I think the pros of CAR-T are, it's really ideally a one-and-done approach because there you're taking a big difference is you have to take each patient's T-cells out of the patient, a process called phreasis, kind of like a dialysis process. and then the laboratory genetically manipulates it, and then it's put back into patient. So it's personalized immunotherapy, if you will, but it takes a lot longer because of the nature of having to do all of that manipulation. In contrast, by specifics are off the shelf. It's the same product that every patient is getting. It's not personalized in the way that Carty is, and it means it's ready to go. And I think that's one of the big differences, because if you can imagine, these are patients

who've had typically five different types of chemotherapy. they've had exhausted all available drugs. And if your myeloma is exploding, you don't have the time to wait for collection, manufacturing, administration. So I think probably one of the biggest differentiating factors between the two is that patients with rapidly progressive disease don't have the luxury of waiting for a CAR-T, they need to go to a bi-specific. And also, there's tremendous constraints right now in CAR-T's between the so-called vectors,

the viruses that are used to make CAR-T, the number of spots, lengthy wait times. So the way I would conclude it is I think both are important, both are extraordinary developments, both are in the 70 to 100 percent response rate. But I think the way I made, the analogy I closed with in my debate was these Cartes are like Rolls Royce phantoms, very hard to get. We all want them, but rare and expensive. But the bi-specifics, I would argue, are not that necessarily different in terms of expense because you're giving the drug repeated.

So CAR-T, you do one costly intervention, and there is some recovery period there, too. But the bi-specifics have to begin typically, depending on the drug, anywhere from weekly to monthly. And so there is cost with that. But I think the comparison would be Toyota Corolla, widely available, the most sold car globally, and really what makes the world go around. So bi-specifics I could foresee eventually also being given in the community. I don't see that happening with CAR-T anytime soon because basically CAR-Ts are like transplants. They're going to be done at large academic centers.

And so they're really different products. And I think we need them all. And also we're so early. We're going to probably also have sequencing issues just because you get one doesn't mean you can't get the other. But we need to generate that data too. Dr. Char, I have one last question for you because I know when we broadcast this on the radio and podcasting and all the people who are ill with cancer and especially multiple myeloma, they're going to say, how do I get in on either one of these tests or when can I get this drug for me?

What do you say to that? I would say it's very important for every myeloma patient, even from newly diagnosed all the way to those who've had all of the easy drugs that are approved by the FDA. It's really important to work in collaboration with an academic myeloma center. And studies have shown that those patients who do that actually have better outcomes and live longer. So one is to have that partnership. And it doesn't mean you have to drive hours every day to get all your treatment or every week.

But it means there should be a collaborative relationship. Well, what I'm asking is, I guess, is it available? I mean, if you drive to get your stuff, is it available to drive to and get the treatment? I think there's two ways. There are now two commercial cartis, and there's also commercial bi-specific. So there's three products that are available, but they're not being done in the community yet. So you'd have to go to an academic medical center. Then there's a bunch of additional cart-tees and bi-specific.

that are actually in clinical trials because, as I said, if the CART slots are few and far between, and there's a research CART slot that's actually demonstrating activity. So that's why I was encouraging collaboration with academia, because right now, all of these products are very tightly linked, and there's a steep learning curve to giving them, which has been mastered. But for now, I would say collaboration, but in the future, I would love to see these patients getting their bif specifics from their community oncologists. But there's a, I think that's going to take at least six months to a year to get all of those kinks worked out. Okay, I got a number out of you. Because that's what everybody wants to know is how long is it going to be till the average person

and the public can get it? It is available now in all the academic centers because the first by specific just got approved and we're all trying to launch those. So contact your closest academic Miloma Center. Well, that's good news. Yeah. Dr. Cherry, thank you for taking time to be with us today. Thank you so much for having me. Dr. IJ. Cherry, director of research for multiple myeloma at Mount Sinai's Icon School of Medicine in New York. This is Science Friday from WNYC Studios. If you celebrate Christmas, odds are good that you've acquired a Christmas tree or you're planning to do so this weekend. Oregon is the largest producer of real Christmas trees in the country, responsible for about 25% of them. Earlier this year,

SciFri producer Kathleen Davis went to a Christmas tree farm in Aurora, Oregon, and check out how the Christmas tree industry is changing and the impact that increased heat and drought climate change are having. Chow Langren may have one of the coolest job titles out there. He's a Christmas tree specialist at Oregon State University. He manages a program that for decades has bred and developed seedlings that are raised to become Christmas trees. There are dozens of tree species that are used for the purpose of holding ornaments and lights. And Chal says there's no easy answer as to which type is best. You know, it's kind of like asking, how do you pick a beautiful person?

You know, there's lots of opinions. But some of the things that we look for in the breeding program are, you'll notice that these trees are a darker color. So color, dark, dark gray or blue color. Vertical branching, if you look at the Douglas fir behind you, you can see that straight up and down branching. that helps fill in a lot of holes on the side of trees for ornaments. And that color, we haven't fertilized these trees ever, but you can get this dark blue color. And the needles are important too. Christmas tree needles are the bane of vacuum cleaners everywhere.

And Christmas tree breeders know this. You think you'd like big needles, but the testing that we've done with consumers, they tend to like small needles. Bushy, short. But all of these trees have been tested for needle loss. So we've run through some trials where we've taken branches and measured the number of needles that fall off and then bred in the ones that didn't have significant needlefall after two weeks.

Douglas furs and noble furs are native to Oregon. But these trees are also vulnerable to pests. So a big trend in Christmas trees over the last decade is seedlings sourced from Georgia, the country, and Turkey. These Turkish Nordman and Trojan trees don't get a lot of the diseases that plague native trees. The other is that Turkish and Nordmen and Trojan do a lot better in these drier summers that we've been having. We've really struggled with dry summers particularly for noble fir, which is what's growing out here. Like many parts of the country, the Pacific Northwest has been hit hard by heat and drought this past decade.

This is bad news for Christmas trees, which take about 10 years to grow to proper size. There was a big heat wave this summer in the Pacific Northwest, and Chal says that's going to affect the trees 10 years from now. My kind of anecdotal information is that we probably, between the summer and the heat dome, we probably lost 50% of the seedlings that were planted. Again, these trees take 10 years to grow, so shortages will be felt in upcoming Christmases. That makes research on tree survival imperative. Chal and his team have been experimenting with adding different things to planting soil and trying out different fertilizers, really throwing things at the wall and seeing what sticks. The most promising thing so far, mulch, just wood chips.

And that's made of probably a 30% improvement in survival, just having the wood chips at the base of the trees. It keeps the heat down and a little bit more moisture in. seems simple, but it's been working. What'll really help cooler summers and more rain? That may just need a Christmas miracle. That was sci-fi producer Kathleen Davis reporting from Aurora, Oregon. We have to take a break, and when we come back, we'll talk about our favorite science fiction video games of 2022, including picks about cyberpunk cats and Mendelian genetics. Stay with us. Hey, I were here with an exciting message. Science Friday currently has a dollar-for-dollar donation match and effect, which means that any donation you make through December 31st will be doubled.

Yes. Now is the time to head over to ScienceFriday.com slash support and make a gift. Our 2023 programming depends on the generosity of our fans and our listeners. Again, that's ScienceFriday.com slash support and thanks. This is Science Friday. I'm Ira Flato. You know, every December we talk about our favorite science books of the past year, and we thought this year, why not do the same thing with some of our favorite science fiction video games? I know you're all playing them. Joining me is producer Dee Petersmith to lead us through this discussion. Hi, Dee. Hey, Ira. Yeah, have you been playing any games recently? You know, I have to admit that I'm playing the games that are like first-person

shooters trying to get some skill in that. I'm shooting. I'm shooting Mars. Martian blobs with eight arms on them. So that's as far as my science fiction video game playing goes. I don't know. It sounds like you're pretty deep in it to me. But there were just so many cool sci-fi and science-related games this year that I think our audience would really like. And I got this great panel together of video and board game experts. And we're just going to talk about our favorites. That's great. I've got my notepad out to take notes on this. So let's hear what you've Got. All right. Today, we're sharing our favorite sci-fi and science games from 2022 in the slightly recent past, since this is the first time we've done one of these. Here to talk video and

board games with me are my guests, Maddie Myers, Deputy Editor of Games at Polygon, and co-host of the gaming podcast Triple Click. Welcome, Maddie. Hi, thanks for having me. And Mandy Hutchinson and Suzanne Sheldon, who run the Twitch and YouTube channel's Salt and Sass games, where they play and review board games. Nice to have you both. Hello. Thanks for having us. Hello. Great. And just a reminder that everything we're talking about will also be on our website, and you can check out the full list of games at ScienceFriday.com slash best games. So I can start us off. Please. My first pick is a game called Stray. This is one of my favorite games this year. It happens to have these great sci-fi themes and settings. You basically play as a cat. You get separated from your cat buddies, pretty early hunt in the game. And you have to traverse through this dystopian cyberpunky world to get back to them. It seems like a pretty shallow game on the surface. You're like trying to traverse and solve these environmental puzzles as a cat, which is super fun, but then you like get deeper and deeper and you're like, oh, there's like a whole story going on here. And where did all the humans go? And you get like your own robot companion

along the way who helps you like translate this like gibberish robot language into English, which I also love because it implies that cats kind of understand what we're saying and just choose not to listen to us. But there's also like a dedicated button for me. Very important. I literally was going to ask you if that was the thing, but I didn't want to be embarrassed myself, but I'm so glad to hear this. Yeah, there's also a specific prompt. If you're standing on a rug, you can make biscuits with your paws. I love it. Very cute. Great. So that's Stray. You can play that on PS4 and PS5 and PC. And I'm going to throw it to you now, Maddie. What's your first pick? Okay. My first pick is Citizen Sleeper. It's available all on the Nintendo Switch PC and. Mac, Windows and Xbox. And I played it all in one whack on a Saturday. It's like six to eight hours,

but not everybody is blessed with no life as I am. So it is set on a space station many, many years in the future, who the heck knows when. But instead of playing as a human worker or even an alien worker, you're a robot, but you've been given a human consciousness that's been uploaded. But it's only been uploaded to you from somebody else's memories to make you a better worker. And you are owned by a corporation. But the game actually starts with you on the run from that corporation. You've already had a life as a worker. And now you are basically being shipped off as parts. You are trash, but you are trash that is owned by someone else. So you need to escape. And you basically work a series of odd jobs on the space station to which you've,

escaped at the charity of a series of other humans that you meet, like a person who owns a restaurant, a person who owns the scrapyard. And much later, you meet this autonomous collective that is growing mushrooms on the space station. And that ends up unfolding into a series of really poignant stories about what life on a space station like this could look like, people trying to live outside of the capitalist systems under which it was built and find a different future for themselves, including people like your player character who might not even be considered people legally, but who clearly are and have feelings and have capabilities. And it can be quite difficult because you can get into a poverty spiral for lack of a more positive way to describe it.

Like if you don't do enough odd jobs, you can end up constantly repaying debts and never winning, if that makes sense. So you have to- So like real life. Yes. Unfortunately, yes. And that's on top of just the larger themes about whether you are or not a person. And I just thought that was really neat to see a game telling that kind of story. And to have one about a character who would normally be a side character and have them be the hero I thought was fascinating and really wonderful from a sci-fi fan point of view. Very cool. I love this. So that's Citizen Sleeper. Suzanne, let's go to you. Sure. So first step for me, I wanted to bring up Genotype. And this one is spot on the nose in terms of how it incorporates science into the wonderful world of board games.

Genotype is published by a group called Genius Games, and their entire mission as a publisher is to incorporate direct scientific principles and properties into a super fun and engaging and clever board game experience. This is literally a game in which you play Gregor Mendel's assistants competing to collect data so that you can control the phenotype and genotype through things like seed shape and seed shape. stem color and things like that. So even though there's just all this really great scientific foundation to the theme of the game, it's not like you need a PhD to play it. This is actually a very fun, lightweight game that you can play with your family and maybe learn something along the way. That's a good one. I'm all about, I was maybe just really nerdy in school. So I'm a teacher, so I can really appreciate, you know, education and science was always one of my favorites. I, always loved learning about genotype, you know, your recessive gene, your dominant gene,

I would spend hours trying to figure out, okay, so if I had a kid and someone had this gene, you know what I mean? And it kind of brought me back. Pun it squares are the new mash. Yeah, I'm following. Yes, exactly. So this game brought me back to those days. But that's a good choice. And I really enjoy that way. You're such a nerd, Mandy. I know. I really am, actually. Well, Mandy, can you tell us how much of a nerd you are with your first pick? Oh, yeah. No, actually this totally shows how much of a nerd I am with my first pick. So this game is called My Father's Work.

And just like it sounds, you are working off of someone's work. You're scientists. And you're taking a page from your father's journal, and you have this largest state where you're trying to perform your devious experiments. I say it like that because it has a kind of a macabre kind of theme to it. but these experiments are, you know, not necessarily on the up and up. But in order for you to complete the experiments, you have to traverse the town,

you have to be able to gain resources in order to make these experiments. You also have to watch your sanity. That's very important. You get too deep in those experiments, and oh, my goodness, the townspeople start coming for you, or you start getting challenges in your way that you have to overcome in order to complete these experiments. And sometimes you're doing experiments on like yellow fever and things like that.

Diseases. Yeah, but you're making it a way that's not good. You're not necessarily trying to help people. Oh, you're making diseases worse. You're making it worse. Or potentially something that's grown from that. I know Suzanne's played this game with me as well. I don't know if she had that one.

I had that one. It was terrible. But yeah, that's kind of the sentiment. So I know it's not nice, but. You really have to get in the role play zone to play as a mad science. is developing a lethal disease. Right? I'll be honest.

Mandy slides into that persona really brightly smoothly. Oh my gosh. Meanwhile, I had so much trouble being mean and untitled goose game. This is not the game for me. It's like, how can I nicely honk at you? Yeah, I was so worried about all the townspeople. Oh, no, Maddie, so you're telling me we can't play together. This is upsetting.

I mean, I will roleplay as a townsperson who's coming to check in. Okay, I will deal for you. I'm okay. It gives us some, you know, some tension. Great. Okay, that's my father's work. And my last pick is Subnotica. And kind of cheating a little bit.

This came out a few years ago. But I think our audience will really like this if you love oceans or if you've ever loved submarines or anything like that. I think you're really going to love this game. You know, again, some centuries into the future, you're the sole survivor of this huge crash-landed ship. You have a little life raft where you can make really basic things. But you have to, like, venture into the ocean. It's an ocean planet, which I don't think I mentioned. And you have to, like, gather resources, and then you bring it back to your raft,

and then maybe you can, like, make more oxygen from that, or you can make batteries. And so you eventually, like, kind of level up your habitat. You're basically, like, trying to get off the planet. And this game is, like, kind of amazing to play just in the sense that sometimes a critique of indie games is that they're trying to do too much, and they don't really do any of it that well. this game somehow like nails open world exploration thing this mystery there's also this advanced alien life that's there and it remains hidden you kind of have to like learn about that there's the survival aspect there's this crafting thing it's got this really intriguing science component and it also turns eventually like

I just end up spending so much of my time just like building up my base and this kind of like animal crossing like everything just has to be just so and I was like oh my god I have to get this so I can get like an upgraded radar scanner or whatever. But it's so much fun. And there's also so many moments where you're like about to run out of oxygen, but it's like, oh, I just got to get this thing. Or you're trying to stay out of view of this like enormous sea monster. And you're just like, oh, my God, my ship is almost destroyed.

I have to get back to the base somehow. But yeah, that's Agnotica. And I think it's out on all platforms now, which is great. Including VR, which I think is preferred. I don't know if I could do this in VR. That size of 10. Yeah. Yeah, I don't think I could do you.

No way for me, but for the hardcore. Great. Maddie, let's go to you. Okay, my next one is called Somerville. It's a sort of War of the Worlds-esque aftermath from an alien apocalyptic invasion. This is a puzzle platformer, but mostly it's a walking simulator. Mostly, you just walk and you see a pantomime of the story and you enjoy the vibes. And the other thing I like about this, just as a storytelling perspective, is that you are just playing as a regular guy trying to find his family in the midst of this absurd apocalyptic event.

And he's pretty hardy. He is a video game protagonist at all and can survive more of this alien invasion than I personally think I would be able to. But nonetheless, I do enjoy an every man at the center of a sci-fi narrative, just a regular person dealing with something. that is so much larger than themselves. And just above all, looking back on my picks for this show, I'm really thinking about how the pandemic has affected art that's being made by indie creators. And all of these picks, the anti-capitalist messages, but also just the idea of something much bigger than you, and it being mishandled by either corporations or government institutions

around you. And you are just a regular person trying to survive that. is definitely a theme in all these games and something that is portrayed really effectively and poignantly and movingly in Somerville. It's a beautiful, just atmospheric-looking game. Yes, it's gorgeous. Yeah. Check that one out. I haven't heard of it.

Great. So it's Somerville, which is on Xbox and PC. Mm-hmm. You're listening to Science Friday from WNYC Studios. And let's go to Suzanne for your last pick. All right. last pick, I had to pick Dune Imperium. And as the name implies, this is a game set in the world of Dune, the whole, the Frank Herbert, you know, epic science fiction, classic. And this one is actually

based on the films. And just like in Dune, this is a board game in which you are playing cards to represent the different factions on the desert planet. And whether you are, you are, representing, you know, the desert dwellers or, and of course I'm forgetting all of the different character names and all of the different elements to it. No matter what you're... Zendaya. To make the Shalameh. How could you forget these names from the Dunez?

Maddie, we have never hung out before, but you totally get me. Like the fact that you understand me, the Harkonins, things like that, right? So you're playing these different characters and you're fighting for control of this planet. and you want to be the champion. So whether you're building up a really strong secret faction in your deck of cards, or whether you're going out into this area on the board to fight it out.

So Dune Imperium is an excellent, excellent board game just in general. Then you put the wonderful Dune theming over it, and it's a really fun game to play. And with the new expansion that just came out, I just got that and it adds so much more to the game, and it's just a great time. So I had to pick Dune Imperium in there.

Great, thanks. And Mandy, close us out. What is your last pick? See, now I feel like I have to end strong. And it is a game that released very recently, actually, and it's called Twilight Inscription. And Twilight Inscription is a science fiction-based game. And it's kind of like an adjacent cousin to the much larger game, Twilight Imperium. And in this, you have the Lasix Empire.

And in this game, it's been burnt. Down to Ash, it's been rejected. their subjects want nothing to do with it. And now there's some conflict and things arising from that. And over the dark years, people are trying to recover their strength to kind of get back to a better kind of place. And now people see an opportunity to reclaim what was lost, to kind of redefine this galactic civilization. So there's some conflict. So you have war where you can go to war with other players. Now it's not super intense. It's a matter of, hey, I can make this ship based on the rule that I just had and then assessing the results afterward to see, did I beat you? Did I beat you? And then getting a bonus because of that.

Or opening planets and reaching certain planets will give you more points or other cards that can give you points. I know I'm missing a couple boards or two more boards here. Suzanne, help me out. There's the... Oh, you know, there's like voting and negotiation and resource collection. Ultimately, Twilight Inscription is the most epic, overwhelming, science fiction themed game of Yatzi you will ever play. It 100% is. And I got to tell you, we've had fun with it. Suzanne has been very good at it.

No, really. But this is one in the board game world. Everybody has heard of this. And it's just it's something that people want to immerse themselves in with this whole galaxy world that's been created. So Twilight Inscription for me, I thought, was very enjoyable. And you just kind of want to be part of that world. And this is kind of a lighter way to do it.

being so overwhelmed by potentially the original game. Cool. Great. I think we're going to have to end it there. But thanks everyone for taking the time today and sharing these wonderful games. Thank you. Of course. Thanks for having us. That was Maddie Myers, Deputy Editor of Games at Polygon, and Mandy Hutchinson and Suzanne Sheldon of Salt and SaaS Games. And you can check out a full list of the games we talked about today at ScienceFriiday.com slash best games. Thank you, Dee. And that does it for this hour.

Here's Emma Gomez with some of the folks who helped make this show happen. Thanks, Ira. Diana Montano is our experiences manager. Felissa Mayors is our office manager. Ariel Zich is our director of audience. And I'm digital producer Emma Gomez. Thanks for listening. Thank you, Emma. BJ Leatherman composed our theme music.

And of course, if you missed any part of the program, or you would like to hear it again, subscribe to our podcasts, or ask your smart speaker to play Science Friday. And, of course, we're active all week on social media or you can contact us the classic way. SciFri at ScienceFriday.com. Have a great weekend. I'm Ira Flato.