Science Friday - Psychedelics With Michael Pollan And Intel Student Science Fair. May 18, 2018, Part 2

Episode Date: May 18, 2018

In his latest book, How to Change Your Mind, Michael Pollan writes of his own consciousness-expanding experiments with psychedelic drugs like LSD and psilocybin, and he makes the case for why shaking up the brain’s old habits could be therapeutic for people facing addiction, depression, or death. Pollan and psychedelics researcher Robin Carhart-Harris discuss the neuroscience of consciousness, and how psychedelic drugs may alter the algorithms and habits our brains use to make sense of the world.  This week, science students gathered in Pittsburgh for the finals of the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, a competition founded by the Society for Science and the Public. Nearly 2,000 students from 75 countries came to present their projects. Two of the finalists share their projects: Everett Kroll discusses how he created and tested an affordable 3D-printed prosthetic foot, while Alyssa Rawinski explains how she studied the feasibility of using mealworms to recycle plastics.  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, coming to you today from the studios of 90.5 WESA in Pittsburgh. Now, if I say Timothy Leary, you say, weird guy tripping out on LSD, right? Hippies dropping acid or having peyote dreams out in the desert, all remnants of the drug culture of the 60s, right? Well, Michael Pollan is here to change that paradigm. In his new book, How to Change Your Mind, the author who changed our minds about what to eat, Eat food, not too much, mostly plants. It's here to change your mind about psychedelic drugs, which science is now investigating seriously

as aids for people dealing with cancer, depression, and even death. He also argues that psychedelic drugs like LSD and psilocybin allow parts of the brain that never talk to each other to actively communicate, shaking up the snow globe, as one scientist called it, allowing us to learn how the brain works or might work better by looking at these new connections brought about by psychedelic compounds. So if you have a question about the scientific study of psychedelic drugs or how they could help us understand consciousness,

give us a call on number 844-724-8255, 844-724-Sai Talk, or you can tweet us at SciFriLown. Let me introduce formerly my guest, Michael Pollan, teaches writing at Berkeley and Harvard, his new book, How to Change Your Mind, what the new science of psychedelics teaches us about consciousness, dying, addiction, depression, and transcendence.

We have an excerpt of the book up at Science Friday.com slash mind. The book is titled How to Change Your Mind. It blew my mind when I read it. I want to welcome back, Michael Pollan from WLRN in Miami. Welcome back, Michael. Good to have you. Oh, Ira, great to be here.

I'm very much looking forward to this conversation. Well, let's get right into it because as I mentioned before, you know, people think of, you know, the hippies of the 60s, and there was a rich tradition, though, of psychedelic research in the 50s, as you say, a thousand studies, tens of thousands of research subjects, how did all that get buried? Well, it's a good question. We're too much Lerie's antics responsible for, you know, doing away with that.

Partly. Partly. I mean, I think what most of us understand about psychedelics is the image that was kind of frozen in place during the 60s. And during the 60s, they were the source of a lot of controversy and help fuel the counterculture and the backlash against the counterculture. But what I was surprised to learn is that the 60s is one brief chapter in a much longer and more interesting history that goes back actually thousands of years. They're traditional cultures that have been using psychedelics in their religious ceremonies and their healing ceremonies. But for our purposes, there was a very rich tradition of research from about 1950 into the mid-60s where they thought of psychedelics as the next psychiatric wonder drug. and we're getting some really promising results. And so what happened?

I mean, why did it suddenly go underground or disappear? I mean, even movie stars like Carrie Grant or big evangelists, right? Yeah, oh, yeah. He said he was born again after 60, you know, psychiatric administrations of LSD. What happened was the drugs escaped the laboratory, and they were taken up by the counterculture, and people like Leary, you know, got impatient with science, basically. And he went from thinking this might be useful to treat individuals to it might be useful to treat the whole society. And this is an occupational hazard, I think, of many people who work with psychedelics, that they get so excited about the possibilities and the fact that they could potentially help everybody, that they kind of lose interest in science and become evangelists.

And that is what happened to Timothy Leary. And in the 60s, psychedelics did play a very disruptive role, a positive or negative. It's up to your perspective on the 60s. But, you know, we hear about the generation gap, the fact that you had this very unusual bifurcation of young people and old. And the young were inventing their own culture with their own styles of dress and sexual mores and music and culture. And that was very frightening. And psychedelics had something to do with that. Because for the first time that we know of, you had a right of passage, which is what a powerful psychedelic trip is.

It's a conversion experience. But it was a rite of passage that wasn't organized by the elders in a society. Normally, the elders organized the rite of passage, and they use it to bring adolescents into adult society. Here, the kids were organizing their own right of passage, and it plopped them down in this country of the mind that adults thought was completely terrifying. And so this contributed to this split in society. And then you had people like LERY saying, you know, kids who take LSD aren't going to

fight your wars. which was very upsetting to President Nixon, who in turn called Leary the most dangerous man in America. Wow. And the experience that you describe of taking psychedelics is very different from that cliche. Tell us about how a session now or your experience is conducted, it's formalized, is guided. Yeah. Well, that's a very important point. I'm glad you brought it up.

There's a real distinction between the typical recreational use of psychedelics and the way they are now being used in a therapeutic context. It is a guided trip. You're not alone. You're in a room. You're stretched out on a bed or a couch. You're wearing eye shades. You've got headphones on. You're listening to a very carefully curated playlist that's meant to kind of structure or support the experience. You're prepared by your guide or guides who's telling you what to expect, helping you to know what to do if it gets really scary, which it may well get. And that basically the advice is encouraging you to surrender to whatever happens. It's really when we resist what's happening in our minds under psychedelics that we get into the situation where we panic. And that is the

bad trip very often. And then during the session, they're there with you to take care of your body so you can let your mind wander. And that's very reassuring. You know, nobody's going to knock on the door. You're not going to do anything foolish. You're not going to walk into traffic. And then after the experience, they help you integrate it. The guides let you retell it. And the stories are very vivid that you have, but you don't necessarily understand it. And they help you bring insight from the experience and apply it to the conduct of your life. Much as any psychotherapist would do.

So it's a situation in which the experience can be done. You can let go and feel safe. I had an experience that resulted in the complete dissolution of my ego. I never would have surrendered to such a terrifying experience if I didn't feel incredibly safe. And so where are these research sessions? Are they therapy sessions? How widespread are these happening now? There's a couple things going on.

You have these organized clinical trials that are really interesting and they've been very productive in many ways. And that's going on at very prestigious universities, NYU, Johns Hopkins, UCLA, Imperial College in London. And very soon, there will be trials all over the country in another dozen or so locations, mostly at medical centers and universities. But at the same time, I discovered, there is a shadow world of underground therapists who are guiding psychedelic journeys in a therapeutic way. These are very often trained psychologists, MDs in some cases. You know, many of them are licensed people, and they just feel that this therapy is so effective that they're willing to take the chance of doing it illegally at great personal risk. I found them to be the ones I met.

I mean, some of them seemed a little loosey-goosey, and I couldn't entrust with my mind. But I met many that I was really struck by how professional they were. And the fact that they, you know, very carefully clear, you know, figure out what medicines you're on, do a medical questionnaire, an autobiographical questionnaire. As one said to me, we don't have very good insurance, so we're very careful. And you've discovered how, totally, these experiments and these therapies have totally upset the opposite of the effects people think or thought they would have on the brain. And we're going to get into a little more brain research after the break. But that just was amazing to me also. Well, the idea, you know, most of us think of psychedelics is something that can make you crazy.

Yeah. The big takeaway is, turns out, under the right, with the right support, they can make you sane. Wow. Say more about that. Well, that, you know, we do know this history of people getting into psychological trouble with psychedelics, and there are psychological risks. There are not a lot of physical risks, I was surprised to learn. The drugs are relatively non-toxic. They're non-addictive.

But people can get into psychological trouble. they're already at risk for mental illness or they do the kinds of stupid things people do when they're on drugs. But when they're used with proper support, with guidance, they have been proven to be effective in dealing with a lot of various indications of mental illness, such as, as you mentioned earlier, treatment-resistant depression, addiction, both to alcohol and cigarettes, and there's a cocaine study underway now in Alabama, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and anxiety, and especially the anxiety and depression of people with cancer. I think that's been the most dramatic and moving work, that people facing a terminal diagnosis

who undergo a psychedelic experience have a complete reset of how they approach their death and mortality. And it is, in many cases, remove their fear and allowed people to die with equanimity, which is an astonishing thing. Why would a fungus produce a chemical? These mushrooms, that's such a radical effect on people who eat it. What's in it for the chemical? What's in it for the mushroom?

Well, I actually explored that question, trying to figure it out, because one of the curious things about the chemical, it's called psilocin and psilocybin in this, there are 150 different mushrooms that produce it, is that it appears to be only in the fruiting body of the plant, the part that comes, you know, the mushroom, And as you know, mushrooms are 90% underground. That's where the real organism is.

The mushroom is like the fruit. So the chemicals not produced underground in the body of the plant, which suggests maybe it's not a defense chemical. So we're not really sure, but we do know that there has been a selection in evolution for stronger and stronger psilocybin mushrooms, that animals like them, and we have many. anecdotal reports of animals eating these mushrooms selectively. And frankly, people's interest in these mushrooms has helped spread them around the world.

Their habitats now include college campuses, the lawns in front of police stations. So it's that old co-evolutionary story that one of the things we use plants and fungi for, besides food and beauty and clothing and shelter, is to do. change the contents of our consciousness and the experience of consciousness. This is a deep human desire. I mean, Ira, everybody in your audience probably today used a plant to change consciousness. It may have just been caffeine in, you know, in coffee or tea. We're going to take a break and talk a lots more about this with Michael Pollan, author of

how to change your mind. It changed my mind about a lot of this stuff. We're also going to bring on one of the scientists in the book. Robin Carhart Harris to talk about the science and what's going on in the brains. So a lot to talk about. Stay with us. We're right back after the break. Don't go away. This is Science Friday. I'm Ira Flato. We're talking with Michael Pollan about his new book, How to Change Your Mind. And one of the scientists he writes about who investigates consciousness and what happens in the brain under the influence of psychedelic drugs is Robin Carhart Harris. He's the head of the psychedelic research group at Imperial College in London.

and he joins us now from the BBC in Oxford. Welcome to Science Friday. Hi there. Pleased to be here. Thank you for taking time out from this wedding weekend for us. Yeah, it's all good fun. Now, I know you study psychedelics and their effect on the brain, how they might be used therapeutically.

Serotonin receptors are involved in how psychedelics work. Do we know how much more, anything more, about how that works? Well, the psychedelics seem to work on a particular kind of, serotonin receptor. There's some 14, at least 14 of these different receptors and they each tune the brain in a different way. Serotonin comes in as the common key, but these receptors are like different locks if you want. And there's one particular one, the 2A receptor, the 2A subtype, which seems to be key, critical in how psychedelics work, because if you block it, you give a drug that selectively gets in the way of a psychedelic getting at this receptor. then people won't trip. They won't have a psychedelic experience. So it's a really nice grounding sort of staple finding in the science of psychedelics that, you know, despite all the, you know, sort of mystical stuff that can be conjured up by these compounds and all the artistic interest and such like, you know, we can trace it all back to a particular molecule in our brains and a particular protein. And it sort of brings the whole area back down to Earth in a way.

Well, you bring up that topic and I'm glad, I'm glad about that because I want to. want to get into that. And one of the more surprising. I mean, there's so much surprising in this book. Michael, you write about the part of the brain called the default mode network, which I think 99% of us have never heard of. What is that? And not only that, you write that the psychedelics work in just the opposite way in that network that we thought they did. Yeah, and that was Robin's, I think, critical discovery. Many scientists assume that when you gave a psychedelic to the brain, it would lead to kind of, you know, an explosion of activity, much like the fireworks people report.

But in fact, when Robin imaged the brain of people who were tripping on psilocybin, he found this surprising finding that activity in this one particular network called the default mode network went down, was downregulated. And this is a network that's critically involved in really our concept of self. It's where we go to mind wander. It's time travel takes place there thinking about the future in the past, self-reflection, worry, and theory of mind, the ability to impute mental states to others. And that, I think, is really the other key finding that is helping to tell this fascinating story. And in fact, Rob, and you have a map of connection.

in the brain, and the brain on the psilocybin shows a dense forest of lines connecting every region to the other, which is so much greater connections compared to the much more pruned organized connections of a regular brain. Yeah, that's right, yeah. So you're saying that under the influence of psychedelics, parts of the brain that never talk to each other now can talk to each other. Yeah, or don't talk to each other that much ordinarily can have a much freer conversation under the drug. And that picture that we see, it actually looks more similar to the kind of

organization that you would see in the human brain earlier on in life. So as the brain develops and we develop and we mature, our thinking becomes more sophisticated, more specialized, more analytical, and all these systems start to parcelate off and specialize. And so what happens under psychedelics is that there's a kind of despecialization in a way, and the brain sort of operates in this more sort of rudimentary, freer, more hyper-associative and plastic kind of way. So you, and the point is made that that's sort of reversing us into more of a childlike state where children are more receptive to new information, and maybe that's why when you're on psychedelics, you're like, wow, look at the world.

world. You're looking at it with new eyes, so to speak. And you're exceptionally vulnerable, you know, like a child, you know, and exceptionally sensitive to your environment and your context. And children are great learners as well, you know, when poets have written that they are, you know, sort of spiritual beings. And so you can see a lot of overlaps with that. Do we have any idea whether these then, you're showing all these neural connections, are they ever permanent when you're done? That we don't know. I mean, that would be an area that's very much deserving of further study is what are the longer term implications? We've done a little bit of this at Imperial

looking at the brain after a psychedelic, not during a psychedelic experience, but after the effects have worn off. And what we've seen there is something quite surprising. So the sort of picture that you'll see during the experience with brain networks, dissolving. Michael was talking about the default mode network, dissolving or disintegrating. What we see when the drug effects wear off is that these networks spring back. There's a kind of resetting of them, and they reconfigure. And that's quite reassuring in a way. But, yeah, there's a lot more to discover, I think. Let's see if we can go to the phones, get some calls, and let's go to New Haven, Connecticut.

Carolyn, welcome to Science Friday. Thanks, Ira. My question is about microdosing hallucinogenic, and by that I mean taking very small doses, basically subperceptual doses. I've heard anecdotally about the potential of microdosing psilocybin to have a positive effect on treatment-resistant depression and creativity and other things. And I'm wondering if your guests have anything to say about microdosing and the neurological process is involved. Michael, Robin? You write about it in your book a bit. I think Robin is about to study it, which I think is really important. The key fact about microdosing is what we know about is purely anecdotal. And there is no scientific basis, as far as I know right now, to believe that it works and is anything more than a placebo effect. However, Robin, tell me if I'm wrong.

I think your lab is about to take a look at it, yes? Yeah, we are in a placebo-controlled study. But this is true that it's amazing that this meme, this phenomenon of microdosing has really captured people's imagination. And it seems so many people are doing it in creative areas in the world like Silicon Valley and this idea that it can aid creativity and enhance well-being. And all of it so far is anecdote. So, you know, the placebo effect is incredibly potent. Expectation is incredibly influential. And so the idea of microdosing is take these tiny doses that you don't really feel.

And so it is an open question. I could see how it could work conceptually. I could see how very low doses of LSD might kind of lubricate the mind. But where we are right now, keeping our feet on the ground, there isn't any evidence to support it. And you could ruin the whole phenomenon, Robin, by finding that it doesn't work. Well, that's the beauty of science. I know.

Well, let's talk about the. Let's talk about the science of this because how do you do serious double-blinded studies of psychedelics if you really want to be accepted, right, the results, since the effects are going to be so obviously different than the control group? I mean, how do you go about, Michael O'Robbin, to actually verify the science of what's going on? Well, there's no perfect solution. The thing is the effects of psychedelics are so conspicuous, they're so obvious. So when you are given a high enough dose of a psychedelic, very quickly you realize that that's what you've been given. And so it's hard to control for that. And so you can't give a standard placebo because you know that you haven't had anything.

You know, you're not meeting God and having these transformative experiences. So there isn't really a perfect solution here. You could try what we call an active placebo, another psychoactive drug that changes consciousness, but not in the same way as a psychedelic. You could try lower doses of psychedelics so that people have the expectation that they're going to get as psychedelic, but that serves as a control.

So there's no perfect solution here. And one thing to add is that, you know, the placebo effect and expectancy might actually be part of what these drugs work on anyway in terms of enhancing psychological expectations. So in the context of therapeutic work, it might be part of the treatment model. You know, I think Robin raises a really interesting point here, which is that these drugs are so strange in many ways that they're hard to fit into the paradigms we have for doing science and for doing therapy.

So, for example, it isn't just the molecule that is the therapeutic agent here. It's the experience people have under the influence of the molecule. And that experience is shaped by lots of other factors, including the therapist, the trust in the therapist, the room that they're in, the expectations they bring to the session. So it's messy, but in a very exciting way, I think. And how exactly we will fit this kind of therapy into the models we have, which tend to be either pharmacological or talk therapy. This is a new hybrid. Let's go to the phones. Let's go to Sarah in Missouri.

Hi, Sarah. and welcome to Science Friday. Go ahead. Sarah, you're there. Hi, hi, I'm sorry. My name is Sarah. I have been suffering from treatment resistant and depression since I was 18. I'm currently 39. And I was just wondering a normal person like me who's gone through several different times

of medications from the tricyclet to the SSRI and even SSNI without any kind of effect, how can a normal person like me become a person in the study who might be able to see a this did change my life in the way I look at my life. Yeah, how do you count can people who are suffering getting on a study or get therapy? Good question. Robin, you want to take that? Well, yeah, sure. I mean, it's hard because there's so much demand, it seems now.

And, you know, that's exceeding supply on such a vast scale. So it's difficult because, you know, for example, we're doing a new study at Imperial where we're comparing two doses of psilocybin to, you know, to, you know, for example, we're doing a new study at Imperial, to six weeks of taking an SSRI every day, a satelopram. And yet we can only have 50 people in the trial and only half of them get the full dose of the psilocybin. So it's tricky to cater for all this. And the key message is that to deliver this therapy properly,

you have to do it in a particular way and maintain certain safety standards. And so it's a difficult situation because people may well, know, be quite desperate for this new treatment that they hear can be effective and they want to have it, but they can't, you know. And then there's, of course, the legal implications. So what is, Michael, what is keeping this from being expanded, you know, to normal studies of thousands of people? Well, we are going to move into phase three studies. That is the less

step in the FDA protocol before they will rule this, a medicine that can be prescribed. So that's very exciting. That should happen before the end of the year. And there will be a dozen or so sites in America and another, I think, eight or ten in Europe where they will be studying, having, you know, trials involving hundreds of people. The funding is in place. The FDA appears to be on board. So there will be opportunities. And if callers want to learn about it, the organizations that are sponsoring the studies in this country is the USONA Institute, USO-N-A. They're in Madison, Wisconsin, and at some point soon, they'll have information on their website where you can apply to take part in these studies. And there is other very exciting studies going on that MAPS is doing, an organization called the Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies.

And they're studying MDMA or ecstasy in the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder. And they're starting widespread trials this summer. So, but for, Robin's right, the demand is going to overwhelm the supply. The hope is that within the next several years, these phase three studies will be completed, and this will become an accepted form of therapy, paid by insurance. Even before that happens, though, the FDA has certain expanded access or compassionate use programs, and so it may actually be possible in the next two or three years that people will, will be able to have access.

I don't want to raise expectations too high, but that scenario is a real one. I'm Ira Flato, and this is Science Friday from WNYC Studios. Talking with Michael Pollan, author of How to Change Your Mind, and also with one of the scientists mentioned in the book doing cutting-edge research, Robin Carhart Harris. This book did change my mind, and one of the first things I thought about is,

gee, how could I try that out on myself? because, you know, I'd be scared to do it. But you make such an incredible case about what happens in your mind so differently about how you sort of revert us to our childhood states, right, Michael? And opens up, and that's really the trip. The trip that we see people describing is not, you know, what is the trip? It's in flux, the flooding in of stimuli we never were allowed to let in before. That's part of it. I think for me, my understanding, and I should say it was shaped in large part by Robin's work, which is really visionary work.

And I encourage people to look up some of his papers. But basically what seems to happen on a high dose is an ego dissolution. Your sense of self vanishes or at least is softened in profound ways. And you realize that one of the things your ego is doing is patrolling the borders of self and other, of you, other people, you, nature, and erecting these walls. And that when those walls come down, incredible things happen in the mind. For one thing, you do have this flood of information from the world that comes in that you might not have been aware of. The gates, you know, the doors of perception, as Huxley called it.

But also, your ego defends you against unconscious material and all sorts of things emerge from your unconscious and your memory. So you're given access. And there's also this what can be wonderful or terrifying, depending on whether you surrender to it or fight it, this sense of merging with an entity larger than yourself, whether it is nature. And I certainly had that experience or other people. And when these gates open, what rushes in very often is a sensation of love and connectedness. And, you know, a lot of the problem, if you're depressed, if you're depressed, if you're, addicted is your connections to the world and other people have been frayed and depression certainly is a case of being a feeling disconnected and those connections are reestablished and even though it is

only temporarily the case these are memories you bring forward into your life i i talked to one patient that robin treated an american living in london who had been depressed continually since 1991 it lifted for a month and even though the depression came back, she now had this destination, this objective that, yes, there is this other consciousness, and it's worth working to get there. I'm not going to give up. And that's very powerful. Talking with Michael Powell, an author of How to Change Your Mind, and we're going to take a break and come back and take more of your questions. Lots of people have questions about it. and just want to thank him for, well, we actually've run out of time.

I'm sorry. Yeah, we have you back to talk more about it. This has got so many people interested. Michael Powell, an author, of How to Change Your Mind. Am I reflato? This is Science Friday. This is Science Friday. Am I Refledo?

If you think back to your high school science fair, there were probably a few baking soda volcanoes. Remember that one? or maybe a diorama of the earth? Well, this week, students from 75 countries came to Pittsburgh to present their projects as part of the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. And these were the finals, and the students have stepped up their game.

They're not doing those little pipe cleaner or paper machine models, so not one in sight. These students were using carbon nanotubes, AI, neural networks, 3D printers to investigate a pretty complex, complicated questions. And these kids are all right. And we have two students here joining me in the studio here in Pittsburgh to talk about their projects. Let me introduce them to you. Alyssa Rewinkie. Rewinsky is a junior at Monta Vista High School at Monta Vista, Colorado. Welcome to Science Friday. Thank you so much. Everett Crowell is a junior at Stillwater Area High School in Woodbury,

Minnesota. Thank you so much. Thank you both. Are you excited to be in Pittsburgh for the finals? Yes, very. Yeah, it's exciting. Now, let me talk to you first. Alyssa, you tested a really interesting way of recycling plastic. You fed three different types of plastic to mealworms. That's exactly right, yes. Whoever thought of that?

I was reading a lot of information about how plastic was affecting species in the ocean, damaging ecosystems. I really wanted to do something about that. So through research, I found information about the mealworm, and its ability to biodegrade polystyrene, which is styrofoam. And I want to look deeper into that and explore other plastic types. So who ever thought mealworms would ever eat plastic? It's amazing.

You probably didn't either. No, I didn't. It doesn't hurt the worm, does it? No, I found that eating or feeding them strictly plastic didn't kill more worms than just feeding them potato. However, it did slow down their life cycle a bit. However, you can prevent that by providing a healthy food source such as potato to the mealworms as well, and they will still consume plastic. Now, how can they can consume plastic, and I can't do that?

What do they have going for them? There's a special type of bacteria that they have in their digestive system that breaks down the molecules in plastic. Yeah, you know, we talk about the microbiome a lot on Science Friday. So they must have a really interesting microbiome, right, in their own little bodies. Yes, exactly. Just did in pursuing that, learning what that's like. Yeah, definitely.

I'm really excited by this. Could you imagine then scaling this up for all the plastic? We have all this plastic pollution, right? Right. So to give you an idea, a dump truck of mealworms could consume an SUV's weight in polystyrene plastic in one year. Say that a whole, wow. A dump truck of mealworms. Wow.

Can be an SUV of polystyrene. Last year, you had a project where you studied Western snowy owls. Snowy plovers. Excuse me. What were you trying to find out in that project? I was looking at their nesting characteristics. They're threatened species, so it's really important to save their preferred nesting area. And I was trying to figure out exactly what they liked.

Yeah. So you're drawn to environmental topics. Definitely, yes. Because? I think we really really. need to be compatible with everything on this planet. And as far as working together to help the environment is really important. I turn to you, Everett, you printed, 3D printed a prosthetic foot.

Your interest came from? Just discovering a need for it, I guess. Last year I developed a transtibial prosthetic, which is from the knee down. and this year I just tried to remedy both the two largest problems associated with prosthetics in the world, their level of biocompatibility and the price. So it was really just carrying over my work from last year into this year. And so how do you try to improve prosthetics? What were the key questions that you were trying to tackle on this?

Well, what areas affect gait, which is how we walk, just different factors that go into the specimens associated with humans and how they walk and then bringing the materials that are used for prosthetics into a more viable prosthetic design. So what, you looked at the prosthetics we have around and said, I could make a better one.

In what way? In what way is it better, your idea? It's a lot of different material property is accounted for in the prosthetic. So since it's passive, which means that there's no really moving part, I have to use my knowledge of material science and physics to really bring out the hidden talents of material property. Right. And it stores potential energy better. It lasts longer. it is a lot cheaper to produce and can do just about anything, any other prosthetic on the market can. So it's better bang for your buck, I guess.

So you had to sit down and actually do the math. Oh, yeah. What kind of math are you? Differential calculus, multivariable calculus, linear algebra, all different types of high-level math. You're a junior in high school, right? Yeah. How did you get the knowledge to do this math? self-taught, just kind of sat down at my desk and read a lot of different textbooks and

just read online. Have you been able to interest any prosthetics maker? I've done a lot of work with different hospitals, and I've worked with the hospital Basque Home, Fairview Medical Hospital, and gone into different prostheticists offices and stuff like that, but I don't think it's, at this moment, the best way to distribute it right now. Yeah. Now, you're a runner on the track team? Cross country.

Cross country, excuse me. So you must have studied how people move on the run on the track team. I actually use my cross-country, like, brethren, I guess, are teammates for running study. Is that mean guinea pigs? Oh, yes. They actually ran on a force plate, and it was kind of funny. They had to sign an IRB form, which is kind of consent form. Oh, yeah.

Investigational research. I had to assure them that they would not be cut open with anything. And that was kind of funny just to see how much they could get scared over just running, which is something they do every day. but it's just a great way to involve other people in science. Let me ask both of you. Let me ask you to listen first. What did you learn about yourself when you did this?

I learned that I really like discovering new things, and it's really fun to do new things and learn from your mistakes, especially. Mistakes. We don't reward mistakes, do we? But you have to learn when you do science mistakes are what it's all about. Yeah, this project really did help me figure out that I do want to go into behavioral studies in the future. And, yeah, this was a really exciting project for me. And Everett, what surprised you the most?

You learn nothing from doing something right the first time. Say that again. You learn nothing from doing something right the first time. Everything in science has done either through failure or learning from failure. and I failed a lot in my project. My final iteration of design is my 54th iteration of design. Wow. And it's hard to keep going after you put 20 hours into one design and it just shatters.

But you did. You kept going. Yeah. If you have a goal that you're trying to get to and you really just keep focused on that next horizon or that next hill, the things you can accomplish are just amazing. So just pushing yourself or identifying that when you fail, it's not necessarily the end, just another way to improve. You know, that is the definition of research.

Yeah. You know, there's the search. That's the first part. And then there is the research. Yes. And you keep researching it all the time to get it right. Very true. Yeah.

Being a geek is one of our highest honors around here. I want you to know. I have pocket protectors, I can. If you know what they are. You don't look geeky like I am. I mean, how do you know, do your fellow students look at you as geeky for kids, you know? Yeah? I would say so.

Yes, you're not. Yes, definitely. Melissa, what do you mean? How do they treat you differently? I don't know if they treat me differently in a bad way. It's just they know that I'm a big science fan, and I'll do all. all I can to work hard and do the best I can. Does any of that rub off on them?

I would hope so. That's what I would like that. And Everett? I would say definitely my school or my friends view me as a nerd. I am captain of my robotics team and I'm in Science Bowl, Science Olympia. All sorts of different geeky things, I guess. And I love being the person that can have an in-depth conversation about like the string theory on the bus.

So just anything that is science-related, I'm there. So I like it a lot. Do you think adults are interested enough in science? Do you think they appreciate, you know, especially in the environment? You're very much in doing environmental things. Do you worry that there's not going to be an environment, you know, like they have when you grow up? Definitely. That is my biggest worry.

And at this point, I'm doing all I can to not only, educate the adults through science fair, but most importantly the students that are my age and younger than me. I think we are the generations that are going to make a difference. You know, we old people like me, we're looking to you, teenagers, to, you know, there's an old saying that we borrow the future from our grandchildren because that's their future and we're using it up. So I see that you're shaking your head also.

Yeah. Do you feel motivated? Do you feel like this part of your mission is to try to save your future? 100%. You need to protect what is going to be there for you later. So especially in environmental scientists, I think that's one thing that's being greater or the appreciation for or the focus on is being increased over the past two years or so, which is really important. And it's definitely a necessity or it's necessary for it to be increased. have a higher importance.

And how can you as teenagers do something about it? Open your mind. Science fair. Science fair. How about opening your mouth? Yeah. Talking about it. Yeah.

Talk about it. Learn about it. Don't be afraid that it doesn't, if you don't understand it, try to understand it. And if you don't ask somebody. I'm Ira Flato. This is Science Friday from WNYC Studios. We're talking with two of the very lucky people to be involved in the science and engineering fair, the Intel Science and Engineering Fair here in Pittsburgh, Lissa of Rowinski and Everett Crowell.

Do you have heroes? Do you have any scientists whom you look up to? I mean, when you go through this, you talked about failure, and failure is very big in science. Yes. Do you have a hero you name? It's hard to pick one. Yeah. Well, name a few.

There's the easy answers, the big one, like Hawking, Einstein, just anybody really that's been named, all sorts of scientists that if you think about it, the ones that everyone knows, they're not the ones that did it right the first time. Einstein submitted his special relativity paper, I think, several times. Yes, he did. You can't get it right in the first time, and that's not the best thing. So you got Thomas Edison who figured out a thousand ways not to make a lightball. That's right. Limited everything that didn't work. Yeah.

That was the brute force method. Alyssa, do you have someone who? Well, I agree with Everett. Definitely. For me, it's more inspiring the support that I have at home for my teachers and my family. They're big supporters, and they really do inspire me. What was it like then? And what is it like this week to be part of the science fair?

And finally, you know, you're geeky working by yourself in your high school. And suddenly you're here with hundreds of other kids who are like you. Right? What is that like? It's amazing. You're joined by your fellow nerds. You're no longer a nerd. You're an average kid, which is a little bit scary.

Right. At first, you're not the kid that can recite pie. you're that kid that can't recite it as much as the next kid next year. So it's a really great experience just to see and be with somebody or be with people that are just as excited and passion about your passion as you are. So it's a great thing. I agree completely. It's so much of a learning experience and meeting new people and, yeah, being with people

just like you is really amazing. Well, you're both juniors. you have to think about going to college next year. What are you thinking about? What do you want to study? Where do you want to go? Alyssa, I'll ask you for you. I'm still open to ideas.

I'm leaning towards biology or zoology and possibly in state where I'm from Colorado. But I'm keeping my options open as long as I can. I would like to go into mechanical engineering, physics or applied mathematics. I like rigorous courses so I definitely get that with engineering. Do they have a school that you're looking at? I'm looking at a lot of different schools like she has just keep my options open but I do like Northwestern so far. Yeah.

Are you able to talk to your parents about what you do? Do they understand the level of what you're working at? Yes. My mom can recite Young's modulus and everything that is associated with material science because she's read my paper so many times. She's a scientist? No. She's an accountant, but she is brilliant, and I appreciate her very much.

You can see where you get it from. And Alyssa? My parents are big helpers with my science work project. My dad is a retired soil scientist. Oh, is that right. And my mom is a wildlife biologist, so they're excited by my mom. they're excited by my work as well. So that's where your interest in the environment comes from.

Yes. If you could do anything, any career, let's say forget about college. I could award you a career. What would you want to do? Where would you like to study? What you're doing. I would like to study all over the world.

You? Probably at 3M back in Minnesota. All right. I hope they're listening. Hope everybody's listening. It's all the time we have. I want to thank both of you. Good luck to you.

both Alyssa and Everett, Alyssa Rowinsky Jr. at Montevista High School in Montevista, Colorado. Everett Krull Jr. at Stillwater Area High School in Woodbury, Minnesota, both finalists in the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. That's all about time we had for today. Our thanks to 90.5 WESA in Pittsburgh for hosting us today and to WESA's John Sutton, Russ Lloyd, Tom Hurley, Helen Wigger, Terry O'Reilly, Nick Wright for the help in putting on our program. And join us tomorrow night at Carnegie. We don't know how to say it's Carnegie or Carnegie. We'll say it both way. Library Music Hall for a special live taping of the show.

Still a few tickets left, ScienceFriday.com slash Pittsburgh. And if you missed any part of the program, you always hear our podcasts. Also, we're all. Every day is Science Friday. We're on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and you can ask you a smart speaker to play it at any time. Have a great weekend. I'm Ira Flato in Pittsburgh.