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Title:
What Is the Polar Vortex? - Best of the Blogs #12
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Description:
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Hello, and welcome to January
¶
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at the Scientific American blog network.
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I'm Carin Bondar, and you know,
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this month was kind of
a wacky one for the network.
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We are going all over the place,
from extreme weather events
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to extreme viral behavior,
to the evolutionary psychology
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behind the booming industry
that is -- monster pornography.
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I'm gonna throw it right over to
John Horgan to explain that one first.
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Monster porn;
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this is written primarily by women,
for women and it involves
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fantasies of women having -- sex
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often, at least initially,
non-consensual sex
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with -- bigfoot, with Godzilla, T. rex,
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giant robotic aliens -- I mean,
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every possible crazy entity
that you can imagine.
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The angle I came up with was --
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that not just the human mind in general,
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but especially the female mind
and the female libido
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are completely mysterious.
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I mean, because who could possibly
predict something as crazy as --
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monster porn?
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This month on her blog, The Artful Amoeba,
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Jennifer Frazer gets us a history
about a virus that has managed to
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successfully invade an animal host
from a plant host.
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This is mind-boggling!
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Tobacco ringspot virus
normally causes trouble
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in plants like soybean, raspberry,
and of course, tobacco.
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So it came as a shock
when scientists discovered the virus
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had apparently invaded honeybees.
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Honeybees and plants are separated
by about 1.6 billion years of evolution.
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So, host leap of that magnitude
is mid boggling about.
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The virus may have been added by
a high mutation rate
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and also by the fact that can be
a sexually transmitted disease of plants.
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Which means it can get around
virus per packet, we call polen.
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Since bees regularly wallow in the stuff,
and do it with gusto,
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the virus clearly had
a motive and an opportunity.
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When scientists discovered the virus
comfortably ensconced
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inside bee's wings,
antennae, nerves and blood,
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it became clear that,
no matter how improbable,
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the virus clearly had the meets as well.
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We are all very aware
of the crazy cold weather
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that has been going on in a lot of places
in North America this month.
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Mark Fischetti is here to explain
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what this polar vortex is
and exactly why such cold temperatures
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in such extreme storm events
are happening.
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We keep praying about this polar vortex
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every time the temperature has dropped,
like it's some mystical beast
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that comes down from the North Pole
and grips us into a deep freeze.
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So, what is this thing anyway?
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Well, my blog has the details,
but you can think about like this:
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The polar vortex is a prevailing
wind pattern that circles the Arctic,
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flowing from West to East
all around the entire planet.
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Normally it does state far north
and locks the cold air up
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towards the North Pole,
but occasionally the vortex weakens
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and allows that cold air to drift down
through Canada into U.S.
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The vortex, when it does that,
can also push the jet stream
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much further south and keep it there,
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so we do stay in the cold for days on in.
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So, what causes the vortex to weaken,
in the first place?
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Well, we'll have to read the blog for
the details, but here's a hint:
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it has to do with a lost
of arctic sea ice in the summer time.
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Well, there you have it,
just a small sampling
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of some of the highlights from January
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at the Scientific American blog network.
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Make sure you check back
to all of your favorite blogs, you know,
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weekly there are so many cool histories
coming in your away.
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I get the highlights just of a few of them
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and I will be back to do
just that again in February.
