Kind: captions
Language: en
We can bring microbes back to life, if
you will, that have been frozen in
perafrost for 30,000 years.
>> They're pretty badass. Like, they'll put
up with a lot.
>> They'll put up with a lot. I get it. I
should marry a microbe. Is that what
you're telling me? Well,
>> you already got a whole bunch more
microbial cells in you than you sells,
buddy.
[music]
>> Dr. Peter Gurgus, welcome to Particles
of Thought.
>> Thank you. Thank you. It's a pleasure.
So, you're a deep ocean explorer, but
you're not just thinking about the
ocean. You're thinking about life in the
ocean, microbial and some macroscopic
animals, and you're thinking about life
off of the Earth, right? Is that
>> Yeah. Absolutely right. And I I would I
would suggest that if we really want to
start thinking about life uh say in our
solar system, we got to start by
understanding life on Earth, especially
the microbes. And I can't help but toss
out a fun fact and that is [snorts]
>> microbes really rule this planet. I mean
they run the planet and there are about
10 to the 27th microbes on Earth.
>> Wow.
>> And one of my favorite things to tell
students and this is legit true is if
you took those microbes each about a
micron in size and you strung them end
on end like pearls on a necklace.
>> Yeah.
>> They stretch 105,000 lighty years.
>> What?
>> Right.
>> Holy cow.
>> Right. So
>> Right. Go ahead. That's across the Milky
Way that crosses the galaxy, right? So
when I think of big numbers, I don't
think of astronomical numbers anymore. I
think of microbial numbers and it's a
reminder that there's a lot of them
here.
>> And with that being said, they work
together to run the planet. And so if we
want to think about life on say Mars or
Europa or Titan or in Selenus,
>> you look to Earth first and say, what
are the fundamentals here? What is it
that these microbes do and how do they
make a living? And that helps us think
about what to look for on those other
planetary bodies. man. You know, as a
scientist, when you know, I'm skeptical.
And when you first said, "Microbes run
the world." Yeah.
>> I immediately thought,
>> not according to Beyonce, [laughter]
>> she's like, "Girls."
>> Okay.
>> In addition to Beyonce, microbes run the
world.
>> All right. [laughter] All right. When I
think of life,
>> I divide life into two classes.
>> Multisellular [laughter] and not
multisellular. Right. Right. Uh things
like bacteria archa. And I for me that's
a nice filter because I think about
>> a random sample.
>> If I were an alien and I came to Earth
for eight nights of its history there
would not have been multisellular
macroscopic animals. It would all have
been microbes. So in a way is a
microbial world.
>> Yeah. Now you're warming my heart here
my man. So look we we um so we're human
and we're you know we've got these
fingers and hands and brains and all
this and we breathe air and we live on
land. So, it's understandable that we
have this bias to thinking of us as
being like this pinnacle of of life on
Earth. And I I don't want to cheese
people off who believe that. Let me just
say that this is very much a microbial
world. And I'm going to give you some
quick examples. When you think about the
oxygen in our atmosphere, a whole lot of
that was produced by microbes billions
of years ago.
>> The oxygen in Earth's atmosphere came
from microbes. That's the deal. And so
without that event having happened,
>> you couldn't you wouldn't have animal
life as we know it today.
>> This is true. I know the plot where
first oxygen takes off into the
atmosphere, then you get the Cambrian
explosion.
>> That's exactly right. So, you know, we
nickname it the great oxidation event.
It's just a fancy way of saying
>> this thing happened where a bunch of
oxygen showed up.
>> And that's because microbes for the
first time figured out how to, and I'm
going to nerd out a bit, how to split
water. M
>> let me explain what I mean by that. A
lot of us at some point have maybe read
about like you can take a a battery and
you can take two wires and stick it in
the water and you get hydrogen gas and
oxygen gas, right? It's electrolysis.
>> So in a very real way, a lot of the the
early microbes figured out, hey, I like
I'm going to be a little anthropomorphic
here and talk like they're talking to
each other, but these microbes are like,
I can take energy from the sun and I can
split water and I can make a living
doing that. I can make my all the stuff
I need to stay alive and give off
oxygen.
>> So, do you does it use the energy from
the sun to split the water?
>> Absolutely. Oh,
>> yeah. Super cool. And there were
microbes before that knew how to use the
energy from the sun, but not split
water.
>> And then this capacity is super cool. I
don't want to like drag us into the
details, but it it was a neat way in
which these microbes that we call them
cyanabacteria.
>> Yeah.
>> Evolved this ability to use water and
split it and that gave off oxygen. And
it was so successful because it yields a
bunch of energy
>> that they they did great. They started
flourishing and guess what built up in
our atmosphere? The oxygen
>> there. So wait a minute. Is the oxygen
their poop? That's their poop.
>> Look, one one creature's poop is another
creature's breath, right? Like that's
like that's what So actually that creeps
me out now I think about it that way.
That's kind of breathing. Yeah. Right.
We're breathing a bunch of
cyanobacterial poop. But it's true. But
that oxygen molecule started in the core
of a star then
>> which is even cooler.
>> It went into water then it became
cyanobacteria poop.
>> Yeah. Exactly. And and so here this
little microorganism
starts doing this and they by the way uh
they start um their activity leaves
behind these uh really clear fossils.
They're like think of it as like um
chalk. It's a carbonate. So it's this
big mound that we can see in the fossil
record and we can see little laminations
where they grew and they grew. So
>> the reason we know they exist is because
they they kind of made their own sorts
of rocks, these carbonates. And so we
can look at them like that's where
microbes were. All right. So they start
putting oxygen in the atmosphere.
>> This sets the stage for the
multisellular life you were talking
about for animals,
>> right? Yeah.
>> Um,
>> animals are cool because they build all
sorts of neat body parts that are
specialized, you know. So, if you think
about you and me,
>> we've decided that a bunch of our cells
are going to form our brain
>> and they're going to do the kind of
command and control, right? Well,
because the point you bring up is
something I talk about all the time is
that we are,
>> you know, and I wonder because every
cell is a living thing
>> and there are single cells that live out
there as single cells, but we're made up
of a bunch of single cells. So, are we
us or are we a colony of gazillions of
individuals?
>> Yeah, it's a great question. Let's start
with the US cells.
>> Uh we're um we're us in that we have
sort of decided and forgive me for being
again a bit kind of anthropomorphic
here, but but we're our bodies are like
we're going to have some cells do this
job of command and control. And that
frees up the muscle cells in our bodies
to be muscles. They don't have to worry
about command and control,
>> right? So, this tissue specialization
means we've got organs
>> and that lets us do crazy cool things
like walk around, uh, eat a
cheeseburger, uh, pick a fight, you
know, uh, run for your life, whatever it
is. So, that's what animals are good at.
>> There are some trade-offs, though, and
I'm going to tie this into oxygen. Yeah,
we animals and basically every animal on
the planet can't live without oxygen
because the only way that our an our
bodies can harness energy is by eating
dead stuff or live stuff if that's your
thing. You eat stuff and you you you
basically control burn it with oxygen.
You oxidize it, right? That's what we
do.
>> And that's what all animals have to do.
That's the only way we generate enough
energy. Wrong. Harness enough energy to
stay alive, right? Because it's not
>> it's not uh created or destroyed. We are
just harnessing energy from these
reactions. Okay, so far so good. That's
what animals do.
>> But the trade-off is that's the only
thing they can do. There is no animal
alive on Earth that can do like live off
of rocks, right?
>> But see, microbes can,
>> right?
>> That's what's so cool about microbes is
that there's so many different kinds of
microbes. They can make a living off
just about any pair of chemicals that
can react by passing electrons to one
another.
>> Wow. That's a lot of
>> That's a lot. So, there's like microbes
that live off of uranium.
>> What?
>> Yeah. And they've, this is even cooler,
they've evolved ability to to deal with
uh radiation damage to their DNA because
they have like 12 copies of their genome
and they just fix the errors every time.
Yeah. So, microbes can do all this stuff
and they can eat all sorts of different
foods. We animals, we're stuck with
breathing oxygen and eating organic
matter. Scientists call this aerobic
respiration. So, so animals are great.
They're successful, but it's like this
deal you made we made with the devil a
long time ago. Like, okay, I'll take the
best one of the best ways of harnessing
energy. I'll take that and I'll do all
this cool stuff, but that's all I can
do.
>> Wow. Yeah. Yeah.
>> And for a long time, this was just a
microbial world.
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Are there any animals, this is weird,
that have both gills and lungs? I would
love that. Right. So I could dive into
the ocean and because I just discovered
that the southern elephant seal Yeah.
can stay submerged for two hours.
>> Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty badass.
>> Yeah. Without gills. Yeah. Yeah.
>> It's pretty badass. Yeah. So, are there
animals that have both? There there are
some definite funky animals out there.
And this is one of the things I love
about animal physiology and
biochemistry, which I started off with
in graduate school,
>> is that animals have evolved all these
cool tools to do different things. Like,
let me give you an example. There are
some frogs that have patches of their
skin that's transparent and they can
suck up oxygen just through that little
skin.
>> Through the water or the air.
>> Through the water, right? Or the air
actually.
>> Or the air.
>> The punch line with getting g getting
oxygen, right? For all animals, all
animals need oxygen. The punch line is
>> you need to be able to get as much
oxygen as you need,
>> but that surface also gives up water.
>> Ah.
>> So our evolutionary kind of compromise
are lungs. So, we can breathe in oxygen
and exhale it, but it's it really
doesn't work as well as some other kinds
of gas exchange things. So, so animals
are cool cuz there's so many different
designs to solve problems.
>> Yeah.
>> But like
>> there none of them are perfect.
>> They're all a compromise, right? And
that's that's okay. That's cool. It
works.
>> But there are some creatures out there
that have a little bit of both and they
live in crazy weird places like African
lungfish, right? Which do really well.
So, yeah. When you talk about this being
a microbial world, two two things come
to mind.
One of them is mass extinctions.
>> Yeah.
>> And [clears throat] you know, right now
we're suffering this loss of
biodiversity on Earth, right? Due to,
you know, people think human activity,
but microbes aren't suffering that. And
then, you know, there's the big
extinction that occurred and that was
the only mass extinction allegedly that
insects suffered. I've heard somewhere,
>> right? Is there a known record of
microbial extinction events like global?
>> That's a great question. That is a great
question.
>> Yeah. Yeah.
>> I don't know.
>> Yeah. I've never heard that.
>> I kind of doubt it.
>> Yeah.
>> But I want to I I want to remind let's
take a step back and say that um
>> mass extinctions have been a part of
life on Earth since there's been life on
Earth. And there's been many. And if you
think about it, uh, if if we make an
estimate, probably about 98 or 99% of
all of the biodiversity that's ever
existed on this planet is gone.
>> Oh, wow.
>> So, the the diversity we have today
is is precious and important.
>> Yeah.
>> But I do think we have to sometimes
remind ourselves that things evolved and
go extinct throughout Earth's past
before humans ever tinkered with
anything.
>> Right. Right now, microbes are wild
because
>> it's really hard to know what a
microbial species is.
>> So, when you see different bacteria, I
mean, they they're shaped differently.
[laughter]
>> They're shaped differently. So, yeah, we
got some in different shapes, but let me
put it this way.
>> Um, despite your best efforts, if you
fall in love with a cat, you're not
you're not going to have a cat human
baby.
>> Right.
>> Right. That's like not going to happen.
It's not in the cards. But microbes are
kind of, how do I put this? They're like
>> they're sort of floozies with their
genomes. What I mean is they can swap
genes all the time
>> with other species. Oh, absolutely. All
the time. Yeah. So, so if we rely on a
genome to say, okay, this is Hakee and
Hakee's a human cuz this is what his
genome is. We lose that in microbes.
Like, we don't can't do that very
easily.
>> So, have microbes suffered mass
extinctions? I'm willing to bet there
are certain microbes that were alive on
Earth in the past that aren't alive
today.
>> Yeah.
>> Because the conditions on Earth don't
favor them. But I'm not don't I don't
know if I could call that a uh a mass
extinction in the way that you know if
we have a meteorite or an asteroid
impacted and we have this die off of
animals. I don't know that they're the
same.
>> Right. It's a great question.
>> That's a different Yeah, that's a very
different realm of existence, the
microbial realm if you're doing that. So
let's get back to the ocean.
>> Sure. So
>> favorite place
>> I heard you said something about the
ocean ecosystem and how it differs from
our land ecosystems that we have contact
with every day and think about go into
that for me.
>> Yeah,
>> sure. So
>> the um
>> so let me start with a bit about the
ocean, right? It covers the majority of
our planet's surface. uh and it's it is
a huge part of what makes our planet
um habitable and comfortable for us. And
I want to make it clear that you don't
need an ocean for a planet to be
habitable per se. You need water. But I
want to make it clear that uh that the
the world as we know it today is really
useful for for us and for other animals,
right? The ocean tempers heat like it
absorbs heat and releases heat. It keeps
our planet from having the wild
temperature swings that you know better
than I do happen on like uh on the moon
or on Mars, you know, like crazy
temperature swings. All right, but
>> but the other thing is the ocean is so
foreign to us that sometimes it's easy
to lose sight of
>> just kind of how different a place it
is. So check this out. So sunlight goes
through the ocean, right? And it
disappears at about a thousand meters.
Okay? And we call that upper thousand
meters uh like um the the the epipelagic
and misopagic. These are fancy names we
come up with. But below that we call
that the deep sea proper or baipelagic.
>> Okay.
>> Now the deep sea proper is the ocean
beyond the reach of sunlight.
>> And when you think about
>> its size and its volume, you realize
that 80% of our planet's living space is
deep ocean.
>> Oh wow.
>> Right. Super cool, right?
>> 80% 80%. Now, so that means everything
else that we think of off the top of our
heads, the um the Serengeti, right? The
Amazon rainforest, even the shallow
water coral reefs,
>> Washington DC, Boston, Paris, you name
it. All that's in the other 20%.
>> Wow.
>> And I, you know, I've I've said this
this little fact because you have that
top layer of the ocean. I would imagine
that a big percentage of the 20% is that
sunlit
>> part of the ocean.
>> Yeah, that's right.
>> And the land because you only cuz the
vertical
>> extension of land is to the top of the
tree canopy.
>> Yeah, that's right.
>> From the ground. Yeah, that's it. And so
even that other 20% a bunch of it is
ocean, right? Right.
>> So, so you know the if uh you're talking
about aliens, right? So, I love saying
that if aliens came to Earth and they
had to go back and tell their leader
what the typical condition on Earth was
like, they would tell her it's cold,
wet, dark, and salty. [laughter]
>> Cold, wet, dark, and What else fits that
description,
>> right?
>> Cold, [laughter] wet, dark.
>> I'll let you run with that one.
>> I can't think of anything. I can't think
of anything.
>> So, because it's cold, ice cold sea
water, right?
>> Yeah.
>> Now, that is really interesting, right?
because it means that this part of the
ocean about and we're just just just
barely like getting eyes down there,
right? Like we're just barely starting
to study it and understand it. That's
the that's our planet's sort of largest
living space. Now, in fairness, just so
I don't want to paint an inaccurate
picture, most of the biomass, like most
of the stuff that's alive on Earth lives
in that 20%. Because the sun,
>> yeah,
>> is our planet's power source.
>> You know what? This is my insight that I
have been telling my colleagues for the
last decade or so
>> uh and my students. I was like what
makes earth special is not
[clears throat] the fact that it has an
ocean. It's the fact that our ocean is
bathed in sunlight.
>> Yeah.
>> Totally.
>> Yeah.
>> Totally. And I love Thank you for doing
that work. I keep telling people because
in my in in my um even in my ocean world
many scientists are like oh well water
is unique to Earth. And we know it's not
right. just like quazars that have a
million times more water than Earth
does.
>> But it's that bathed in sunlight and
that lets
>> these photosynthetic organisms like
algae and microbes and plants, they do
the the work of harnessing energy from
the sun
>> and turning it into biomass and
everything else lives off that. So
what's cool is our planet, our
biosphere, our lives, we're fueled by a
star,
>> right? Yeah. What I think is also cool
and what fascinates me about the deep
sea is that there are microbes that live
in underwater volcanoes and they harness
their energy from volcanic gases and
chemicals.
>> So they're actually fueled by the
planet's core.
>> Wow.
>> Which is cool cuz it's different. And
that is why myself and others who many
of my colleagues who study these
ecosystems,
why NASA turned to us and they're like,
"Hey, y'all think about these microbes
that live off of planetary chemicals,
right? Can you help us think about what
life might look like? What would it take
to keep things alive?
>> Ice of Enceladus or Europa or the thick
atmosphere of Titan perhaps,
>> right? I'm not Hakim. I'm not an
astrophysicist. I I have nothing to
contribute there in any deep meaningful
way. But when we understand how these
organisms on Earth can make a living off
volcanic gases,
>> let me give you an example of an
interesting organism, these uh microbes
called methanogens. They make methane.
>> Wait a minute. Aren't those the same
one? I hate to go back to this topic
again, but aren't those the same ones
that make farts in our gut?
>> Yeah, they you uh you carry around your
own little methanogen colony, right? And
um the those those microbes, a lot of
them make a living by taking hydrogen
gas
>> and carbon carbon dioxide and they react
them
>> and they poop methane.
>> That's what they do, right?
>> And when we go to places like Enceladus
uh and you got uh things like Cassini
catching little whiffs of water vapor or
CO2 and hydrogen because there's a
little plume. First off, the plumes are
like, "Well, how'd that happen? Where's
that coming from?" That's that's above
my pay grade. But my my uh my
astrophysics colleagues and and geoysics
colleagues are like, "Yeah, that
suggests there's some kind of
hydrothermal activity maybe." But it's
the chemicals in there that catch my
attention because if there's hydrogen
and CO2,
>> that checks this first box of
>> are there the chemicals you need to keep
something alive.
>> That's just the first box though, right?
>> And so like it's looking pretty
promising in that regard. And now we
have the hard work of saying, okay, what
else might be needed to actually sustain
a microbial community to have them live
and evolve, right? And that's a tougher
question.
>> So is this so, you know, surface life
photosynthesis?
>> Yep.
>> Is what you're describing what I've
heard the phrase chemosynthesis.
>> That's it.
>> Yeah. Are there chemosynthesis
chemosynthesis processes that
result in a production of oxygen just
like with photosynthesis since it since
photosynthesis comes in two types? Does
chemosynthesis also come in two types?
>> That's a good question. Uh and I I think
that there's been a bit of work in in
thinking about can you have
chemosynthetic oxygen production. Let me
actually tell you this brings up a
little sidebar comment I want to make.
Recently there were scientists studying
oxygen on the seafloor
and they were measuring oxygen uh in
this area where um industry wants to do
deep sea mining and it was just part of
let's figure out the microbes and the
animals and all that jazz. And what they
noticed is that oxygen was being
produced on this part of the seafloor
beyond the reach of the sun. There can't
be photosynthetic oxygen production but
they're calling it dark oxygen
production.
>> Interesting,
>> right? Super cool. And this has turned
into a a kind of a hot topic because
people are like, "Wow, are microbes
producing oxygen from chemosynthesis or
some kind of chemical reaction?" I think
the answer is being a trying to be a
good scientist, I'm like, "Sure, it's
plausible. Let's talk about that."
>> But I also think it's possible that
these just abiotic non-living chemical
reactions. Yeah. Like we'll call them
electrochemical reactions where you have
two different minerals.
>> Yes. there there might be oxygen
production from that. So let's give the
authors the benefit of the doubt and
assume that oxygen is being produced
there. Fine.
>> Let's also pretend that that could
happen on something like Enceladus.
That's fine. My job and the job of my
colleagues who are thinking about this
is to ask is that enough to actually
sustain a viable population.
>> You see there's it's one thing to be
like I'm let's be Star Treky here. If I
wanted to beam a bunch of bunch of
methanogens to Enceladus, I'm like, beam
them into the Enceladus ocean. Could
they make a living? Uh, if there's
enough stuff, maybe.
>> But that's not what we're asking. We're
asking is, is there enough energy
available
>> for those organisms to evolve and
sustain and perpetuate and reproduce and
all those things? That's a different
question.
>> Different question.
>> That's hard to answer.
>> Yeah.
>> So, that's where we're at.
>> Yeah. Is there any sort of of theory on
that that allow you to model it? like
let's plug in the plug in the values and
see if it crosses the threshold of
sustainability.
>> You know, I'm going to give a shout out
to a bunch of my colleagues that I've
been working with over the last few
years with support from NASA who I think
smartly said uh you all should get
together and use your different talents
to think about this. So, uh, a fellow
named Chris German at Woods Hole
Oceanographic, who is known for
discovering and finding hydrothermal
vents. He brought a bunch of us together
and said, "Let's put in let's put in
this proposal and do what NASA wants."
So, myself, I have another microbiology
colleague named Julie Huber, a fellow
named Tory Holder who works for NASA as
there's a whole a guy named John
Marshall at MIT who you may know is does
a lot of cool geoysics works. We're
trying to build a model right now as a
team.
>> I see. as a team of of asking can we
predict to some degree
>> how much life could be supported in
these areas right
>> wow wow so one of the most interesting
ideas well not
interesting but divergent ideas I've
heard about life um is radioactive
comets
>> if you have you know so comets the ices
pro provide the water you have some
uranium or something in there that is a
natural reactor it melts the water. If
you have the right
>> your in chops, nitrogen, carbon,
hydrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, sulfur,
>> you could get life.
>> Yeah.
>> And the other thing I just saw recently
was this study that showed that uh oh,
you don't necessarily need a lipid cell
wall. These droplets uh did you see that
one is very recent recent paper. What do
you think about all those
>> very divergent ideas from what we
normally consider?
>> So, I'm going to give you two answers.
One is we as scientists are trained to
be cautious and that's important. It's
important. We should not give that up.
>> But I think it's equally important that
we be open and imaginative.
>> And so right now when I read about those
ideas, I was like, man, that's wacky.
>> But I who really in a way who am I to
say no to that? My job is to gather
enough data to test and poke at those
ideas. Right.
>> Right. So right now I would say the deck
is stacked a little bit against them.
>> Ah, I see. But I think it's really bad
um form as a scientist to just rule
something out because you're like, I
just don't believe it. That's nonsense.
Our job is to test it.
>> Right.
>> And they're cool ideas.
>> Yeah, they are cool ideas.
>> So, we know that living things can
harness energy from light,
photosynthesis. We know that they can
harness energy from chemicals.
>> Yeah.
>> But is it possible that they could uh
directly harness energy from other forms
of radiation?
>> I don't know. I don't know. I'm not
really what ready to rule it out. We
just got to be cautious and think about
it.
>> Well, that's where astrophysics comes in
because you get the big numbers, right?
Right. Hundreds of billion stars in the
galaxy. Hundreds of billions of
galaxies. Totally. Well, hundreds of
Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So, you actually
though go deep in the ocean yourself,
>> right? Yeah.
>> Man, listen. I I people always ask me if
if aliens came, would you go with them?
If there was opportunity to go to Mars,
would you go? And I'm like, hell yeah.
Yes, I will go. Right. I don't want to
go to the deep ocean. [laughter]
That's scary,
>> you know?
Uh, all right. So, for fun, I'll let
tell you a little bit about what it's
like to do that. So,
>> uh, I dive in a submersible called
Alvin, and it's been, uh, Wait,
>> is that the famous one?
>> That's the famous one.
>> Yeah.
>> Right. And it's been doing work since
the 1960s. Totally different. It's been
rebuilt. It's not the same sub, but
>> but here we are. It's a It's a 2 m or
about 6T titanium ball. That's the the
dimensions on It's actually about 6'2
now cuz I can stand up and touch my
head. That's about my height. So, uh,
you get in there with two other people
and you're
>> It doesn't sound like you fit.
>> Yeah. No, I Yeah. You're You're looking
at me. You say I'm a big guy. Yeah. No.
Um, do I fit? Depends on
>> No, I mean, you two people in there.
[laughter]
>> Yeah. From my point of view, I'm
comfortable. But, you know, the thing
is, you get in there with two other
people and it's cozy. And I got to tell
you, I don't like confined spaces. But,
let me explain why this works. Because
the moment they put the sub in the water
and you're looking out your window and
you see the ocean, once you get past
that nasty disgusting feeling on the
surface, you're just down 5 10 meters
about 20 30 ft.
It's magical. I forget that I'm in a
little ball. I mean it. I completely
mean it cuz I'm looking out the window
and as you go down you start to see
bioluminescent organisms, these
creatures that light up and it's a light
show. I mean, Hakee, I am not
exaggerating to say it's
>> it's like these incredible moments that
I I I just never forget. I've been on
about I think nine or 10 of these. Um
>> they're amazing.
>> So, I don't like small spaces. This is
really different, though.
>> This is really different. Wow. Wow. How
deep have you gone?
>> About 4,000 mters, something like that.
>> 4 kilometers, 2 miles deep.
>> What?
>> Yeah. Isn't that wild?
>> Wow. That is wild. So, what happens with
um So, is that is kept at just straight
atmospheric pressure? Yeah.
>> Yeah. It's a big old titanium ball.
>> The same gas mixture that we're
breathing right now.
>> It is. It's air. And and and I want to
also say um it's cool that they designed
it to be so simple and reliable. And
knock on wood, right? This thing's been
diving for a long time and there are
many submersibles. There's about two
dozen deep diving submersibles
worldwide. They do great.
>> What's the duration of the time of of
ascent, descent, and staying at depth?
It's
>> about eight hours total. Right. So, we
get in in the morning. Wait a minute.
Where's the bathroom?
Never mind. [laughter] So, here's the
deal. You get in and it's two hours to
the bottom and then when you're down
there, uh you got about four hours on
bottom, two hours back up. And if you
have to pee, you know, we're
professionals and so you hand a person a
pea bottle and uh the other person, she
or he stands up, pees, everyone looks
away, and you move on.
>> Do you ever get scared down there? You
ever do you ever hear it like creaking
and cracking?
>> Only on my first dive.
>> So, here I was uh I was like I was a
graduate student. And I've been a
graduate student for one month
>> and I get in the sub, not with my
mentor, but a guy whom I had turned down
for grad school. He tried to recruit me.
Oh, that was a setup. Turned. That was a
total setup. So, he's on [laughter] the
boat. I'm in there with him. And you
know, he's he's pretty cool. But he
decided to navigate to our dive site
using a Xerox copy of a map from
National Geographic. Even though the
originals are on the research vessel.
No, it's my map. Anyway, I don't want to
badmouth him too much, but we end up in
totally the wrong place and we run out
of battery power. So the pilot has to
shut everything down and I didn't I
didn't know what the hell was going on.
So I'm freaking out and I'm like I'm
going to die like on my first dive. This
sucks, right? Well, that's the it's a
Navy owned sub that we just turned down
>> the power for science. There was a whole
other battery pack and we weren't in any
real danger, but I didn't know better.
That was the one and only time where I
turned to this guy. I'm like, I'm glad I
didn't go to grad school with you.
You're like an [laughter] idiot. You
know, I was so mad.
>> Well, I was imagining like is there a
hand crank for to recharge the battery?
go with a generator down there.
>> Actually, that's genius. But no, there
isn't. Uh yeah. So, no, that's it. I
mean, honestly, honestly, honestly, it's
otherworldly, you know, and like you'd
go to Mars in a heartbeat because, you
know, it would blow your mind.
>> Absolutely. You know, it reminded me I I
went to one of my dream destinations,
which was to fly on the Zerog plane. I
did it exactly a year ago.
>> Oh, wow.
>> Wow. So cool.
>> The vomit comet until it wasn't.
>> Oh, right. Okay.
I learned why it's called the vomit col.
I I I went through 30 cycles.
>> Wait, really? I thought they did like
two or three.
>> No, they do five in a set typically, but
I was on a special research uh with all
these NASA experiments. I see.
>> And I made it through the first 10,
which for me is was pretty good. Yeah,
it was pretty good. But the next 20,
man, it was pure misery.
>> I thought you were I thought you were
going to say they were going to try to
break. They're like, let's keep going.
They achieved it. Keep going. They
broke. One of the things way ways that
science made a difference in my life,
you know, growing up from a humble
circumstances. Yeah. Is, you know, I
never thought I'd be able to travel the
world except for when I was young in the
Navy, right? But I didn't Yeah.
>> do that. Um, and now I've been in like
over 40 countries, right? And it's all
every trip was free because it was a
science trip, right?
>> Yeah.
>> I imagine that this, you know, you know,
I've been to Indonesia and and you know,
that part of the world is so different
from our east and west coast here. You
know, then you have the Arctic Ocean,
the Antarctic Ocean, which will kill you
in its heartbeat. Uh where have you
been, man? What what are these how the
Mediterranean? What oceans have you
descended into? Great question. I I um
most of my work has been in the the
Pacific along uh all the way from about
the coast of um Vancouver in California
uh in Canada, I'm sorry, Vancouver and
Canada, all the way down to the Gulf of
California. That's where most of my work
has been.
>> Yeah. Yeah. is because of the ring of
fire volcanism.
>> That's it. Yeah.
>> Yeah.
>> But I've been uh I do work in the middle
of the Atlantic in the Gulf of Mexico
and this uh coming year members
>> You say middle of the Atlantic or you
talking about the mid-Atlantic range?
>> Yeah, that's exactly right. And we're
trying to figure out actually the
microbes that live deep in the
subsurface off the Mid-Atlantic ridge.
So, and a lot of these cruises these
days use a robot sub.
>> And yes, safety matters.
>> Uh some people think it's more cost
effective. To be honest, it's about on
par with a human occupied submersible.
>> But a big reason to use a robot sub is
that I can take the video from that
robot sub and up beam it to a satellite
and send it to you. How can
>> Wait a minute. While it's in the water
cuz I was wondering earlier about when
you mentioned that how you do navigation
cuz I I would assume there's no GPS.
>> No GPS. That's the one of the sucky
things about water and makes it hard.
And why we don't know as much about the
deep sea as we really ought to is that
that we don't have GPS. We don't have
Wi-Fi. We don't have Bluetooth. All of
these wireless ways we communicate here
on Earth to fly drones. None of that
works. None of it works.
>> The way we communicate through water
without a wire is to yell at each other.
And I'm being cheeky, but literally we
use these things called acoustic modems.
That's the most common way to do it. And
you basically send uh it data as sound
and you have a microphone listening for
it.
>> What?
>> Yeah. And that the speed of that is like
the old school dialup modems.
>> You're being dolphins and whales, right?
>> Totally. Yeah. Yeah, but but poorly,
>> right? So, so and now we got cool
optical modems. There's new stuff coming
out. Binary uh just coded like
>> it's usually dual.
>> Yeah, it's usually coded like that.
Sometimes uh we actually use our voice,
but but the but the most of the time
>> we just don't have the means to
communicate that swiftly and quickly.
So, we send a robot sub on a tether,
>> fiber optic tether.
>> Got it.
>> And the robot sub itself uses many
kilowatts. Like, we're pumping a lot of
power down to this
>> this robot. It's plugged in.
>> Oh, absolutely. Yeah. To a big research
vessel. So once we have the signal on
board ship, we can send it up to a
satellite and send it back. Even before
Starlink, like there's been satellites
orbiting the Earth and doing
>> live telecasts of, you know, sports
events and all that forever. So, so we
send it up and then we send it back
down. And now that means Hakee, I can
involve scientists and students in
classrooms around the world. Right. Wow.
And this was something uh largely
pioneered by a guy named Bob Ballard who
discovered the Titanic. And to his
credit, he had the foresight to say this
is a cool way to engage people.
>> Yeah. So you can do a live from the
>> live from the seaf. So in fact
>> live you want to watch it live when
we're working out and uh we're going out
in November and February.
>> Yeah.
>> Uh you can go to YouTube and watch our
research dives live.
>> And how do people know when they're
going to occur so they know to tune in?
>> We try social media. Yeah, we try to use
social media, right? There's a few
different organizations that do this
now, but but I think where I think we
can still do better, Hakee, to be
candid, is right now you can tune in and
you can watch and uh it's not especially
interactive and scientists don't use
this to its full potential. So big part
of my life now is saying
>> scientists when someone goes to see and
they're studying a hydrothermal vent,
let's invite another 10 or 20 scientists
around the world,
>> colleagues from Ghana or Brazil or
Argentina or the Philippines. Have them
chime in and ask for samples and let's
really support one another cuz there's
so much work to do.
>> So they can actually say
>> absolutely.
>> Oh, I see something there. You need to
get that.
>> Yeah, that's my dream. And and we can do
it now. It's a little clumsy, but I'd
love for us to as a as a community lean
into this.
>> So, what what types of sample grab
capabilities do you have?
>> So, if you're studying microbes, I'm
guessing a scoop of sand or
>> chunk of water. I don't know what you
call a [laughter]
>> small parcel.
>> A parcel of water.
>> Yeah. Yeah. How do we do that? It's a
great question. Uh the robot subs and
the human occupied vehicles have
manipulator arms. They actually,
speaking of being adopted, they came
from the nuclear reactor industry. So
they use these robot arms to to do
things inside in the presence of
radiation and they have now adopted them
for these submersibles.
>> And so they can do things like pick up
this little cube. They can grab eggs
without cracking them. Like no joke,
they're really good.
>> And we have all the other tools we we
develop like water samplers or little
suction devices. So, we've got What
about like, you know, when you send
something to Mars, it drills into the
rock and takes a core sample?
>> We suck at that.
>> Oh,
>> we kind of we kind My colleagues are
going to hate me, but like we've tried
to make these drills for a while and the
ocean uh uh sort of oil and gas, they
drill all the time. Um it's it's
challenging for us because you've got
this big thing in the water, but it's
floating
>> and so you try to drill, you push
against something, you're going to have
an equal and opposite force. Yeah. So,
we're getting better. We're getting
better. But there's a long way to go
before it's a normal tool and that's
>> we got work to do in that regard.
>> Yeah. And I guess you're you're limited
in the size of what you can bring.
>> Yeah. Now there's a whole ocean drilling
program with a ship that does deep cores
but that's a separate thing.
>> Yeah. All right. So let's go back back
out to space a little bit. But let's go
to
>> the red planet because we are recording
this on September 10th.
>> Right.
>> And there has been an announcement from
NASA. And let me read this. It's a
quote.
>> Yeah.
Just a few hours ago, NASA had a big
press conference saying they've
discovered what, I quote, very well
could be the clearest sign of life that
we've ever found on Mars.
>> Let me catch my breath.
>> Yeah. Take a deep one,
>> bro. Seriously, like clearest sign that
is those are
>> clearest sign of life. Like I would be
happy with a sign of life.
>> There are pictures.
>> Yeah.
>> Right. What NASA points out in this
image is something called a leopard
spot. They circle this rock and say
leopard spot. So
>> I'm guessing they're not saying that a
leopard spot fell off a leopard on Mars
and now it's right here on the ground.
Right. It's some sort of mineral
signature. So what what is going on with
the leopard spot that seems to make it
the clearest sign of life yet?
>> Yeah. Yeah. So understandably NASA
scientists like the rest of us, you
know, we give these things nicknames.
And so if you look at the photo, you can
see that it's got these speckles, right?
And it kind of looks like the spots on a
leopard.
>> And this is it looks like a sediment
deposit with different kinds of minerals
sort of sprinkled in there, if you will.
And what's really exciting is that those
minerals have very different chemical
properties. And so on Earth, you don't
usually find them next to one another
unless some microbe has been involved.
>> Oh,
>> and I want to underline the word
usually.
>> Usually, right? So, this I would not
read this as a smoking gun that there
was a microbe. But what it does suggest
is that like here on Earth when we see
these different kinds of minerals side
by side that chances are there's some
microbe that did this and in the case of
Mars there was a microbe that did this
in the past and this became preserved in
this sediment. That's what's exciting.
That's why the NASA scientists who are
publishing these data are like this
smacks a bit of what we see microbes
doing on Earth.
>> Wow. So in this particular sample that
NASA has produced
>> Yeah.
>> Um
why
is it that them being in proximity
I get it that
>> they're in proximity but why does life
put them next to each other versus a
non-living scenario?
>> Yeah. One of the things that uh well you
know I've been alluding to is this idea
of life out of disequilibrium and
disequilibrium from the environment.
What I mean by that is we know for
example that there are microbes on earth
that uh in the deep ocean sediments
>> when you get a few centimeters or a
meter or so into the ocean sediments
oxygen's gone.
>> Okay?
>> So it's all there's no oxygen dioxygen,
right? There's no oxygen gas dissolved
in the water.
>> In many of those places there's iron
oxides. Just call it rust generically
speaking. Different forms of it, right?
But there are microbes that can take
that rust and they can breathe it the
way you and I use oxygen gas. They will
breathe that rust through a really cool
process.
>> And in so doing, they will produce
non-rusty iron or iron 2,
>> right?
>> And that's often soluble, but sometimes
it reacts with with elements. And I have
a buddy Brandy Toner in Moda. She loves
this stuff. She's good at it. And what
she does is uses really cool probes at a
like the synretton facilities, these
places where we can like zap things
>> and she looks for different mineral
phases. And if you've got a rust sitting
next to a non- rust,
>> it's unless it's in a specific place
like a vent, right? If you got that
sitting in deep sea sediments, there's a
good chance a microbe did that.
>> Oh, it's kind of like with uranium
decaying into lead. Yes. You see this?
>> Right. And so this particular
combination smacks of some microbe
breathing this oxide and turning it into
making this iron too. That's why the
Mars the lead scientists were excited
>> because this is we see bits of this on
Earth. Right.
>> Right. So for for these particular
minerals that they found on Mars, where
do we find the same minerals side by
side on Earth?
>> Yeah. It's like it's again it's the
same. It's underwater um hot springs.
It's deep sea sediments, right? They're
iron containing minerals and they're it
looks like a microbe could have been
breathing one and producing the iron.
>> So does it is it always deep sea because
on Mars
>> uh Jezro crater is sort of like a
>> my understanding it has like a river
delta type situation where water was
flowing into a crater lake.
>> Yeah, great question. It's not always
deep sea, but the reason on Earth it's
often deep sea is because we have this
atmosphere full of oxygen. And the
moment a microbe on the surface takes,
say, rust and turns it into this
non-rusty iron 2, atmospheric oxygen
messes with it. So, we've got these
minerals.
>> Uh, it's unusual to find them
juxtaposed.
>> And there they are sitting side by side
in this mud. So, here's what I think is
cool. Here's where I agree with NASA.
This leans towards something less usual.
Unusual. It's something unusual.
>> Yeah.
>> And so it means that these minerals uh
which are Vivianite and Greekite, if I
remember correctly,
>> the fact that they're near each other is
similar to what we see here on Earth. So
it's a it's it's sort of um
circumstantial
>> circumstantial
>> evidence, but it's cool.
>> Yeah. Yeah.
>> It's a good place to look.
>> Yeah. Yeah. is a step in the in the in
the direction of finding life,
>> right? And as much as I'd love to tell
you that we scientists come up with like
silver bullet answers like the bullseye
on a target, that's not how we search
for life.
>> Let's let's let's so so for example, we
talk about early life on Earth. There
are these zirkcon crystals where they
look at carbon isotope ratios. So let's
talk about signs of life. So when when I
talk about what's different about
Earth's life is that it's based on
sunlight. What I'm getting at there
without saying it is that most of the
oceans are under miles of ice, miles of
rock or a super thick atmosphere,
whereas we have this little tiny thin
atmosphere. Right. Completely.
>> So if I wanted to look for signs of
life, you can do it both remotely and
you can do it, you know, from a
distance, right? And you can do it by
sending a probe there. Yeah. Right. And
aside from finding thing critters
crawling around or skeletons.
>> Sure. What are the different ways that
you could potentially tease out that
there is microbial life? Because I'm
guessing that that is the standard. If
if life exists, nine times out of 10,
just like on Earth, if you visit Earth
throughout its history, most of the time
you're only going to find microbes.
>> Yeah.
>> Right.
>> How do you go about what what are the
different indicators that you could poss
that you guys have thought of so far?
>> How Yeah. So, a bunch of scientists like
myself, um, we study, uh, life on Earth
through kind of, I'm going to call them
different lenses. So, some of my
colleagues think a lot about DNA and
genomics. And of course, if you find a
molecule like DNA and if you can be sure
you didn't drag it to Mars with you,
>> it's pretty cool, right? So, that's
because that's like information in a
molecule.
>> So, so finding a a a molecule, a life
molecule.
>> Yeah. That is unquestionably a life
molecule.
>> Yeah. And let me give you a kind of
little bit more there. Some of my
colleagues are asking like how small
does a mo can a small a molecule be
before you're sure he it's not life. Or
another way of putting it is like if I
find let me take acetic acid which is
vinegar.
>> Yeah.
>> If I find vinegar molecules on Mars that
mean anything
>> cuz we like you got all these like
little organics floating around in
space. But what if you find um 10 things
strung together? Can that happen without
life? What if it's 20 or 100?
>> So, what I'm getting at here is there's
something about the complexity
>> that can give us a hint as to whether or
not this was produced by a living thing.
You know, your your DNA is like millions
of little bases strung together. That's
cool. That's a lot of complexity
complexity. So, if we found something
that's a million bases long, like come
on. Like, that's pretty clear.
>> So, that's one lens. People like myself,
we think a lot about energetics as you
kind of gathered from me talking, right?
>> One way I define life is like it's got
to keep itself at disequilibrium from
the environment. And if I had those Star
Trek triquarters, I could walk around
and poke at things and be like, "Oh,
look, that's the right mix of different
elements all wrapped up in a little
bubble that it may have been at some
alive at some point." Right.
>> But this the challenge with that, what
makes it hard is if I kill you, and I
don't mean to be creepy here, but like
if I Well, let me back up cuz that's is
a bad thing to do on your show
[laughter] in 2025. I know.
>> Can we edit that out? No. So, if if
something dies and we bury it, right,
>> it goes to equilibrium over time and we
can no longer tell it's there. Yeah.
Right. So you take let's just I mean if
you take a piece of cheese and bury it
in your backyard and over a century you
go back like you can't tell that a piece
of cheese was there. Those chemicals
diffuse they get washed away and all
that stuff. You see where I'm going with
this? So it's when we go and look for
life on Mars and if it's you know up two
billion years old we're not going to
find an intact cell with all those
elements in there. So my disequilibrium
model is tough.
>> Yeah.
>> So and so is looking for DNA. So the way
we approach this is we take all of these
five or six or 10 different ways and we
try to overlap them. If I got a little
bit of evidence that leans in the right
direction and someone else has a little
bit, you can imagine starting to say,
"Okay, this is more consistent. We got
five, six, seven, 10 lines.
>> It becomes more than a coincidence when
you have it. That's it." Cuz right now
we got two minerals.
>> Yeah. Yeah.
>> That's where we're at.
>> Two minerals. [laughter]
>> It's a good sign.
That's not your millions of uh
>> things strung together. Oh my goodness.
So,
>> what would conclusive life look like
then at the microbial level?
>> Um, you know, if we were going to
Enceladus and flying through the plumes
>> and we took samples, right? What what
would it
>> I mean it that might be a weird question
because there's a point where you
actually have living critters. That's
clearly conclusive, right? but
nonliving.
>> Well, let's let's uh let me uh so what
I'm going to say is uh is is a is a bit
halfbaked again, but check this out.
Like if you look at Earth, you have all
this oxygen gas in the atmosphere.
>> And just like you alluded to earlier,
oxygen is an element, you know, as in O
the element O like that's all over the
place,
>> right?
>> But it's that O2 gas.
>> That's kind of an interesting
fingerprint because it's like microbes
did that.
>> Yes.
>> Right. And then there's this there there
are all these different kinds of
isotopes. And just as a reminder to
those listening in, that's like when you
have something like carbon, uh you got
three different flavors of it, right?
There's like a carbon 12 and a 13 or 14.
And that has to do with the number of
these things called neutrons, as we
know, sort of stuck to it, right?
>> So sometimes living things discriminate
against one or the other, and they
actually leave a we're going to call it
an isotope fingerprint. Yeah. So when I
look at methane on Earth, to give you a
clear example, and I work with a very
large mass spectrometer in my lab, for
example, I can tell methane made by
microbes versus methane made by
volcanoes.
>> Oh, really? Because Mars is making
methane. It's methane on Mars. Yeah.
>> Yeah. But in order for us to tell if
that methane came from In order for us
to get closer to figuring out if it's
living things or dead stuff, we need to
look at the isotopes. And that's hard to
do.
>> You can't do that remotely. You got to
need a sample. So I actually I'm not
really sure if NASA has that tool. I was
maybe that's something you and I can
look look up after this but I don't know
that there are really high performance
isotope analyzers like on Perseverance.
I don't think that's the case.
>> How do you is it just about by the mass?
It just weighs more.
>> Yeah, it's a mass. So you have to that's
what mass specs are good at. And so
that's the brilliance of sample return.
Like we got to get samples back from
Mars. I would love to see us do this
internationally and really put all of
humanity's uh ingenuity to looking into
what is the evidence in this rock,
right? But we that we have to bring them
home. I don't think we can do it on
perseverance.
>> Yeah.
>> If there was life on Mars, what does
that tell us about Mars?
I think broadly speaking uh it tells us
that there may have been a time in the
past where Mars had uh maybe been in a
position where we had liquid water and
it's pretty it's looking like there
probably was liquid water on Mars and if
that's the case
>> and I don't know enough about the core
of Mars but if there's any heat coming
out from from Mars in the past or now
>> if you have that temperature gradient
which you mentioned that's cool
>> Hakee
>> cuz now if you got liquid water and you
got some heat,
>> right?
>> It's not like the elemental composition
of Mars is that different than Earth. I
mean, it's not exactly the same, but
>> I wouldn't be surprised. I wouldn't be
surprised if we found microbes. I just
wouldn't be. It seems like we keep
getting teased with these, you know,
there was the Martian meteorite with the
microbes in it. There's a methane on
Mars. There's Oh, there's water. Look at
there's still remember the crater where
you can see the seasonal changes. Then
there's the water under the solar under
the the the polar ice.
>> Yeah.
>> All these little teasers.
>> Yeah. Teasers.
>> Yeah. You know, when are we gonna get
the you know, I want a catfish for Mars.
Like when are we going to get to the
real life
smoking gun, [laughter]
>> you know? Yeah. So there a So yeah,
>> it's going to be a while for that
catfish, hike. But I I'll say,
[laughter]
look, I think that here's here's a a
question for for frankly all of us, all
like all of humankind.
>> We're we we we a lot of us want to know
this answer, right? A lot of people do.
And if we do, we should be asking
ourselves, what is
>> a better way to get more conclusive
evidence. And so I'm a big fan of this
sample return idea because so many of
the tools we have on Earth, we can't put
on spacecraft cheaply or easily or
practically, right? Yeah.
>> But if we can get a sample back,
>> that changes things. And again, this
just is something that I think is in the
heritage of all of humankind. We should
look at this together and figure it out.
To me,
>> if we get and if I could wave a magic
wand, what I would love to do, you're
talking about probes. I'd send out
probes to six best candidate places on
Mars or maybe 10.
>> Let's grab a sample. I want to look at
them and then
>> I'm not going to promise everyone we're
gonna find life or not, but I'll bet you
if we came back with six or 10 samples,
we would have a much better idea. If
there was life and we'd have a b idea if
there wasn't, we walk away from it.
>> How about this? How about this? Instead
of sending
>> rovers, what about we send a team of
geologists to six sites on Mars?
>> You know, three geologists.
>> That's a that's that's that's a So, I
think this is a cool idea. I also part
of me is like can we do this with
robots? This question came up during
Apollo, right? Like, do we send people
or do we send robots,
>> right? Because at the time when they
were thinking about sending humans to
the moon,
>> this debate was raging. But I think
Hakee, people were like,
>> "Sending people to the moon is more than
just grabbing rocks, isn't it?"
>> Yeah.
>> And so sending people to Mars, I get it,
right?
>> So if you really just want some samples,
send some robots. But you're talking
about something that I think is bigger.
>> Yeah.
>> And it's an important question. Well, I
I want to hear what you think about this
question because whenever I have a
conversation like this and it's public
>> and there's a comment ability to comment
on the conversation.
>> Yeah.
>> Someone always invariably points out,
>> oh, you're talking about doing this
research using these rockets. This costs
a lot of money. There's a village where
they don't have clean water. Yeah.
>> Why are you doing this? Isn't this a
>> waste of money? How I have my answer for
that type of question. You know, part of
it has to do with understanding how
economies work.
um and that it's not a fixed amount of
money and it's here or there. Uh but how
do you address that particular criticism
that we as scientists are often
confronted with?
>> Yeah. And I think you and I have a
pretty what you just said uh tracks and
resonates with me. I would I would I
would put it this way. I would say that
um sometimes we act like
uh we've got this kind of zero sum game
if you know what I mean by that. You
have a hundred bucks and that's all you
got.
>> Yeah.
>> It is equally important that we solve
the problems of clean water
>> around the world. And is it equally
important we solve problems with clean
water in the US?
>> I guess go back to Flint, Michigan for
crying out loud, right? These are real
problems. Yeah,
>> not going to space and not doing the
science isn't going to solve that
problem.
>> True.
>> What I really want is again, if I could
wave a magic wand, I want all people to
recognize that, you know, working
together like we are greater than the
sum of our parts. These are all
addressable problems. That's the bottom
line.
>> These are all addressable problems. And
there's a lot to be said for the fact
that technologies that get developed for
studying the world around us often end
up helping people like this is not
uncommon. And they they create new
money.
>> They create new money. Creates value,
creates jobs. So we we we can do better
than we're doing.
>> Yeah. It's not harnessing money. It's
creating money. The opposite.
>> That's right. It's not there isn't just
one pie. We need to be baking more pies
and thinking about who who needs help
and where and how do we get there.
Right.
>> Unders Understood. Understood. So I I
feel you know Mars might be overrated
and the problem with uh Europa is that
it's within Jupiter's radiation belt.
>> Yeah.
>> Right.
>> But Titan is different and I don't you
know it's it's within Saturn's
protective magnetic field but outside of
its radiation belt. So do you have any
ideas of what life might be like on
Titan? Because you're in the methane.
[laughter]
It has these hydrocarbon lakes and this
atmosphere that's earthlike in in in
some ways.
>> Well, I'll start I'll start by saying
Hakee, this is why I love working with
you and astrophysicists and cosmologists
because if I don't listen to you and
listen to my colleagues who think about
uh magnetic fields or think about um
gravitational pull on planets like I'm
missing something. I go in there with
all my own narrow assumptions. So when I
think about Titan, putting my biology
hat on, I was like, great. Okay,
there's, you know, methane. That's a
good start. But I start thinking about,
all right, so I there are microbes on
Earth that can use methane and oxygen
and harness energy.
>> Yeah.
>> Or they can use methane and sulfate or
what. I mean, there's a whole bunch of
combinations.
>> Yeah.
>> I don't know
>> what's possible on Titan. So, I'm super
excited about Dragonfly because I think
it's gonna give us
>> the mission the space mission Dragonfly
is going to fly around the surface. Will
it have a boat, too?
>> I I think it's I don't know that it'll
have a boat. I think it's intended
though to land on these sort of skids,
right, and kind of be able to to look at
these bodies of water. I think I have to
go back and
>> bodies of liquid. Bodies of liquid.
>> I'm sorry. Did I say water?
>> I meant to say liquid. In fact, in fact,
I was thinking about that every time I
hear someone talk about Titan and they
talk about oceans. I'm like, try to
remind people that this is like liquid
methane or something else, right?
There's a lot going on,
>> right?
>> Could life live there? I I don't know.
But it's a very organic world.
>> Excited, excited, excited for Dragonfly.
>> Yeah. What? I don't know. When it fly, I
have a I went to the um
>> the the APPL, the advanced physics
laboratory at John Hopkins, and they
actually have a vending machine of
mission t-shirts. Is that cool? So, I
got a dragonfly t-shirt. [laughter]
>> I love it. You and I did the same thing.
I just I just I just gave a talk there
like four months ago. I'm like this
vending machine rocks right exactly
pumping money in.
>> So what do you think about panspermia?
You say you say that these um you know
if if you're on the surface of an
asteroid or something like that. Okay.
It might be tough to survive the
radiation environment. But then there
are microbes that are more radiation
hardy and you could also be inside that
asteroid living on uranium or something.
>> You nailed it. You totally nailed it.
You nailed it. Yeah. So, we know that we
we we study microbes that live inside
rocks today. We call them endolithic.
And I want to make it clear
>> that microbes can't aren't going to live
um in something that's like a glass
bubble because there's no exchange with
the environment. So, they run out of
they'd run out of food, right? And then
they can't do anything. Yeah,
>> but there are big chunks of rock,
carbonates, sulfides, all sorts of other
kinds of rocks where you could have a
micro, you know, cime or meters inside
this rock and there's enough exchange
with the outside world that they're
they're doing fine.
>> Now, you tell me, Hakee, if a rock like
that can shield them
>> from, I don't know, ionizing radiation
or whatever, now we have a we have an
opportunity.
>> Yeah.
>> That might to see how microbes might
move between these bodies. I don't know.
I just think it's a little arrogant to
just rule it out
>> or arrogant to assert that it had to
have happened. That's why we do the
work. That's why we do the work.
>> But man, when you look at like Earth,
you know, I I think about the moon.
>> Yeah.
>> I'm like, okay, Earth is is the moon is
only 1% the mass of the Earth, right? A
quarter the size. So, it's a smaller
target and it doesn't have as strong of
a pull, but it's covered in craters and
some of them are massive. Imagine
[laughter]
what the how beat up the earth must be.
How much stuff must have just slammed
into Earth. Now, I'm not saying that
they brought microbes, but what they may
have done is kick parts of Earth out
into space, these giant chunks. And we
know Earth had microbes at certain
times, right? I don't know if you know,
it's most of those impacts happened
right as life was getting started. So,
you know, who knows?
>> That's cool. I like the way you describe
that because
>> you're what you're saying is
>> maybe a a rough way of putting this and
correct me if I'm wrong, but there was a
time in Earth's history, let's call it
about 4 billion years ago,
>> where enough enough kind of asteroids
floating around knocking the be Jesus
out of these planets and and and bodies
that there could just have been a lot of
exchange. That's what you're saying.
>> That's what I'm saying. Yeah.
>> That's cool.
>> Yeah. Yeah. And that's within our solar
system. And now we've come to the time
now where we're discovering objects from
other parts outside our solar system
entering our solar system. And certainly
there would have been collisions there.
>> 100%.
>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And these microbes are
so hardy. I remember seeing a study
recently of some little um pocket of
microbes that were found to be still
alive after being inside their rocks for
millions of years. That is that a common
thing in your
>> It's a common thing. It's such a common
thing. And I you know again this it's
they're they are they share the same bu
basic building blocks of life that we do
>> but remember I was talking about this
sort of deal with the devil that animals
made like we get to be all complicated
and smart and big and you know all those
things
>> but we don't actually tolerate a lot.
>> Yeah.
>> At the end of the day
>> but these single cell microbes right
they they can put up with a lot. That's
why we have them growing on the walls of
nuclear reactors or why they live, you
know, in in uh in the bowels of a ship
or on spacecraft.
>> They grow on the walls of nuclear I
never heard that before.
>> Pipes, I should be more clear, but yeah,
they grow in there. So like
>> but they're in a high radiation.
>> Oh, absolutely. Don't phase them at all.
And uh the in fact like the Department
of Energy has invested money in saying,
"Can we use these to clean up uranium
messes that we've left?" Right? cuz you
can grow them and they can go down there
and turn them from one kind of uranium
mineral into another that's less water
soluble. It's a good way to keep it from
getting into water.
>> Wow.
>> Yeah. So, they're they they're they're
awesome, man. Hey everyone, if you're
loving this podcast, please go ahead and
like us or leave a comment. And also
make sure to subscribe so you never miss
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everything and helps us reach more
curious minds like yours. Now, back to
the show.
>> All right. So, let's play a little game.
>> Yeah, let's do it.
>> It's called Two Truths and a Lie.
>> Yep.
>> And I'm going to give you three
headlines, and you tell me which one is
a lie. All right. First one,
>> Slime Mold composes music, furthering
evidence of intelligence. And I'm
assuming this headline is talking about
slime mold intelligence.
>> Yep.
>> Second one,
>> when you move house. Yeah,
>> your microbial aura moves too.
>> Yep.
>> And the third one, plastic eating
bacteria turn waste into useful starting
materials for other products.
>> Slime mold's a lie. The other two are
true.
>> That's my guess.
>> You nailed it.
>> Yeah, that's my guess.
>> So, here I it is is loosely based on a
real headline that they use electrical
signals generated by slide mode to
create music.
>> That was cool cuz I I already saw it.
>> I think I saw it cuz I was like I know.
I'm sorry. It's kind of a cheat, right?
Kind of cheat.
>> But that's that's so cool cuz Yeah.
Someone was like looking at a electrical
signals not just in slime but in plants
and you can translate that into a sound
and it's it's kind of neat. What that
I'm going to
>> that's done in astronomy as well too.
It's called sonification.
>> Wait, really?
>> Oh yeah. Yeah. So So uh a lot of stars
pulsate, right? And so it creates this
this frequency, right? This waveform
with a particular frequency and it and
it's not just a up and down. is like
right
>> that's cool.
>> Yeah. Yeah. That's cool.
>> And the thing about that is because um
>> when we get those
>> plots is normally you see it as a plot.
>> Yeah. Sure.
>> And you want some software to classify
it as this type of star, that kind of
star.
>> Yeah.
>> The software isn't as good, but the ear
is such a great classifier that you let
groups of students listen to them.
They're like, "Okay, it's that kind of
star." Delta Scooty SX Phoenicius R L.
>> Okay, that's pretty badass. I did not
know. That's so cool. So, we need to get
this in the hands of some jazz and
hip-hop artists kind [laughter]
like, "Hey, hip-hop artists take all
kind of sounds." I remember when um
>> when uh Timberland made that Aaliyah
song that had the baby in it, everybody
was like, "Wow, so cool."
>> Exactly. Exactly. That's cool, thanks
for sharing.
>> Yeah. Yeah. All right. So, let's go back
to to you and you and you.
>> Sure.
>> You you and you.
>> Sure. Sure. Sure.
>> Because you have a interesting personal
story. Uh we we touched on a little
about this chatting in the green room,
right? You mentioned to me like, yeah,
you know, you know about my history in
LA. Yeah. Growing up with uh my cousins
being uh members of the Crips gang and
Robin Banks and all this kind of jazz.
You're from similar uh neighborhoods you
went through. So, let's talk about um
you know, number one.
>> Yeah.
>> There's this thing that happened to me
when I left Mississippi and showed up at
Stanford University. No one could
understand me when I spoke.
>> Yeah.
>> Right.
>> And I had to change the way I speak.
>> Yeah.
>> And so I learned later that there was
this phrase called code switching.
>> Right. [laughter]
>> Right. And I remember at one point my
mother visited my house some years ago
and I had a VH test a VHS tape of a talk
that I had given at NASA. She watched it
and I'm thinking, "Oh, mom's going to be
so proud of me." And she goes, "Who the
hell was that guy? [laughter] I don't I
know you.
>> I don't know who the hell that was."
Right. Yeah.
>> So, you grew up as a as a child of
immigrants and you know, you lived in
your neighborhood. You you became
scientisted. Let's go into your your
background a little bit and tell me
about your path to becoming interested
in science, your your social dynamic
that you you live through. So, so as a
kid, uh, and my my my parents being
immigrants from Egypt, that there were a
lot of things that I wanted to do as a
kid that other kids were doing,
>> certain clothes I wanted to wear, or
certain movies I wanted to go see, and
my parents were like, "No, no, no, no.
That's not what you do." Right? And
there were times where I would even uh
be at my with my folks at some parent
teacher meeting and they're talking kind
of past each other because they're
coming from two different cultural
references.
>> For my folks, teachers are held in
reverence. And in Egypt, you know, you
go and you you do what your teacher
says, you bring them gifts, you do all
this. There's things that you just don't
do here, right?
>> And this sucked as a kid cuz I'm trying
to like
>> teach my parents and be a kid and learn
from my parents. Man, it was hard.
>> Yeah. And so I think an interesting
thing happens to the children of
immigrants or different communities as
you go from one to the other. You learn
how to translate.
>> And what I mean is growing up I realized
that from my parents the science that I
did made sense
uh made most sense if I presented to
them in a certain light.
>> For example, when I said I want to be a
marine biologist, they were like you're
talking like Shamu. But if I said to
them, I want to be a professor
>> for them culturally that was relatable
>> because teachers are held in high
regard.
>> And so I learned that different people
understand the world through their own
lens. How can you know this as well as I
do? And so [snorts] learning how to um
listen to different people
>> from different perspectives became uh a
skill.
>> Yeah. And today I think it matters
because as I talk to other scientists or
here's a good one as I talk to policy
makers like I've done some work with the
United Nations uh on treaties for the
ocean. I understand and I'm aware that
people are speaking from a different
vantage point and that helps you hear
what it is they're trying to say. Yeah.
>> And that's been a big part of my um
professional life is learning to listen.
>> It's clear from our discussion that you
care deeply about humans. and you love
this science that you're doing. Um, and
and so how does how do they combine?
Right. So we have the future of humanity
and microbes just as they have been a
part of our past, beer, yeast, right?
How are they going to shape that future?
>> Yeah. I I think we're at this point
where humankind is beginning to
understand and appreciate the role that
microbes have played in shaping this
earth and us, right? It's only been the
last 10 or 15 years where we've been
talking about the human gut microbiome.
>> And that was a gamecher in that it got
people thinking about microbes doing
good things for us. So many people think
about microbes through that point of
view of pathogens, right? The thousand
or so microbes that cause human disease.
And [snorts] now they're beginning to
realize, oh, my well-being is is
enhanced by these microbes.
>> Yeah. Who doesn't love bread and butter?
>> Exactly. And it goes beyond that because
microbes are the world's best chemical
engineers, right?
>> Wow.
>> They really are. And so we have this
opportunity now as humans to start
asking how do we work with microbes to
cooperate, if you will, with microbes to
get them to solve some of our problems
in terms of cleaning up pollution or
even producing new materials and new
pharmaceuticals.
>> Let's not forget that microbes play a
huge role in the development of new
drugs.
>> Oh, really?
>> Absolutely. Because we can ask microbes
to make certain chemicals
>> and we can test those to see how they
affect human cell lines. So you can see
is it a toxic compound or does it do the
thing it's supposed to do? They are used
all over the place.
>> I just thought of it. Penicellin,
>> right?
>> Yeah.
>> Absolutely.
>> Game changer.
>> Total game changer. And so that is one
classic example of how microbes have
really um come into their four because
we're beginning to really understand
just how much good they do for the earth
and for us.
>> Wow. What about energy generation?
That's a big topic in in the future of
humanity. Are there are we using
microbes to generate come up with new
energy sources? Is that a thing?
>> Yeah, I think you know there's so many
different ways microbes touch on that.
In my world I do a lot of work on these
devices called microbial fuel cells. We
can harness electrical power from
microbes. Not a bunch, but enough to do
interesting work in the bottom of the
ocean or the middle of Kansas.
>> Wait a minute. So, you basically make a
a a
>> call it a widget.
>> Bug battery.
>> Yeah, that's it. It's a [laughter] bug
battery. Yeah. Yeah. And there's a bunch
of research that's gone into this and
scientists are like, can we
>> generate enough power to power cities
and the like? And all this work is still
going. Uh but as for right now, we can
generate enough power to do interesting
things with sensors. But that's the tip
of the iceberg. Let's talk about all
these rare earth elements that are a hot
topic now for batteries,
>> right?
>> Microbes are really good candidates for
recycling those rare earth elements and
more and more research is happening now.
>> Define recycling.
>> Let me explain. So when we build a
widget like a laptop
>> uh at the end of its life, which sadly,
you know, is too soon because we're such
a consumer society, that circuit board
gets smashed up and you can use
industrial processes to heat it and get
some stuff off. But those rare earth
elements just
nature are sticky. And I don't mean
literally. I mean they mix and it's hard
to separate the element to the element
gallium or something like that. I use
those two as examples, right? But but
it's hard to disassemble them. And so
chemically it's so expensive to do that.
That's why we don't recycle those
electronics that much.
>> But microbes are very good at
specificity. You could you could if I
think with enough work we can find a
microbe or even engineer one that we can
feed it a bunch of broken computer chips
and it's going to pull off the tallium
elements and put it over here.
>> Oh wow.
>> How cool is that?
>> That is super cool.
>> That's what microbes are good at.
They're the world's best chemical
engineers.
>> Period.
>> I love that. Dr. Peter Gerggas, this was
amazing, sir.
>> Pleasure is mine, my friend,
>> man.
>> Yeah, that was great. Thank Thanks for
all you taught me, too. This was fun,
>> bro. I think the teaching was going in
this direction [laughter] and I really
appreciate it, man. That that was
awesome. I can't wait for our next
conversation.
>> Pleasure is mine. You know where to find
me. I look forward to it. All right.
>> Thank you, sir.
>> Be well.
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Hey, hey, hey.
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