Supreme Court Influence, Mars One, Bariatric Surgery

Guest: Christopher Dunn, professor of Brazilian Literature and Culture at Tulane University. He’s the author of Brutality Garden: Tropicalia and the Emergence of Brazilian Counterculture. 

Guest: Xiaohui Fan, Professor of Astronomy at the University of Arizona’s Steward Observatory  Sometimes it takes a fresh pair of eyes to see the unexpected. Researchers at the University of Arizona and the University of Peking in China have discovered a supermassive black-hole at the edge of the known universe, 12.8 billion light years from Earth. Yet these experienced scientists wouldn’t have noticed it if not for the work of students, who saw the anomaly while combing through data their mentors had missed. Their observations challenged standing theories about black hole formation, and prompt new explanations about the early universe.  "You can see it \[Quasar] literally across the universe,” says Fan. "If you traveled to this Quasar and somehow survived, you would see a tremendous amount of light—bright as daylight."

Guest: Lance Davidson, Exercise Science Assistant Professor at BYU as well as a Research Assistant Professor in Cardiovascular Genetics at the University of Utah School of Medicine  Surgery is an increasingly common way for severely obese Americans to lose weight. Gastric bypass—which basically reroutes the intestines to make the stomach smaller—generally leads to rapid initial weight loss. But to-date, there’s been little research on how well people who undergo the procedure keep the weight off and benefit from the surgery after the first few years.  "Of the study, after 6 years, 66% were no longer diabetic. Blood levels stay normal without medicine. We will check them at ten years and see what really happens. But we know that the good cholesterol goes up, and the bad goes down,” says Davidson.

Guest: James Phillips, visiting professor in BYU’s J. Reuben Clark Law School  The U.S. Supreme Court is nearing the end of its term, with a number of big cases yet to be heard and decided. There’s another challenge to the Affordable Care Act. There’s a case involving how law enforcement should treat a violent, mentally-ill suspect. Perhaps the most anticipated case will be heard at the tail-end of the term in late April when the court will consider the constitutionality of same-sex marriage bans enacted in several states.  “The supreme court is like nine separate law firms,” says Phillips. “It’s not about the facts, it’s about the law.”

Guest: Cody Reeder, geology student at Utah State University, finalist for the Mars One program  How eager would you be to sign up for a one-way ticket to Mars? I’ll admit I struggle to get my head around the prospect of leaving Earth for good. But some 200,000 have applied for that very mission since it was announced in 2013.  And now the list has been whittled down to 100 finalists. They are 50 men and 50 women between the ages of 19 and 60 and they come from all around the country.  “When I applied, there were 70,000 people and I knew I had to stand out, so I spent a long time on the application video and the essays,” says Reeder who conducted his interview hanging upside down.  Reeder says his parents are “really happy for me because they know it’s my dream but they don't want me to go.”