Brexit, Curious Remedies, The Secrets Your Smartphone Holds

Guest: Simon Usherwood, PhD, Reader in Politics, University of Surrey, Former Senior Fellow at the “UK in a Changing Europe,” King’s College London British Prime Minister Theresa May submitted a letter to the European Union on Wednesday formally triggering an escape clause that’s never been used before. The British people are still very split about whether they want to leave the EU. But Prime Minister May was clear in a speech to parliament Wednesday that it’s happening.

Guest: Meg Frost, Physiological Sciences Librarian, Harold B. Lee Library, BYU For this month’s installment of From the Vaults, we’ve taken a little field trip across the BYU campus to travel back in time to the 16th Century, when visiting the doctor was not a sterile and sanitized experience. We’re here, in the lobby of the Harold B Lee Library, where, behind a tall black curtain just inside the main entrance, the world of Renaissance Medicine comes alive. The exhibit is called Curious Remedies, and in it we’re introduced to mysterious powders, surgical tools that look like instruments of torture, fantastic masks and lots of blood—and leeches.

Guest: Erick Gerday, Utah Valley Neonatology An estimated 15 million babies are born prematurely each year. If it happens in the US, our hospitals have expensive equipment that can save the baby’s life, including ventilators to breath for these tiny babies whose lungs are not developed enough to breath on their own. But in less-developed nations, hospitals and clinics often can’t afford a $40,000 ventilator and, as a result, babies born there are at a much greater risk of dying. For more information on how to get involved click here.

Guest: David Yeager, PhD, Assistant Professor of Psychology, University of Texas, Austin Here’s the thing about teenagers – we remember what it was like to be one – but at that age everything is such a big deal. Especially the social stuff. The popular kid turns you down for the dance and you’re convinced no one will ever love you. It’s so nerve-wracking to strike up a casual conversation with someone you don’t know well and suddenly you’re sure that you’ll always be painfully shy and have to live as a hermit.

Guest: Pieter Dorrestein, PhD, Professor in the School of Medicine, UC San Diego, Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences There’s a scene early in the BBC TV series Sherlock where Sherlock Holmes deduces pretty much all of John Watson’s personal and family secrets just by looking at the scuff marks on his cell phone. It’s a fun, fanciful exchange. But chemists at the University of California San Diego’s Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences could give Sherlock a run for his money. By swabbing a cell phone, they can tell what you eat, what your wear and even what medicine you take.

Guest: Nikhil Dhurandhar, Professor and Chair of the Nutritional Sciences Department, Texas Tech University Health experts have declared obesity a national epidemic affecting one-in-three US adults and one-in-six kids. Programs to address the program often focus on fitness and diet – much like former first-lady Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move!” campaign which aimed to “end obesity in a generation.” But what if our obsessive focus on obesity as a lifestyle problem misses other causes?