Politically-driven chaos is disrupting U.S. scientific institutions and creating challenges for science in Canada. Science is a global endeavour and collaborations with the U.S. are routine. In this special episode of Quirks & Quarks, we explore what Canadian scientists are doing to preserve their work to assert scientific sovereignty in the face of this unprecedented destabilization.

Canadian climate scientists brace for cuts to climate science infrastructure and data

U.S. President Donald Trump’s attacks on climate science are putting our Earth observing systems, in the oceans and in orbit, at risk. Canadian scientists who rely on U.S. led climate data infrastructure worry about losing long-term data that would affect our ability to understand our changing climate.

With:

Kate Moran, the president and CEO of Ocean Networks Canada and Emeritus Professor of Oceanography at the University of Victoria

Debra Wunch, Physicist at the University of Toronto

Chris Fletcher, Department of Geography and Environmental Management at the University of Waterloo

U.S. cuts to Great Lakes science and monitoring threaten our shared freshwater resource

U.S. budget and staffing cuts are jeopardizing the long-standing collaboration with our southern neighbour to maintain the health of the Great Lakes, our shared resource and the largest freshwater system in the world.

With:

Jérôme Marty, executive director of the International Association for Great Lakes Research and part-time professor at the University of Ottawa

Greg McClinchey, policy and legislative director with the Great Lakes Fishery Commission

Michael Wilkie, Biologist at Wilfred Laurier University

Brittney Borowiec, research associate in the Wilkie Lab at Wilfred Laurier University

Aaron Fisk, Ecologist and Canada Research Chair at the University of Windsor

Unexpected ways U.S. culture war policies are affecting Canadian scientists

One of the first things President Trump did after taking office was to sign an executive order eliminating all DEI policies in the federal government. This is having far-reaching consequences for Canadian scientists as they navigate the new reality of our frequent research partner’s hostility against so-called “woke science.”

With:

Dr. Sofia Ahmed, Clinician scientist, and academic lead for the Women and Children’s Health Research Institute at the University of Alberta

Angela Kaida, professor of health sciences and Canada Research Chair at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver

Dawn Bowdish, professor of immunology, the executive director of the Firestone Institute for Respiratory Health and Canada Research Chair at McMaster University

Kevin Zhao, MD/PhD student in immunology in the Bowdish Lab at McMaster University

Jérôme Marty, executive director of the International Association for Great Lakes Research

Canada has a ‘responsibility’ to step up and assert scientific sovereignty

A 2023 report on how to strengthen our federal research support system could be our roadmap to more robust scientific sovereignty. The Advisory Panel on the Federal Research Support System made recommendations to the federal government for how we could reform our funding landscape. The intent was to allow us to quickly respond to national research priorities and to make Canada a more enticing research partner in world science.

With:

Frédéric Bouchard, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and professor of philosophy of science at the Université de Montreal. Chair of the Advisory Panel on the Federal Research Support System.

Have you ever wondered how particle accelerators work? Or what microwaves really do to food? Have you spent time pondering the mystery of how ice ages changed the Earth’s rotation or why whales haven’t figured out how to breathe underwater? Well you’ll find out all this and more on our Quirks & Quarks listener question show!

Energy with a grain of salt

Researchers have developed a new sodium metal powered fuel cell with up to triple the output for its weight of a lithium-ion battery. The team from MIT, including Yet-Ming Chiang, think these fuel cells could have enormous potential for electric vehicles — including flight. They say sodium can be electrically produced from salt on a large scale to facilitate this technology. The research was published in the journal Joule.

Plants hear their pollinators, and produce sweet nectar in response

A new study has found that plants can respond to the distinctive vibrations of pollinating insects by activating sugar-producing genes to produce rich nectar. In contrast they respond to the sound of nectar-stealing non-pollinators by cutting back on sugar. Francesca Barbero, from the University of Turin in Italy, presented this work at a recent joint meeting of the Acoustical Society of America and 25th International Congress on Acoustics.

Penguin poop helps create the cooling clouds over Antarctica

Penguin guano is rich in ammonia, and when it accumulates in penguin rookeries in Antarctica, that ammonia is released into the atmosphere, encouraging cloud production. Those clouds reflect sunlight into space, but can also trap sunlight reflected from the ice, so have complex climate interactions. This connection was discovered by University of Helsinki researcher Matthew Boyer, and was published in the journal Nature.

Giant sloth family tree suggests trees are just a recent part of it

Sloths used to be giants the size of bears and even elephants before disappearing around 12,000 years ago. An international group of paleontologists including University of Toronto’s Gerry De Iuliis have assembled a comprehensive family tree of the sloth to understand how a group that used to dominate the landscape was winnowed away to only a handful of relatively small, tree dwelling species. The research was published in the journal Science.

Eradicating diseases — Can we wipe out ancient and modern plagues forever?

In 1980 the World Health Organization declared Smallpox officially eradicated, meaning that for the first time, a plague that killed hundreds of millions of people had been eliminated by human ingenuity. It opened the question of whether we could do this for other lethal threats? We look at efforts to eradicate Polio, an ancient plague, and HIV, a more modern epidemic, to understand how researchers are trying to eradicate these diseases , how close they’ve come, and what’s preventing their final victory.

Quirks spoke to Stan Houston, an infectious disease specialist and professor of medicine and public health at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. He’s worked on treating HIV and tuberculosis in places such as Zimbabwe, South Sudan, Ecuador and Alberta.

Catherine Hankins was the chief scientific adviser for the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS in Geneva, Switzerland. And in 2013, she was named to the Order of Canada and in 2023 was inducted in the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame. She is currently an adjunct professor at the School of Population and Global Health at McGill University and a senior fellow at the Amsterdam Institute for Global Health and Development.