October 12, 2021
Animal Traits with Vyas
Description
Animal enthusiast and biomedical engineer Vyas "Bear" Ramanan mauls our minds with insights into axolotls, gene sequencing, nanobody-based medicines, and snakes with legs.
Episode
Bio
Vyas "Bear" Ramanan is a principal at Third Rock Ventures, a Hertz Foundation fellow as well as a PhD in Medical Engineering and Medical Physics from Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology. He is also a graduate of the Jerome Fisher Program in Management and Technology at the University of Pennsylvania where he performed as a former soprano for Pennsylvania Six-5000, Penn’s premier comedy acapella group. He is currently a proud dog-father to Wallaby.
Images

What Jason Learned
Raisins and golden raisins both come from green grapes.
What Kelcey Learned
The average person pees 6-8 times a day.
Top Five Land-Based Animals

  1. Dogs

  2. Raccoons

  3. Giant Tortoises

  4. Elephants

  5. Gila Monster

Fact or Fiction: Human Edition

  1. Humans are the only animals with chins - FACT

  2. You can pinch your elbow skin as hard as you want and it won’t hurt - FACT, your elbow skin is called your weenus. Tough skin, like that on elbows, has fewer pain sensors.

  3. Humans have FEWER hairs on their bodies than chimpanzees - FICTION, humans have just as many hairs on their body as chimpanzees; human hair is just a lot shorter and finer.

  4. When you cry and your nose becomes runny, it's actually your tears - FACT

  5. Most people breathe through one nostril better than the other throughout their whole lives (either Right or Left) - FICTION, at any given time you’re mostly breathing through one nostril. But every few hours, the workload shifts to the other nostril. This is called the nasal cycle.

  6. The average human erection has roughly about 130ml of blood in it, while the average rabbit has about 126ml in its entire body. So, there is more blood in a boner than in a bunny - FACT

Won't You, Haiku?
Animals

Bears and snakes and birds
Have more than meets the eyeballs
Animals, they're great!