Clever Apes #10: Yuck

by Gabriel Spitzer | Apr. 13, 2011

Bill Stanley holds the skull of an African rat he discovered, being cleaned by c

Let’s consider the beauty of a seething swarm of carrion beetles picking clean the carcass of a dead rat.

Sorry – were you eating breakfast?

To a scientist, that grisly scene might evoke the cycles of ecosystems, the connectedness of life and death, and the elegant efficiency of a life form sculpted by eons of evolution to be the perfect flesh-removal machine. To most of the rest of us, it’s just gross.

Yucky stuff has always been part of the mystique of science – alluring for some, forbidding for others. In the latest installment of Clever Apes, we consider the dirty work of science, from the “bug room” at the Field Museum to the lab where scientists analyze dead critters found in food.

But we aim not to titillate. Oh no. In this part one of our two-part series, we hope to show how the yucky can also be elegant. So hold your nose and listen.

Clever_Apes_10_Yuck.mp3

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Chris Palenik mans the transmission electron microscope at Microtrace.

Comments

Bode Gbagbo wrote:

Not really a story for the Breakfast crowd; plus it made me really itchy!

Wed Apr 13 2011, 6:51 AM

Andrea wrote:

I don't gross out easily, but you lost me at "It sounds just like a bowl of rice crispies after you put in the milk."

Wed Apr 13 2011, 2:07 PM

Paul Dickinson wrote:

I was fortunate to be able to shoot video of the Dermestid colony for a video installation I was producing in 2002. The museum staff was kind enough to turn off the ventilation system long enough for me to get a high quality, close-mic'ed recording of their amazing sounds. The "bowl of Rice Krispies" analogy doesn't do it justice. A brief clip can be seen and heard here: http://www.youtube.com/user/pdickins

Enjoy your Rice Krispies!

Sat Apr 16 2011, 10:39 AM

Clever Apes

Clever Apes is a nano-sized show with a cosmic scope. It explores the Chicago area's rich scientific community, its quirky characters and the mind-bending questions they're out to answer.