< Back to Issue 4 Interviewing Dr Karen Freilich by Rachel Ko 1 July 2023 Edited by Caitlin Kane Illustrated by Pia Barraza Science in the real world is never straight-forward. The realm of medicine and health is particularly intricate, riddled with myths and marvels. This makes the healthcare journey a difficult one to navigate, both for the patient, and for the provider. It is undeniably a field where an ever-evolving myriad of factors makes the bedside experience vastly different to the textbooks. In my first year studying medicine, I am constantly realising that a strong understanding of the fundamentals is often a saving grace, while learning to dispel the mirage of medicine as a simple science. Enter Humerus Hacks , a podcast recommended to me in the first week of medical school by peers who had walked the treacherous road before. A guiding light in the murky waters of medical education, Karen and Sarah’s playful banter lays out high-yield medical content with catchy mnemonics and gracious advice. In this interview, we had the special opportunity to talk to Dr Karen Freilich, one of the hosts of Humerus Hacks , about her journey in medicine so far as a young GP, and the story of how she created a podcast that masters the art of science communication in a perfect marriage of education and entertainment. Tell us about your journey with science, and your career so far. I’ve just completed my GP Fellowship training after about 12 years of study. It’s a relief to be done —medicine is a long slog! I’ve had a brilliant time and been fortunate to take part in exciting studies. I took some time off clinical medicine to complete a Masters of Reproductive and Sexual Health Research in London (LSHTM) as well as completing a Diploma of Obstetrics (DRANZCOG). I currently teach at the University of Melbourne’s Medical School as a tutor in Sexual Health, and write and train high school sexual health educators through Elephant Ed. I work as a GP most days of the week, in a clinic with a focus on sexual and reproductive health and I’m a proud medical abortion and contraception provider. I’m also fortunate to work at Monash in the Sexual Medicine and Therapy Clinic, and work together with the Australasian Society for HIV, Viral Hepatitis and Sexual Health Medicine (ASHM). It’s a tricky balance wearing a number of hats, but I love the diversity. Unsurprisingly everything I do is focused in sexual and reproductive health through clinical work, education, advising and science communication. My career is certainly tailor-made to my interests and passion, and took quite some time to get to this point! I love being able to educate on both a one-on-one and broader level on sexual and reproductive health care, particularly through a reproductive justice lens. What was the inspiration behind Humerus Hacks ? In the early years of medical school, my mate Sarah and I used to spend hours and hours trying to memorise different antibiotics and the differences between them. It felt incomprehensible to have to learn not only a new science, but an entirely new language behind it. It felt like a Duolingo course! So in order to scrape through exams, we made silly little stories to try and remember the differences between gentamicin, amoxicillin etc.. Fast forward a few years and Sarah and I ended up running a weekly study group for the year below us, filled with our mnemonics and silly stories. We developed a bit of a cult following (if I say so myself!). It seemed there was a real appetite for otherwise tedious and dry medical education made fun and entertaining. In final year, we both ended up on placements requiring huge drives. We turned to podcasts for ‘edutainment’ — and found there simply were none. So we did what everyone in 2016 was doing, bought a microphone and recorded our own. We were a bit mortified at the start and convinced we wouldn’t get internships if our future employers heard us swearing and being inappropriate online, so we hid our faces and were anonymous with our names. Fortunately it turned out we had nothing to be nervous about, and Humerus Hacks was a hit. Sarah is a musical genius and recorded the intro song with her band. It’s now been over 50 episodes and over 150,000 downloads. We’re often in the iTunes Medical Podcasts Top 10! The inspiration has and always will be pure study laziness — trying to make studying more interesting, fun and accessible and ultimately, more memorable. What is the process of developing and recording an episode? Me, Sarah, or another co-host or friend (Callum, Bridget, Robbie and Dan to name a few!) sitting on a couch with a microphone and chinwagging about a topic. If we’re lucky, maybe some prep. I’d love to suggest it’s more fancy than that! I have brilliant colleagues who play an integral role. Alex edits our episodes and does a brilliant job. And Bella creates fantastic art for the episodes. Sometimes I play around on Canva too for some social media. Shout out as well to our friends who helped with some graphic design and audio. It’s definitely a team effort, and so many people to thank for their ongoing contributions and support. What is your relationship with your audience like? Our audience sends us messages and emails all the time — even if we haven’t made an episode in months! It’s a joy to receive any messages and warms our hearts every time. We get the most delightful and lovely messages. We also get a lot of requests which I wish we could keep up with more, the irony of doing our own exams over the past few years! We try to respond to all messages and keep up with requests. Knowing that our silly little mnemonics has helped anyone with exams is a huge joy. How has science communication evolved since you began? Mnemonics have been a huge part of medicine for a very long time. In fact, I have my uncle’s Medical Mnemonic book from 1958! Some of them have aged terribly, unsurprisingly, but many we still use to this day. So, we are far from inventing the wheel. In saying that, the boom of social media and podcasts over the past few years has lent itself to subspecialised Instagram pages, YouTube channels and more podcasts than I could have ever imagined. Making medical education (and science communication) fun has become much more mainstream and accepted as a genuine study tool. Who knew, making dry education entertaining actually works…! What has been the biggest challenge in your science communication journey? Hands down, time. I run Humerus Hacks with a group of excellent friends and colleagues, but we all happen to be medical students or doctors. Unsurprisingly, it means we are all always bogged down with shift work, exams, and burn out. Humerus Hacks is a labour of love. So we make an effort if and when we can, without any time pressure. I wish we had more time! What role would you say science communication plays in your daily practice? I’m a GP with a special interest in sexual medicine as well as a sexual health tutor for medical students. I also write and train individuals to run high school sexual health education. I’ve also been fortunate to be a guest host on ABC Breakfast Radio under ‘Doctor Breakfast’ providing science communication for a number of medical topics. So, it plays a huge role in my daily practice! I particularly enjoy the interplay of small scale science communication through one-on-one patient interactions compared with larger scale communication through radio, teaching and podcasts. They balance each other really well, and I enjoy the individualised, tailored approach whilst simultaneously thinking of the broader public health messaging. What role would you say science communication plays in society generally? There is so much misinformation floating around. As a huge fan of social media and TikTok myself, I can see how these avenues can be both a wonderful source of information but simultaneously promote unnuanced, oversimplified and often blatantly incorrect health messaging. Social media (including podcasts) provides a really accessible, often free avenue for science information that is otherwise inaccessible. However, we have a responsibility to ensure the information is correct, up to date, and safe. Social media loves a quick snap messaging, but science is almost always more nuanced and complex. A 30 second TikTok often unsurprisingly misses the mark! So, accurate and accessible science communication is the key — the hard thing is making it fun and interesting. What are your immediate goals in science communication this year, and what do you hope to achieve in science communication in the long-term? Great question! I am thoroughly enjoying my career balance at the moment. It’s a great mix of GP clinic, sexual medicine and therapy clinical work, sexual health teaching, and radio/podcasting. I’d love to make more Humerus Hacks episodes now that I’ve finished my own training and have (hopefully) both more knowledge and time! I’ve put together a SPHERE Sexual and Reproductive Health podcast focusing on upskilling clinicians to provide medical abortion and contraception in primary care. I am also loving radio work and would love to keep going with this. I may or may not delve into the TikTok world… watch this space! Long term, hopefully ongoing science communication in the field of sexual and reproductive healthcare. What advice would you give to students exploring the world of science communication? Social media is a game changer that had only just begun when I was a student. TikTok, Instagram etc all provide a free and accessibly way to both gain knowledge and skills, and to educate others. Science students in all disciplines have such incredibly knowledge and insight, and if you’re interested, there’s a willing and enthusiastic audience out there. The phrase ‘see one, do one, teach one’ forever rings true. Teaching and providing science communication helps your own education, and has always been my favourite learning tool. Finally, and I cannot emphasise this enough, being a student is long, tedious, and exhausting. Enjoy the process and look after yourself and your colleagues as a priority! ------------------- It is undeniable that Humerus Hacks is a project succeeding on its steadfast mission to uncover the mirage of medicine. Through a blend of education and entertainment, it reveals the intricate realities of science in health, as a complex and ever-changing landscape that demands a strong foundation of knowledge and willingness to adapt. We extend our heartfelt gratitude to Dr Karen Frielich, for not only agreeing to talk to us, but also for all of her work to demystify the healthcare journey, both for the professional, and for the patient. You can check out 'Humerus Hacks' on Spotify , on Apple Music , or online! Previous article Next article back to MIRAGE

< Back to Issue 9 Eyeballs, a Knife, and No Fear of God by Jess Walton 28 October 2025 Illustrated by Anabelle Dewi Saraswati Edited by Chavindi Sinhara Mudalige Humans have wanted to understand our bodies the entire time we’ve had them, which is to say, the entire time. Late Classical Athens, around 300 BC, at a peak of intellectual prosperity: Herophilos cuts into a corpse. From this, he’s going to make the novel argument that the brain contains knowledge, and in doing so, he’s going to criticize Aristotle’s writing, which describes the brain as something akin to an air conditioner. Aristotle thought the brain was a cooling chamber, essentially, to prevent the heart from overheating, and that cognition happened in the heart. Much, much earlier, around 1000 BC in India, Sushruta, in his foundational surgical text, overestimated the bone count in humans by over 100. Many ancient societies had impressively detailed understanding of anatomy, considering they had no microscopes, no cameras, no X-rays; usually nothing more than their knives and eyeballs. It’s important to note as well that this article is a brief overview of a complex subject, with a major focus on Classical, meaning Ancient Greek and Roman, examples, and is in no way a complete story of early anatomical developments across the globe. Asia, Africa, the Americas and the Arab world each had their own rich and complex traditions, beyond the few examples cherry-picked here. Most societies had a few impressive hits and a few impressive misses; in a way, their approach to science isn’t all that different from ours today. What can we learn from them, and what can we learn about ourselves? In Ancient Athens, Aristotle believed the heart to be both the intellectual and emotional center of humans; the “seat of the soul” (1). Some remnants of this remain in our modern association between heart and emotion, though we know now it isn’t backed by science. His reasoning behind this was the convergence of blood vessels at the heart and its importance; from this, he also, perhaps reasonably, thought it to be the source of blood (2). Despite being deservedly considered a major anatomist, Aristotle likely made his observations from examining and dissecting the bodies of animals, particularly lower mammals, like dogs or livestock, instead of real humans (3). He unknowingly used homologous structures, long before evolution or even Charles Darwin himself was conceptualized, to essentially assume the anatomy of humans from other animals. Given this, his conclusions on the brain become a little more understandable. The brain is a strange-looking organ, critically important to life, though not obviously connected to the pulse or rich with blood; how were they to understand the structure of nerves and white matter? That it assists the heart in some way becomes a logical conclusion. So why not serve a cooling function? Blood is hot, so the heart must get hot. Overheating is usually bad; see fire. And the brain’s size makes it ideal for such a thing. The thing about anatomy and science, Aristotle’s assertion being one primordial example of many around the ancient world, is that it changes. Herophilos and Erasistratus were two more Greek anatomists who succeeded and often contested Aristotle. Unlike him, they dissected humans, having no qualms about a man’s dead—or, according to some sources, still alive—body (4). However, they offered several accurate, or at least more accurate, insights inside human bodies. Herophilus argued that the brain wasn’t a cooling chamber but contained knowledge (5). While he was at it, he argued that the heart has four chambers, unlike Aristotle, who claimed it only has three (5). Many of Herophilos and Erasistratus’ insights required Aristotle’s, or some other prior Mediterranean scholar’s, claims to give them something to criticise. Praxagoras was one such anatomist, from about 400 BC, about 100 years earlier. He correctly associated the pulse with natural movement within the body, but also asserted that arteries carry air (6). There is, possibly because of this claim, debate as to whether he had any practical anatomical experience or observed any dissections. If so, it’s quite impressive to miss the blood in arteries. He did, however, note that veins carry blood (2). Thus, he was later included in Herophilos’ critique. Before we criticise how long it took for them to realise seemingly obvious facts, we must remember that bloodletting as an acceptable treatment persisted into the 19 th Century. Modern and recent understandings are far from flawless. A couple of hundred years later, Galen, a Roman from the late 2 nd Century AD, would voice similar critiques (2). Galen would later become famous for his theory of the four humors: blood, yellow bile, black bile, and phlegm, each with associated personalities and elements (7). While these are all real liquids found somewhere in the human body, they do not really work as the four-way counterbalance he describes. Galen made some incredible leaps forward in Roman anatomy, including developing more elaborate tools for dissection and surgery processes, which would be instrumental in allowing future developments in the field. However, he also learned more anatomy from treating severe gladiator injuries—which is awesome—or like Aristotle, from dissections and studies on lower mammals (7). This led to some interesting conclusions; his description and diagrams of a human uterus match that of a dog’s uterus exactly, for example (7). He did well with the tools he had, but guesswork has its limits. Three hundred years before Aristotle, and over seven centuries before Galen, the ancient Indian physician Sushruta, a continent away, was revolutionizing, and if there was nothing to revolutionise, inventing surgeries and surgical techniques. He also valued an understanding of human anatomy, which likely contributed to his surgical skill, and dedicated a portion of his seminal Sanskrit work, Sushruta Samhita , to anatomy, calling it the Sharira Sthana . In his work, he describes in detail the head, which he correctly identified as the major center of essentially all function, particularly the cranial nerves (8). He also includes the first detailed guide to human dissection, alongside the anatomy of the embryo at various developmental stages; this is described as arising from seven skins, each with their own associated ailments, and while the skins are anomalous, many of the ailments correlate impressively with known diseases (8). There’s also, incredibly, a detailed description of cataract surgery procedure, where exceptionally specific incision locations in the cornea are interspersed with instructions to sedate the patient with wine mixed with cannabis, which makes sense in a world far predating modern anesthesia, then to spray the eye with breast milk (9). This part seems outlandish and harder to explain, but anyone who has studied immunology can tell you that breast milk contains antibodies and antibacterial proteins. Sushruta likely made some link between breast milk and reduced post-op infections, even if there were not yet microscopes to see bacteria with. Even if they couldn’t see why on the molecular scale, ancient anatomists were able to understand what worked and what didn’t and justify it to the best of their knowledge. When Sushruta describes the bones of the human body, he does so in great detail, and also counts more than 300 of them. Humans typically have 206 bones, give or take a rib: Sushruta mildly overestimated. This is thought to be from him, largely basing his skeletal insights off child cadavers, before many bones have fused together (9). Hindu religious law calls for the cremation of any body over two years old, in its natural and thus undissected state; though there are accounts of Sushruta performing dissections, presumably on adults, the bodies he likely had the most exposure to were infants. Sushruta was working within the confines of the society and world that he lived in, as was Herophilos. Medical insights which seem obvious to us today, like that the brain is for thinking and the heart is for beating blood, and that blood goes through the arteries and is most definitely a liquid, rely upon prior knowledge reached with tools that hadn’t even been invented yet. These firsts—surgeons, anatomists, scientists—would probably have to be physically pried away from microscopes and X-rays, if ever introduced to them. They often didn’t even have a human body to dissect, yet drew human anatomical conclusions regardless. And it’s easy to marvel at their mistakes, but it’s even easier to marvel at how much they got right; Herophilos correctly uncovered nerves and linked them to sensation and response, which is impressive in itself. Could you find a nerve in some meat, with just your naked eye? He also linked the heart and the pulse. The Huangdi Neijing , for example, is a Chinese medical text said, though disputed, to be from 2600 BC, which describes the relationships between organs in military terms: the heart as a king, the liver as a commandant, and the gallbladder as an attorney-general responsible for coordination (10). However, both like and before Herophilos, it also correctly identifies the cyclic nature of blood flow and links it to the heart (10). The Edwin Smith Papyrus, dating from 1700 BC in Ancient Egypt, is the oldest known surgical text, describing 48 different injuries with treatments; all shockingly accurate (11). Sushruta may have miscounted the bones, but he described their shapes accurately and suggested legitimate therapies for particular bone breakages and dislocations. Nowadays, little has changed: in just the 1950s, lobotomies became the standard cure for a headache; even long after we developed microscopes, we were recommending treatments, like scrambling our brains, that only 70 years later seem ridiculously stupid. We’re far from done charting our own bodies, either. In 2018, an entirely new type of tissue all throughout the body was found: the interstitium, which is critical in cell and organ communication across the body (12). It’s been there the whole time, but no one had noticed before. Humans are humans; it is only natural to want to understand ourselves, and as a part of that, our bodies. We now study our ancestors as they studied themselves; the same mix of awe, confusion and confidence. Their methods and conclusions may be fallible, but their curiosity was not, and as long as we remain, never will be, dead. These examples were only a fraction of those whose work has been preserved, who themselves were only a fraction of the ancient people across the globe who investigated human anatomy. A millennium from now, our descendants will laugh at our misconceptions, when they have mapped every neuron in the human brain with instruments we could not conceive of. But without us, they wouldn’t know what they know, and without our original anatomists, we wouldn’t know what we know. Our modern granular understanding of our own structure is built on the bodies we looked in before ours. So, we should perhaps extend some empathy to our predecessors. They had only eyeballs, a knife, and our own curiosity. Different tools, same bodies. References Aird WC. Discovery of the cardiovascular system: from Galen to William Harvey. J Thromb Haemost. 2011;9(Suppl 1):118–29. Johnston IH, Papavramidou N. Galen on the Pulses: Medico-historical Analysis, Textual Tradition, Translation [Internet]. De Gruyter; 2023 [cited 2025 Oct 10]. Available from: https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/9783110612677/html Crivellato E, Ribatti D. A portrait of Aristotle as an anatomist. Clin Anat. 2007;20(5):447–85. Papa V, Varotto E, Vaccarezza M, Ballestriero R, Tafuri D, Galassi FM. The teaching of anatomy throughout the centuries: from Herophilus to plastination and beyond. Med Hist. 2019;3(2):69–77. Bay NSY, Bay BH. Greek anatomist Herophilus: the father of anatomy. Anat Cell Biol. 2010;43(4):280–3. Wright J. Review of: Praxagoras of Cos on Arteries, Pulse and Pneuma. Studies in Ancient Medicine, 48 . Bryn Mawr Class Rev [Internet]. [cited 2025 Oct 10]. Available from: https://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2017/2017.07.34/ Ajita R. Galen and his contribution to anatomy: a review. J Evid Based Med Healthc. 2015;4(26):4509–16. Bhattacharya S. Sushruta—the very first anatomist of the world. Indian J Surg. 2022;84(5):901–4. Loukas M, Lanteri A, Ferrauiola J, Tubbs RS, Maharaja G, Shoja MM, et al. Anatomy in ancient India: a focus on the Sushruta Samhita . J Anat. 2010;217(6):646–50. O’Boyle C. TVN Persaud, Early history of human anatomy: from antiquity to the beginning of the modern era. Med Hist. 1987;31(4):478–9. van Middendorp JJ, Sanchez GM, Burridge AL. The Edwin Smith papyrus: a clinical reappraisal of the oldest known document on spinal injuries. Eur Spine J. 2010 Nov;19(11):1815–23. Benias PC, Wells RG, Sackey-Aboagye B, Klavan H, Reidy J, Buonocore D, et al. Structure and distribution of an unrecognized interstitium in human tissues. Sci Rep. 2018;8(1):4947. Previous article Next article Entwined back to

By Juulke Castelijn < Back to Issue 3 Believing in aliens... A science? By Juulke Castelijn 10 September 2022 Edited by Tanya Kovacevic and Ashleigh Hallinan Illustrated by Quynh Anh Nguyen Next The question of the existence of ‘intelligent life forms’ on a planet other than ours has always been one of belief. And I did not believe. It was probably the image of a green blob with multiple arms and eyes squelching across the ground and emitting noises unidentifiable as any form of language which turned me off the whole idea. But a book I read one day completely changed my mind; it wasn’t about space at all, but about evolution. ‘Science in the Soul’ is a collection of works written by the inimitable Richard Dawkins, a man who has argued on behalf of evolutionary theory for decades. Within its pages, you will find essays, articles and speeches from throughout his career, all with the target of inspiring deep rational thought in the field of science. A single essay gives enough food for thought to last the mind many days, but the ease and magnificence of Dawkin’s prose encourages the devourment of many pages in a single sitting. The reader becomes engulfed in scientific argument, quickly and completely. Dawkins shows the fundamental importance of the proper understanding of evolution as not just critical to biology, but society at large. Take, for instance, ‘Speaking up for science: An open letter to Prince Charles,’ in which he argues against the modelling of agricultural practices on natural processes as a way of combating climate change. Even if agriculture could be in itself a natural practice (it can’t), nature, Dawkins argues, is a terrible model for longevity. Instead, nature is ‘a short-term Darwinian profiteer’. Here he refers to the mechanism of natural selection, where offspring have an increased likelihood of carrying the traits which favoured their parents’ survival. Natural selection is a reflective process. At a population level, it highlights those genetic traits that increased chances of survival in the past. There is no guarantee those traits will benefit the current generation at all, let alone future generations. Instead, Dawkins argues, science is the method by which new solutions to climate change are found. Whilst we cannot see the future, a rational application of a wealth of knowledge gives us a far more sensitive approach than crude nature. Well, perhaps not crude per se. If anyone is an advocate for the beauty and complexity of natural life, it is surely Dawkins. But a true representation of nature, he argues, rests on the appreciation of evolution as a blinded process, with no aim or ambition, and certainly no pre-planned design. With this stance, Dawkins directly opposes Creationism as an explanation of how the world emerged, a battle from which he does not shy away. Evolution is often painted as a theory in which things develop by chance, randomly. When you consider the complexity of a thing such as the eye, no wonder people prefer to believe in an intelligent designer, like a god, instead. But evolution is not dependent on chance at all, a fact Dawkins argues many times throughout his collection. There is nothing random about the body parts that make up modern humans, or any other living thing - they have been passed down from generation to generation because they enhanced our ancestors’ survival. The underlying logic is unrivalled, including by religion. But that doesn’t mean Dawkins is not a man of belief. Dawkins believes in the existence of intelligent extraterrestrial life, and for one reason above all: given the billions upon billions of planets in our universe, the chance of our own evolution would have to be exceedingly small if there was no other life out there. In other words, we believe there is life out there because we do not believe our own evolution to be so rare as to only occur once. Admittedly, it is not a new argument but it had not clicked for me before. Perhaps it was Dawkins’ poetic phrasing. At this stage it is a belief, underlined by a big ‘if’. How could we ever know if there are intelligent life forms on a planet other than Earth? Dawkins provides an answer here too. You probably won’t be surprised that the answer is science, specifically a knowledge of evolution. We do not have to discover life itself, only a sign of something that marks intelligence - a machine or language, say. Evolution remains our only plausible theory of how such a thing could be created, because it can explain the formation of an intelligent being capable of designing such things. We become the supporting evidence of life somewhere else in the universe. That’s satisfying enough for me. Previous article Next article alien back to

Ever wondered what it's like to contribute to OmniSci? We spoke to Tanya Kovacevic about her experience, from starting writing during lockdown to what's in the words for Issue 4: Mirage! Tanya is currently in her third year of the Bachelor of Biomedicine and studying a concurrent diploma in Italian. For Issue 4: Mirage, she is contributing to four articles as an editor. Mee t OmniSci Editor Tany a Kovacevic Tanya is an editor at OmniSci, currently in her third year of the Bachelor of Biomedicine and studying a concurrent diploma in Italian. For Issue 4: Mirage, she is contributing to four articles as an editor. interviewed by Caitlin Kane What are you studying? I am studying a Bachelor of Biomedicine, currently in third year, and a Diploma in Italian. I’m majoring in human structure and function, which looks at how the body works: the muscles, the bones, the visceral organs, everything. I’m hoping to get a research subject placement at the Florey Institute because I have a very big passion for neurology. I feel like it will be fun to get exposure to both what’s happening behind the scenes through research and be able to apply it in the future as well. I want to hopefully go into medicine and become a GP with a focus on neurology. What first got you interested in science? My primary school wanted to start introducing science subjects and I was chosen as one of the students to give it a shot. I found that I really enjoyed it. Especially when the skeleton was brought out of the closet–all dusty and stuff–and we finally started to use it. Then compulsory science subjects at high school, I continued to find that interesting. I thought, I guess I’ll stick with this. What is your role at OmniSci? I started off writing a piece during lockdown and I wrote my first piece about lockdown fatigue. I remember speaking to my psychologist about it because I was experiencing it. When I heard of it, I thought this actually explains a lot so I wanted to share that with other people. I applied for the editing role as well, so that’s what I’ve been doing these last three years. I quite enjoy helping people flesh out their ideas. I find that I’m quite an analytical and meticulous person, so I will always look for the little things that could go wrong and always like to correct them. I thought it was a pretty good fit! What would you say to someone else who was thinking about getting involved at OmniSci? It’s really open with what you can do. You can communicate with so many different people. Getting involved is a good way of exploring your own interests and putting your skills to the test. It’s nice having something on the side that takes your mind off study but is also related to things that you enjoy. It's a good pastime but also something that gives you professional experience. Kills two birds with one stone. What is your favourite thing about contributing at OmniSci so far? I like seeing when it gets printed and everything has been put together, because you really see the contribution of everyone, and it all falls into place. While you're doing it, it’s sort of “I’ve got to focus on this aspect,” but then it’s nice seeing how your feedback has been included and how people have really improved in their writing and been able to use the skills of others. It’s a very collaborative thing that comes together. It’s a good product, especially with all the cool illustrations. I love looking at art–not very good at it, but I love looking at it. It’s exciting to see something that I was interested in while writing or editing come to life in a physical representation, an artistic interpretation. Can you give us a sneak peek or pitch of what you're working on this issue? With Mirage it’s very open ended. Placebo effect is something that everyone talks about, but there are hidden aspects that we don’t quite think about. It’s interesting looking at a bit of the biology behind it, particularly between the different sexes. That’s one thing to look out for! What do you like doing in your spare time (when you're not contributing at OmniSci)? Reading all sorts of stuff, watching TV shows and movies–I’m a bit of a film fanatic as well. Going outside and playing tennis or walking my dog. I love spending time with my dog. My dog is my life so he takes up a bit of my time. Do you have any media recommendations? One of my favourite international films is called ‘I cento passi’ or ‘One Hundred Steps’. It’s an Italian movie about the mafia and the man it’s based on is very courageous. I think it’s something we all need to see to remind us that we do have a voice even in such horrible, dark moments. I think that’s definitely something that people can look into! It’s on Youtube with subtitles [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhc9S8txE9c]. Which chemical element would you name your firstborn child (or pet) after? That’s a very um… specific question! Curium is one, so Marie Curie. Fantastic woman, pioneering woman, who was definitely ahead of her time. Or Thorium, because Thor! Read Tanya's articles Sick of lockdown? Let science explain why. Law and Order: Medically Supervised Injecting Centres Space exploration in Antarctica Believing in aliens... A science? Behind the Mask From Fusion to Submarines: A Nuclear Year

The body, et cetera Wiggling Ears By Rachel Ko Ever wondered why we have a tailbone but no tail, or wisdom teeth with nothing to chew with them? This column delves into our useless body parts that make us living evidence for evolution- this issue, ear wiggling. Edited by Irene Lee, Ethan Newnham & Jessica Nguy Issue 1: September 24, 2021 Illustration by Quynh Anh Nguyen Human beings fancy ourselves to be quite an intelligent species. With our relatively enormous brains and intricate handling of the five senses, we like to believe that the things we see, touch, smell, taste, and hear, define the boundaries of our universe. Yet, evidence of our shortcomings exists in plain sight on our own bodies. This becomes even more prominent when compared to the furry companions we often assume we are superior to. After living together for almost a decade, my dog is rather sick of me. While she is educated enough to know her name, I no longer even get a turn of a head when I call her. Often, the only response I receive is a wiggle of the ears as she turns them towards me. I, the source of sound, must wait as she considers whether my call for attention is worthy of her time. In this scenario, my dog’s ego might not be the only thing giving her superiority - in the realm of ear wiggling, her abilities are anatomically unattainable to us mere humans. The muscles responsible for this skill are the auriculares, with the anterior controlling upwards and forwards movement, the superior controlling the upwards and downwards movement, and finally the posterior pulling them backwards (1). In other species such as dogs, cats and horses, these muscles have evolved to become intricate over generations, with dogs manoeuvring their ears using 18 muscles, and cats using more than 30 (2). In most human beings, voluntary control of the ears has been almost entirely lost. For the 15 percent (3) of us who can wiggle our ears, the trait is vestigial – effectively useless, except for perhaps readjusting your glasses without using your hands. Despite this, ear wiggling was once a useful functional trait in our ancestral Homo species. Tracing back more than 150 million years (4), a common ancestor of mammals learnt to pivot and curl their ears for evolutionary advantage. It is theorised that before we walked upright, our own primate predecessors directed their ears in response to sound (5). This allowed them to pinpoint sources of danger that were hard to locate while moving on all fours. It was a mechanism comparable to when big cats, like those often featured in Attenborough documentaries, perk up their ears as they prowl through the grasslands. In fact, most of our mammalian relatives (6), other than our closest ape family, have preserved some level of ear wiggling ability, from foxes and wolves to lemurs and koalas. The deterioration of human ear-wiggling began with the emergence of bipedalism. As our ancestors lifted upright, off their knuckles and onto two feet, their entire centre of gravity shifted. This awarded them a wider scope of vision and diurnal activity (7), meaning they began to primarily operate during the day, so humans began relying on vision for many important things: hunting, protecting and surviving. Ear-wiggling's role in showing emotional expressions, such as anger or fear (8), was also replaced with gestures of the hands that were now free to be swung about. With no need for the sophisticated ear machinery that evolution had equipped us with, human beings’ ability to move our ears diminished, while our eyesight drastically improved. It seems that over time, the ear-orienting ability in humans simply died out with evolution. We have not let go of it completely, though. Interestingly, Homo sapiens have retained the neural circuits that were once responsible for ear movement. In the journal Psychophysiology by Steve Hackley (9), a cognitive neuroscientist at the University of Missouri, remnants of this neural circuitry were observed in clinical studies. When stimulated by an unexpected sound, the muscles behind the corresponding ears twitched and curled. Similarly, distraction with sounds of bird songs while attempting a set task kick-started bursts of ear muscle activity. While ear wiggling is no longer required for our survival, we exist as evolutionary fossils. As humans, we now have other options in well-established senses while hearing remains a dominant form of sensory input in other species – a very well-refined one too, if my dog’s ability to recognise the sound of her treat packet opening is anything to go by. While the only thing human ear-wigglers have is a cool party trick, our furry friends have mastered intricate ear control, giving them a paw up on us at least in this race. References: 1. "Auricularis Superior Anatomy, Function & Diagram | Body Maps". 2021. Healthline. https://www.healthline.com/human-body-maps/auricularis-superior#1. 2. "10 Things You Didn’T Know About Cats And Dogs". 2021. Vetsource. https://vetsource.com/news/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-cats-and-dogs/. 3. "Why Can Some People Wiggle Their Ears?". 2021. Livescience.Com. https://www.livescience.com/33809-wiggle-ears.html. 4, 7, 8. Gross, Rachel. 2021. "Your Vestigial Muscles Try To Pivot Your Ears Just Like A Dog’S". Slate Magazine. 5. "Understanding Genetics". 2021. Genetics.Thetech.Org. https://genetics.thetech.org/ask-a-geneticist/wiggling-your-ears. 6. Saarland University. "Our animal inheritance: Humans perk up their ears, too, when they hear interesting sounds." ScienceDaily. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/07/200707113337.htm. 9. Hackley, Steven A. 2015. "Evidence For A Vestigial Pinna-Orienting System In Humans". Psychophysiology 52 (10): 1263-1270. doi:10.1111/psyp.12501.

'Science is everywhere' Competition Submissions Scroll to view the submissions we received for National Science Week 2021! Lily Robinson, 20 Science is everywhere in our lives. As soon as you take a walk outside, you are immersed in it. This picture is of a dam at my family home at the end of a drought. The water was crystal clear and there were these amazing deep cracks in the mud. I decided to rotate the image upside down to symbolise the impact of the drought upending our lives and the bush around us. Rebecca André, 23 I captured this photograph on my Olympus OM-2 film camera while out on a lunchtime walk. At first I took no notice of this indistinct bunch of leaves but as I moved around them the sun caught my attention and I noticed the illuminated veins. This photgraph reminds me that the beauty of the natural world is all around us all the time, if only we are mindful to observe it. Through science and observation, the beauty of unseen worlds and intricate truths are revealed to us. Sajitha Biju, 36 Vivipary in papaya fruit: Viviparous germination is a type of seed germination seen in plants, where the seeds/embryo begin to develop before they detach from the parent plant. Viviparous germination is also seen in the mangrove Avicennia. Stephanie Tsang, 25 A photograph of a jellyfish pulsing through the cold waters of Port Philip Bay, Victoria. It has no brain nor heart. Science is spectacular and can be found submersed underwater. Cnidarians have been around for millions of years and later and are the common ancestors of many other creatures. The oldest fossils found date back to around 500 million years old. They are found all over the world following the ocean currents. Stephanie Tsang, 25 A photograph of a jellyfish pulsing through the cold waters of Port Philip Bay, Victoria. It has no brain nor heart. Science is spectacular and can be found submersed underwater. Cnidarians have been around for millions of years and later and are the common ancestors of many other creatures. The oldest fossils found date back to around 500 million years old. They are found all over the world following the ocean currents. Betty La, 24 I like to practise on this contraption of wood, metal and vibrating air almost every morning. My motor pattern for the music is set into motion, followed by eighty-eight felt-covered hammers acting as oddly-shaped springs, dancing along steel strings wound with copper. They are spurred on by levers of black and white. The sound is amplified from a wooden soundboard, which expands and contracts imperceptibly with the temperature of the room. Ella Banic, 19 I wish I could explain why I think science is everywhere, but it is too ubiquitous for me to comprehend. In my artwork I have been interested in the relationship between humans and nature, particularly in the liminality of experience. While I can’t really describe what science is or where to find it, in this piece I see science as a life force; which gives us direction and allows us to see above the surface. Sarah Wehbe, 18 This photo of a strawberry was taken with a magnifying glass to show the individual hairs and textured skin of the strawberry that you wouldn't normally notice. These fibrous hairs protect the fruit from insect damage and each of these yellow seeds contain the DNA to produce a whole new strawberry plant. Biological sciences are all around us in the foods that we eat. Junsheng He, 18 This photo of the Moon was taken on the 26th of May this year, the day when the total lunar eclipse took place. When we think of the Moon, it is always an image of a shining silverish sphere. Nevertheless, in this particular night, red light shines to the Moon when it is passing through the shadow of the Earth, turning it to the "Blood" Moon. It insinuates that even the seemingly ordered patterns, the forever rotating heavenly bodies, can change their property driven by the power of science. Minchi Gong, 20 Furry Buddy and Pumpkin: I’ve got a pumpkin from the market, and left it on my desk for a couple of weeks because I was too busy to cook it. One day I surprisingly found that there’re a bunch of furry moulds growing on its body, which successfully caught my eyes. Wow I never thought the mould can be so AESTHETIC! Seems like these little furry microorganisms are so keen to show their sense of presence and to express their interpretation of arts. Louie Minoza, 30 Here we witness the first moments of a new born calf. As it witnesses the warm glow of the setting sun for the first time, unconcerned on where the bright light is going. Taking in the textures and scents of the grass under its body. The feeling of fullness as it suckles on it’s mothers teat after instincts urges it to go against gravity. This new found freedom shall be utilized to embark and explore this world it was born in. Caitlin Kane, 20 Have you ever wondered how a clear sky becomes an electrically charged thunderstorm? Electric currents, like those that flow in our powerlines, are made by the movement of tiny charged particles called electrons. When operating safely within a house, electricity can light a bulb, keep a fridge chilly or charge a car. In the big woolly clouds above our heads, the movement of dust, ice and water can create a static electric charge, like when hair is rubbed with a balloon. Sachinthani Karunarathne, 28 years In the fall, you see trees having photogenic colours. Trees do this not for the beauty what we see but to conserve energy during winter. Because due to changes in the length of daylight and temperature, the leaves stop their food-making process (photosynthesis). So, chlorophyll pigment breaks down, the green colour disappears, and the yellow to orange colours become visible and give the leaves part of their fall splendour. Caelan Mitchell, 23 Copper is one of my favourite metals. It has a significant history, and it looks stunning. It looks even more stunning when you catch an everyday object stained by a rich patina — a complex of copper oxides formed by heat and air. I've never seen anything like this. Joanna Stubbs An Australian native Eucalypt growing for years next to an urban creek and bike path in inner city Melbourne. Scientific research is required in how anthropogenic climate change will affect specific tree species, and inform measures on how best to ensure their survival in a warming climate. Sachinthani Karunarathne, 28 Blood oranges may have a sinister-sounding name, but they’re just a natural mutation of standard oranges. This mutation led to the production of anthocyanins, which make not just blood oranges bright red but also blueberries blue. The flesh develops its characteristic maroon colour when the fruit develops with low temperatures during the night. The anthocyanin pigments continue accumulating in cold storage after harvest. Longer the fridge time redder they become! Sachini Pathirana, 28 A microscopic image of a cell? Nah it’s simple kitchen science. When you wash oily dishes, you will see oil droplets forming thin layers like this on water. This is because adhesive force between oil and water molecules is greater than cohesive force between oil molecules. So, the oil molecules do not mix with water molecules. As a result, oil spreads on the water surface forming a thin layer. Sachini Pathirana, 28 Kernel colour was used to unravel an odd phenomenon in non-Mendelian inheritance: transposons. Transposons are stretches of DNA that jump from place to place in the genome, and landing in the middle of a pigment gene would alter the colour of that cell. Barbara McClintock won a Nobel Prize for her discovery of these transposons. Even the regular white/yellow corn you find in supermarkets has made big genetic leaps. Yitao Gan, 21 The beauty of nature from the preys, harvesters and predators. Christian Theodosiou, 19 My entry shows a sapling in the foreground and a waterfall in the background, captured at midday in the Springbrook mountains of Queensland this year. I aimed to photograph the scene so that perspective gives the appearance that the young plant is being watered by the waterfall and I think that the forms of the leaf and the white foamy water are quite complementary. Even though this waterfall does not directly feed this plant, the fact of their shared environment draws a life-giving relationship between them anyway. Science is everywhere because we, like all complex or simple organisms, are situated within and sustained by infinite webs of interdependence. Whether biological or more molecular, all science everywhere is defined by both obvious relationships, and those that take more time, devotion and study to identify. Teck-Phui Chua, 22 A sapling is growing where an older tree once grew. However, upon closer inspection, the older tree never fully died; part of it was still alive which has allowed a sapling to sprout from its trunk. In a similar vein, science is everywhere and has always been, but what has changed is how much we understand as one generation passes their knowledge onto the next so new discoveries can be made. Additionally, the tree may have seemed dead, but there was still life in it. Whether we choose to act on strong scientific evidence or ignore it, the science will still be there. Sarah Wehbe, 18 Interactions between living organisms are everywhere and are the essence of life itself. This image illustrates the commensal relationship between algae and turtles. The turtle’s shell provides an ideal surface for the algae’s growth, and the turtle is completely unaffected by its presence. In fact, it may help turtles camouflage and hide from prey. This simple interaction between living organisms highlights the existence of science in every aspect of life. Grace Li, 22 Science is often overlooked as a form of art due to its ubiquity. However, a simple photograph can be the reminder needed that science is not only everywhere, but it is beautiful. For example, a photograph is the result of photons travelling from the sun, bouncing off objects, and landing on a camera's sensor. Similarly, these incredible macro-photographic patterns of a lamp is captured by photons travelling through optic fiber. Christina Evans, 43 The bee retrieves pollen from the prickly thistles & how it's all stored on its hind legs like saddlebags. Xuezhi Yang It is fascinating how science is present everywhere, oftentimes interacting with itself creating intricate and mesmerizing works of art. In my artwork, I attempted to capture the anatomy and essence of the Antelope Jackrabbit's ears as light rays penetrate through them. Without light, the delicate and daedal arteries and veins would have been otherwise invisible, tucked away in fur and cartilage. If we truly pay attention, art is found everywhere in science.

< Back to Issue 10 Unpacking Myths: Distortions of Sex Differences in Popular Culture by Vicenta Wheatley 2 June 2026 Illustrated by Jessica Walton Edited by Han Chong Open TikTok, scroll through Reddit, or fall down a Youtube rabbit hole about dating and relationships, and you will almost certainly encounter a familiar set of claims: men are biologically wired to seek young, fertile women, while women are evolutionarily programmed to prefer high-status providers. These preferences are presented as universal, ancient, and essentially fixed. The studies cited are real, and the researchers exist, yet something crucial gets lost between the data that differentiates a statistical pattern from a universal truth. This is not simply a story about misunderstanding science. In some cases, simplified narratives about attraction may be actively reinforced because they are commercially effective (1). Dating platforms, for example, operate within engagement driven systems where presenting certain patterns such as “younger is more desirable” can increase competition, user activity, and in some cases subscription behaviour. Whether intentional or not, the result is the same: complex research is translated into persuasive but incomplete stories about how men and women are supposed to be. To understand how distortion happens, it helps to first understand what the science actually says, because the research is more careful and more interesting than its popular reputation suggests. Evolutionary psychology does not claim that all men and women behave identically, but instead it identifies probabilistic patterns shaped by millions of years of reproductive pressures. The key thing to note here is that these are tendencies, not rules, and they come with enormous individual variation. The question, then, is not whether differences exist, but how they are interpreted, and why that interpretation so often becomes simplified the moment it enters public discourse. What the Science Actually Says Evolutionary psychology attempts to explain certain human behaviours through the lens of reproductive adaptation. At its core is the idea that psychological tendencies, much like physical traits, may have evolved because they increased reproductive success in ancestral environments. One of the field’s most influential frameworks is the sexual selection theory first proposed by Charles Darwin, suggesting that traits linked to mate competition and mate choice become more common over generations. From this perspective, evolutionary psychologists argue that men and women may, on average, display somewhat different mating preferences due to asymmetries in parental investment (2). Figure 1 . Average importance ratings of partner characteristics across male and female participants in romantic and sexual attraction contexts. While average sex differences appear in some traits, substantial overlap remains between groups. Adapted from (3). Since women have historically faced greater biological costs associated with reproduction through pregnancy, childbirth and, for most of human history, primary infant care, the parental investment theory predicts that women may place greater emphasis on stability, commitment, and resources when selecting long-term partners. Men, in contrast, may be somewhat more likely to prioritise cues associated with fertility and reproductive health, such as youth and physical attractiveness (Fig. 1). Research in this area is not purely speculative, nor was it invented by a podcast host holding a microphone the size of a small telescope. In a widely cited 1989 cross-cultural study spanning 37 societies, evolutionary psychologist David Buss found that women consistently rated financial prospects and ambition as more important in long-term partners, while men placed greater emphasis on youth and attractiveness (4). Subsequent studies have identified similar broad patterns across cultures, lending support to the idea that some mating preferences may have evolutionary roots (5). Yet the popular interpretation of these findings is usually far more rigid than the research itself. Let’s be clear, evolutionary psychologists do not argue that all men pursue casual relationships, nor that all women seek wealthy providers. The differences observed are statistical averages across populations, not fixed scripts handed out at birth. In reality, the overlap between men and women is substantial, and human attraction is shaped by a dense interaction of biology, personality, culture, upbringing, social norms, economic conditions, and individual experience. Let’s also remember that humans exhibit mutual mate choice, meaning both sexes tend to value qualities such as kindness, intelligence, emotional stability and loyalty among others, particularly in long term relationships. The science, in other words, is far more nuanced and probabilistic than its online afterlife often suggests. When Research Becomes Content Once these findings leave academic journals, however, they often undergo a dramatic simplification. On social media platforms, dating podcasts, YouTube commentary channels, and algorithm-driven feeds, probabilistic patterns are frequently reframed as fixed biological truths. For instance, a statistical tendency for men, on average, to prioritise youth in certain contexts becomes the sweeping claim that women inevitably “lose value” with age, which is usually accompanied by a graph created from non-peer-reviewed data, a ring light, and enough confidence to make one briefly forget what a sample bias is. Findings about short-term mating strategies are transformed into declarations that men are biologically incapable of monogamy. The context and variation embedded within the original research are gradually stripped away and replaced with narratives that are far easier to package into viral content. Part of the appeal of these narratives lies in their simplicity. We all know human relationships are emotionally messy and socially complicated, but biological explanations can sometimes offer the illusion of certainty. Algorithms further intensify this process by rewarding emotionally charged claims that provoke engagement. Nuance rarely performs as well online as confidence does. A creator who states that attraction is shaped by a complex interaction of evolutionary, social, and cultural influences is unlikely to generate the same reaction as someone confidently declaring that “men are just wired this way” while speaking in a podcast. In this sense, the distortion of scientific findings is not always accidental. Simplified biological narratives are highly marketable because they are easily understood and capable of reinforcing existing insecurities. Within digital dating ecosystems, where apps and influencers often profit from continued dissatisfaction and competition, there may even be incentives to amplify narratives that encourage users to constantly optimise themselves in the pursuit of desirability. Dating app data provides a particularly striking example of how this process unfolds. OkCupid user data is frequently circulated online to support the claim that men of all ages overwhelmingly prefer women in their early twenties, with stronger aggregate attention toward younger women (Fig. 2b); while female preference patterns appear to remain relatively age-aligned. These visualisations are often interpreted in a highly deterministic way, stripped of their behavioural and contextual limitations. In particular, messaging and preference data from dating platforms reflect engagement patterns within an insular digital environment rather than stable or universal mate preferences. Despite this, such findings are repeatedly circulated as evidence of fixed biological tendencies. Figure 3. Distribution of age differences in unmarried/cohabitant straight couples within the U.S. Age disparity between male-to-female is displayed in years on the x-axis, while frequency of couple age gap is shown as a percentage on the y-axis. Data compiled from U.S. Census Bureau estimates. Adapted from (7). Messaging behaviour on dating apps does not necessarily reflect long-term compatibility or actual partner selection. When broader relationship outcomes are considered, this interpretation becomes less stable. Age differences in real-world couples are generally modest, with most partnerships clustering around relatively small age gaps (Fig. 3). Marriage and cohabitation data, for instance, show far smaller age gaps than viral internet discourse might imply. Nor do these datasets capture the influence of culture, social expectations, or the fact that attraction itself is highly multidimensional. The issue, then, is not that the original research is fabricated, but that selective interpretations become amplified to the point that statistical tendencies are reframed as fixed biological determinism. The Social Cost of Simplified Science The distortion of these findings matters because biological explanations rarely stay confined to academic discussion. Once ideas about attraction and sex differences enter popular culture, they begin shaping real expectations about relationships and personal value. Claims that men are biologically programmed to prioritise youth, for example, are often interpreted less as statistical observations and more as warnings directed at women. Entire online industries have emerged around this premise, from female value discourse to anti-ageing products marketed with thinly veiled evolutionary language. Exposure to enough of this content can encourage the perception that desirability functions like a countdown, reinforced by highly persuasive and aggressive marketing frameworks. What makes these narratives particularly persuasive is their association with science . Most people are not reading evolutionary psychology papers directly, nor are they spending their evenings analysing sample sizes and methodological limitations for fun. Instead, findings are filtered down through influencers, dating coaches, podcasts, and viral clips that present contested or nuanced ideas with remarkable certainty. Once a claim is framed as biological, it can become harder to critique because it appears rooted in nature itself rather than social interpretation. Statements such as “men are naturally non monogamous” or “women are wired to seek providers” can gradually shift from descriptive claims about averages into prescriptive assumptions about how people should behave. In this way, scientific language can end up reinforcing existing gender norms while giving them the appearance of inevitability. These narratives affect all genders, albeit in different ways. Men are increasingly told that their value depends on wealth, height, status, confidence, and sexual success, while emotional vulnerability is framed as weakness. Women, meanwhile, are frequently confronted with narratives suggesting that desirability peaks in their early twenties before declining with age; encouraging constant self-monitoring through beauty routines, cosmetic procedures, anti-ageing products, and pressure to remain attractive within increasingly narrow standards. However, while rising engagement with cosmetic procedures is often linked to these cultural narratives, this relationship is likely multifactorial rather than singular in origin. An increased access to minimally invasive treatments, changing medical norms around cosmetic enhancement, and broader social media exposure all plausibly contribute to these trends, alongside the influence of appearance-focused cultural messaging. For instance, reports indicate a substantial rise in cosmetic procedures among younger age groups in recent years (8,9), and while these figures cannot be attributed to a single causal driver, they are nonetheless consistent with environments in which aesthetic pressure and visibility have increased. Taken together, this suggests a complex interaction between cultural narratives, medical technology, and evolving aesthetic norms, where expectations about attractiveness may play a meaningful reinforcing role. Research into human attraction and sex differences can offer valuable insight into broad behavioural patterns, but those findings are frequently distorted once they enter popular culture. Probabilistic trends in mating preferences and behaviour are often repackaged into rigid truths about how men and women supposedly are. In an online environment that rewards certainty over nuance, scientific literacy matters more than ever for not only understanding the research itself, but for recognising when complex findings are being simplified into something far more prescriptive than they were ever intended to be. References Brady WJ, Wills JA, Jost JT, Tucker JA, Van Bavel JJ. Emotions shapes the diffusion of moralized content in social networks. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2017;114(28):73138. doi:10.1073/pnas.1618923114 Trivers, R. Parental investment and sexual selection. In: Campbell B, editor. Sexual Selection and the Descent of Man . Chicago: Aldine Publishing Company; 1972. P.136-79 Scheller M, de Sousa AA, Brotto LA, Little AC. The role of sexual and romantic attraction in human mate preferences. J Sex Res. 2023. doi:10.1080/00224499.2023.2176811 Buss, D. Sex differences in human mate preferences: evolutionary hypotheses tested in 37 cultures. Behav Brain Sci . 1989;12(1):1-14. doi:10.1017/S0140525X00023992 Thomas AH, Jonason PK, Blackburn JD, Kennair LEO, Lowe R, Malouff JM, et al. Mate preference priorities in the East and West: a cross cultural test of the mate preference priority model. J Pers. 2020;88(3):606-20. doi:10.1111/jopy.12514 Rudder C. Dataclysm: Who we are (when we think no one’s looking). New York: Crown; 2014. Kamenov A. Age disparities in relationships: statistics. City-Data Blog; 2020. https://www.city-data.com/blog/2620-age-disparity/ CNN Health. Surge in cosmetic procedures among young people. 2024 Jan 16. https://edition.cnn.com/2024/01/16/health/young-cosmetic-procedures Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Gen Z driving increase in cosmetic injectables. 2026 Feb 28. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-02-28/gen-z-driving-boost-cosmetic-injectables/106258646 Previous article back to Fact & Fiction Next article

< Back to Issue 2 Building the Lightsaber Some of the most iconic movie gadgets are the oldest ones. For this issue we look at how the lightsaber was brought to life. by Manthila Ranatunga 10 December 2021 Edited by Sam Williams and Tanya Kovacevic Illustrated by Rohith S Prabhu Star Wars : A New Hope was a massive success when it hit cinemas back in 1977. It was a groundbreaking sensation in the field of science fiction movies and computer generated imagery (CGI) in films. What really caught many fans’ eyes was, of course, the lightsaber. Also referred to as a “laser sword”, it is described as “an elegant weapon, for a more civilised age”. Now in our civilised age, we have decided to replicate this dangerous weapon. Lightsabers have already been built by a few enthusiasts. For this piece, we will be focusing on Hacksmith Industries’ lightsaber build from 2020 , as it is the closest to the real deal. Fig. 1. “Hacksmith Industries’ latest lightsaber build”, Hacksmith Industries, 4000° PLASMA PROTO-LIGHTSABER BUILD, 2020. Hacksmith Industries was founded by James Hobson, an engineer who builds real-life versions of film and video game gadgets. After multiple attempts, the team managed to fabricate a retractable, plasma-based lightsaber. However, this is not a real lightsaber, but more-so a protosaber in the Star Wars universe. We will get back to this point later on. How do they work? Let us first talk about how lightsabers work in the movies. A lightsaber consists of three parts: the hilt, the Kyber crystal and the blade itself. Similar to a traditional sword, the hilt is the handle and is made of a durable metal such as aluminium. It contains the Kyber crystal, which is a rare crystal found in the Star Wars universe and is the power source of the lightsaber. Moving onto the more interesting part, the blade is a beam of plasma. Often called “the fourth state of matter”, it is created by heating gas up to temperatures as high as 2,500 degrees celsius. A battery inside the hilt activates the crystal. The produced plasma is then focused through a lens and directed outwards. An electromagnetic field, essentially a force field, generated at the hilt contains the plasma in a defined beam and directs it back into the hilt. The crystal absorbs the energy and recycles it. Hence lightsabers are extremely energy-efficient, allowing Jedi Knights to use them for their whole lifetimes. Fig. 2. Robert W. Schönholz, Blue Lightsaber, c.2016. Of course, the lightsaber breaks the laws of physics. Electromagnetic fields do not work as they do on fictional planets like Coruscant. Energy-dense power sources such as Kyber crystals do not exist in real life, which leads us to the protosaber. In Star Wars lore, a protosaber is a lightsaber with an external power source. It was the predecessor to the lightsaber when Kyber crystals could not be contained inside the hilt. Since real-life high energy sources cannot be squished into the hilt, Hacksmith Industries' lightsaber build is reminiscent of the early protosaber. The build The engineers at Hacksmith Industries settled on liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) as the power source, the same gas used for home heating systems and barbecues. This gas is fed through the brass and copper hilt, and is burnt continuously to keep producing plasma. To form the beam shape of the blade, they incorporated laminar flow of gas. Ever seen videos of “frozen” water coming out of taps like this ? Laminar flow occurs when layers of fluid molecules, in this case LPG, flow without mixing. In this instance, a smooth beam is created. Unlike actual lightsabers, the beam does not return to the hilt to be absorbed. Of course, to be a lightsaber, it has to function like one, too. The plasma is extremely hot, reaching up to 2,200 degrees celsius. Therefore, it can cut through metal and other objects much like we see in the movies. This also means contact with the blade can lead to serious or even fatal injuries. The external power supply is in the form of a backpack, with mounted LPG canisters and electronics for assistance. Overall, the build looks, feels and works like a real lightsaber, which makes it a pretty accurate replica. However, we do not have the Force or ancient Jedi wisdom, so there are some notable imperfections in the design. Fig. 3. “Finished lightsaber build”, Hacksmith Industries, 4000° PLASMA PROTO-LIGHTSABER BUILD, 2020. Colours Lightsabers come in a variety of colours, each reflecting the wielder's moral values in Star Wars canon. Blue, for example, represents justice and protection. Green, blue and red are the most commonly seen in the movies, but lightsabers also come in purple, orange, yellow, white and black. If you did high school science, you may remember mixing bunsen burner flames with salts to produce colours. The same principle applies here; salts can be mixed in with plasma to colour the blade. For example, Strontium Chloride gives a red colour, so you can finally live out your Sith fantasies. Fig. 4. “Lightsaber colours by mixing salts”, Hacksmith Industries, 4000° PLASMA PROTO-LIGHTSABER BUILD, 2020. Improvements The downside of using plasma is that we cannot fight with it. Blades would pass right through each other without clashing. To fix this, a metal rod that can withstand high temperatures, such as Tungsten, could form the blade with a beam of plasma around it. However, this means the lightsaber would not be retractable, which defeats the purpose. To keep the blade coloured, salts have to be continuously fed through the hilt. This can be done with another pressurised canister along with the LPG, although it requires extra space. Despite the imperfections, the protosaber by Hacksmith Industries is the closest prototype to a real-life lightsaber. With constantly evolving technology, we will be able to build a more compact model that more closely resembles those in the movies. Makers all around the world are building cool movie gadgets like the lightsaber, so keep a lookout for your favourite ones. You never know what the nerds may bring! References 1. Amy Tikkanen, “Star Wars”, Britannica, published April 10, 2008, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Star-Wars-film-series. 2, 4, 7. Hacksmith Industries, “4000° PLASMA PROTO-LIGHTSABER BUILD (RETRACTABLE BLADE!)”, October 2020, YouTube video, 18:15, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC6J4T_hUKg. 3. Joshua Sostrin, “Keeping it real with the Hacksmith”, YouTube Official Blog (blog), November 12, 2020, https://blog.youtube/creator-and-artist-stories/the-hacksmith-10-million-subscribers/. 5. Daniel Kolitz, “Are Lightsabers Theoretically Possible?”, Gizmodo, published August 10, 2021, https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2021/08/are-lightsabers-theoretically-possible/. 6. Richard Rogers, “Lightsaber Battery Analysis”, Arbin Instruments: News, published October 3, 2019, https://www.arbin.com/lightsaber-battery-analysis/. 8. Phil Edwards, “Star Wars lightsaber colors, explained”, Vox, published May 4, 2015, https://www.vox.com/2015/5/31/8689811/lightsaber-colors-star-wars. Previous article back to DISORDER Next article

< Back to Issue 10 Fiction Disguised as Fact: The Cost of Scientific Misinformation by Kara Miwa-Dale 2 June 2026 Edited by Nushi Singh In 1998, Andrew Wakefield published a paper in The Lancet claiming that the MMR vaccine was linked to autism. For such a serious claim, the evidence was astonishingly weak (1). The study included only 12 hand-picked participants, had no control group, and was riddled with inconsistencies. To make matters worse, Wakefield failed to disclose that he had received funding from a lawyer representing parents taking legal action against vaccine manufacturers. He further concealed that he had filed a patent for a rival vaccine that stood to benefit if confidence in the MMR vaccine fell. Despite these glaring flaws, the paper gained enormous influence. Media outlets across the world amplified its alarming claims, often with little scientific scrutiny (2). The Wakefield study became one of the clearest examples of fiction disguising itself as fact: a false narrative cloaked in the appearance of scientific credibility. Once released into the public sphere, emotionally charged claims quickly began to overshadow scientific evidence. Wakefield’s paper sparked widespread concern about the MMR vaccine. Few members of the public were likely to read the original study themselves, let alone critically evaluate its methods. Instead, many depended on journalists and news reports to interpret the findings. In doing so, they relied on a broader trust in scientific institutions and science communication, often assuming that published research had already been thoroughly vetted (3). This misplaced trust had far-reaching consequences. Before the paper was published, MMR vaccination rates in the UK sat at around 91-92%. Within five years, by 2003, this had fallen to approximately 80% (4). Although it is impossible to prove that Wakefield’s paper alone caused this drop, there is little doubt that it ignited widespread anxiety. By the time subsequent research had comprehensively refuted the claims (5, 6, 7), public trust had already been badly damaged. The media played an important role in amplifying parental fear. News coverage often prioritised emotional headlines and personal anecdotes over scientific evidence. Although evidence supporting vaccine safety was reported during this time, it accounted for only 37% of media stories during the controversy (2). Parents who were unsure about vaccinating their children were strongly influenced by mass media coverage (8). In one Welsh study, parents who chose not to vaccinate their children were 4.5 times more likely to rely on newspapers for information about the MMR vaccine (9). Twelve years later, Wakefield’s paper was finally retracted (10). By then, however, the damage had already been done. Despite overwhelming evidence disproving the claims, many people continued to believe them. Psychologists describe this as the ‘continued influence effect’, where misinformation can continue shaping attitudes and behaviour even after it has been debunked (11). Misinformation is not only persuasive — in some cases, it can also be deadly. It would be comforting to believe that society has become better at recognising misinformation. Unfortunately, the problem remains deeply entrenched. In some cases, misinformation does not originate from fraudulent researchers, but from governments themselves. This is perhaps even more insidious, because institutional authority can give misinformation an appearance of legitimacy that is extraordinarily difficult to undo. A striking example emerged in Japan in 2013, following the introduction of a national HPV vaccination program for teenage girls. The vaccine was supported by strong scientific evidence demonstrating its effectiveness in preventing cervical cancer (12). Yet only two months after launching the program, the Japanese government suspended its active recommendation of the vaccine due to growing public concern about safety (13). These concerns were largely driven by media reports of alleged side effects following vaccination. Television programs and newspaper stories featured emotional stories from young women reporting chronic pain and neurological symptoms, triggering widespread panic across the country (14). Crucially, many media outlets failed to emphasise that no scientific evidence had established a causal link between the vaccine and these symptoms. Although the government described the suspension as temporary while investigations continued, political caution and public pressure transformed it into a prolonged policy pause. Vaccination rates plummeted from 70% to barely 1% within a single year (15). The suspension ultimately lasted more than eight years, creating what researchers have described as a ‘lost generation’ of women who missed the opportunity to be protected against HPV (14). While the program has since been reinstated, public trust has not fully recovered. As of 2025, vaccination rates remain around 30% — a far reach from the World Health Organisation target of 90% (16). The long-term consequences may not become apparent for decades, as cervical cancer rates rise in under-vaccinated populations. This case highlights the powerful role of the media in shaping public perceptions of risk, and in turn, influencing policy decisions with enduring public health consequences. Addressing misinformation is not solely the responsibility of scientists or governments. Journalists and media organisations also play a critical role in shaping public understanding. The persistence of misinformation highlights an important reality: scientific evidence alone is not enough. Even the most robust research can be undermined if it is not communicated in a way that is accessible, transparent and trustworthy. This is where science communication becomes essential — helping to bridge the gap between evidence and public understanding so that scientific knowledge can inform real-world decisions. In the space between fact and fiction, communication determines which voice is heard. In an age where information moves faster than ever, the ability to communicate science clearly, honestly, and effectively may be just as important as the science itself. References 1. Flaherty DK. The Vaccine-Autism Connection: A Public Health Crisis Caused by Unethical Medical Practices and Fraudulent Science. Annals of Pharmacotherapy . 2011;45 (10):1302-1304. doi: 10.1345/aph.1Q318 2. Lewis J, Speers, T. Misleading media reporting? The MMR story. Nature Reviews Immunology . 2003; 3 (11):913-918. doi:10.1038/nri1228 3. Howell EL, Wirz CD, Scheufele DA, Brossard D, Xenos MA. Deference and decision-making in science and society: How deference to scientific authority goes beyond confidence in science and scientists to become authoritarianism. Public Understanding of Science . 2020; 29 (8):800-818. doi:10.1177/0963662520962741 4. Pearce A, Law C, Elliman D, Cole TJ, Bedford H. Factors associated with uptake of measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine (MMR) and use of single antigen vaccines in a contemporary UK cohort: prospective cohort study. BMJ . 2008; 336 (7647):754-757. doi:10.1136/bmj.39489.590671.25 5. Peltola H, Patja A, Leinikki P, Valle M, Davidkin I, Paunio M. No evidence for measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine-associated inflammatory bowel disease or autism in a 14-year prospective study. The Lancet . 1998; 351 (9112):1327-1328. 6. Madsen KM, Hviid A, Vestergaard M, et al. A population-based study of measles, mumps, and rubella vaccination and autism. New England Journal of Medicine . 2002; 347 (19):1477-1482. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa021134 7. Taylor B, Miller E, Farrington C, et al. Autism and measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine: no epidemiological evidence for a causal association. The Lancet . 1999; 353 (9169):2026-2029. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(99)01239-8 8. Evans M, Stoddart H, Condon L, Freeman E, Grizzell M, Mullen R. Parents' perspectives on the MMR immunisation: a focus group study. Br J Gen Pract . 2001; 51 (472):904-910. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1314147/ 9. Walsh S, Thomas DR, Mason BW, Evans MR. The impact of the media on the decision of parents in South Wales to accept measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) immunization. Epidemiol Infect . 2015; 43 (3):550-560. doi:10.1017/s0950268814000752 10. Rao TS, Andrade C. The MMR vaccine and autism: Sensation, refutation, retraction, and fraud. Indian J Psychiatry . 2011; 53 (2):95-96. doi:0.4103/0019-5545.82529 11. Johnson HM, Seifert CM. Sources of the continued influence effect: When misinformation in memory affects later inferences. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition . 1994; 20 (6):1420. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.20.6.1420 12. Paavonen L, Naud P, Salmerón J, et al. Efficacy of human papillomavirus (HPV)-16/18 AS04-adjuvanted vaccine against cervical infection and precancer caused by oncogenic HPV types (PATRICIA): final analysis of a double-blind, randomised study in young women. The Lancet . 2009; 374 (9686):301-314. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(09)61248-4 13. Iked S, Ueda Y, Yagi A, et al. HPV vaccination in Japan: what is happening in Japan? Expert Review of Vaccines . 2019; 18 (4):323-325. doi:10.1080/14760584.2019.1584040 14. Takahashi T, Ichimiya M, Tomono M, et al. Overcoming HPV Vaccine Hesitancy in Japan: A Narrative Review of Safety Evidence, Risk Communication, and Policy Approaches. Vaccines . 2015; 13 (6):590. https://www.mdpi.com/2076-393X/13/6/590 15. Yagi A, Ueda Y, Oka E, Nakagawa S, Kimura T. Human papillomavirus vaccination by birth fiscal year in Japan. JAMA network open . 2024; 7 (7):e2422513. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.22513 16. Sazawa M, Ishiguro C, Mimura W, Maeda M, Murata F, Fukuda H. Impact of the resumption of proactive recommendation of HPV vaccination on HPV vaccination rates in Japan: an interrupted time series analysis based on the VENUS study. BMJ Public Health . 2025; 3 (2):e000982. doi:10.1136/bmjph-2024-000982 Previous article back to Fact & Fiction Next article

By Julia Lockerd Meet the New Kid By Julia Lockerd 23 March 2022 Edited by Caitlin Kane Illustrated by Quynh Anh Nguyen ‘Machines Enrol in Art Class!’ The title of the American Scientist article (1) I’m currently reading is droll take on the process of artificial intelligence (AI) learning. I imagine the first art class I ever attended had a robot classmate. “I want everyone to be very welcoming to our new student! Class this is DALL-E.” DALL-E’s name is a clever blend of surrealist painter Salvador Dali and robot character WALL-E. It is the most popular AI art platform in the world, as well as the face of a quickly expanding industry. The purpose of DALL-E is evident in its namesakes: simply, it is a robot that creates art. Artificial intelligence is described as "the science and engineering of making intelligent machines (2).” More specifically “machines that think like humans.” AI art is an application of this wider machine learning. In short, it is art created by a “thinking” computer. In mid-2022 the world of AI art became a monster of industry, with AI art platform Midjourney reporting over 12 million users since its launch in July 2022 (4). However, as with any quick advancement in technology, there are issues that come with the new power we’ve been given; there is a question we must ask ourselves: how far is too far? Back in art class, other students and I share uneasy glances as our strange companion clicks and whirrs behind his desk. I smile at him and reach out a hand. He breaks my finger and steals my Snoopy drawing right off my desk. Ouch. This is the first impression many artists had when AI art was first introduced. For years we had been told that truck drivers, factory workers and other industry roles would be fully automated in the future. This was an issue in itself, but an inevitability as the wheels of advancement turned over. Few expected that the creative industries would so quickly slip under the control of automated technology. With AI on the rise, many artists fear for their livelihoods, job prospects and their intellectual and creative property. To both create and vet the art for our personal viewing experience, AI uses tools called Generative Adversarial Networks (5). Imagine two little robots hunched over side-by-side desks. One’s job is to create images and fool the other into believing its art is original. If the second robot is fooled half the time, the first is performing as it should, creating art the public will believe is genuine. Fool me once. The definition of “genuine” art is vague at best and still under heavy debate. I believe that “genuine” is a feeling you get when you look at the art in front of you. It’s up to you to decide, can AI art ever really be genuine? Another issue arises from AI art: usually when you go to an art class, the teacher knows they’re teaching. My robot classmate begins to shuffle through its filing cabinet of pre-existing works made by humans. It’s been fed these images, paintings, photographs and learnt to reassemble the input as AI-created art (1,6,7). I can’t help but bristle in contempt as he examines my sketch of Snoopy and adds it to the ever-growing collection of “borrowed” art. As public use of AI continues to rise, we will inevitably have more ethically grey tundra to cross. In 2018 the Portrait of Edmund Belamy, sold for 432,500 USD at Christie’s Auction house. The controversy surrounding the piece stems from the fact that it was painted by an AI that had been fed 15,000 portraits from 20th century artists (7). Edmond De Belamy is not a real person, nor is the person who painted his portrait. Both are simply amalgamations of the people who came before. Which begs the questions, who deserves to be rewarded for this artistic feat? Is this painting even original? Once upon a time it was something genuine; it is up to us to decide how many times we can take the derivative of a piece of art before it loses its emotion. Or is it simply always the case that every artist takes inspiration from those who came before? When each creation is the derivative of a piece, it’s critical to examine what it’s deriving from. It is both fascinating and alarming that social biases have even made their way into the creative and malleable minds of machines. Dark-skinned people and hijab wearers have taken to social media to report their selfies, which they had run through an AI software, had returned distorted, warped or whitewashed (8). AI learns from the dataset that its human trainers provide, and it's important that we consider who and what are represented in that training. It is a strange sort of embarrassment to know that these machines and their endless learning have picked up on our shortcomings. In a world that already rejects difference and shame people for their deviation from unachievable standards, we have taught machines to do the same. Like a child passively taking up its parents' opinions. In this way, some consequences of our technological development aren’t so much AI art issues as they are societal issues. The only fix is to work to include and recognise all people in creative spaces so that machines can learn to think like all humans. Despite criticism and philosophising, we cannot stop the march of progress. AI will continue to advance, to become better at thinking and emulating us. Perhaps our responsibility will just be to give them something good to copy. As for traditional artists left behind by the AI advance? I believe we’ll be okay. We differ from machines, and there will always be something more rewarding than just an output. The joy is in the creation, the connection, and the humanity of art. Half of my art class is robots now, churning out hundreds of creations per second. I hold up a half-finished picture to my desk mate to see their smile. That moment of connection is why it’s worth staying until the end of the class. References Elgammal A. AI Is Blurring the Definition of Artist [Internet]. American Scientist. 2019. Available from: https://www.americanscientist.org/article/ai-is-blurring-the-definition-of-artist McCarthy J. What is AI? [Internet]. Stanford.edu. 2012. Available from: http://jmc.stanford.edu/articles/whatisai.html Midjourney Discord Interface [Internet]. docs.midjourney.com. Available from: https://docs.midjourney.com/docs/midjourney-discord Hughes RT, Zhu L, Bednarz T. Generative Adversarial Networks–Enabled Human–Artificial Intelligence Collaborative Applications for Creative and Design Industries: A Systematic Review of Current Approaches and Trends. Frontiers in Artificial Intelligence. 2021 Apr 28;4. Goodyear S. Why those AI-generated portraits all over social media have artists on edge [Internet]. CBC. 2022. Available from: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/artificial-intelligence-ai-art-ethics-greg-rutkowski-1.6679466 Christie's. Is artificial intelligence set to become art’s next medium [Internet]. Christies.com. Christies; 2018. Available from: https://www.christies.com/features/A-collaboration-between-two-artists-one-human-one-a-machine-9332-1.aspx GANs. Edmond De Belamy, From La Famille de Belamy [Internet]. Caselles-Dupré H, Fautrel P, Vernier G, editors. original gilded wood frame. 2018. Available from: https://www.christies.com/lot/lot-edmond-de-belamy-from-la-famille-de-6166184/?from=salesummery&intobjectid=6166184&sid=18abf70b-239c-41f7-bf78-99c5a4370bc7 AI selfies — and their critics — are taking the internet by storm. Washington Post [Internet]. Available from: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/12/08/lensa-ai-portraits/ Previous article Next article

< Back to Issue 10 The Predictions of Genomics: Fictions Once Called Fact by Scarlett Yang 2 June 2026 Illustrated by Anabelle Dewi Saraswati Edited by Aimee Fogarty-Bennett What is a prediction in science? We often think a prediction is just a guess about the outcome of an event – something we throw out into the blue and then try to test. I, for one, have definitely thrown out random guesses when I didn't do any pre-reading for my university practicals. However, predictions are more than random guesses. They require a set of precise beliefs about how the world works. In making a prediction, we essentially pull from a past set of beliefs, particularly scientific knowledge, to say we believe this will happen in the future. Scientific predictions must be precise so that they can be proven wrong. We like making statements that are likely to be true under all circumstances (after all, it does feel great to be right!). However, it's important to know that the point of a prediction is its provability. When our prediction is wrong, we are able to begin questioning the perceived ‘facts’ of science and revise them to more accurately predict the future. It is precisely this falsifiability, and what happens when our predictions are proven wrong or incomplete, that is sometimes more important than a correct prediction. Essentially, we can say that scientific predictions are 1) based on past knowledge, and 2) specific. Think of it this way: we are trying to run a printer, and we know that there is a red cartridge and a blue cartridge inside. A guess would be to say, "We will print colour”. This is not specific enough to be proven wrong, and not based on our past knowledge. Instead, a prediction would be that, based on colour theory, "if I have red and blue , I should get purple text." If we print and get green ink, I know there is something wrong with my past knowledge. What we thought was fact becomes fiction we had postulated. Each new fact we collect reshapes the prediction that follows, nudging our proposed knowledge closer to the truth. After all, what makes science ‘science’ is the fact that it is rarely certain, but rather a process of increasingly more accurate predictions. One of the most extraordinary fields for watching this process is genomics. Understanding our genome The birth of genome analysis arguably came with the Human Genome Project. The idea was, in itself, quite simple. If we could sequence all three billion base pairs of human DNA, every genetic instruction our body follows, we could surely understand all diseases. It would enable us to predict, and ultimately prevent, the things that kill us. It took thirteen years and roughly three billion dollars. It was completed in 2003 (1). It was an incredible achievement. Unfortunately, it did not solve all problems. However, it was incredible all the same because it revealed the scale of what we did not yet know about human function. The genome is not a simple instruction manual. It is a dense, layered system in which the same sequence can mean different things depending on context, timing, the presence of other genes, and environmental signals we are still cataloguing. Say, if our red cartridge and blue cartridge are the genetic code, whether or not we get purple ink depends on the instructions the computer sends, whether the printer is working, and the relative amounts of red and blue ink, including the possibility of no blue at all. A green page means something is releasing yellow somewhere we didn't expect. A red page means something is blocking the blue cartridge entirely. It's easy to know we have blue and red cartridges inside. Understanding how the cartridges are actually used by the printer has occupied genomics ever since. These letters have allowed us to do something genuinely strange and exciting: simulate a living organism from its own genetic data. NeuroMechFly is one such project, a digital fruit fly with sensors that receive signals and six legs that respond to virtual terrain (2). The aim of the project is to find where our predictions, shown by the simulation, about real flies fail, and what that tells us about the nervous system and how it controls movement. If the model holds up to real behaviour, our understanding is roughly correct. If not, there is more to know. So far, researchers are still working on it. But what simulations like this can do is expand our understanding of humans, since more than 60% of fruit fly genes have human counterparts, and roughly 75% of the genes known to cause human genetic diseases are also found in flies (3). Indeed, fruit flies have helped us understand human biology in the past, including giving us the first tumour suppressor gene (4). But even so, isn't it interesting to consider the effects of using flies as a model of disease for humans? And whether our predictions about being "similar enough" actually hold? It is important to keep in mind that we cannot always extend our understanding directly across species. If we do, we can meet a paradox . Paradoxes We know that as we get older, we get significantly higher cancer rates. The science behind this is simple. As our cells replicate more, there are higher chances of mutations building up, thus leading to higher chances of cancer. Similarly, larger humans have higher rates of cancer, simply because there are more cells, more divisions, and as a result, a higher chance of mutation. Essentially, printing a thousand pages should produce more errors than printing ten. If we extend this knowledge to a bowhead whale, which weighs over 80,000 kg and lives more than 200 years compared to humans – averaging around 70 kg and 80 years ourselves – we would predict whales must be riddled with cancer. This prediction was reasonable, evidence-based, and most importantly, wrong. Across mammals, there is no correlation between body size, lifespan, and cancer incidence. A mouse weighs around 20 grams. A blue whale weighs up to 150,000 kilograms. The cancer-rate difference between them is incredibly small. The observation that large, long-lived animals do not carry proportionally enormous cancer burdens was first formally noted by the statistician Richard Peto in 1977. It became known as Peto's Paradox, and it has been generating arguments ever since (5). I have two predictions about why it fails. First, cancer rates in large animals are simply difficult to measure. Our data is incomplete, our sample sizes are skewed, and our conclusions are premature. Second, for a whale-sized organism to exist at all, it must have evolved mechanisms of cancer suppression far beyond our own. Either or both could be true. Neither might be. So far in science, we have found extraordinary mechanisms that potentially explain parts of this paradox. TP53 is a tumour suppressor gene which codes for a protein that detects DNA damage and triggers cell death before a damaged cell can divide. Elephants have 20 copies of this gene compared to the single copy humans carry (6). When their cells are exposed to DNA damage, they undergo apoptosis more effectively, meaning problematic cells die before they can replicate. Bowhead whales express a gene called CIRBP at around 100 times the level of other mammals, which dramatically improves the repair of double-stranded DNA breaks (7). Rather than killing damaged cells, the whale's cells repair the DNA so that mutations rarely accumulate. When researchers applied these mechanisms by introducing higher CIRBP expression into fruit flies, the flies lived longer and became more resistant to radiation-induced DNA damage. In human cells, DNA repair efficiency roughly doubled (7). We are starting to take what evolution spent millions of years building and turn our predictions into intention. We are starting to explore the possibility of applying these mechanisms to humans through the exciting field of genetic engineering. Genetic Engineering If we understand genetic information from genomics well enough, can we rewrite it? As with all things in science, the answer is: only if we narrow the scope of the question, and provide specificity. If a genetic condition is caused by a single gene, the answer increasingly is yes. One such case is a baby called KJ Muldoon, who was born with a faulty gene for the protein that breaks down nitrogen. Without it, ammonia builds up in the blood, which is highly toxic. Using a CRISPR base editing therapy designed specifically for KJ's mutation, the wrong DNA letter was converted to the correct one (8). Instead of living in and out of hospital, KJ has been able to live a normal life. Genetic engineering is a field of extraordinarily rapid development. We have already moved from the early approach of extracting cells, editing them outside the body and returning them, to delivering the editing machinery directly into living tissue. Maybe one day we can answer the broader question of addressing diseases that are caused by far more complex factors than a single gene. But for now, being able to help KJ live a normal life despite being born with a condition that had no cure is an inspiring example of how predictions can be turned into intentions, fiction into fact, and how genomics is changing the world of biology. References National Human Genome Research Institute. International consortium completes Human Genome Project. National Institutes of Health. April 14, 2003. https://www.genome.gov/11006929/2003-release-international-consortium-completes-hgp Lobato-Rios V, Ramalingasetty ST, Özdil PG, Arreguit J, Ijspeert AJ, Ramdya P. NeuroMechFly, a neuromechanical model of adult Drosophila melanogaster . Nat Methods . 2022;19(5):620-627. doi:10.1038/s41592-022-01466-7 Reiter LT, Potocki L, Chien S, Gribskov M, Bier E. A systematic analysis of human disease-associated gene sequences in Drosophila melanogaster . Genome Res . 2001;11(6):1114-1125. doi:10.1101/gr.169101 Gateff E. Malignant neoplasms of genetic origin in Drosophila melanogaster . Science . 1978;200(4349):1448-1459. doi:10.1126/science.96525 Callier V. Core Concept: Solving Peto's Paradox to better understand cancer. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A . 2019;116(6):1825-1828. doi:10.1073/pnas.1821517116 Sulak M, Fong R, Mika K, et al. TP53 copy number expansion is associated with the evolution of increased body size and an enhanced DNA damage response in elephants. eLife . 2016;5:e11994. doi:10.7554/eLife.11994 Firsanov D, Zacher M, Tian X, et al. Evidence for improved DNA repair in the long-lived bowhead whale. Nature . 2025;648(8094):717-725. doi:10.1038/s41586-025-09694-5 Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. World's first patient treated with personalized CRISPR gene editing therapy at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. CHOP News. May 15, 2025. https://www.chop.edu/news/worlds-first-patient-treated-personalized-crispr-gene-editing-therapy-childrens-hospital Previous article back to Fact & Fiction Next article

Sick of lockdown? Let science explain why. By Tanya Kovacevic Feeling like the ant under COVID’s boot? Find out just why you are feeling so down, and how you can break free of the overflow of emotions. Edited by Sam Williams Issue 1: September 24, 2021 Illustration by Quynh Anh Nguyen Trigger warning: This article mentions symptoms of mental illness. If at any point the content is distressing, please contact any of the support services listed at the end of the article. COVID-19: the greatest enemy of 2020 and 2021. Victoria has had six lockdowns in the hopes of disrupting the course of the virus, leaving many feeling tired and hopeless. The endless restrictions have tested our resilience beyond belief. As a result, many of us are sick of lockdown: we are tired, moody, and anxious, following months on end of being secluded in our homes. It seems we have all turned into little Snorlaxes. If this is sounding uncomfortably familiar, you are not alone. Psychologists have realised it is a common occurrence amongst many Australians. So why are our little octopus plushies showing their angry little faces? What can we do about it? Illustration by Quynh Anh Nguyen Cue the entrance of ‘lockdown fatigue’: the psychological phenomenon describing a wide-reaching feeling of intense exhaustion, due to the long-term effects of COVID-19 (1). Speaking to your fellow students (and lecturers/staff), you might find that a common theme of working from home is too much time binging on Netflix. In other words, there is a shared lack of motivation and concentration. The Australian Psychological Society has likened these symptoms to the natural process of grieving – yes, you read that right: we are all grieving. The world that we once knew has been completely disrupted, with our daily freedoms and safety torn away from us. Lockdowns have introduced so many unfamiliar aspects into our lives, from regular tests to social distancing to travel restrictions. Where we once had freedom to go to concerts or the footy, or to lie in the sand with the sun on our faces in Torquay, we are now confined within our own boring four walls. Combine this with missing our friends and family, worrying about the future, and inconsistent messages from politicians, it is no surprise that we are currently witnessing a lockdown fatigue epidemic. Identifying lockdown fatigue can be extremely difficult, as most of the symptoms overlap with common mental illnesses, such as depression and anxiety (2). Racing thoughts and conflict with those close to you are early signs (3). A study of 243 Filipino students showed that headaches and body pain were also common amongst students attempting to balance the effects of lockdown with their education (4). The most frequent symptoms are perhaps the most observable: depressed mood, irritability, fear or anxiety about how this will all end, lack of motivation and/or concentration, inability to make choices, and, of course, feeling mentally and physically exhausted (5). You could even be having more nightmares (6), some being about the coronavirus-ad jingle. It’s tiring just to read through that list. So many symptoms, but what causes them? Grief for the freedoms we have lost and stress about the future is messing with everyone at the moment. The high levels of stress mimic a post-traumatic stress response while we live through horrible lockdown moments again and again, kicking our sympathetic nervous system into overdrive (7). The sympathetic nervous system is responsible for all things fight-or-flight (or fight-flight-freeze, if you are a psychology nerd), releasing stress-related hormones such as cortisol and adrenaline. Stress over long periods of time, especially over 18 months, is undoubtedly going to take a toll – that toll is seen in lockdown fatigue, with those levels of cortisol building up. The accumulation weakens the immune response, which is why you may be getting colds more often, and it also taps into the brain, altering mood, motivation levels, and the fear response (8). The body’s resources are drained by constant worrying, and even more-so the resources of the mind. With mental fatigue comes lethargy, preventing you from paying attention to those lectures that feel longer than Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. It is a ripple effect: lethargy turns to apathy and stress, stress leads to frustration when the internet drops out for the 100th time during the lecture, frustration leads to further fatigue, to sadness… Everything has a cause and a consequence. There are ways to combat lockdown fatigue, so do not think that it is the end of the world, even though it may seem like it. One of the key symptoms of lockdown fatigue is an overflow of emotions. The rush of feelings (or lack thereof) can often cause distress on its own, so it is important to accept that there is nothing wrong with feeling the way you do (9). Analysing and criticising your emotions will do more harm than good, so try to be nice to yourself! Dr Luana Marques, a psychiatrist and associate professor at Harvard Medical School, reminds her students at that, “however you may be feeling is valid in its own right (10).” Take it easy. Learn to love yourself. Mindfulness is a commonly recommended method of staying in touch with your mind and body (11). Whether it is journaling, meditating, or yoga, any mindfulness activity can strengthen the prefrontal cortex – responsible for thought processes and self-control – increasing your resilience and your ability to pay attention to your surroundings (12). If you notice that you are beginning to be overwhelmed by your emotions, change your focus (13). Think about everything that you have achieved, as small as it may be. Perfected your sourdough? Amazing. Taught your dog some new tricks? Get that on TikTok. Made your bed this morning? Go you! It does not need to be something extravagant, like making a new spacecraft; any accomplishment is something to be proud of, no matter how small. Many of us are also missing social contact, so say hello to your neighbours or get on FaceTime with your friends. Maintaining relationships is fundamental to breaking through the overwhelming uncertainties and negative emotions that come with lockdowns (14, 15). Finally, as much as you may want to, avoid staying bed in bed the whole day. Staying in bed will only give those annoying thoughts a chance to come crashing down (16). Instead, go outside and see some natural light. Natural light will help maintain your circadian rhythm – the cycle which decides when you feel tired and when you are pumped with energy – and make you feel better (17). So go ahead. Make a routine and take back a little bit of control. Start doing downward dogs and turning into a pretzel. Get this bread. COVID-19 and lockdowns have found a way to disrupt so many aspects of our lives, but ultimately, we decide how we approach it, though we may need a little bit of help. Lookout for yourself, and for your friends and family. The fact that you are resilient enough to still be here is testimony to your strength. If you can live through this chaos, you can live through anything. If at any time you feel or have felt concerned about your mental well-being, please consult a GP or contact any of the following services: Suicide Call Back Service: 1300 659 467 or suicidecallbackservice.org.au; Lifeline: 13 11 14 or lifeline.org.au; Beyond Blue: 1300 22 4636 or beyondblue.org.au; MensLine Australia: 1300 78 99 78 or mensline.org.au; or the University’s CAPS: 03 8344 6927 for an appointment, or 1300 219 459 for emergency support. References: 1, 2, 5, 9, 14. Australian Psychological Society. Managing lockdown fatigue. Victoria: The Australian Psychological Society Limited, 2020. 3, 10, 12. Marques, Luana, and Waldinger, Robert. “Overcoming Quarantine Fatigue.” Massachusetts General Hospital. Published June 2, 2020. https://www.massgeneral.org/news/coronavirus/quarantine-fatigue . 4. Labrague, Leodoro J., and Ballad, Cherry Ann. “Lockdown fatigue among college students during the COVID-19 pandemic: Predictive roles of personal resilience, coping behaviors, and health.” Perspectives in Psychiatric Care 57, no. 3 (Mar 2021): 2-6. 6. Silva, Kristian. “Feeling tired during the COVID-19 pandemic? Here’s how you can improve your energy and motivation levels.” ABC News, September 9, 2020, 8:21 a.m. AEST, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-09-09/fatigue-during-covid-19-pandemic-how-to-lift-energy-motivation/12640002 . 7. Victorian Institute of Forensic Mental Health. "Lockdown fatigue amid Lockdown 6.0." Published August 2021. https://www.forensicare.vic.gov.au/lockdown-fatigue-amid-lockdown-6-0/ . 8, 15. Mayo Clinic. “Chronic stress puts your health at risk.” Published July 2021. https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/stress-management/in-depth/stress/art-20046037 . 11, 13. Beyond Blue, “Lockdown regrets? Focus on what you did do.” Published 2020. https://coronavirus.beyondblue.org.au/managing-my-daily-life/coping-with-isolation-and-being-at-home/lockdown-regrets-focus-on-what-you-did-do.html .