Our tapeworm episode last week mentioned the remarkable finding of tapeworm eggs in a 270 million-year old shark coprolite, that is, fossilized feces. And this certainly wasn’t the first time coprolites have come up on the podcast; we’ve referenced them several times before, mostly when discussing early histories of parasitic worms. But there is so much more to the world of coprolites than just which parasites were found and when. To help us explore all that coprolites can teach us is the world-renowned paleontologist Dr. Karen Chin, Professor at University of Colorado Boulder and Curator of Paleontology at CU-Boulder Museum of Natural History. In this exciting bonus episode, Dr. Chin takes us on a fascinating tour of the what (what are coprolites?), the why (why are they important?), the how (how do feces get preserved?), and the who (who dung it?) of these incredible trace fossils.
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Om Podcasten
This podcast might not actually kill you, but Erin Welsh and Erin Allmann Updyke cover so many things that can. In each episode, they tackle a different topic, teaching listeners about the biology, history, and epidemiology of a different disease or medical mystery. They do the scientific research, so you don’t have to.
Since 2017, Erin and Erin have explored chronic and infectious diseases, medications, poisons, viruses, bacteria and scientific discoveries. They’ve researched public health subjects including plague, Zika, COVID-19, lupus, asbestos, endometriosis and more.
Each episode is accompanied by a creative quarantini cocktail recipe and a non-alcoholic placeborita.
Erin Welsh, Ph.D. is a co-host of the This Podcast Will Kill You. She is a disease ecologist and epidemiologist and works full-time as a science communicator through her work on the podcast. Erin Allmann Updyke, MD, Ph.D. is a co-host of This Podcast Will Kill You. She’s an epidemiologist and disease ecologist currently in the final stretch of her family medicine residency program.
This Podcast Will Kill You is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including science, true crime, comedic interviews, news, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark, Buried Bones, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast and more.