and weekly. if you would like any more information on the crawler virus or any other science topic you should really check out our podcast where you get your podcast you can also find us at. some plants and flowers are equipped with very simple superpowers want to know what they're good for stay tuned to find out. we also need to go with autism who's getting special type of therapy to help her cope better with everyday life. and they might be tiny but we shouldn't underestimate them we take a closer look at monies and how they communicate. welcome to tomorrow today just science show on d

w. animal is fellow grant chasseur obama it's their way of defending their territory coming their fellow creatures finding partners. but. we humans can't always hear them bats and whales for example emit sounds in the ultrasonic range. but they are not alone. if you go down to a summer today you might be in for a surprise and if you hear one mouse scurrying around to the next one be far away house mice are pack animals rather than lone wolves and researchers have been investigating their complex social mice a key point is the secret communication. used by the small rodents mice lay scent

marks and similar to bats they emit sounds and the ultrasonic range that is for humans. to understand more about the so-called mouse songs a research group at the university of veterinary medicine vienna set up live traps in place where mice aren't welcome though this nigga luckiest and. marconi have to check the traps regularly a painstaking exercise one that's vital for the research we have in madrid was we want to work with wild mice to study the natural behaviors and the functions of songs in the wild things that the mice is sometimes extremely in brad and wild mice of very different and that behavior. that makes wild mice more suitable candidates here at the con hard law friends institute for comparative behavioral research the ultrasonic songs of mice were discovered back in 1049 but

it's only recently become possible to make them and all their complexity. for her 1st experiment dogs nickle luckiest chooses a male to confront with another male in the neighboring cage a highly sensitive microphone records the ultrasonic sounds she uses a frequency diagram to make the sounds visible. but it's only when she slows them down by a factor of 20 that the whistle like sounds can be heard. this mentioned this and it's this my own head doesn't seem to show much interest and we can tell by the fact that the songs are relatively simple and there are no big jumps in frequency and what's interesting is that these songs are sung at relatively low frequencies. but will that change when she swaps the one male

with the female the 2 mice begin to vigorously sniff each other the sounds become much more intense. as a human to get singing so hear the songs already seem a bit more impassioned to me i do already see more variations in the individual syllables and they 1st into a higher frequency range between 60 and 80. as soon as a potential mate is nearby the male begins to up his game and his frequency and attempt to woo her similar to the courtship songs of burns and the scientists noticed something else we found that there are indeed matters that are features secretary sticks a need to look at ease ishaan that might be different from one made to another and we found that there can cease them so over more people recording so you can that's a record highs that may. when the divider is removed the male

mice become even more stimulated the singing now even includes jumps in frequency. as into some time before overall we found unrelated has interacting with each other directly have the longest most complex songs these pairs with the fastest to reproduce successfully. as capturing wild mice is very time consuming she wants to use this insight for breeding 2. because once a pair of mice couple reproduction as a rabbit female mice can fall pregnant up to 8 times per year bearing litters of up to 11 the tiny newborns grow for within a few days. the male mouse is highly aggressive when chasing away a rival. he'll attack physically but also has another secret mode of communication using sense that he leaves everywhere by

a tiny droplets of urine. this is can lose in skis field of research. he lays out sheets of paper in the enclosure that the mice walk over he uses a trick to make their set markings visible. exposing the paper to ultraviolet light i think the sun marks of my eyes are interesting because these chemicals that are in the sun mars almost the thing that's closest to writing in humans they can leave a little message they can also use this to kind of show their territory where they're living and to also give information about themselves. by analyzing the contents of urine especially the pheromones listens he wants to find out what other function the scent marks have. to do this he compares the urine of different male mice in a group. and we find that dominant males have

a higher expression of particular smells very modes then subordinate males if we present these smells to a female we find that the female prefers the smell of individuals that have dominant slow compared to support let's. so both scent trails and courtship songs apparently help the mice to create optimal offspring and thus keep the species as fit as possible the team still have plenty of research to do as they continue their mission to unlock more of the secrets behind the mind which of mice . in our next report we focus on human communication in particular the challenges facing autistic children. a recent survey showed that 372 per 10000 children were diagnosed as having autism in hong kong and island 153 and

in germany 38. special type of therapy could help to make everyday interactions easier. francesca is in her element in the forest a place where she feels comfortable and safe. here my. status based. francesca is 12 years old and autistic. staying divided for her the forest is a peaceful place to come she can deal with leaves and other objects far better than with another human being. and the big issue is communication and francesca has her own way of communicating just. from just i can optimize i had to call moments. by. russian or and yeah when you have

a child who can't sleep at night they're naturally going to be irritable and aggressive. right i think that's what makes everyday life so tough for a child with autism talks was. autistic kid and. francesca was diagnosed with relatively severe early infant high autism therapists today referred to an autism spectrum disorder of which there are various levels the family's outings aren't always as joyful as this visit to the zoo. and your mom might get me . we might go out for a walk in the summer and then out of nowhere there'll be a lawn more for her a sound she can't place and one that makes her scared see me on. my pew. today the bellowing of the sea lions is just too much for francesca. autistic people filter

incoming sensory stimuli differently than others some are not so sensitive others like francesca feel quickly overwhelmed and retreat into their own world. children like francesca exhibits stress symptoms and might develop tics some self harm or become aggressive infectious. and when they're unable to express themselves through language they might resort to more desperate means of communication. as issues this is read some of the worst moment for me was when she tried to play with another child at the playground but it wasn't possible i think she realizes that she's different to the other children she ended up biting the other child flank. so what can you do when your child shows that kind of aggressive behavior the autism outpatient clinic in your own back offers parents advice and support. learning therapist caterina floor uses pictures to help the children communicate.

francesca is given a schedule containing symbols that show her what to expect in this therapy session . first up is learning how to set the table. so asking people to market the problem is that people with autism on typing to respond to silly language based stimuli. they often need a visual. and that's where these pictograms help. someone posts they often have difficulty understanding the context in question 1st and up lloyd thought. this is which was 1st developed at an american university is now used around the world the visualisation helps the children in their temporal and spatial orientation both of which can be a huge struggle for people with autism. today francesca is more in the mood for

playing. once she's completed an item on the programme the picture card is put in the done box. the clearly structured set up evidently pays off. kinda heading inland nursery age children diagnosed with early infantile autism. they couldn't talk about enough for us a few years later they've made amazing progress fun for some made it into the best schools with ongoing support and it works well. the parents then practise the activities with their children in everyday life. the cards help francesca to give a structure to her daily routine at home and at school. so you've got those clothes on today right. so it goes into the box. for the past year francesca has only spent her weekends at home otherwise she lives in a special home a desperately tough decision for her mother to make but she felt unable to cope

so i said it was really stressful because you feel that you failed as a mother you want to be there for your child but i got to the point where i just couldn't do it anymore. as i'm from mishmash it's a move that has benefited the family. back at the zoo francesca and her mom are trying an experiment by going to the on site restaurant how will francesca react to being surrounded by other people after some initial discomfort she starts to relax to the pleasant surprise of her mother. and for me shoots god i'm so happy right now to see her sitting still a couple of times before she ran around moving trees and what have you. so i had to leave pretty much right away. to go on then. it's another little step forward on a journey that mother and daughter will be taking together and they're planning to

come back to the zoo as soon as they can. it's indisputable social media plays an important role in modern communication since 2015 the number of users has leapt from over 2 to more than 4000000000. in the philippines people log on to social networks for an average of 255 minutes that's more than 4 hours a day compared to 186 minutes or just over 3 hours in egypt 84 minutes in germany and 51 in japan. and what about you how much time do you spend on platforms like facebook twitter and instagram and how has social media changed your lives we asked you via d.w. social media platforms of course. primo malana right social media has made communication easier but they are also alarming aspects such as hacking misleading

information and other negative content. marcus d must spend a lot of time on social media learning something new almost every day to use it to talk and facebook as sales platforms pinterest and google for learning line and twitter funny use. one taras poses the question the other way around he writes it would be better to ask how long we don't spend on social media it will be easy to work out. the opportunities of communicating with others are practically unlimited given the sheer number of platforms what has that made us any happier for the opposite trevor daniel from nigeria had a question about that. can spending too much time on social media make you depressed. what's app instagram chitra the number of platforms has been constantly growing as has their popularity and

music has soared during the pandemic of users. can stay in contact with friends and family share information and stave off boredom all under lockdown but social media has always been controversial numerous studies suggest that spending too much time on such websites can lead to an increase in symptoms of depression amongst users. but is there a causal link here is it spending time on social media that makes people depressed or do they take to social media because they're already depressed the classic question of which came 1st the chicken or the egg a recent study carried out by the american universities of arkansas into pittsburgh sheds more light on the issue users were monitored over a longer period 990 of the 1300 test subjects exhibited no signs of depression at the start but after 6 months of high social media use $95.00 of them had developed

symptoms. more research is needed before any definite conclusions can be drawn but in the study it was precisely those who used social media the most who developed symptoms. one factor causing depression may be that social media takes up a lot of time meaning other valuable pursuits come up short. another issue is constant comparison and the resulting pressure users feel to measure up to the impossible ideals of beauty and success that's especially the case on instagram the brain also has to deal with sensory overload as it struggles to respond quickly to the mass of information and images incidentally in the current pandemic the question is also how lockdown measures affect our social media consumption and whether it's excess usage that's driving depression or the lockdown itself or could

social media actually help alleviate depression in some cases here to more research . if outlet is right right right right. do you have a science question you'd like us to answer. then get in touch you can send us a video text ovoid smith if it makes it onto the show we'll even send you a little surprise as a thank you come on just dance. you can find more interesting science stories on our website and on twitter. accounts communicate with one another they do this via chemical substances that they emit from their roots and leaves and with cancer and fragrance they attract bees and other pollinators to help them reproduce after all they can't go on dates

to find a partner. some plants like corn have other amazing tricks up their sleeves researchers are hoping to harness those capabilities. this is no ordinary garden in the eastern german town of flyback what looks like a random array of plants in fact comprises carefully selected species with genuine superpowers. it's called final mining which is basically mining with plants we use partly conventional plants like corn to extract economically relevant elements from the soil such as germanium and rare earths and also gallium copper and zinc. it will now become apparent how well the corn did its job in the summer because it's harvest time a big day for biologists. who initiated the project at the local technical university but what makes the plants take in the various elements in the case of corn it's all down to a curiosity of nature. foreign as such what's. to absorb

silicone grasses in general are silicone accumulators. they extract silicone from the ground and store it in their leaves. the silicone then forms little stones that protect the plant from being eaten if. you face and shoots or it's these i have no option takes place via transport mechanisms which due to a whim of nature cannot distinguish between silicone and germany it's someone commanding with the side. which is why the act like dick makes of plants and flowers in the experimental garden then makes sense corn as we've heard collects germanium whether it's farm for animal or human consumption the similar looking mimic does the same buckwheat on the other hand stores rare earths and its leaves and stems as do sunflowers. why is that relevant

rare earths are a group of 16 different elements with similar chemical properties. they're used in everything from mobile phones and l.c.d. screens to electric motors and wind farms. germanium is likewise used in high tech products in phones and solar panels in fiber optic and computer cables and night vision equipment. germanium is also expensive one kilogram currently costs around 2000 euros so researchers are looking for cheaper alternative ways of extracting the precious substance this is how it works the corn mistakes germanium for the silicon also found in the soil and absorbs them both directly via its roots. the germanium is then guided along with the silicon transporters through the stems and

into the leaves. here like silicon it is stored primarily and the cell walls. millet extracts germanium via the same method but buckwheat and sunflowers used a different trick. you might normally associate buckwheat with healthy organic cooking but it also happens to boast unexpected super powers it's able to mine rare earths out of the ground the buckwheat does this by extracting calcium in the process acidifying the soil around its roots the acids caused the phosphorus and iron that the calcium is bound in to do salt also releasing the rare earths that are in the phosphate rock. they all then migrate to the leaves via their stems here they are stored in the cells their walls and in special water reservoirs come back . the final mining project at the university of fine back still has

a long way to go but all of a vicious says the potential in these plants is enormous the burden if they're the worst it's loyals constitute the biggest source of these elements on the planet for centuries to come we could farm and harvest these crops and every year we find the same elements in the plants. of course in order for us to use the rare earths and other precious raw materials they 1st have to be extracted from the plants and that happens here at the university's bio gas plant the corn is turned into tiny chips and dried out before being weighed in poured into a reactor device together with the point to the of water here bacteria assume 2 important tasks they generate bio gas and break open the plant cells the resulting product is a liquid that is then dried out and in of it. this

is the interest in this is the digested with and yet. for us it's a can to plant or containing all the elements which we then want to make available for use. and that now involves burning the plant residue. those treasured elements are then found in concentrated form in the combustion residue ashes. that is up to put the entire process takes around 30 hours what we then get which you can see here are knock us looking white and colored powders. germanium dioxide and rare earth salts sides and they will then be used in e-cards in cell phones and scientists. the researchers aren't yet able to say exactly how much the test garden in feinberg will harvest in terms of valuable the materials so far they've been able to produce around 50 grams of germanium and 50 grams of rare earths per

hectare are not much perhaps but for all of a vision and his fellow researchers a very promising start. for germany as an industrial nation it's massively important to have alternatives to regular imports of raw materials. i say this process needs to be turned into a pilot project as soon as possible to be usable in the future. to belong to. the potential in such plants has still to be fully determined some of them even have the ability to extract toxic heavy metals out of the ground on the fido mining front the researchers are confident of discovering further super plants that powers that we can harvest and harness. the another big step and chantrey such a team of scientists in singapore or attaching electrodes to venus flytrap sun and tobacco plants for example to communicate with them if the detection of distress

signals could help elect firmest to disease or pests soon and. that's all for this week c.n.n.'s time on tomorrow today until then take care and stay curious.

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the but. this is new news live from berlin the u.n. condemns the senseless cycle of bloodshed in the middle east but there's still no end in sight. more israeli airstrikes pound several areas of gaza city prime minister binyamin netanyahu says the military campaign against hamas is continuing a full force also coming up on the program. cheney votes for assembly members to shape a new constitution a legal framework which will sweep away those.