98. Your Brain on Plants, the Stress Buddy System, and Selective Green Thumbs w/ Morgan Johnston

What if you could explore the complexities of the human brain while also discovering the fascinating world of plants? Join me as I sit down with behavioral neuroscientist Morgan Johnston, aka Ask a Neuroscientist, for an engaging conversation about these two seemingly unrelated worlds. You'll learn how Morgan's journey from a small farming community to the world of neuroscience research has helped her uncover unique connections between plants and humans.

We dive into the effects of various chemicals and drugs on the brain, and how both plants and humans cope with stress. Morgan shares her insights on the evolutionary development of similar molecules in plant and animal systems, as well as how studying these interactions informs our understanding of mental and physical health. You'll also hear about our experiences in using animal models to study human behavior, and the critical role stress and anxiety play in our lives.

As we wrap up our discussion, we emphasize the importance of science communication and the need for reaching diverse audiences in today's world of misinformation. We share anecdotes from our own research, and explore the challenges of navigating academia and pursuing a career in science. Don't miss this enlightening episode with Morgan Johnson, where neuroscience and plant science collide to create a world of wonder and discovery.


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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:10

What is up? plant people Hey, it's time once more for the Plant anthropology podcast. This short, we dive into the lives and careers of some very cool plant people to figure out why they do what they do and what keeps them coming back for more. I'm Vikram Baleega, your host and your humble guide in this journey through the sciences And, as always, my dearest friends. I am so happy and thrilled to be with you today. Hey, we've got some important questions to answer today, like can M&Ms help you with your stress? Can your green thumb be selective? How do our brains interact with plants? And so many more things about plants and life and neuroscience. And I am so excited to have today's guests on My guest, morgan Johnson, known across the internet as Ask, a Neuroscientist, and I recorded this actually back a couple of months ago And I'm finally getting this out and I'm so excited for you to hear it.

Speaker 1: 1:04

So Morgan actually got to come into town. She lives in a different city but she was coming into town for some different stuff. But I convinced myself because it makes me feel good that she drove all the way here six hours just to see me and to record this podcast with me. But I was so excited to get to do this in person, because it's hard to do in-person interviews sometimes And especially when I've got guests from all over the state and all over the country and all over the world. But Morgan and I sat down and talked about her life as a neuroscientist. She is working on her PhD in neuroscience right now, studying things like the effects of different chemicals and drugs on the brain, the ways we handle stress and sort of the intersections between all those things.

Speaker 1: 1:46

So a little bit of a quick content warning for today's episode. We have a frank discussion in this about different types of drugs, both the recreational kind and the medicinal kind, and the ways that they affect our brains. We talk about some of the causes of addiction. We talk about some things that may make a slide back into addictive tendencies and things like that, and so it's really a fascinating discussion of how different chemicals and different plants affect our brain chemistry and our bodies and how we find out how some of those things happen. But I know this is a sensitive subject for some people, So just bear that in mind.

Speaker 1: 2:23

Listener, discretion is advised. As always, this is safe for work, but in terms of content, you may just want to self-police on this just a little bit, but it's such a fun episode. Morgan is wonderful and brilliant And I had so much fun actually getting to meet her in person, to talk with her. We actually have known each other for a little while just through some of our science, communication and social media stuff, but you are going to love this one. I am glad to be back at this and putting new content out there. So get yourself ready for episode 98 of the Planthypology podcast with my friend Morgan Johnson, also known as Ask a Neuroscientist ["A New World"]. Well, morgan, i am so excited that you made the long drive up And I know you didn't drive here all the way the six hours for this, but I'm pretending like you did.

Speaker 2: 3:23

Yeah, take that. Just assume that I'm that passionate about this podcast.

Speaker 1: 3:29

Yeah, no, it makes me feel good. So that's what I'm going with, but thanks so much for coming in today. I'm really excited to talk to you. I'm excited for our listeners to hear sort of a different take and a different sort of angle into plant science. But to start off with, why don't you introduce yourself, tell us about you and what you did growing up and what got you interested in science and where you are today?

Speaker 2: 3:55

Yeah, so my name is Morgan Johnston. I am currently a behavioral neuroscientist, meaning that I study how our brains generate the behaviors that we do, And I guess my journey to science. Whenever I was young I grew up in like a really small, like farming community, small town, and you know those people tend to have certain opinions about women in science, And so for a long time I was told that I couldn't go into science or that like I was too smart for my own good And so I had to kind of like push past that And eventually I wound up like going to a school in the city, that sort of like, more so fostered the science scientists in me And actually my senior year of high school I ended up doing research on a medical campus studying traumatic brain injuries And then I went to my undergrad at Oklahoma State University And they're a big land grant university.

Speaker 2: 4:51

They have a lot of like horticulture and plants and landscaping stuff there And while I was there I was engaged in a lot of basic research. And the difference between like basic and like medical research is that basic research, sort of focused, was more on like how do things function?

Speaker 2: 5:08

in general versus medical research. you're like trying to find a cure for everything And I think that sort of helped me see like the importance of looking at sort of like the more what someone who studies like bodies would consider like the basics of things like how do the nutrients that we eat affect us, that we just sort of like take for granted? How do like how are plants able to interact with us when they're not made of the same stuff that humans?

Speaker 2: 5:34

are made of Like they have different cells, they have different things going on. So there I was involved in really basic research looking at social interactions, And then I came to Texas to do my graduate research. So right now I'm a third year PhD student at a Texas institution that I won't dox.

Speaker 1: 5:53

That's fine.

Speaker 2: 5:55

But now I'm studying how different drugs interact with our brain. One of those drugs is cocaine. I also have sort of a interest in looking at marijuana or cannabis or weed or whatever people want to call it. I have colleagues who are interested in like magic mushroom type stuff, lsd And just looking at, like, how these different substances are able to make us feel certain ways and have certain experiences that maybe, like we're not physically going through.

Speaker 1: 6:26

psychedelics is like what I'm trying to say in like a science way.

Speaker 2: 6:30

Yeah, so that's why I look at now And I also look a lot at stress which stress is something that impacts all of us And also something that's really big in like. how do we make stress have less effects on people?

Speaker 1: 6:43

Interesting Well that, as a PhD student, I feel like that is probably something that's relevant to your life is how do you reduce the load of stress on yourself? just in general.

Speaker 2: 6:55

Yeah, i'm very lucky A lot of our students have to start their talks with like, oh, why should anyone have to care about this? Why do I care about a certain cell, what it's doing, and I get to start all my talks with? we're all stressed.

Speaker 1: 7:07

Yeah, instantly relatable. Instantly relatable, especially like in any academic setting, like if you go to a conference like everyone looks tired. Everyone's just stressed out all the time. It's like the three days you get out of a lab or out of whatever, and so we're all stressed. Yeah yes, we are. Yes, we are. So you have and I was kind of reading through your experience earlier and you have two bachelor's degrees. Is that correct?

Speaker 2: 7:33

Right, yeah, so my first bachelor's degree is in biology and my second is in physiology. So basically about halfway through my biology degree I decided this isn't easy enough and I want to take more classes. So I took enough to get the second physiology degree, also because Oklahoma State University doesn't have a neuroscience program. So but I think that benefited me in a lot of ways, because a lot of people who study purely neuroscience they get sort of what we call tunnel vision, like they're very focused on that versus I feel like I'm able to have more like a holistic view of the body and I can bring up like how the heart might be involved in certain stuff and things like that.

Speaker 1: 8:12

That's really interesting. And I mean for sure because I think, and I like what you were talking about earlier a little bit about basic versus medical research or applied research. So I'm very much an applied scientist. My work has always been at sort of macro level, systems level. We were kind of talking off mic before we started about how in plant science we do things that, like you, couldn't get away within any other biological science. It's like I'm going to stick this tree in a bag. I am going to not water one of these for three months.

Speaker 2: 8:46

And let's see what happens Right, which I absolutely could not get away with with my animals No, no, no, i don't want to. I don't want to get away with that.

Speaker 1: 8:53

There would be some, yeah some probably unpleasant phone calls to deal with from IUcock and different different groups from from that, But you know so. So a lot of my work has been, you know, if we induce physiological environmental stress on plants. Well, my master's work was more physiological, But since then it's born, I'm like how long does it take this thing to not do the thing it's supposed to be doing? Yeah, when I don't water it or leave it in the sun or whatever, Well, something that's really interesting.

Speaker 2: 9:23

I follow this lady on TikTok who studies like stress in corn plants, and it's so funny to me because wherever you guys say stress, you mean I don't water it or like I leave it on in the sun for too long. And wherever I say stress, i mean like I put my rats in a little tube and they get stressed out. So the first time I saw it I was like how do you stress a plant? They don't have the same emotion.

Speaker 1: 9:43

Yeah, no, no. But it is interesting though because it you know and again, i am not an animal biologist in any stretch of the imagination But you know, we see in plants that we induce different stressors, from whether it is introducing pests, whether there are things being withheld like fertility or water or sunlight or whatever. It is interesting to me as someone who is stressed 85% of my life. You know some of the sort of coping mechanisms, and that is not the right way to talk about plants, but some of the things that plants physiologically do to cope with. That is sort of an interesting parallel in some ways.

Speaker 1: 10:29

Do, i think, like animal biology? like, oh, we will. If we exclude sunlight, they will do things like the stems get longer and they will try to, you know, get into the sun. Or if we restrict water, sometimes they will shed the larger leaves because that is where all the water is lost from, and things like that. So they do have actually very, sometimes very quick, stress responses. It is just not like an emotional response, it is just sort of a okay, the environment is doing this, so I am going to do this kind of thing.

Speaker 2: 10:59

Right, and humans and animals have, like our I say like a physical stress response versus like sort of like an emotional or like a neurological stress response. And so, like humans, for example, if they go through like a famine and they like aren't able to eat for very long, then their cells will start to like retain more nutrients, and so then you actually end up gaining weight from not having as much food because your body is trying to like store that, And that can be like generations down the line.

Speaker 2: 11:26

people struggle with like being perceived as like overweight by society because their ancestors were starved.

Speaker 1: 11:34

Huh, that's fascinating. I actually died No idea. That's really what it's really interesting that that passes down through sort of the The genetic line as well, like it's something that affects us at the like DNA level.

Speaker 2: 11:47

And that's something that happens like mentally too, like um, we have seen in like I, if you look over the course of years that Like mental health is deteriorating.

Speaker 2: 11:57

Like young people have the worst mental health now than like they have ever ever yeah yeah, and It can actually like compound, like if your grandparents had anxiety and then your Parents had anxiety and then you have anxiety likely it's getting like degrees worse throughout. Well, what's really neat or not so neat for the people who struggle with this? But interesting is that it's not always the same. So people think of like mental illness as genetic, because I can get passed on this way. But, um, say, like your grandma had schizophrenia, your then mother might not have schizophrenia, maybe she has generalized anxiety disorder and then maybe you have obsessive compulsive disorder. So you all resulted in a mental illness, but not necessarily the exact same one.

Speaker 1: 12:41

Wow, that's they are. That is really interesting. And you know, with plants we tend to think of some more. You know, direct heredity of, or Inheritance of, traits like okay, this plant had. You know, if we want to get real simple, like this pea plant, has white flowers, this one, you know, if we want to look at just Mendelian genetics, but at the same time too, we we've got a plant in the garden right now that We're starting to see some striping on some of the new flowers that are coming out and that is usually induced by environmental stress or a virus. You know that is messing with the transposons in the, in the, the genes, but that's something that gets carried forward. So if you've ever seen like a rose that has marbling in the in the flower, that's usually virally induced, but then you can carry it on down through the genetic line.

Speaker 2: 13:31

That's really interesting because I know I have a friend who like collects a Lot of plants. I know those are like really highly sought after the one that once I have that marbling. So, kind of crazy that that comes from stress.

Speaker 1: 13:41

Yeah, it's, it's a, you know, some kind of either a pathogen or there's a lot of ways it happens. But yeah, you know, and I'm thinking about it now, we do see inherited traits, that that get carried on, even just like well, and when we do drought stress research Which is actually a lot of what we do here because, as you may have noticed, driving in it is dry.

Speaker 1: 14:01

Yeah, and there's endless and less nothing. You know, we have to figure out how do our crop plants, how do our other things survive, that, and we can Do it through breeding work. But, you know, some of it's just selection pressure, natural selection pressure. Some of it though is, you know, we induce changes based on environment. That's just, i don't know. I think that I Sort of the more I learn about biology one, the more I realize I don't understand about biology because it's so complex, but two, about how we see certain biological things that hold up across Even kingdoms, you know biology.

Speaker 2: 14:42

Yeah, i think it's really interesting, like I was looking up recently, because so I'm talking about like cannabis stuff You in your body have something called like the endocannabinoid system and for a long time I was like, wow, we really have like a system that's purely dedicated to people who smoke weed. But actually the way that it came about and like I think the way that a lot of these similarities between, like humans and plants came About, is because we evolved together. We sort of just evolved the same traits, like naturally. So in your body you have molecules that resemble like THC or like CBD, but also like the cannabis plant also just independently developed those same molecules, which is really nifty and so like, like, same for like these coping stress, coping mechanisms of.

Speaker 2: 15:32

Like what to do wherever there's a drought. Humans had to figure that out, plants had to figure that out. We all have been living on this earth together, going through.

Speaker 1: 15:40

Yeah, yeah, and that's yeah, and that's a fascinating thing, and I think that's maybe something that In general now I'm not saying like by science, but by people just in general, like this may be not well understood about evolution. That it's. It is a response to the things that stress us out right as a species.

Speaker 2: 15:58

I get asked all the time So there's in your Skull that supposedly like protects your brains. You have some spiky bits that like if your brain hits those then you get brain damage. Yeah, and people ask me all the time. They're like well, why would we evolve that? because that's not helpful. And I just have to like evolution is not working towards like the most helpful thing. It's working towards like what is helpful in this moment, not what is going to be helpful for the long term. And so your skull evolved to help you get through puberty and that sort of its main goal And then, past that, your body doesn't really care about you.

Speaker 1: 16:33

Yeah, yeah, that's really, yeah, that's interesting. So, talking about your current research, okay, so You know, when you're looking at all these different plant compounds, all these different, just You know, i say plant compounds and you made up a good point that like everything is kind of plants, like everything kind of comes from plants.

Speaker 2: 16:54

Exactly like I was shocked recently. I was telling one of my friends that was gonna be coming on the podcast and like, initially, wherever you asked me if I knew anything about plants, the only plant that I can think of was cannabis. But then I was talking to my friends about this and they were like, oh well, you also studied cocaine and cocaine comes from a plant. And I was like, oh my god, it does the. Like the vast majority of the medicines and the drugs that we have at some point did come from a plant, like Nowadays I want to say it's like around 70% that did come from a plant originally, but now we make synthetic. But if we hadn't had that plant to begin with, we would never have figured out those drugs. And the vast majority of Neuroscience and like the type of research that I do, which is called neuro pharmacology, which just means we're looking at drugs in the brain, is based on like how are these plants able to affect us? like Human, see a plant, they consume it. The plant has an effect right.

Speaker 2: 17:51

Why? why would that plant have an effect on us? What is it doing? And that's how we managed to figure out. A lot of the body is just looking at like Oh, if we change this thing, in this case, eating a plant, how did? what did it do?

Speaker 1: 18:04

Yeah, it's really interesting. I think I think about that a lot from a so I study food quite a bit, so from a food standpoint, i think about that a lot and that's come up on here before. But, like, so much of what we know just came through observation of like Bill ate that plant and Now what's going on with Bill? like Oh, no, bill's dead. And then like maybe we don't eat this plant again or you know, there were some kind of Positive effect from it. It's like, oh, we need to figure out why. And you know, for a long time I think we just did things because it worked and we just did things and, you know, over the past I don't know a few hundred years, we've really started drilling into. What does that mean? Like, what does it mean for us? What does it mean as a global ecosystem?

Speaker 2: 18:47

Exactly And, like I don't really want to like discourage anyone's faith in medicine because, like modern medicine is the best that's ever been.

Speaker 2: 18:53

Sure but we still to some extent do that, like we see medications that we make for a specific population, like we still to this day, or like we see something have an effect and we're like, huh, maybe I want that effect, maybe we should use it and maybe we don't know exactly why. Like SSRI is serotonin selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors that are commonly prescribed for depression. We know that they selectively reduce the amount of serotonin. That's Sort of like put in the trash bin and you're in your head So you have more serotonin lying around, but we don't know why that helps.

Speaker 2: 19:28

We don't know why that helps, or why it like helps some people and why it doesn't help other people. We just saw that it does help some people and so we should use it. We should use it.

Speaker 1: 19:38

That's really interesting too, and I think, and what I don't want people to hear, because I know, being a scientist, i know what people hear sometimes is like well, they're just like trying stuff and exactly, and the fact is like, well, i mean kind of kind of, but like we rigorously test these things right.

Speaker 2: 19:55

Exactly. It's not anymore like the way that we developed the smallpox vaccines where we were like let's pull in a child off the street.

Speaker 1: 20:01

Right, give them a vaccine nowadays.

Speaker 2: 20:03

Yeah, we have like the FDA, we have ethics committees, we have like all sorts of stuff that we go through and we're trying things. It's always an educated Yes like we're not like what would happen if we give a depressed person a blueberry.

Speaker 1: 20:17

We have no evidence to do that study right, right, well, and you know there's a lot of research coming out, sort of on the plant side of um. We look at psychology and human physiology of how much evil. So it's always sounded kind of like intuitive, like go outside, you'll feel better.

Speaker 1: 20:37

Yeah like I know as a kid, like if I was just like moping around the house, he'd be like go play outside, like just go outside, get some sunlight, get some, you know, be around the plants. But there's more research starting to come out of like we're kind of like you made a good point earlier that you know we co-evolved with these plants, all these different organisms and it's.

Speaker 1: 20:54

You know, at some point we convince ourselves that we're so other Yeah but like we have these evolutionary relationships And so like we have receptors in our brain that can detect the volatile organic compounds that plants are putting out to like message each other and like bugs and things, and like it does have physiological effects, just like Be an outside.

Speaker 2: 21:16

Yeah, there's like parts of our brain that, since sunlight, that like want to be in the sunlight for a certain period of time, and there's been I don't even know how many studies on like the benefits of having like a potted plant in the lab, a potted plant in your office, um, just like be around it. and yeah, not to be like too hippity-dippity, but yeah, i definitely feel a lot better whenever I go outside.

Speaker 2: 21:39

And it's upsetting sometimes because your therapist will be like Go, spend like 30 minutes outside and you'll feel better. And then you do it and you do feel better.

Speaker 1: 21:46

I can't believe that worked. I could have been doing this the whole time. No, and like there's a whole thing on tick tock right now. If people like going outside like I'm going outside to take a Stupid walk for my stupid mental health and mad because it works.

Speaker 2: 21:59

And I do that all the time. If an experiment is not working properly, i go outside and we have a I've discovered on my campus like a nice little secluded area That's just like a bunch of trees that no one goes in for some reason. And so I'll just like if I'm really angry at like my boss, who I would never be angry at in my entire life, or like if my experiments aren't working properly, i'll just like go outside and sit in some trees for a little while, and then it's better. It's better.

Speaker 1: 22:23

Yeah, it's simple. if nothing else, right, it's like I don't know I've. I have always found comfort in just like being alone in nature, for even if it's five or 10 minutes, like some days, especially on stressful days like I'll go grab lunch or I'll take lunch and just go sit at the park and just like eat lunch outside by myself for 10 minutes, and it kind of resets my brain a little bit and lets me get back into my day.

Speaker 2: 22:47

I also think there's a part of our self that's sort of like. You're sort of like tricking your brain into thinking that everything is okay by going outside, like in our modern world, like the office is a stressful environment.

Speaker 2: 22:58

Our brains are really good at picking up on cues and the different things that signal danger especially. And so if, like, you've been in your office stressed for a whole week, your brain is gonna start to associate your office with stress. But if you're, like, not typically stressed outside, you know that whenever you go take these like 30 minute walks so you feel better than whenever you go outside you're telling your brain hey, we're in a safe place, we're in a happy place, we're gonna be happy now, and your body sort of follows along. Your brain is incredibly good at tricking your whole body into thinking either you're okay or you're in danger, and we can use that to our advantage. It can also incredibly hurt us a lot.

Speaker 1: 23:36

Yeah, that's interesting. So, to the degree you can, I'd like to hear more about your research. Again, like don't scoop yourself and like this is everything that I've done and here's all my data, But like I'm really curious to hear, like, what are you looking at with these different compounds?

Speaker 2: 23:54

Right. So in my lab we sort of have several different projects that we work on. The big one is looking at, like, exactly what cocaine is doing to the brain is sort of like our main thing, because, like, some people are able to take cocaine once or twice and not become addicted to it, other people are very dependent on it And so what is it doing to the brain to create that dependency? And then also we're specifically like looking at a different set of neurons than people normally look at, or I should say, a different set of brain cells. So in your brain people think that like all brain cells are neurons, but actually only about half of them are neurons and the other half are what are called glia And that's they used to be thought of as like support system for your brain And so that's why, like, no one really thinks about them, or talks about them Cause they were like I was just like the structure of your brain.

Speaker 2: 24:53

But nowadays people are discovering oh no, it actually has a purpose And there's a reason why our brains developed those. And so people are looking more at their role in addiction, because they haven't been studied much in the past. And then also we're looking at how stress might so like people who are in stressful situations are more likely to relapse. And so why?

Speaker 2: 25:18

And is there something that we can do to help people in that situation? Is there maybe like a medication that we could administer to like help them not feel if either feel the stress or feel the need to relapse if they are stressed? And then, separately from that, I also just study generally how stress impacts our behavior. So a really interesting finding from our lab that's published.

Speaker 2: 25:45

so I can say it is that stress can actually enhance learning, so you can actually learn better when you are stressed, and probably that evolved because you need to know what the danger is. So but what's really neat is that it also works for rewards, so you can also learn where the good things are very easily if you're stressed. Yeah, yeah yeah, which sounds brilliant And a lot of professors get really excited when they say that because they're like our students are stressed.

Speaker 2: 26:13

But what's not so good is that it inhibits flexibility And so, like, the way that we look at that is sort of like let's say you have like a coffee shop that you really love and you go to it all the time You're really stressed, you go to your favorite coffee shop. They don't have your coffee anymore. There is a coffee shop across the street that does have coffee, but you're not really used to them. If you are stressed, you're less likely to sort of change your behavior. You're more likely to sort of like sit there and be grumpy that your shop is out of coffee and just sort of like be upset and sort of builds on that stress Versus. If you're not stressed, you're just gonna like practically go across the street to the other coffee shop. So that's another aspect of our research. And then, like I said, I have like colleagues and friends who are looking into it more, like the cannabis and the elixir.

Speaker 1: 27:02

Well, and that's really interesting And I think that you know, and it's interesting to talk about in our sort of like current social and political climate, when some of these things are so divisive in a lot of ways.

Speaker 2: 27:18

Oh yeah, what's been incredibly interesting for me? working in a lab that studies cocaine. So cocaine is obviously an incredibly addictive drug. It's really highly monitored by the DEA. Our lab has to have inspections by the government to make sure that we're not like stealing any.

Speaker 2: 27:33

It's all very intense And I asked my boss one time hey, why don't we also study marijuana? Wouldn't that be really interesting? There's a lot of really cool research going on in like Colorado And he was like it is so much easier to have cocaine in the lab than it would be to get marijuana.

Speaker 1: 27:49

Yeah, like That's, wild.

Speaker 2: 27:51

The approval system for it. He was just like. It's not even worth it to go through that system.

Speaker 1: 27:56

Well, and you know there's work going into in a lot of these things. it's just sort of like in some ways a matter of time And I think having the research infrastructure to study some of these things is really important, like we do work in industrial hemp right. So like we grow it, we research it for like fibers for a lot of uses. It's actually a really useful plant.

Speaker 2: 28:22

But that's like the separation that people use of like you can grow hemp, but you can't grow weed.

Speaker 2: 28:27

And what's really like. I just got done reading a really interesting review article on how, like, neuroscience has also treated it as like a very separate issue, because it is fairly easy to get approved to use like THC, like pure THC or like pure CBV, but to actually get cannabis is like the difficult part of it. But, like, because of that, a lot of people will study separately, like THC and CBD, which you're gonna get both of those, and so we have less knowledge about what they do together, which is like the relevant information.

Speaker 1: 29:02

That is yeah, and that is really interesting, And I think that you know that makes an interesting point. when we talk about our health, when we talk about the things we consume, whatever that is, food, or stimulants, or depressor, whatever, it is like none of this exists in a vacuum.

Speaker 2: 29:20

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 29:21

Like we are complicated meat robots or whatever And it's like, no, we have to look at like a total system thing, like the individual research is important. But I like the idea that, no, we should be looking at this stuff holistically, like how did these things work together? What compounding effects both either positive or negative do they have?

Speaker 2: 29:43

Right. What's incredible is so many people who study things like addiction often will look at like, okay, if we get a rat addicted to cocaine, what happens? But they don't look at like, okay, well then, if the rat is stressed or something else happened, if the rat has a friend, versus if it doesn't have a friend, what happens? And nowadays we're getting a lot better at acknowledging that aspect of it. But it can be really interesting that, like a lot of times they'll find like the key to even like like any form of substance abuse or even sorry substance use, any form of that can be reduced if you just have a friend if you just have a buddy to have a social support system.

Speaker 2: 30:22

But because we were studying like all of these things separately for so long, it was like, oh, why won't this medication work in some people, but we'll work in others? And the key was adding in that social support.

Speaker 1: 30:31

Wow, that's really interesting, Really fascinating stuff. So I have maybe and you can take this question how you want as someone who studies stress, have you found good like techniques for dealing with it? Like I know you're looking more at the like physiological, psychological effects of it, but like, has that led you to any conclusions in your own life of like how you deal with that?

Speaker 2: 30:59

So this is gonna be really ironic coming from someone who studies sort of like drug effects in their brain, but honestly, i think the most important thing that people can do is like trick your brain into thinking you're not stressed. So, whether that is, people have found that placebos can be incredibly effective in this area. So even if, literally, you can know that something is a placebo and will still have the placebo effect on you. So if you go, wow, i'm really stressed, this Eminem is gonna make me not stressed, and then you take it like a pill, it's going to help reduce your stress. If you can do some breathing exercises and tell your body, hey, we're not trying to run away from a lion right now, we're totally calm, everything is good, that's going to reduce your stress. You're not gonna feel as bad anymore. Really, just tricking your brain into thinking that you're okay can make you think that you're okay, sort of. In my opinion, the key to all of this Now, none of that is to say that people shouldn't be taking medications.

Speaker 2: 32:00

I'm very openly on medications for anxiety. So, like, but what I'm talking about is specifically like, like. Stress and anxiety are two very different cities. Stress is something that happens like in your office, wherever you have like a due date.

Speaker 1: 32:12

Anxiety is like a constant all the time. thing Right.

Speaker 2: 32:16

But yeah, just, and then also learning your individual coping mechanisms, because something that I see even among my rats rats are incredibly useful tool to study human behavior, because actually humans are just big rats, in my opinion.

Speaker 1: 32:31

I like that, yep.

Speaker 2: 32:33

Our brains work a little bit differently, but in general I can say what would I do? And then my rat usually makes the same decision that I would make. And but what's really interesting is there's variations. Like some rats, we put them through the stressful situation and they come out of it and change. They're like totally fine, nothing bad happened. And some go through it and it was the end of the world for them. And so we do all this ethically, with approval.

Speaker 1: 32:59

No, right, right, right of course.

Speaker 2: 33:01

But the point of that is know yourself Like you are going to respond differently to stress than other people are, and the important thing is to know what is normal for you and what you can do that helps. Whether or not it reduces someone else's stress is irrelevant. If your friends look at you and they're like why are you telling yourself that Eminem's going to cure your stress? Like that's their problem, That's not your problem. If it reduces your stress. It reduces your stress.

Speaker 1: 33:27

No, that's so interesting And I love the fact that you can even know that that's what you're doing to yourself, like you can even know, like I am telling myself that these Eminems are good for me, or that they're good for my stress, and your body's just like all right sure Your brain is incredibly good at tricking you.

Speaker 1: 33:47

That's really interesting to me. I really like that And that's good advice. I think the idea that for any of these things, that it's like a one size fits all kind of thing, like I just don't think that works.

Speaker 2: 33:58

That's why I think too many people are looking for like the cure. I think the most relevant example that I've ever heard is like there's not going to be a single cure for cancer. It's going to be a different cure for each type of cancer That can apply to everything. Like there's not going to be a single cure for stress. It's going to depend on who you are, what type of stress you're facing. There's not going to be a single way to grow your crops. It depends on what type of crop you're growing. There's not a single best way to do anything. It's very individualistic.

Speaker 1: 34:25

No, i love that And it's like, and I know, as humans or as researchers, we like to both, you know, not just reason, i mean, everything is sort of a.

Speaker 2: 34:36

What do you mean? researchers or robots?

Speaker 1: 34:38

Well, yeah, no right, yeah, and we write like that right. Yeah, which is the dumbest thing, but like and I guess everything is sort of a I don't want to say it an effect of like we can say well, research is like this, but research is like this because we're like this right, like it's an effect of how we are.

Speaker 2: 34:57

Yeah, there's been a lot of issues that I've taken with academia. I know like there have always been problems with academia, but I particularly am of like sort of a younger generation and we sort of came in or like, wow, this is all bad and are like trying to fix it.

Speaker 2: 35:12

And the main pushback that I get anytime I try to fight something is well, this is how we do it in research, This is how we do it in neuroscience. I'm like, but why? And like we're all people, neuroscience isn't some giant concept. It's human beings studying it. Like we can change it, We can do things differently, but some people don't want to do that.

Speaker 1: 35:32

No, i get it. No, i understand it. I'm with you. I think that you know there are things that, like, when we see that they need to be changed, they need to be changed. And one of those things which I think, where I started going with that before I came quickly off the rails, which is, for anyone listening to this show knows, like, that's just how I am. That's the fun of it. It's the fun of it, right?

Speaker 1: 35:50

We like to distill things down to like very simple answers to a point in space because they're easy to digest, right, like, do this? this is what happened. Water your plants and they're happy. Okay, but that's. There's more than that, right? How often do you water? in what context? How heavily? like what kind of soil is it in? And like we don't like to let complicated things be complicated, and I think that what you're talking about, in the way that you're talking about approaching it, i think is very much that Like let's take these complex issues and Let them be complicated and try to tackle them as a whole, which I think is really cool.

Speaker 2: 36:31

Yeah, but I think part of the issue is that researchers especially don't like not having answers.

Speaker 1: 36:36

Right.

Speaker 2: 36:36

We got into this job specifically to get answers And I'm sure, as we both know, the more that you learn, the more you learn that you don't know. So I've even been told this wherever I'm doing science communication, like I do a lot of outreach work, and I'm told that wherever I'm speaking, like to the general public, like don't let them know when you don't know something, like we need everyone to, like we need to show that scientists know what we're talking about And that it makes people uncomfortable if they ask you a question and you go.

Speaker 1: 37:04

we don't know.

Speaker 2: 37:06

No one knows that. we haven't looked at that. No one knows, But that's the truth of it. No one knows certain. there are certain things about the world that no one knows. That's why researchers still exist. Yeah And yeah. it works that same way. Whenever we're writing our papers, we're supposed to be like we found the one solution to everything, And that's why you should give me the Nobel Prize.

Speaker 1: 37:25

Right.

Speaker 2: 37:25

But yeah, there's not a single solution, and that's okay.

Speaker 1: 37:29

That's okay And it needs to be okay. So this seems like a good time to take a quick break And when we come back we're going to talk a little bit about science, communication and some of the other cool stuff that Morgan does. Well, hey, welcome to the midroll. As always, i'm glad you're here, i'm glad you've made it this far And I hope you're enjoying the episode. If you want to connect with plant apology, you can find me all the places on the social medias. I am on Instagram, twitter, facebook, as plant apology, which is anthropology with appeal slapped right on the front. Look for the green background with a personal co-op pine, and that'll be me. You can also find me on Twitter, instagram and the tick tock machine, as at the plant profit. And I hope you like silliness, because because there's some silliness And if you want to support the show, there's a lot of ways you can do it.

Speaker 1: 38:16

First off, thanks so much for listening. I appreciate that That is the best support that you could possibly imagine, but you can also tell your friends about plant apology. If there's people that you know that love cool science and cool science people, send them the show, tell them what you think, tell them why you like it. You could leave a rating and review in any of the places on Apple podcasts, spotify, pod chaser or anywhere else that you listen. It means the world to me. I wear a size five star rating, but I also would like for you to be honest. If you want to be brutally honest, maybe don't do that in a public forum. Shoot me an email at plant apology pod at gmailcom, and I would love to hear your thoughts concerns ideas for new episodes or anything else. If you want to financially support the show, you can do that by me a coffee dot com slash plant apology, and for the price of a cup of coffee, you will literally buy me and my staff here at the greenhouse where I work coffee. That's what it's for. That's what it goes directly to. So when you buy me a coffee, you buy me a coffee. You can also head to plant apology pod dot com and click on merch, and there's a bunch of cool stuff that you can purchase with American dollar bucks, or probably any other country's dollar bucks as well. We're not picky. Speaking of support, thanks so much to the Texas Tech Department of Plant and Soil Science for supporting the show and letting me do it and have so much fun with it and so much freedom to do it. It is a blessing in my life and it has become such a huge part of my life, and I could not do it without the support of my department and my university. Thanks so much to the pod fictance network for letting me be on there And with all the other cool family of shows we have on podfix.

Speaker 1: 39:55

I don't have a trailer for you today, but I wanted to give you a heads up about a couple of great shows that are coming down the pike. I don't know exactly when it's going to start, but sometimes soon. Morgan, who you have been listening to for the past little bit, is going to start a show about science called the method section, and I will probably be on there at some point as well, and don't you love to hear my voice? You listen to this podcast for a reason. Also, my buddy Chesco, known far and wide across Al Gore's interwebs as the speech prof, has a show coming out, i believe on June 14 in the year of our Lord, 2023, called bad advice Wednesdays. He gets asked all the craziest questions on social media And he started doing this thing where he asks people to ask questions and he gives them bad advice. So he's bringing on different guests and celebrities and really cool people and asking them to help give bad advice to you, the listener. So you know what you're getting into. It's hilarious. Chesco is such a good dude And I know you would love that show and you may hear my voice on there eventually as well. He'll be slumming when he has me on, but he may do it anyway. Anyway, you people are great.

Speaker 1: 41:06

Thanks for listening, thanks for being a part of this, and let's jump back into the second half of this episode. What do you think? Yeah, let's go. So that's actually a great segue into talking a little bit about the science communication work you do, because that's something that like. So we kind of got to know each other a little bit through TikTok, maybe a discord group, like all the kinds of stuff. Like what made you want to do that? Because, objectively, like, we have a lot of other things to do as researchers and scientists and academics. But you know I'm there with you, that I love doing it. But, like for you, what was it that drew you to science communication?

Speaker 2: 41:43

So I grew up in 4-H, which I've heard other people on your podcast talking about before, so I'm not going to go too far into it, but one of the things that was really instilled on me while I was on 4-H was public speaking and like the importance of learning how to do public speaking.

Speaker 2: 41:58

Because of that, i'm pretty comfortable like in front of a crowd or like giving a presentation or filming myself, and I know a lot of people aren't like. a lot of incredibly smart people who like have stuff to share with the world aren't as comfortable doing those things. So there needs to be someone who is comfortable with it to sort of like present it to people. I think that's why the field of science communication is incredibly important, because there are scientists who are doing good, amazing work who don't necessarily know how to communicate their science or don't feel comfortable communicating their science. So there needs to be a group of people who like understand what they're doing and are also okay presenting it. And so that's sort of where I came at it originally, and then I did a lot of outreach work in undergrad. where I was specifically, i was part of a collegiate 4-H program that went out to rural schools and taught different like STEM activities to kids to try to teach them different like STEM concepts. It's awesome.

Speaker 2: 42:55

Yeah, we did a lot of engineering, which was way outside of my house. I tried to teach them how cars work. I was like I don't know they work if you twist a rubber band around the tires. But I did my best And that was a really impactful experience because kids have the best questions. that you ever hear And they'll ask you completely off the wall things, and so you get a lot of practice. That's really useful. And then, whenever I started doing my graduate research is exactly when COVID hit.

Speaker 1: 43:29

Oh, wow.

Speaker 2: 43:30

Yeah, so everyone was impacted by COVID. The way that I was impacted is like whenever I would normally have like gone to school, a school was probably the worst place you could be at that point.

Speaker 1: 43:41

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 43:42

And so my actually my boss suggested that I start a YouTube channel to try to do some science communication, And because of that I started my YouTube channel and then I started a TikTok to try to promote my YouTube channel and then it became the main thing that I do And originally I was one of those people who saw TikTok as like a kids app.

Speaker 2: 44:04

My younger brother was on it and I was like, oh, it's for stupid dances, i would make fun of him for getting on it. And then, whenever I hit 100 subscribers or 100 followers, i sent him a screenshot and I was like, hey, look, i'm on your stupid kids Right And after being on it, i see how incredibly important it is because a lot of academics I don't know how well this is known outside of the academic circle use Twitter.

Speaker 2: 44:28

Their favorite academic Twitter is like a huge thing And I am not that good at Twitter, but I started using TikTok and I realized a lot of graduate students are on there, a lot of undergraduates And even like high school students are on there and are totally willing to learn science. They want to learn science And there's people on there who are spreading misinformation. People love it when you correct the misinformation. They do like like there's a, there's an audience for it And, like the young people, they're not using Twitter. They're not looking up your research papers that you're sharing. You're the academic Twitter. You're only reaching other academics, right, which is a really hot take.

Speaker 1: 45:06

No, no, no, I'm with you for sure.

Speaker 2: 45:09

So so I really like using TikTok as a platform for science communication because you're able to reach the younger people. The other thing that's incredibly important for me, now that I've started doing the online science communication, is, like I said at the beginning, i came from a very small town. I came from a town of about 200 people.

Speaker 1: 45:25

Oh, wow.

Speaker 2: 45:25

Yeah, so a tiny town And one of the big things growing up I had never seen a scientist aside from like, maybe like a movie mad scientist. The only scientist I could think of was like a medical doctor, and so for a long time I learned to be a medical doctor because that was all I could think of. And then I got to college, i discovered research and that's, i realized, like that's the experience of a lot of people came from small towns. They they haven't seen what research is and they don't have the opportunity to see us, like there's not a big college, like in their neighborhoods that they can go volunteer at, and so by doing outreach online, you're able to reach those people who, like otherwise, would not have been able to see a scientist. Like I can't go visit every single small town that's out there, but I can send links to teachers, i can send my videos to teachers, like, so it's easier to get to those communities that need it the most.

Speaker 1: 46:21

Yeah, and that's so important And you're right that, like you know, we have. You know, lubbock, where we are now, is a fairly large city but like there's so much rural Texas around here And yeah, and it's interesting when they come to campus for stuff, like we've been doing the past few weeks, there's a lot of FFA contests that go on that happen on campus.

Speaker 2: 46:44

I saw some FFA kids at a Starbucks and I brought back some memories.

Speaker 1: 46:48

In fact I hear at the greenhouse we there was a contest this morning, there was one last weekend, there was one the weekend before like it's been hectic But some of these kids coming out of, like you said, towns with a couple hundred people, more cows than humans in these towns, like it's all so new and big And it's so important that they're exposed to it, but that is such a small group of students that get the opportunity to come and do it. So I love what you're saying of like take the education to them where they are, where it needs to be.

Speaker 2: 47:22

Right And the groups of students who do stuff like that. I get asked a lot. I get a lot of research grants based on having come from a rural community, because there's not a lot of people from rural backgrounds in science where typically, like I've experienced some discrimination based on just purely being from like a small town And then also, like I said, like there's not a nearby university, not a lot of people from small towns like end up going to college because of like money and stuff.

Speaker 1: 47:49

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 47:50

And so the thing is, though, people will ask me like oh, how did you get out? And I'm like it's not by anything that I did. I was in an incredibly privileged situation where I was in organizations like 4-H. I was in FCCLA Yeah, FCCLA, which is like the home ec version of.

Speaker 2: 48:11

FFA Yeah and I, and through those things I was able to go to colleges and see things as like a junior senior in high school And those things sort of propelled me towards college. There were other kids who went to my high school, who were just as intelligent as I am, just as driven as I am, but maybe their parents that have as much money as my parents sure.

Speaker 2: 48:33

Their parents weren't as like supportive of the idea of going to college is mine. So yeah, to be able to get things to those kids who Don't have as many opportunities as the more privileged kids is really important to me.

Speaker 1: 48:46

Super cool, yeah, no, i love it. I love it. So what I you know, and I asked this question. I don't ask this question all the time, but I ask it of People in grad school a lot because I think it's important for other people listening, like, as you go through the process, like this is. this is a big Undertaking, right? there's so much that goes into it, from writing and research and Trying to sleep and try not to pull your hair out, all those kinds of things like Why do you, why are you doing it? What, where do you want to go with it?

Speaker 2: 49:20

so that's a really big question. And Um, originally I got into graduate school because I wanted to become a professor. Um, i think I made it clear through my science, communication stuff that I'm really passionate about educating people. Um, i had a lot of professors who were extremely influential on me and that I would not have made it through an undergrad without them, and so I really wanted to become that person for other people. Yeah, the more that I see of the inside of academia, the less I'm on board with that plan.

Speaker 1: 49:51

Sure.

Speaker 2: 49:51

So right now I'm sort of floating in the wind. I'm floating the idea of going more of the science communication route and maybe More like a consulting or like I don't know, like TV or podcast or media of some sort, also because those things are aimed more towards the general public, like the people who are at college Already have this drive to learn the things. Um. But also there's still a big part of me that would love if being a professor Purely consisted of being a professor. That is my dream job, but it consists of a lot more than that it does, it does and it it is.

Speaker 1: 50:34

I Understand that emotion a lot because, like as someone who is kind of professor guy, although not I don't do much research, i'm not, i'm not, i'm teaching faculty, i'm not a research faculty and that's kind of what I would rather, because the research side of things When you're like in graduate school, it's really exciting.

Speaker 2: 50:52

There's a lot going on, there's a lot of research that you do, but whenever you get to the professor level, all they do is write grants.

Speaker 1: 50:59

That's what it feels like.

Speaker 2: 51:00

Yeah, and I do not want to do that.

Speaker 1: 51:03

You're preaching to the choir here I am. That is not my thing, you know. It's one of those things like, i'm sure and if my Department chair listens to this, i'm sure he would be happy if I wrote more grants But like I feel like my skills lie in teaching and so that's where, that's where I am, and but I understand that feeling too of like There is so much Baggage that comes with the good things we get to do in academia that sometimes it's Daunting and a little bit like, oh, you know, i, you know, my encouragement to you would just be that, like, you can have that, you can have what you want in academia. But that doesn't mean that and I think this message is just for other people listening to But that doesn't mean that you have to like there is so much of a world outside of these, like walls, so to speak.

Speaker 2: 51:52

That's fair, that's sure.

Speaker 1: 51:53

Yeah, but no, i think that's cool And I love that. You know science, communication and media and outreach and those things are kind of on your brain And you know also and I know that's like a big question I sort of ambushed you with and I apologize, but but but it's also good to hear, i think, for people that are in it or considering it. Or You know, we I think I'll get to points in our academic career, especially these grad students We're just like what am I even doing? You know?

Speaker 2: 52:19

and I I do think the big thing is to at the very least know what you're passionate about. Yeah because there have been so many times where I have I mean every graduate student that they thought about quitting. Oh yeah and every time I come across one of those, i'm just thinking What do I want to do? and not just like career-wise, but like emotionally, what would be fulfilling to me? and Becoming some form of an educator is what would be fulfilling to me, and to do that I have to get through this.

Speaker 1: 52:47

Yeah, yeah, i hear that.

Speaker 2: 52:49

But if I didn't have that some form of a passion or a light at the end of the tunnel I I don't think anyone would be able to make it through grad school without that because it's a lot.

Speaker 1: 52:58

It is a lot, okay, i'm gonna. I'm just trying to come up with like a random question to ask you that's plant related, okay.

Speaker 2: 53:05

Do you have? houseplants so I Have what I have decided to call a selective green thumb. So, growing up, my mom killed every single plant that we had in the house, and I would always be so upset about it because I was like why can't our house be pretty? and like, have cute little plants everywhere? And then whenever I went to college, i filled my dorm with plants.

Speaker 2: 53:28

Yeah, I was such a good plant parent like I had, like all of like the rare ones and the ones that are hard to keep alive and I Have a watering schedule and I was so good at it. And then I got cats.

Speaker 1: 53:40

Oh no.

Speaker 2: 53:41

Yeah, and one of my cats in particular decided there was his mission to eat every single plant that I have my goodness and at one point we went to California, to the redwoods and.

Speaker 2: 53:52

I got a bunch of redwood seeds and I was so excited. I was like I'm going to have a redwood plant. I'm gonna make like I'm gonna grow a tree. I was so excited. I grew four of them. I managed to get them to germinate and sprout, the sprout, the sprouts And um, and I put like a bag over them to like protect them from the cats. And then I came home from work one day and one of my cats had knocked them over and used as a litter box.

Speaker 1: 54:19

Oh my goodness, cats are like the great destroyers.

Speaker 2: 54:22

They are plants.

Speaker 1: 54:23

That's amazing And not a good way.

Speaker 2: 54:26

So ever since then I haven't had a house plant. But what I've started doing is I keep a plant in the lab because, no one can mess with it there.

Speaker 2: 54:35

And what now? as a plant person, you might think this is torture, because I don't know how how okay this is for a plant. But I looked up what plants survive the best in fluorescent lighting because our lab doesn't have windows and uh, i found out that air plants, that I think they have a technical name, but, um, they grow really well with just fluorescent lighting. So I have one that I keep on my desk that it all that it gets is our poor lab lights, but it does pretty well.

Speaker 1: 55:03

You know they're. I mean, if you look at like the shelf behind me, i have my one little grow bowl, but mostly they get fluorescent light too and they, you know, i think it's funny There are And this is maybe an interesting, just biology thing in general like we have Best management practices for plants. It's like you should do this and you should do this, but kind of like we were talking about earlier, it's like the plants don't really care about our best management practices, like yeah, we'll have some that just do the thing. You're like there's no reason you should be living in here and the plant's like I just.

Speaker 1: 55:34

I really don't care exactly.

Speaker 2: 55:36

They just don't have vibes and you just have to go with it.

Speaker 1: 55:39

Yeah, you just go with it. Now, i like the, i like having a lab plant and I'm, you know, i know that I am fortunate as a plant person to work in a greenhouse. But, like I'm thinking, like, if I move offices, how am I gonna like? what am I gonna take with me? What's gonna, what can survive?

Speaker 2: 55:53

Well, you should do one of the old labs that I Worked in. Someone had decided to grow a tree in that lab. So it was like potted and originally it was maybe like up to like an adult's waist, so it was very easy to like carry into the lab. Whenever they moved labs They were with them. But it was a tree and so like. Eventually it grew so that it's so big that you couldn't fit it outside of the door, and so they just left it.

Speaker 1: 56:19

I like that, that there's. There's just a tree in this room.

Speaker 2: 56:21

So you can just make your mark on the university. Just grow a tree that are too big big to get out of clout.

Speaker 1: 56:27

That's actually really funny because like There's I don't know if you've ever heard the term gorilla gardening where people will go and like plant wildflowers and empty lots and things like that. I really like the concept of like planting trees inside offices and college classrooms that people come back from like summer and they're like How, why is this here? and they can't get it out. I think, that is really funny.

Speaker 2: 56:52

Put some idea, that would really bother.

Speaker 1: 56:54

Yeah, just like the walls are covered with it when they come back from From summer break or whatever That's. That's pretty funny.

Speaker 2: 57:00

I have never heard about gorilla gardening, but now that you say it, me and my brother used to do that to my dad all the time. My dad is very much one of the people who is like, oh, i'm gonna have the perfect lawn, it's gonna be like that exact.

Speaker 2: 57:11

Like put, put a ruler out there and like see how tall my grass is, and me and my brother we would take like every dandelion, every like wild seed and we would spread them everywhere. One year my brother, through 4h, got a giant coffee can full of sunflower seeds Yeah, like, like the actual ones that grow flowers and he planted them everywhere and my dad was like why can't I mow through?

Speaker 1: 57:36

It's like biological warfare. Oh, that's so funny. Um, so, just as we kind of wrap up the question, i like to ask all my guests at the end and you've, you've given some great like pieces of life advice. It's just just things that you've learned and I, and I really appreciate it. Um, but I like to ask, like, if there was one thing about school or Your subject matter or just whatever life in general that that you would like our listeners to kind of take with them, what would that be? What like one thing would you want to leave?

Speaker 2: 58:09

That is a tough question.

Speaker 1: 58:10

It is right.

Speaker 2: 58:11

I think Two things. Number one find what you're passionate about and find the best route to get there and. Keep that in mind, like I have a book, like a notebook, that anytime i'm starting to doubt what i'm doing or i'm not feeling great or maybe like it's been a really rough week, i'll go in it. I'll write down What am I passionate about, why am I doing this, and I guess you could call that journaling.

Speaker 2: 58:36

Sure Yeah it's specifically dedicated to that, and then, if i'm feeling really bad or feeling really down, i can go back and look at it and be like, okay, this is what i'm passionate about, this is why i'm doing this, this is why i'm going through this, and that's been incredibly helpful. My second thing is Get plants that are safe for cats. There are a lot of plants out there that are not safe for cats, um, and cats will still eat them, so make sure your plants are safe for cats.

Speaker 1: 59:03

I love that. That's that's great And it's really actually very good advice, because the plants don't or the the cats don't care.

Speaker 2: 59:10

They don't. They'll eat anything. They'll eat anything.

Speaker 1: 59:12

Yeah, i like it. That's really good advice. Um morgan, where can people find you?

Speaker 2: 59:18

So I am on tiktok, instagram and youtube as ask a neuroscientist, and then i'm on twitter as ask a neuro, and that's where you can find a my science communication stuff. Uh, right now I'm trying to on youtube, do like a neuroscience 101 series. That's very much meant for People who know absolutely nothing about the brain or anything about science. So, um, i really recommend that if you're curious about how your brain works.

Speaker 1: 59:42

Yeah, that's awesome, lots of fun. Um, so look for links for all those things in, uh, the show notes of this episode. but, morgan, thanks for driving six hours to come be on this podcast. I appreciate it.

Speaker 2: 59:54

I'll do it again in like a month. Yeah, there you go.

Speaker 1: 59:55

Perfect. Y'all follow morgan sage advice and make sure your plants are cat safe. Thanks so much for listening. Thanks for being a part of this. Uh, you know I do this for you and you know that I Enjoy recording this show because you enjoy listening to it. Thanks again to morgan for coming on and giving us her experience And her knowledge and her wisdom. She's so much fun And I hope you really enjoyed that. Uh, keep an eye out for the method section when it comes out. Go follow morgan all the places at ask a neuroscientist And uh, just stay tuned for more updates. Uh, thanks again to the podfix network and to the tech tech department of plant and soil science.

Speaker 1: 1:00:33

Plant apology is recorded, written, edited and produced by yours truly and uh, y'all you know I love you so much. Thanks for being a part of this. Thanks for Uh listening, thanks for being my friends. Uh, definitely connect. Uh send me messages. I love it when you people say hi. Uh, keep being kind to one another. If you have not yet been kind to one another, maybe give that a shot. It's pretty great. And keep being really cool plant people.