Wonderful Wool: The secrets of this amazing fluff

NOAH: You're listening to Brains On, where we're serious about being curious.

SUBJECT 1: Brains On a supported in part by a grant from the National Science Foundation.

MENAKA WILHELM: OK. I've got the popcorn.

MARC SANCHEZ: I've got the juice boxes. Grape for you, Sanden. Tangelo for Menaka, and of course pomegranate pickle for me. [SLURPS]

SANDEN TOTTEN: I'm pretty sure your taste buds are broken, Mark.

MARC SANCHEZ: [SLURPS] OK, we're ready. I've got the channel queued up for the annual Alpaca Jack Movie Marathon. Let's get this pack up party started!

MENAKA WILHELM: Yeah, 12 hours of nonstop action with our favorite crime fighting alpaca superhero. So which movie are we watching first?

MARC SANCHEZ: It starts with Live Fast, Die Wool. Then To Hoof or Hoof Not. Oh, and after that, it's my favorite. Alpaca Jack Indestructiwool.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

SANDEN TOTTEN: Oh, yeah. This is the one where he karate chops through a submarine. Hi-ya! I wish I could do that.

MARC SANCHEZ: Yeah. And he uses his super brain to decode all six of Barron bottom feeders riddles at the same time. Well, yeah. If I could have any of his powers I'd totally want that one.

MENAKA WILHELM: Oh, yeah. And remember the part where he's super soft and cuddly? That's the power I want.

SANDEN TOTTEN: Menaka, what are you talking about?

MENAKA WILHELM: He's so fuzzy, and pettable. And evil trembles at his Downy soft coat of food stuff. Wool yeah!

MARC SANCHEZ: Ah, I don't think wool is a superpower. That's just what alpacas are covered in.

SANDEN TOTTEN: Yeah. Wool isn't going to outsmart any bad guys.

MARC SANCHEZ: Or kick through concrete.

MENAKA WILHELM: Well, no. But wool is stretchy. Wool can shift into all kinds of shapes. It wicks away water. It's tough to light it on fire. It's like a soft, fuzzy, super suit of armor.

SUBJECT 2: And now, it's the Alpaca Jack Movie Marathon. All the alpaca action you can handle. Wool yeah!

MARC SANCHEZ: Oh, it's starting. Pass me that blanket. I want to get cozy for the movie.

MENAKA WILHELM: You mean this wool blanket?

MARC SANCHEZ: Sure.

MENAKA WILHELM: Wool for the win. Wool yeah!

[THEME MUSIC]

MOLLY BLOOM: You're listening to Brains On from American Public Media. I'm Molly Bloom, and my co-host today is Noah from Minneapolis. Hi, Noah.

NOAH: Hi, Molly Bloom. It's great to be here.

MOLLY BLOOM: It's great to have you here. So today, we're talking about the marvelous, multifaceted material known as wool. We use it to make clothes and rugs.

NOAH: But also to insulate homes, to absorb odors, to fill furniture, and even soften sounds in speakers.

MOLLY BLOOM: So it's no wonder our listeners are curious about stuff.

HOLLY: Hi, I'm Holly.

KAITLYN: And I'm Kaitlyn. We are from Redmond, Washington. And our question is, why do sheep have wool instead of fur?

MOLLY BLOOM: So Noah, we asked you to co-host because you actually work with wool. So what do you do with wool?

NOAH: I crochet.

MOLLY BLOOM: What is crocheting?

NOAH: Crocheting is a bit like knitting. But instead of using two needles, you use one hook that you use to pull loops through the fabric that you've already made.

MOLLY BLOOM: So what can you make with crocheting?

NOAH: I mean, you can make a lot of different things, like I make little stuffed animals and plants. I like to make hats. You can make sweaters, although I've never done that.

MOLLY BLOOM: When did you start crocheting? How old were you?

NOAH: Let's see. Maybe nine or 10. I'm not sure exactly.

MOLLY BLOOM: How old are you now?

NOAH: 13.

MOLLY BLOOM: So you've been doing it a few years. Who taught you how to do it?

NOAH: Well, I mostly taught myself from books and videos.

MOLLY BLOOM: So do you have a favorite material to work with?

NOAH: I mean, I think wool of various types. I mean, I think my favorite yarn that I've made a hat out of was probably one that had brushtail possum fur in it, as well as Merino wool.

MOLLY BLOOM: Whoa. So you have Merino wool, which comes from sheep, and then possum fur?

NOAH: Yes. I actually brought it with me so you could see it.

MOLLY BLOOM: Oh, I can feel it.

NOAH: Yeah.

MOLLY BLOOM: Ooh. It's purple, and brown, and stripey. This is a very nice hat.

NOAH: That was actually my first one.

MOLLY BLOOM: Is it the first hat you made.?

NOAH: Yeah.

MOLLY BLOOM: It's very professional. It's very soft. And warm. Do you wear this?

NOAH: Yeah, I wear it.

MOLLY BLOOM: Does it keep your head very warm?

NOAH: Yes.

MOLLY BLOOM: And there's another kind of needle work that you do. Can you tell me about that?

NOAH: It's called nalbinding. And it is much older than crochet and knitting.

MOLLY BLOOM: This is a very old technique that was used by Vikings?

NOAH: Yes.

MOLLY BLOOM: And how is it different than crocheting?

NOAH: So for nalbinding, you have one needle with a hole in it that's usually flat and made out of wood, bone, or antler. And you have loops on your thumb that you put the needle through.

MOLLY BLOOM: What advice or tips would you have for other people your age who might be considering taking up crocheting?

NOAH: Maybe try something a little bit easier if you're getting frustrated.

MOLLY BLOOM: So nothing wrong with starting easy and slow. Got to work your way up.

NOAH: Yeah.

MOLLY BLOOM: You can't expect super fast progress necessarily.

NOAH: No. My first thing that I made was just a little square-ish-- you can't even really call it the square because it's like a misshapen rectangle.

MOLLY BLOOM: But it was your very first thing.

NOAH: Yeah. And it's all right if it does not look good at first because you'll get better.

MOLLY BLOOM: Well, let's get to it.

NOAH: Wool yeah!

MOLLY BLOOM: We usually think of wool as the stuff that grows on sheep. But other animals make it to.

NOAH: Like alpacas, llamas, camels, and even some goats and rabbits.

MOLLY BLOOM: Wool is different from cotton, which is also used for clothes. Because cotton is made of a material called cellulose.

NOAH: That's what plants are made of. And cotton is a plant.

MOLLY BLOOM: Wool, on the other hand, is made of proteins. It also has some unique lipids, which are fatty, oily substances.

NOAH: But hair is also made of proteins. So what makes wool special? And why is it so good for clothes and stuff? Like why can't I crochet a scarf made out of my own hair?

MOLLY BLOOM: Or a hat. Think about it, a hair hat that covers your hair. It makes perfect sense. Well, for starters, wool is very stretchy, so it doesn't break easily and can take on lots of shapes.

NOAH: It's also covered in super tiny scales. If you take a look at wool under a microscope, it looks like it's covered in roof shingles or fish scales.

MOLLY BLOOM: And it's crimped, meaning it's got very small waves in it. These waves and scales make it so the strands of wool get tangled together very easily.

NOAH: When a bunch of wool strands get tangled like that, they can form a string. That's how yarn is made.

MOLLY BLOOM: Your typical hair strands aren't as crimped or scaly and can't really stick together like wool can.

NOAH: So to recap, wool stretches, sticks to itself, and makes super strength. Wool for the win.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

MOLLY BLOOM: Wool also has other amazing properties. It traps air really well, so it can keep you warm when it's cold out and cool when it's hot.

NOAH: Plus it can soak up as much as 30% of its own weight in water without feeling wet. Take that, rain.

MOLLY BLOOM: So how does it go from animal fluff to everyday stuff?

NOAH: To find out we send to our pal Menaka Wilhelm to a farm outside Santa Barbara, California.

MENAKA WILHELM: Get ready. This is a bit of a sheep safari. Jenya Schneider and her partner Jack Thrift run Cuyama Lamb. Their sheep live in a sprawling fenced area, and they roam quite a bit. When I visit, the sheep are wandering somewhere in a sandy 100-acre canyon. Here's Jenya.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: We have a flock of about 430 sheep out here. So we're going to see how many we can find today. They're out and about, and eating, and growing wool as we speak.

MENAKA WILHELM: Besides growing wool, these sheep have another job, munching their way across different landscapes. The idea is that sheep can help prune weeds and brush, and fertilize the land with their poop. We start our sheep search at the end of a little dirt road.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: Well, we keep our eyes out because we could see a sheep at any time.

MENAKA WILHELM: We're also looking for signs of sheep. When the sheep brush up against plants, they sometimes leave fuzzy evidence.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: It looks like they were chewing on some of this oak right here. You can see some wool they left behind on the tips of the branches.

MENAKA WILHELM: It's a few more sandy footsteps before-- and he's got a--

JENYA SCHNEIDER: Where she be?

MENAKA WILHELM: A sheep.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: That's extra exciting when-- you never know if you're going to see them. Here some more through the juniper here.

MENAKA WILHELM: Sheep like to hang out in groups. So once we spot the first sheep, we see a bunch more. This herd is nearly all lady sheep or ewes. Their noses are pink, and they're covered in cottony, cream colored magic fluff.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: These sheep are all growing white wool. Some sheep grow brown wool, some black, some curly. This is a fine wool sheep. And so we have fine white wool.

[SHEEP BLEAT]

MENAKA WILHELM: Different kinds of wool feel different. Coarser wool might be itchy for a sweater but stronger for a rug. These sheep are growing soft wool, perfect for a sweater or for socks. And they grow that wool by eating all kinds of plants from the land.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: They're snacking underneath these pinyon pines here. Definitely when the sheep find the pine nuts on the ground, they love them. There's lots of good grasses down there.

MENAKA WILHELM: Jenya also leaves out water in big white buckets with salt and vitamins for the sheep to eat.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: You might hear the sound of them scraping against this protein tub over here. It has some protein, and some molasses, and some different vitamins and minerals for them. They have a salt over here that's also mineral rich, make sure they get all their nutrients. We'll check the water too. So we're walking over to their water troughs right now, see if any sheep are getting a drink and make sure that the hoses are all working well. All right. Here we go.

[WATER SPLASHES]

Water.

MENAKA WILHELM: They're pretty thirsty sheep.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: [LAUGHS] Definitely thirsty sheep.

[DOG BARKING]

Lucy. Hey, Lucy.

MENAKA WILHELM: Lucy is one of the big fluffy white dogs that live out on the land with these sheep.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: Mainly, the dogs are guarding against coyotes and mountain lions. Say hi to everyone. Tell them how hard you've been working. What'd you do last night? Yeah, did you keep some coyotes away?

MENAKA WILHELM: The guard dogs also stay with any sick sheep to make sure that Jenya knows about them. That's handy because Jenya doesn't count all 400 sheep every day. And mostly, the sheep don't have names. But a couple standouts do. There's one who acts like a dog and always tries to eat the dog kibble.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: [LAUGHS] Oh, yeah. Here's Kibble Monster. She's the sheep that loves eating dog kibble.

MENAKA WILHELM: Kibble Monster's ears stick out to the sides, and her fluff coat seems about as thick as a layer of cotton balls. Kibble Monster kind of looks the same as all the other sheep. But somehow, Jenya knows her from the pack.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: Oh, look at that face. You can never forget a face like that.

[BOTH LAUGHING]

MENAKA WILHELM: Before we go Jenya shows me how she herds the sheep from place to place. It doesn't take much. She can pretty much just wave her arms and--

JENYA SCHNEIDER: Come on.

MENAKA WILHELM: --the sheep are off.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: All right. Well, that concludes the sheep safari. And now, we'll go check out their wool in a couple of different stages. Let's see. So we're looking at some raw fleeces, which is what you call all the wool after you've shorn a sheep.

MENAKA WILHELM: When it's shearing time, about once a year, a sheep shear comes out and basically gives all the sheep a buzz cut, one by one. Raw fleeces are a little dirty, kind of like your hair if you just didn't wash it for a while.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: So yeah. You can see the outer tips are pretty dirty. They're looking like a little brown, gray. And then the stuff underneath is just creamy white as can be. So this is all wool that we saved so that we can send it to a wool mill to get cleaned and processed. We see when it gets all cleaned and combed out, it becomes enormous when all these little fibers are separated. So there's actually a whole lot of wool in every single fleece.

MENAKA WILHELM: When Jenya brings out the clean fleece, it looks like she's hugging a cloud. It is so soft.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: It's super soft. You kind of just want to make a bed of this and curl up. It could be your mattress and your blanket, both.

MENAKA WILHELM: This is the stage where wool is ready for its next life. Maybe they'll spin it into yarn or make it into belt. And in a few months, Jenya will have a whole new batch of sheep fleeces to work with.

JENYA SCHNEIDER: This year, we'll be able to make all sorts of things with our sheep's wool.

SUBJECT 3: Brains On!

MOLLY BLOOM: Humans and sheep go way back. In fact, some archeologists think we began domesticating those fluffy friends 10,000 years ago.

NOAH: Makes sense given how awesome wool is.

MOLLY BLOOM: Madelyn Shaw is the curator for the textile collection at the National Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution.

NOAH: Textile is another word for fabric.

MOLLY BLOOM: And humans realized very early how useful wool could be.

MADELYN SHAW: Wool has been around for thousands and thousands of years. And sheep were one of the first animals domesticated by humans. And the sheep tend to be divided into two kinds. There's sort of a hairy kind and a woolly kind. And humans bred sheep to be more woolly.

NOAH: And wool became incredibly valuable.

MOLLY BLOOM: Today, we have all kinds of synthetic fabrics which are made of plastic, like polyester and rayon.

NOAH: But for a long time, there were really only four main types of fabric, cotton, which we talked about before.

MOLLY BLOOM: Linen, which comes from the flax plant.

NOAH: Silk, which is made by silkworms.

MOLLY BLOOM: And wool. In the 1600s, the king and noble people of Spain owned a kind of sheep that produced a very fine kind of wool called Merino.

MADELYN SHAW: And it was almost literally worth its weight in gold. So people would smuggle sheep out. And there were instances of ships sailing from one part of Europe to another being pirated, where the ship would be stopped, and the Merino sheep would be taken off. They would maybe leave the gold but take the sheep.

MOLLY BLOOM: Well, wool won't help you with this challenge. It's the--

NOAH: Mystery sound.

MOLLY BLOOM: OK. [LAUGHS] Here it is.

[WHIRRING]

[THUMP]

What is your guess?

NOAH: I heard like a spinning cog noises.

MOLLY BLOOM: Um-hmm.

NOAH: I feel like it might be maybe a yarn mill or a sock factory?

MOLLY BLOOM: Excellent guess. So you heard someone spinning, something mechanical, some factory type of thing. well, we'll have another chance to hear it and guess in just a little bit.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Did you know that we have a Brains On fan club? It's true. We do. If you're already in our totally free fan club, you'll know that you get emails with extra activities and resources to go along with our episodes. But we have a new twist.

If you provide us with your mailing address, you'll get actual physical mail with some fun surprises. Our next mailing is going to go out in November. So if you want to get it, make sure you sign up for the fan club by October 31. Sign up at brainson.org/fanclub.

And if you're already a part of the fan club and want to make sure you get those mailings, you can go to that same site, brainson.org/fanclub, and give us your mailing address. But even if you're not in the fan club, we love hearing from you any time. You can send us all your thoughts and ideas and brainson.org/contact.

NOAH: You can also send us mystery sounds or drawings.

MOLLY BLOOM: I would love to see some drawings of Alpaca Jack in action. Wool yeah!

NOAH: You can also send questions to brainson.org/contact.

MOLLY BLOOM: Like this one.

REAGAN: My name is Regan from Toronto, Canada. My question is, if the Earth had rings, when you looked outside your window, would you see those rings?

NOAH: We'll answer that at the end of the show.

MOLLY BLOOM: And we'll announce the latest group to join the Brains honor roll.

NOAH: So keep listening.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

SUBJECT 4: now back to Alpaca Jack in Destructo-wool.

COUNTESS KOMBUCHA: Alpaca Jack, when I get you back to my lab I'll cut you open and find out what makes you so totally awesome. Now, get in my evil truck of evil or else-- [LAUGHS]

ALPACA JACK: Or else what Countess Kombucha?

COUNTESS KOMBUCHA: I'll drag you into my truck myself after I freeze you with my blizzard blaster.

ALPACA JACK: You can put those plans on ice. Your blaster is no match for my mighty mohair sweater, and these lambs wool socks, and this cashmere scarf.

COUNTESS KOMBUCHA: Wait, you're both covered in wool, and you're wearing wool? Does anyone else think that's a little weird?

ALPACA JACK: As a scientist, you should know wool is amazing at keeping bodies warm. Wool fibers are crimped and textured that creates little pockets of air that trap your body heat so you stay nice and toasty. Wool yeah!

COUNTESS KOMBUCHA: But like you're not wearing pants or shoes, but you have socks on? I don't get it.

ALPACA JACK: Hi-yah! Flying kick. Double chop. There. Now, your blizzard blaster is a pile of scrap metal. And the best part is, even though I broke a sweat tearing it apart, this wool I'm wearing absorbed the moisture keeping me nice and dry. Plus wool absorbs odors. No pit stink on this alpaca.

COUNTESS KOMBUCHA: Drats. Well, if you want come with me, you're going down in flames. I've just got to pull this flamethrower on my first.

ALPACA JACK: Don't bother, Countess. Wool is flame retardant.

COUNTESS KOMBUCHA: Ugh! You've got to be kidding me.

ALPACA JACK: Right, so that means it doesn't easily catch fire. You see, wool is made out of protein. And protein has lots of nitrogen, which doesn't burn. Some other parts of wool do burn. But thanks to all that nitrogen, even if I do catch fire, it'll be pretty easy to put out. Looks like wool just threw cold water on your red hot plans.

COUNTESS KOMBUCHA: Ah! You haven't seen the last of me, Alpaca Jack. I'll find your weakness, then you'll be mine. [LAUGHS]

ALPACA JACK: Huh, they never learn. You can't beat wool. It's just so-- Ah! A moth! Run!

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

MOLLY BLOOM: You're listening to Brains On. I'm Molly.

NOAH: And I'm Noah. So we've talked about where wool comes from. But what happens after it leaves the farm?

MOLLY BLOOM: Like Jenya the sheep farmer said, mills comb sheep's wool into clean soft fluff.

NOAH: Then you can twist and spin that fluff into string and start knitting or weaving with it.

MOLLY BLOOM: To learn about that, we heard from a Native American weaver in New Mexico. His name is Zefren Anderson.

ZEFREN ANDERSON: [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] This is how we greet each other in my tribe, the Navajo tribe. We also call ourselves Dine. I'm a Dine weaver born for the mud clan. I was about seven when our class started little projects with little looms, cardboard looms.

And from the stories on both sides of my family from my fathers, grandmothers, to my mother's grandmothers, I heard that we were always great weavers.

MOLLY BLOOM: Zefren spins yarn and weaves rugs and blankets the way Navajo people have for a long time. First, he takes that raw wool fluff and make stringy yarn out of it. To do that, he smooths out the wool with tools that look like big hairbrushes. Then he basically twists that fluff into thread.

He uses a tool called a spindle. It looks like a spinning top, but it's about as big as a baseball and has a tall rod sticking up out of its center. He starts by twisting a corner of fluff into a little thread by hand and winds that around the spindles rod. Then as he spins the spindle on the ground like a top, he guides the wool so the fluff twists into yarn bit by bit and winds around the spindle.

ZEFREN ANDERSON: We take these naturally, unbunched, straightened fibers, straighten them out. Put a little work by twisting within them so that it becomes stronger than the material that's made out of. And this is the basis for everything that is weaving clothes and fabric.

MOLLY BLOOM: After the wool is spun, Zefren is ready to weave. He does that at a device called a loom. That looks like a big, open picture frame. First, he sets up two wooden posts for the left and right sides of the loom.

ZEFREN ANDERSON: Between the two is put a very long, strong pole that is called the sky beam. This is the pole that carries the weight and tension of the weaving. And below, the last pole is called the Earth beam, which goes between both the right and left pole. This setup between all the different elements is a reflection of the bigger environment of our sky, the Earth, and all the elements between them.

MOLLY BLOOM: For weaving, yarn goes in two directions.

ZEFREN ANDERSON: Warp is the vertical strings that go up and down between the two posts that I mentioned, the sky and Earth beam. And the weft is the yarn that goes between the right and left posts. Between this loom frame, what makes a weaving weaving is going in and out of every other warp in a set sequence.

MOLLY BLOOM: Here's Zefren pulling the side to side weft yarn under then over different threads of up and down warp yarn. He builds the weaving upward from bottom to top. So the bottom part, he's already woven looks like a blanket. Above that, the empty up and down yarn looks almost like a fence made of yarn with gaps in between each thread.

As he weaves, he pushes down the fabric he's already woven. It sounds a little like a hammer. He uses a tool that looks like a wooden comb to push down the threads so his weaving stays together tightly. Those are the basics of weaving.

ZEFREN ANDERSON: And it's all this different types of counting, different types of colors that create all the weavings that all cultures around the world share.

SUBJECT 5: Brains, brains, Brains on.

NOAH: And now, for one wild and woolly song by our pal Danny Weinkauf.

MOLLY BLOOM: It's called What Else Wool?

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Proteins and lipids, what does that mean? Where does it come from? Where does it seem? How do we use it? How is it made? It's all around us from day to day.

Wool. Make sure a wooly coats. Rabbits, goats, or sheep. To make our rugs and clothes. Like it's full of sleeves. Proteins and lipids, what does that mean? Where does it come from? Where does it seem?

How do we use it? How was it made? It's all around us from day to day. Most come Australia, China, or the USA. It's even in the hammers of pianos that we play. Wool is used to make clothing, blankets, rugs, carpets, insulation, and upholstery, which is the inside of furniture. Even piano hammers are made from wool. That's the part of the piano that hit against the strings to make the sound of music.

Proteins and lipids, what does that mean? Where does it come from? Where does it seem? How do we use it? How is it made? It's all around us from day to day.

Wool is just about everywhere.

NOAH: Yeah. Even in pianos.

MOLLY BLOOM: A big wool yeah to Danny Weinkauf for that amazing song. When he's not spinning yarns about fabric, you can find him playing bass for the band, They Might Be Giants.

NOAH: To hear more of Danny's music, head to dannyweinkauf.com

MOLLY BLOOM: OK. That tune hopefully amped up your eardrums because it's time to go back to the mystery sound. Here it is one more time.

[WHIRRING]

[THUMP]

The last time you heard something spinning. Is there any new things you heard in there this time?

NOAH: I heard some sort of thump.

MOLLY BLOOM: Um-hmm. There's a spinning and a thump. And it has to do with sports.

NOAH: Let's see. Is it making a baseball? Because I know they use wool in the wrapping.

MOLLY BLOOM: That's an excellent guess. Are you ready for the answer?

NOAH: Yeah.

MOLLY BLOOM: Here it is.

MIKE THOMPSON: That was the sound of a pitching machine pitching a baseball.

MOLLY BLOOM: Nice work. So yes, baseball, and they do have wool inside. So have you seen those pitching machines where you like feed a ball and, there's two-- so you heard the spinning. You were totally right. There's like a spinning rubber wheel. And you feed the ball, and then it shoots the ball out so you can practice like you're hitting. Yeah. So that was the thump of the ball hitting the ground after it shot out of the machine.

NOAH: Cool.

MOLLY BLOOM: Mike Thompson is the chief marketing officer at Rawlings Sporting Goods, where they produce about 2 million baseballs every year, including balls for the Major League.

MIKE THOMPSON: Wool is used inside of every Major League Baseball. Quite a bit of wool actually. There's enough wool inside to get to the moon and a little ways back. So there's a lot of wool that goes in there.

MOLLY BLOOM: There are a few different layers to each ball. At the center, you'll find what's called the pill. This round piece of cork and rubber. You're probably familiar with the outside, two pieces of white leather, which get hand stitched together with red lace. In the middle of all that, three different layers of wool.

MIKE THOMPSON: You know, baseball is such a traditional sport. And not much has changed inside of baseball for about 100 years.

[WHIRRING]

[THUMP]

[MUSIC PLAYING]

MOLLY BLOOM: Wool is a natural fiber that comes from animals like sheep, alpacas, camels, and llamas.

NOAH: It's different from hair and has some pretty amazing abilities.

MOLLY BLOOM: It's able to absorb lots of moisture without feeling wet. It can soak up bad smells. And it's flame resistant.

NOAH: Plus it traps lots of air that helps keep you warm when it's cool out and cool when it's hot.

MOLLY BLOOM: Wool yeah. That's it for this episode of Brains On.

NOAH: Brains On is produced by Mark Sanchez, Sanden Totten, and Molly Bloom.

MOLLY BLOOM: The Alpaca Jack of our team is our fellow Menaka Wilhelm. She has so many superpowers. We had production help from [LISTING HONOR ROLL] We had engineering help from [LISTING HONOR ROLL] Special thanks to [LISTING HONOR ROLL]

Now, before we go, it's time for the moment of um--

REAGAN: If the Earth had rings, when you looked outside your window, would you see those rings?

LINDA SPILKER: My name is Linda Spilker. I work at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. I'm a planetary scientist and also the project scientist for a mission called Cassini. The Earth doesn't have rings. So much of what we know about rings comes from studying Saturn's rings.

And the Cassini spacecraft spent 13 years in orbit studying Saturn's rings. Saturn has the biggest, brightest, flashiest rings in the solar system. They're made mostly out of tiny particles of water ice. But embedded in that ice are also what you can think of as sort of like dirt.

Saturn isn't a perfect ball. It's squished a little bit. And so the fact that it looks like that also keeps the rings in a very narrow, what we call plain, like a thin piece of paper that orbits right around Saturn's equator. Now, imagine if the Earth had a ring. It would probably be at our equator. It would be something though wherever you would look across in the night sky, you would see a band that would be the rings.

If you were up, say in California or even higher like Minnesota, the rings might form what would look like a rainbow against the night sky lit up by the sun and shining into our eyes. And if you're right at the equator, the rings would be completely closed up, and you might just see a thin line.

You might wonder, why doesn't Earth have a ring or some of the other planets have rings? It turns out the tiny planets of Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars, none of them have rings. In the case of the Earth, our moon is so big that if the Earth tried to have a ring, the moon's gravity would probably very quickly tear that ring apart.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

MOLLY BLOOM: This list of names is the sun in the Brains On solar system. It's the Brains Honor Roll. These incredible listeners are kind enough to share their ideas, questions, drawings, and high fives with us.

We think they're out of this world. Simon from Minneapolis, Meghan from Churchville, New York, Rose from Maplewood, New Jersey. Dora, from Zagreb, Croatia, Liam from Tiffin, Ohio, Findlay from Charleston, South Carolina, Nora from Vancouver, Caden from Iowa, Max from Holly Springs, North Carolina, Ravi from Christchurch, New Zealand, William from Miami, Rosemary from Memphis, Ava from Scottsdale, Arizona, Zuma and Jela from Eureka, California, Alana from London, Averie from Easton, Pennsylvania, Angus from New Brunswick, Canada, Liana and Tony from Dubai, Liam from New York, Victoria from Coldstream, British Columbia.

Chiaki from San Diego, Laura and Braden from North Providence, Rhode Island, Ethan from Washington, Camilo from Alameda, California, Shruthi from North Carolina, Adriana and Amelia from Santa Fe, Cody from Long Beach, New York, Micaela from North Tustin, California, Megan and Carly from Arkansas, Benjamin from Pleasant Grove, Utah, Arlo from Pittsburgh, Khalifa from Doha, Qatar, Madison from Long Island, New York, Advait from Plymouth Minnesota.

Silas from Malden, Massachusetts, Reece from Monaco, Wisconsin, Jette from Memphis, Jasper from Portland, Oregon, Teddy from Saint Paul, Minnesota, Angus from New York City, Reagan from Jacksonville, Florida, Sophia from Northville Michigan, Landon Elijah and Ella from Vero Beach, Florida, Willa from Hornell, New York. Elise and Sasha from Somerville, Massachusetts, Emmett and Betty from Austin, Texas, Neil from Katonah, New York, Kiara from Menlo Park, California, Mercurious from Dumont, New Jersey, Audrey and Alice, Addie, and Jack Jack from New York City.

Oliver and Leon from Stevens, Pennsylvania, Milo from Redding, UK, Madeline from Burlington, Massachusetts, Noah and Adaline from Austin, Texas, Allison from Reading, Pennsylvania, Sam from Tennessee, Jordan from Mandeville, Louisiana, Amelia from Esko, Minnesota, Charlotte from Pittsburgh, Eliza and Theo from Noblesville, Indiana, and Anne Marie from West Des Moines, Iowa.

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We'll be back soon with more answers to your questions.

NOAH: Thanks for listening.