Did Science Find It Yet?

**Kiki Sanford** (0:00)
This is TWIS. This Week in Science, episode number 1072, recorded on Wednesday, August 19th, 2026 Did science find it yet? Hey, everyone, I'm Dr. Kiki. And tonight on the show, we're looking for stuff that will fill your head with cheese, cancer, and cannibalism. But first, thanks to our amazing Patreon sponsors for their generous support of TWIS. You can become a part of the Patreon community at patreon.com/thisweek in Science. Disclaimer, disclaimer, disclaimer!
As scientists peer into the depths of the universe, find fast stars and evidence for glue balls, questions keep coming about the future of science. Who will be able to do science? Who will pay for science? Who will own science? Why don't we worry about these questions? Why do we fret about an endeavor that has historically been closed to so many?
Well, if science is not free, then neither are we. So ponder this information in This Week in Science, coming up next.

**Blair Bazdarich** (1:52)
Good science to you, Kiki.

**Kiki Sanford** (1:55)
And a good science to you too, Blair, and everyone out there. Welcome to another episode of This Week in Science. We are back again to talk about all the science we decided to bring to the show this week. Because we have some good stuff for you. It's been a decent week, you know, lots of stuff going on. You can't rest for a minute these days, but we've got some cancer vaccine success I want to talk about. There are some super powered centenarians, well, super powered super centenarians that are out there. And I have some cheesy news in addition to how we might actually be able to think ourselves well, the impact of being a sugar baby and how you move.
What did you bring, Blair?

**Blair Bazdarich** (2:44)
I brought, oh gosh.
Standby. I brought holotypes and I brought sexual cannibalism.

**Kiki Sanford** (2:59)
So, holotypes, I am going to guess it, not everybody knows what they are.

**Blair Bazdarich** (3:03)
No, we're going to talk about it.

**Kiki Sanford** (3:05)
And so everyone went, holo what? And then you said sexual cannibalism and everyone went, okay.

**Blair Bazdarich** (3:10)
Yeah. So, yeah, which is a throwback. I feel like I have not talking about, talking, talking. Wow, this is an interesting show. I've not talked about sexual cannibalism in a long time. I feel like that was my go-to for the first few years I was on this show. But very much so. It's coming back today.
Oh, it's back in vogue. Yeah.

**Kiki Sanford** (3:30)
It's kind of chic. That should be our, that should be our meme for the week. Sexual cannibalism, it's kind of chic.

**Blair Bazdarich** (3:38)
Yeah.

**Kiki Sanford** (3:39)
Yeah.
Jumping on the meme wagon, you guys. All right. Well, we are here to bring you this show full of science this week. And since you're here, I want to remind you that you can subscribe to TWIS any place that podcasts are found. Look for This Week in Science. Look for that orangey starburst logo and hit subscribe or share it with your friends. Additionally, we are on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitch.
Every week that we are live at 8 p.m. Pacific Time-ish on Wednesday evenings. And then finally, if you have questions about the show, want to know information about stories that we talk about, head over to twis.org where our show notes live. And other than that, well, oh yeah, that's also where our Patreon is. You can click on the Patreon link and get into our Patreon community, or also link to our Zazzle store where you can find some of our cool merchandise that's out there. But now it's time for the science. Are you ready for this?

**Blair Bazdarich** (4:38)
Bring it to me.

**Kiki Sanford** (4:40)
All right. Bring it down. I know a lot of locations have been talking about this already this week. It is the big story for the week, even though it really hasn't been published yet. This is early.

**Blair Bazdarich** (4:54)
That's always good.

**Kiki Sanford** (4:56)
These are early clinical trial results that have been announced by Merck and Moderna.
Now, you might recognize the name of the company Moderna. And when you think Moderna, what do you think, Blair?

**Blair Bazdarich** (5:12)
COVID vaccine. Yes.

**Kiki Sanford** (5:15)
This has nothing to do with a COVID vaccine. It's all about cancer vaccine.

**Blair Bazdarich** (5:20)
Okay.

**Kiki Sanford** (5:20)
Yeah. So even before the pandemic came, people were working on the idea of using MRNA to allow for personalized vaccines for many different ailments. Cancer being one of them. One of the reasons that we end up with cancers is because we have individual mutations that are hard for the body to overcome. And in the case that our immune system can't do it by itself, the idea is that maybe we could help it along. And so these vaccines, and we did report, I think, earlier on the phase one and phase two trials, this is now the phase three trial results. They still need to be analyzed for sure by independent experts, not just the people at Merck and Moderna. But the vaccine that they're using is called Intismaran. And it's given in combination with another immunotherapy drug that's called Ketruda. And the two of them together reduce the amount of time that, well, it increases, I was going to say reduce. It reduces cancer, risk of the disease. It reduces the risk of cancers spreading to other organs, and it increases the time that patients are cancer-free.