A thick blurb from the boston globe, beautifully written and disturbingly funny as her previous books, grunt examines the researchers who are leading the charge in these state of the art developments. An engaging anecdote of reflection. Mary is also the author of the curious coupling of science and sex, spook, science tackles the afterlife and stiff the curious lives of human cadavers. And her writing has a appeared in about every magazine you can possibly imagine. Shes going to be in conversation with our own jeff greenwald, the author of five bestselling books including shopping for buddhas, future perfect how star trek captured planet earth, and jeff is also on our factory factory. [laughter] yeah, jeff works in our factory. [laughter] and besides that, hes also on the faculty of our travel writers conference, so if there are budding writers in the audience tonight, you can find out more about our conferences. Theres a mystery one in july and one in august, and jeff will be on the faculty of that. And you can find out all the information about those before you leave tonight or in our newsletter. So without further ado, would you please welcome mary roche and jeff greenwald. [applause] hi. Hi. [laughter] do you want to say anything about your voice, or will your voice speak for itself . Yeah. Well, im a few act to haves lower due to a case of well, its not laryngitis anymore. You can hear me now. Anyway, im hoping it holds out. Weve got tea here, so should be good. Thanks, everybody, for coming. Thank you, dana, for the great introduction. Im going to start with this question, mary. You work with sprouts from very unusual seeds, so what gave birth to grunt . Actually, it was close to it was a seed. It was a chili pepper. I was reporting a piece on the worlds hottest chili pepper. I was in india, and someone told me when i was reporting on this chili pepper and this contest where people eat it, someone said, you know, the Indian Military weaponized this chili pepper, and i thought, well, i really need to report on that. I went over to this science lab that the indian Army Maintains to talk to them about the chili pepper which theyd never deployed because the man said it was prone to mildew. [laughter] so it kind of bombed. Oh, well. So the exploding chili pepper grenade never was deployed. But while i was there, there were other interesting things going on. They were working on a leech repellant that was right up my alley. I dont know, a leech repel hasnt. Repellant. I thought military science sounds far more esoteric and more roachable than you might think, and thats what got the ball rolling. Yeah. The roachable thing is something id like to ask you about. All of your books are wonderful, theyre scientifically enlightening, and theyre really funny and kind of breezy, a lot of hem. Did you feel any sort of worry about bringing this kind of lightness or breeziness or humor to the world of soldiers which are kind of sacred in the United States right now . Soldiers are our heroes, they sacrifice a hot. How did you feel about bringing your humor to that subject . A lot of trepidation about that, a lot of concern. You know, i wanted to, i have to, i have to be me. I gotta be me. Its got to be a mary roach book. So it had to be funny, it had to have some levity. On the other hand, like you said, this is war, and and people are injured in many ways, and i didnt want to be disrespectful or make light of things in an inappropriate way. So i tended to make fun of myself as the clueless outsider that i truly was. For example, i would at one point i have a chapter on, basically, how do you, how to design a vehicle basically automotive safety for people who drive on bombs. You know, how do you create a vehicle that will keep the passenger safe if a bomb comes up from underneath. So they were showing me around this large armored vehicle, and they were talking about how it had to be stripped down. You couldnt just keep adding more armor, because that would make it so heavy, itd be be too heavy for the engine, for the brakes, etc. So it was very stripped down inside. And i said, oh, its great you still have cup holders. And the guy said, mary, those are rifle holders. [laughter] and that kind of thing would happen over and over because i really am not i havent spent any time in the military. My father was very old, he was 65 when i was born. He actually enlisted in world war i. He was born in england but lived here and made it as far as basic training where he got a hernia, and that was that for the illustrious roach military career. So is this feeding . I think it is. So in terms of your being kind of this person who blunders into these situations without knowing much about them, youve covered so many subjects now. The last one that was similar to grunt was packing for mars. Was it harder to get access to the military or to the Space Program . You would think the military, but in fact, it wasnt as difficult as nasa. The military was very, they were very straightforward. It was either is this prompt classified . Project classified . If so, then no. Right up front, no. If it wasnt classified, people were very helpful and willing to kind of, you know, help me. The problem, the difficulty was it wasnt that people were saying no, it was nobody felt they had the authority to say yes, so youd have like 15 people, you know, i cant say yes, but i think you have to ask these people. And those people it was sort of pingponging back and forth. It tooking a year and a half to get on a Trident Submarine, you know, a year and a half. And not, again, it was just trying to find the, just a way on there. In that case, partly because i wanted to be only on for a few days, not the months that theyre out there. [laughter] you know, i do like to immerse myself in reporting, but it has its limits. The good news is you can getten on, the bad news is get on, the bad news is youll be on for 12 months. Exactly. The beauty in your books is all the details, sort of unforgettable. In your chapter about military uniforms, you mentioned the United States government buttons specification guide is 22 pages long. And i was amazed to read that the army requires that its clothing designers have a Fashion Design degree. Isnt that sort of an oxymoron . Well, yeah, you would think so. I was surprised as well. Be and the woman that i was talking to in the design lab at munich labs munich labs is where they design, basically, the accessories of being a soldier, the clothing, the things you carry, the things you sleep in, tents, sleeping bags, whatever. They have a design lab for the uniforms, and this woman had a fashion be degree, and she her background was in swim wear design. I thought, that makes no kind of sense to me. And she said, well, actually, if you think about it, it does. Because a bathing suit is for a specialized activity, athletic activity, its in a specialized environment, its water. So it has to be, you know, it has to give, it has to react with the water in a certain way. So, in fact, she felt that her background in swim suit design was, in fact, a fairly appropriate one. And the other woman there had worked for priscillas of boston, highend wedding gowns. [laughter] she said here again, okay, whats a wedding gown . Be its a layering of specialty fabrics, very similar to body armor. [laughter] which you might just need. [laughter] one thing we learn from your book is some things that you think would be a lot of great danger to soldiers like sharks, say, if they go overboard are actually no problem at all, but some things you really dont think about like diarrhea with, which is are a gigantic problem. Why is diarrhea such a grave problem for soldiers . [laughter] well, let me tell you. [laughter] well, first of all, theres historically diarrhea was, theres a dr. William osler had a great quote. I dont know, father of modern medicine. I dont know much about him, thats just what they call him. He was one that said dysentery has been more fatal to soldiers than the powders or shot. Seven soldiers died from dysentery and disease versus one killed in combat. And what would happen, you would have these field camps, and youve got the mess tent where youre preparing food, no refrigeration, and youve got an open, like, pit latrine and flies, unbelievable number of flies also attracted if there were any bodies around. So the flies were landing in the latrine material and buzzing over to the beans, so the flies land on the crap, and then they have these pathogens on their feet, and they inoculate the food which sits there for two hours, and then the whole camp gets dissenner the orally or yellow fever, typhoid fever, whatever the pathogen is. So it was a tremendous problem. Now its not because theres good hygiene on bases, theres the bases, we have airconditioning, so the whole Dining Facility could be sealed. You never have to open a window, so theres no flies anymore. So thats not a problem. But it is a problem if youre in, say, special operations, youre one of those guys going out in a small unit in, say, a small village in small somalia or yemen, and those people are eating with the locals eat, and the water is often not safe and the food. And the rates of diarrhea with those folks are very high, twice the rate of ordinary enlisted soldiers. And you can imagine if you were going to, i dont know, take down osama bin laden, whatever your assignment was, and you are hit with extreme gastrointestinal urgency, thats a problem. Do they have any miracle drugs we dont know about . Well, they were testing i went all the way to djibouti, africa, for the diarrhea chapter. [laughter] thats just the kind of gal i am. [laughter] and in a lot of special operations, navy seals, etc. , going out to various yemen, somalia, north africa. And i went with a Diarrhea Researcher who was testing a very quick, onedose regimen where you would at least be, you know, back on your feet in a few in a matter of hours rather than days. So thats one thing. Thats what they were testing. So thats top secret9. Top secret. No, actually, itll be coming soon to a drugstore near you. [laughter] one thing that was interesting in the book, you know, we always sort of take for granted that mexico is kind of like the poster child for travelers, you know, but how mexico won that honor is kind of an interesting little story. Yeah. If you go on to club meld which is a club med which is a database of all the medical journals, most of them anyway, and you put in diarrhea and guadalajara, you will get 35 medical journals. Its like synonymous with diarrhea. Because herbert dubont, the godfather of Diarrhea Research honestly, this man has done more for counteracting diarrhea than any man on the planet, i dont know if hes retired now. Anyway, he set up he thought, where are people getting sick . He set up a lab at the university using students and tourists as his study subjects and published a lot of papers out of guadalajara. Do you think the reason hes never won a nobel prize in medicine is just because the Nobel Committee is embarrassed to call him up . I would think hes probably won an ignobel. [laughter] you dressed up at one point for this role as a journalist, you were with a group called strategic operations, was that the name of it . Yep. You had to play a role in the theatrical recreation of a war scene. What was that like . What was the role that you played . Well, strategic operations is, its a big movie studio in Southern California that is now used for training combat medics and Navy Corpsmen who do the med icine for the marine corps. The films made there used to be action films, war films, so their really good at theyre really good at violence, gore, loud explosions. And they have actors come in. Its hyperrealistic is the word that they use, theyve trademarked the word, hyperrealistic. Medics and corpsmen, and i think some of them are women, and theyre come anything, and they are immersed in this scenario. Its very intense. Theyre got pyrotechnics. Theyre duds, but they sound real. And they have dust hits so it looks like rifle fires actually happening. There are actors, some of whom are amputees who have of a latex sleeve on the stump with, you know, really impressive gore is and a backpack with stage blood that is pumped at an accurate rate. And theres a Remote Control for the bleeding, and if the Navy Corpsman is putting the tourniquet on properly, the bleeding will slow, and its not properly, they continue to bleed, and the actor, you know, gets very quiet. And meanwhile the instructors are screaming. Its a very tense scenario. In order to get close enough so i could see what was going on, i requested a role. And they were like, well, we dont know what to do with you. [laughter] i suggested that i just play a journalist who gets in the way. [laughter] i was typecast. So that, thats what i did. How did these doctors do in that situation . Did they keep their calm . Was there reason to feel confident about their abilities in the field . It was a big difference between the it was a twoday course. The first round of experiment, of simulations versus the last, there was a tremendous difference. The first one was, you know, there would be a guy who would go to pick up a stretcher, and you have to coordinate picking up a stretcher. If the other guy on the other end doesnt know, the patient falls off. [laughter] and this one guy, baker, kept he did that twice. Another time he stood the wrong way, so he was backing up. [laughter] meanwhile, you know, the instructors like, baker, you know, just yelling. A lot of words i cant use on cspan2. [laughter] was it fun or were you actually kind of terrified . Did you get in the spirit of the acting . You definitely, your adrenaline gets going. And just partly from the loud noises and the startle response from the gunfire be even though its not real. And thats part of whats important, because the fight be or flight response, you get this boost of adrenaline, the fight or flight response is great if you need to fight or runaway, but if you need to cut an Emergency Airway or apply a tourniquet or do a decompression when somebodys lung has collapsed, thats not helpful for you. So they need to be practicing these skills in, like, the worst physical scenario when youre flooded with adrenaline x that makes their hands shake. So thats kind of what so it wasnt so much i was afraid, you know, for my life, but you definitely arent its not a relaxing afternoon. [laughter] yeah. You became sort of a method actor at that moment. Yeah. One thing i love about your books is you get to meet all these scientists who youd otherwise never hear of, some people who are on the front lines of some obscure form of research. What are the qualities that attract you in a scientist when you do these books . You know, i dont know who theyre going to be until i go to meet them. Often ive only exchanged emails. Scientists in general tend to be really interesting people. I had no idea what george peck would be like. George peck worked for walter reed, the department of military entomology. He was of the silk fly and maggot guy and not at all kind of what i expected. A very sensitive, philosophical soul who loved nature in all its forms, including the maggot. He had such maggots are used, i should say, i should, you know, explain. Maggots in a wound perform this amazing function. They eat the dead tissue which encourages the growth of the new tissue, and they fight infection in that way. So they do debreedment which is typically do surgically. But in world war ii, these soldiers would come in with these horrible wounds, and the wounds were doing great, they werent infected. So george peck was looking into using maggots at walter reed for some of the ied injuries. The iud injuries . [laughter] yeah. Exactly, yeah. The iud jurors. He tried to put this on me two weeks ago at a talk. Jeff said toalt, so, mary, when you talk about soldiers who have been hurt by iuds [laughter] im sorry. [laughter] sorry. Its all right. You did it this time. [laughter] anyway, yeah. When an ied goes off, because its a buried explosive, it blasts all this debris and sand and dirt deeply into the wound. And so theres a lot of problems with infection. So george peck was looking at bringing maggots into the armory of the surgeon and, like, trying to get people okay with that. But he, so he said, you know, he had me over to dinner, and he said ill raise a clutch of maggots for you [laughter] specially for you. And when you arrive, theyll be the same age as the maggots we introduce into wounds. So i got there, and we had dinner, and we i was finishing my wine, and george peck went away, and he came back with what looks to me like a cut glass bowl with chocolate pudding [laughter] but it was actually raw liver with my clutch of maggots in there happily feeding, which is what maggots do. They love to eat. Anyway, george was saying look at he took, he said, you know, put a couple of them on my finger tip, and he had me look at them outside the context of the raw liver, you know, or whatever you know, maggots, its all context. When you take them out of the rotting body or the liver, theyre cute. Theyre kind of like the size of a cupcake sprinkle. Really . They are, theyre very cute. [laughter] all right. They are. He was like those little creatures, those mandibles can do what no surgeons scalpel can do. He had this real just tremendous respect and passion for these little creatures. I love someone like george peck. [laughter] i didnt know that thats what i was getting when i showed up there, but anyway have you heard from george peck since the books come out . Just to thank me for the book. I dont know if hes read it yet. I didnt want get any feedback. He and his maggots are some of the, you know, most memorable characters in the book. However many maggots you came in contact with. However many. Among the strangest programs you report on in grunt is the armys attempt to create a truly noxious stink bomb. Yeah. But it wasnt really a bomb, or was it . No. What actually is it . You mean the world war ii one or the more recent one . The more recent one. The more recent one, its a malodorant. Its a horrible smell used to clear a room. Like, if i had one here in my bag [laughter] thats actually not, no, its not. I did have, i did have one called stench soup which was the most effective crosscultural hi in any context, this was the stink that everyone loathed and feared. [laughter] and i had a sample. And actually my idea, were i not here tonight, i had an idea that perhaps the place i should open the samples was the Republican National convention. [laughter] [applause] yeah. Yeah. Let us metaphorically right now open [laughter] open the stench soup and hold our noses. I think it would be redun adapt. [laughter] redundant. Yeah. So, but stench soup is interesting because how it