The Science Pawdcast

Episode 34 Season 7: Brain Wash, Golden Genes, and The Chief Bubble Dude to chat BUBBLES!

• Jason and Kris Zackowski • Season 7 • Episode 34

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When the brain gets knocked, it fights back—at least for a while. We open with new research that uses ALPS MRI to watch the glymphatic “waste rivers” of the brain as they surge after repeated head impacts and then falter when the system is pushed too far. That real-time look at fluid flow explains why early symptoms can be misleading and why rest, recovery windows, and better sideline calls aren’t just policy—they’re neuroprotection. We talk sports protocols, long-term risk, and how biomarkers could warn athletes before decline sets in.

Then we lean into joy with rigor. Our pet science segment dives into a Cambridge study of more than a thousand golden retrievers showing that genes tied to trainability, fear of strangers, energy, and dog-to-dog aggression overlap with human genes for anxiety, depression, and intelligence. It’s not destiny; it’s sensitivity. We unpack how emotional regulation genes shape learning and coping, why some “bad” behavior is actually distress, and how training plans can be kinder and more effective when they support the nervous system, not just reward the behavior.

To cap it off, we welcome John Reider,, the chief bubble dude behind Atomic Bubbles, for a whimsical masterclass in safe, scented bubbles for pets. He breaks down cosmetic-grade ingredients, water-soluble fragrances, and machine-friendly formulas that make durable bubbles dogs and cats actually chase. We explore lavender and pheromone-infused bubbles as floating diffusers for calming anxious pets, plus practical notes on storage, allergy concerns, and why bacon and peanut butter scents work without real allergens.

Curious about brain health, dog behavior, and the science of pure fun? Hit play, subscribe for more smart, warm conversations, and share this episode with a friend who loves science—and their pets.


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SPEAKER_03:

Hello, science enthusiasts. I'm Jason Zakowski.

SPEAKER_02:

And I'm Chris Zakkowski.

SPEAKER_03:

We're the pet parents of Bunsen, Beaker, Bernoulli, and Ginger.

SPEAKER_02:

The science animals on social media. If you love science and you love pets, you've come to the right spot. So put on your safety glasses and hold on to your tail.

SPEAKER_03:

This is the Science Podcast. Welcome back to the Science Podcast. We hope you're happy and healthy out there. This is episode 34 of season seven. Chris, are you enjoying the nice weather we've had the last couple days?

SPEAKER_02:

Jason, we woke up today to what minus 25?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, it was cold this morning.

SPEAKER_02:

It was chilly, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Mm-hmm. And of course, the dogs, especially the burners, are impervious to it and they love snow. So we haven't had a lot of snow, and then it snowed and it melted, and then it snowed again and then got super cold. So all of them are way more concerned with playing in the snow than going to the bathroom, as I'm freezing to death this morning taking them out. So I think in a couple weeks I'll be acclimated to it. But yeah, that was a bit of a shock this morning. Okay. All right, what's on our show this week? In Science News, we're going to talk about a new presentation by the Radiological Society of North America about head injuries and the ability of the brain to basically waste clean toxins. So it's an interesting take on how head injuries can affect us. And in science news, it's actually one that you found, Chris. It was about how golden retrievers and humans are maybe more similar than we think genetically.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it was super cool when I found that one. I was like, yep, this is a good one.

SPEAKER_03:

In our ask an expert section, and it is the chief bubble guy, John Ryder. So he's going to be talking to us about bubbles, which uh is near and dear to my heart because I love bubbles. I think they're whimsical.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, so much so that you should have got the bubble mix out to freeze the bubbles because it was so cold. You could do your snow globe science with your bubbles.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, that's fun. All right, let's get on with it. There's no time lake.

SPEAKER_02:

Science time.

SPEAKER_03:

This week in Science News, we're going to talk about some new findings that will be presented to the radiological society of North America about how repeated head injuries are causing issues with the brain's ability to waste clean. Now, I understand that repeated head injuries can lead to some pretty serious cognitive issues. And we associate those sports like boxing and mixed martial arts and even football with repeated head injuries. Do you hear that about some of your students in football, Chris, that they do get some pretty severe head injuries?

SPEAKER_02:

Actually, Jason, that's really interesting because in the classroom I see new protocols being followed for concussions. Whereas before you might have said, oh, and not been worried about it as a parent. Yep, that's just something that happens playing football, crunching helmets, or mixed martial arts or boxing. Now it's quite a concern, and we have very specific protocols to follow when a student has a head injury.

SPEAKER_03:

Sport-related traumatic brain injuries, TBIs, they make up 30% of all brain injuries. And it's not just football. I'm just saying football because that's the most common likelihood at our school. I've had kids with really bad concussions and they play volleyball. They just got smoked in the head by a spike one game and it led to a concussion. And previous studies have already concluded that repeated head impacts are directly linked to a risk for neurodegenerative disease and neuropsychiatric conditions. So they they're pretty, it's pretty well established that if you smoke your head more than once, you increase your risk every time of something going wrong really bad.

SPEAKER_02:

Right. And this study focused on the lymphatic system, which is the brain's waste disposal network and how it appeared to weaken over time after repeated blows to the head.

SPEAKER_03:

So this is not something I'm an expert on, right? Like I'm more chemistry-based than human anatomy-based. So I'm going off some of the research. So your brain has fluid-filled chambers, and these push waste products, toxins, and other byproducts of metabolism out of your brain, like from its nor normal processes, it's gonna make some, it's gonna make some waste. It functions similarly to your body's lymphatic system, but it's localized within brain tissue. These channels help maintain fluid balance, but they also deliver nutrients and immune cells to the brain, and they protect your brain during injury by buffering against blows or damage, or even, God forbid, something gets through your skull.

SPEAKER_02:

I would love to talk about the methodology that the researchers use to measure lymphatic function. So they used something called diffusion tensor imaging along the paravascular space, DTI Alps, and that is an advanced MRI technique that actually tracks water movement in lymphatic pathways. And it was a non-invasive biomarker of lymphatic health. And they said, or they found lower ALPS values have been associated with cognitive decline in diseases like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, which we have talked on the podcast about before.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So poor glyc, but so poor lymphatic function may allow damaged proteins to accumulate, which contributes to various dementias.

SPEAKER_03:

And all of this is about those fluid-filled chambers, right? Or channels in your brain. So if they can track the fluid, that maybe should there should be more of it moving in and out, obviously, just like a river, as the river starts to dry up but leaves stuff behind. And the stuff that it leaves behind, not so good for your brain. This data came from the professional athletes' brain health study that was run by Cleveland Clinic. It tracks 900 active fighters. So we're dealing mostly with the folks who are most at risk. And 300 of them and 300 of them had been followed for at least three years. 95 out of the 280 fighters in total had cognitive impairment at baseline. And then they were matched against 20 people as control. So of those fighters, 95 of them had something they would consider significant, significantly going on with their brain, and their control was just normal, normal people off the street that had no problem.

SPEAKER_02:

What the researchers expected to find was cognitively impaired fighters to have a lower ALPS value at the start. But instead, impaired fighters had significantly higher ALPS values initially compared to unimpaired fighters. But over time, those ALPS values dropped sharply in impaired athletes. And actually the lymphatic function declined further as the number of knockouts increased. And they oof, yeah, they interpreted this where the brain actually may initially ramp up its waste clearing activity as a response to repeated trauma. Your brain's, hey, this isn't very good. I need to ramp up my cleanup crew. But with continued head impacts, the system becomes overloaded and it eventually weakens. So at a certain point, the brain's, I can't keep up and I'm just going to give up.

SPEAKER_03:

An analogy might be there's some grade nines making a mess at lunch and you're okay cleaning it up. So you know they're going to be messy. So maybe you get there early with an extra mop, but then over time, you don't have enough time to clean it up and the mess spreads. And eventually you're just like, this is stupid. Why am I cleaning up after the grade nines? And then you just leave. Sorry if you're a grade nine student listening, but make sure to tell your friends to clean up at lunch.

SPEAKER_02:

That's right. That's what I tell the kids. I'm like, uh, please clean up your mess.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. So understanding these vulnerabilities could enable early detection of brain degeneration. So they could track the ALPS index, giving them more rest or medical intervention, or at least perhaps saying what you're doing is going to damage your brain long term. So maybe look at a different career that doesn't allow you to get knocked out all the time. The importance, though, is intervening before symptoms appear. So perhaps all of this information will give scientists and doctors that toolset to tell these fighters knock it off without getting knocked out.

SPEAKER_02:

Ooh, there you go. That's right. That could be crucial for protecting lifelong brain health.

SPEAKER_03:

Now I was in martial arts for a while.

SPEAKER_02:

I know. So reading this study was a problem for me, Jason, because you definitely got hit in the head quite a few times.

SPEAKER_03:

I did. Yeah. Not hard though. Like, not enough. I never I got hit once really hard in a tournament, actually. But like when we were sparring, we had headgear on, and I we had I always wore a mouth guard, and we never hit each other at a hundred percent. Like we weren't trying to knock each other out at all. It was more like heavy tag, if that makes sense. So if you got kicked or punched in the head, you knew you got hit, but it never really hurt. I don't know if that I don't know if that helps.

SPEAKER_02:

No, it doesn't because you definitely sparred against Gavin, who is a large mammal.

SPEAKER_03:

He's a huge dude, very strong guy, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

And very strong.

SPEAKER_03:

Definitely had to work on my defense for sure. If I was paired with that guy, he made me better. Yeah, and yeah, in the tournament, the ref called stop, and the guy just decked me. Anybody going into martial arts, you always gotta defend yourself. I was not expecting that. I got drilled pretty hard and my jaw locked up for a second. Uh, I don't think I ever told you that. But I was like, oh my god, my jaw's broken. But it loosened up after a bit. And I won the match. So there you go.

SPEAKER_02:

There you go, but not really.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Okay. That's science news for this week. This week in Pet Science, let's talk about golden retrievers, Chris.

SPEAKER_02:

I know. We actually have a golden retriever. Her name is Beaker. Oh, she's a control. I know. And so every time I see things about golden retrievers or Bernice Mountain Dogs, or actually really any dog or cat, my ears perk up for sure.

SPEAKER_03:

Your our niece and nephew were over. I guess there's actually like our great niece and nephew, Rafi and Ellie. And Beaker is always so gentle. Like she just sits proudly and they pet her. Whereas Bernoulli gets a little wild. He likes to run around and what did Bruno, what did Rafi say? Bernoulli knocked him over like a Bammittin or something. He was playing Bammitton with him. Something.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And then he was like, Bunsen is such a good boy, and Beaker is such a good girl, and Bernoulli is crazy.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Bernoulli's a lot.

SPEAKER_03:

But he but he's young, and Rafi was running around screaming. So that just that nothing I watched the TikTok guy and he was talking about there is nothing dogs love more than to be riled up. You're not supposed to rile up dogs, but some dogs just love to get riled up. And Bernoulli, it is his favorite thing to get riled up. He just loves it.

SPEAKER_02:

I was very proud of Bernoulli, though, because in the past in the past, he gets the humping sensation, and he did not at all with Rafi this time. So that was a win.

SPEAKER_03:

Let's head back to golden retrievers because that's what the study's about. Researchers have discovered that genes influencing golden retriever behavior. So this includes some of the breed-specific things we've talked about before, their ability to be trained, golden retrievers are relatively easy to train. They're not really fearful of strangers, they have lots of energy and low aggression. Those traits that golden retrievers have are influenced by genes, may also influence human personality and mental health. So this provides perhaps evidence that golden and humans share genetic roots for emotional and behavioral traits. Ah, that's so cute.

SPEAKER_02:

It is so cute. If I could just be like Beaker, um, I'm sure the world would love me.

SPEAKER_03:

But the study also loves people. She loves.

SPEAKER_02:

She loves people. She loves people with a force of a thousand hurricanes. She just loves them.

SPEAKER_03:

On her last nerve, though, Chris. You gotta watch out for that.

SPEAKER_02:

I've seen that happen. I've seen that happen. And I've seen her protective side of bricks when Bernoulli is, I think I'm gonna go see Bricks over there. And she's like, No, you're not, Bark. Um, but this study offers also a deeper understanding of maybe why individual dogs vary so widely in fearfulness, uh, energy aggression, and trainability, those traits that you are looking at.

SPEAKER_03:

This study comes from the University of Cambridge, and it was published in the proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Good get, Chris. That's from a good journal. We've used this one before. And it's the first study to show direct overlap between genes linked to canine behavior and genes associated with human emotional traits. The three they looked at were anxiety, depression, and intelligence. And they based it on the analysis of over a thousand golden retrievers genetic data and compared it to a huge detailed behavioral questionnaire completed by owners.

SPEAKER_02:

So, in terms of the genetic findings, the researchers identified genes connected to specifically trainability, energy levels, fear of strangers, and aggression towards other dogs. And they cross-referenced this with human genetic studies. They found that 12 dog genes were found to influence human behavior and emotional regulation as well. One of the genes that they found was the PTPN1 gene. And in dogs, that gene is associated with aggression towards other dogs. Whereas in humans, that gene is associated with intelligence and depression.

SPEAKER_03:

You have to be really smart but sad all the time.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, exactly. Another gene variation found in fearful golden retrievers linked to fear of other dogs. But in humans, it associated it with dwelling on embarrassment and high educational achievement.

SPEAKER_03:

Weird.

SPEAKER_02:

It is weird, but it does have implications for training behavior and care of your animals. So the findings revealed that some dogs are genetically predisposed to stress or emotional sensitivity. And sometimes their quote-unquote bad behavior may sometimes reflect genetically driven distress, not disobedience. So, as you and I have always said, all dogs are good dogs, but sometimes you see bad behavior or behavior that's poor choice, and maybe they can't help it. Maybe it's just that reflection of their genetics. So, knowing that owners can better tailor their training, their routines, and their care by recognizing genetically influenced emotional tendencies in their dog. And I always say that, like with our dogs, I we watch them very carefully when they're happy, healthy, but then also when they're not happy and unhealthy, noticing that and trying to catch things as they come. And lastly, behavioral traits like fearfulness may respond well to treatments used for human conditions, like using anti-anxiety meds when appropriate. But for that, make sure you reach out to your vet person, your vet.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, don't listen to our advice on the podcast. We're just we're just breaking down the science. Another gene, R-O-M-O-1, was linked to trainability in golden retrievers. And ironically, in humans, this gene was tried tied the and ironically in humans, this gene is tied to intelligence and emotional sensitivity. This may suggest that dog training isn't only mechanical. Emotional regulation genes may affect how well a dog learns. So training should therefore consider emotional support, not just giving them a treat based on their behavior and how you want to shape it.

SPEAKER_02:

That's right. When we have gone through dog training, we've been encouraged to make training fun, make training exciting, change up your voice, all those things to make the dog respond more on a potentially an emotional level, as opposed to just doing the thing because we want them to do the thing. Now we're very fortunate that our dogs are food motivated, so they love to do the thing. They say, Hi, my name is Bernoulli. I work for treats. He does work for treats. He works for treats, but he also works for that high praise and that love. Like he, of all of our dogs, is responds very highly to that positive reinforcement.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, he just wants to make you proud. He just like beams when he gets it. It's really cute. Just a heads up, the study did mention that these genes do not produce specific behaviors. If you have a gene for fearfulness, your the dog will be aggressive. Instead, they just influence overall states of emotion, their sensitivity to stress, and their behavior regulation. They may have some of these genes that code for these influences, but the dog may not show them. They may have a steady emotional state despite them being gene coded to not. Dogs with non-social fear, so like they're scared of things like vacuum cleaners or buses, they present uh they possess a gene that in humans contributes to irritability and anxiety, similar to humans being anxious or sensitive about stuff. Pets don't just share our homes, they also share our psychological challenges of the modern environment. Oh man, we were at Costco today. Costco stresses me out. That's too many people getting bananas and stuff in the same area.

SPEAKER_02:

It was a lot today. Boy oh boy. There was a lot of people in there.

SPEAKER_03:

If I felt like barking at people, and if I was a dog, I'd be like, what is this place? That is not a normal place. That is a modern environment that we were never genetically selected to deal with. We just have to deal with it.

SPEAKER_02:

I love Costco.

SPEAKER_03:

If you're wondering where the if you're wondering where the genes for these dogs and how they were analyzed came from, that comes from the Golden Retriever Lifetime Study that's tracked thousands of dogs since 2012. And then they have also had a questionnaire for a bunch of people in the study. They analyzed blood samples from the dogs and searched their entire genome for the genetic markers associated with each behavioral category. So just as an aside, there, they did actually look at the genes of the golden retrievers, which is cool.

SPEAKER_02:

That is so cool.

SPEAKER_03:

We maybe should cut Beaker some slack. Maybe she has some of those genes that were identified in this study. Maybe. All right. That's pet science for this week. It's time for Ask an Expert on the Science podcast. And I'm thrilled to welcome John Ryder, the chief bubble dude of Techno Bubbles. John, how are you doing today?

SPEAKER_00:

Jason, I'm doing wonderful. Glad to glad to be with you and your listeners this evening, man. It's awesome.

SPEAKER_03:

I'm very excited to talk to you about bubbles. They're whimsical. And just as an aside to maybe give you an idea why I'm excited to talk about it, is I present at teachers' conventions and I present on the science of bubbles. That's one of my things that I do with my students. So I'm all in on the bubbles. I understand how whimsical they are. I used to do about five experiment experiments when I would show this to teachers, and we never got through the bubble one. They just became little kids and wanted to play with the bubbles all day long. So yeah, magic stuff.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, isn't that amazing how that little soapy sphere can transport even uh even a grown person back to their childhood and just make them smile and just uh bring back all those awesome memories of playing with bubbles as a kid, huh?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, no matter how deep we push it, the child in us wants out all the time. So yeah, that's very true.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Where are you in the world, though? I always ask our guests where are you calling into the show from?

SPEAKER_00:

You know what? I am right in the middle, St. Louis, Missouri. We're almost smack dab, right in the middle of the United States. Uh great part of the country. We love it here.

SPEAKER_03:

I'll have to get down there one of these days. Just you'll laugh. I arrived with a little bit of time to spare for this interview because it's blizzarding right now for us. So much snow is coming down. I don't imagine it's the same weather for you in Missouri.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh my God. I think we had 74 degrees. It's definitely not the same weather. Keep it there if you would, Jason.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh, yeah. I can't wait for the snow. I'm one of the Canadians that just loves the winter. Yeah, we'll keep I'll keep it up here for you. Great. Um, and before we talk about the whole bubble thing, right? Was that like I don't want to presume anything that you weren't doing bubble stuff your whole life, but just out of curiosity, what have you been, what were you up to before this the bubble venture?

SPEAKER_00:

I was always this curious kid. I was always someone that when a service man came to the house to like work on the stove or the furnace or the air conditioning man, I was I was his shadow. So I was always this mechanical kid and always loved working with things in my hands. Things I've done in my life, I've been a I've been a professional chef. We've I my education, my schooling is in aircraft engineering. I worked at Donald Douglas on the F-15 fighter jet for about five years. And then we we played around with high-tech electronics for about 20 years, too, doing everything from home automation and security and home theater when that big craze was going on back in the late 80s, early 90s when all that launched. We were doing high-tech electronics, and really bubbles were nowhere in my future, really, or in my life, really.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh that's that what a cool, varied career to get to this point. I don't think I've talked to a guest yet that has worked on the fighter jet. So that's very interesting.

SPEAKER_00:

Jason, all the all the money my dad spent on college education and stuff, he's no longer with us, but I always look up to the heavens and say, Dad, at least bubbles are still aerodynamic. I think the tuition money didn't go all the waste.

SPEAKER_03:

So that's sweet. Yeah, that's a good way to tie it back. Yeah. All right. So here's the people are like a bubble guy, chief bubble guy, chief bubble dude. CBD, right? You called yourself. That's that's cool. What are these atomic bubbles? What are they? And what's the story for how they came about?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, atomic bubbles is a culmination of about 20 years, 20 plus years of us playing with soap water. I met a guy and met a product some 20 plus years ago called Techno Bubbles. It was a guy who had invented glowing blacklight bubbles. So he had made bubbles that glowed under blacklight, Jason. And they and they were amazing. I saw videos of them and stuff, so I ordered some. And by golly, they were exactly as as advertised. These these were glowing orbs when you put them under blacklight. That started my whole interest in bubbles, this wacky uh side of bubbles. Over time, we we bought this guy out, we bought his patents, trademark marks, and recipes, and then we became the face of this glowing blacklight bubble called Techno Bubbles. And over the years, we we were advertising those bubbles, trying to market them and stuff. And the haunted house industry was a huge early. Oh, cool, yeah. Yeah, yeah. They can use them as like toxic waste gas, radioactive fumes, and we rode that way for a while. We still technobubbles is still a great product, and Halloween, all my haunted houses still come around and buy them. But then we got into the event business, and we have a business called Bubble Bus. I think you mentioned that early, Bubble Bus. And it's an event business where we go around and peace, love, and bubbles is our mantra where we go around and do events. And then around pandemic, we got into the line of pet bubbles, pretty love bubbles. So we fine-tuned our crafting and dove into the pet industry with our with our bubble formulations.

SPEAKER_03:

And so that leads you smacking our crosshairs because our podcast is all about science and pets, right? I was intrigued when I believe it was your agent contacted us about that. I was like, oh, cool. Um, and they are like the bubbles are made for both cat and dogs, right? There's cat bubbles and dog bubbles. Did I get that correct?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, that is correct. Yeah. So we use uh kind of the same holy grail base recipe that took us like 60 formulations to find, and then we sent them and craft them for dogs and cats. So for instance, we have bacon, peanut butter, birthday cake, pumpkin, apple pie, lavender, and then we're doing a gingerbread scented bubble for for the Christmas season for our for our pups. And then for our kitties, we've got catnip infused, which is really our one of our best-selling products. And then we just got into some calming bubbles with some scientifically developed pheromones that actually do slow the heart rate of a cat and relieve stress and anxiety.

SPEAKER_03:

Awesome. Perfect. Now, I know you can't give away your trademark for how the bubbles are made exactly, but I'm sure like our audience would love to know what is some of the science that goes into making these bubbles, both maybe how they're made, so they I assume they don't pop as readily as the average bubble, and you infuse them with these different smells. If you could tell us anything about that, that'd be fascinating.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, absolutely. When you go to work on a bubble first, there's all these weird things that, like, if you're making a bubble and you want to make it your livelihood, you have to make a really good bubble. So, some of the things is you mentioned it has to be resilient, it has to last a long time, it has to be colorful, and and it has to be safe. Those are the three criteria that that we strive for quality, fun, and above all, safety. So, yeah, so what we've done is we've crafted these bubbles by by going in and using human-grade raw materials. A lot of them are sourced from the cosmetic industry, so it's all cosmetic grade safe. So, again, like shampoos and stuff, so if you get it in your eyes, you know, it's not gonna hurt or tear. Although my bubbles aren't meant to be ingested, you can get them in your system with the with no ill effect. So, in case a dog or cat gets gets them in their mouth or whatnot. And then the real kind of nuance to it is trying to find sense that dogs and cats are going to perk their heads up to.

SPEAKER_03:

So that was my question. Sorry, I had to jump in here. I did peruse your website, and that I was like, one, how did you pick them? Yeah, and maybe you're gonna explain this anyways, and I apologize. And two, how did you get the scent in the bubble? If you I'm obviously you can't tell us exactly, I understand that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, yeah. For dogs and peanut butter were like no-brainers, okay. So when you're going after a dog bubble, it's like they love bacon and they love peanut butter, okay? So those were like those were the first two bubbles we created for puppy love. Um in in the cat world, catnip was was was a no-brainer as well. And we source our we put real mother nature in our catnip bubbles. That is real essential oil that actually is a Canadian oil uh that comes out of so we're uh supporting the Canadian economy some by uh by sourcing our uh catnip from from you all, which is wonderful.

SPEAKER_03:

And is it the tree is it the catnip plant or like another cat attracting plant that works like catnip?

SPEAKER_00:

No, it's actually the catnip plant that they uh yeah, that they steam distill or cold press or however they get it out, but it's yeah, and boy, I tell you what, it is potent, Jason. When we are making catnip bubbles here, boy, I tell you what, a few drops goes a long way. That is some powerful stuff, brother.

SPEAKER_03:

It grows wild in parts of Canada too. That's something that we always tell people. My gosh. Yeah, it does, just grows wild. There's a other honeysuckle is another wood that grows wild some places in Canada, and that's another one of those. Anyway, sorry, go ahead.

SPEAKER_00:

You have amazing catnip, and it's the and it's the one we've settled on, and it's really put us on the map. How we put them in is we infuse them into the bubbles, we mix them just like I said earlier, or when you asked me what you know what I did. I think I did some cooking in my early days. So, really being a production chemist, as you know from your chemistry background, it's all about measuring and making sure and just letting your imagination go. As long as the science is correct, you can get very creative in your brain. So, really, what we have to do is we have to find fragrances and essential oils and the right ratios of percentages to mix so that quality of our bubble still stays high. A lot of our fragrances are man made, so they're synthetic. So, like our peanut butter fragrance smells very authentic, but it was man made, so no. Fear of peanut allergies.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Yep. And in our lavender calming bubble for puppies, too, that is real lavender essential oil. And it has the same calming attributes in animals as it does in humans. And it's finding that right ratio. Not too much, not too little. You have to worry about shelf life too. You have to put enough in because that little bit of soap, that cosmetic grade soap that we put in to make them bubbles, starts deteriorating those fragrances over time. So it's we tout about a two-year shelf life on our bubbles for fragrance. So after about that, they they the bubbles still blow, but the fragrance starts going away.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. That is that's interesting. And I totally get probably using some kind of ester for your peanut butter smell because you people won't have the same kind of or at all the anaphylactic reaction to that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Yeah. Early on, the first we were getting a lot of pushback on that peanut butter, but although people liked it and their pets loved it, we very quickly had to put allergen-free and advertise that because people really thought it's man, this smells so authentic. It's but I can't use it because I have a peanut allergy or my kiddos have peanut allergies or something like that. So yeah, it's again, it goes back to that safety. We want to make sure that when people are people and pets are using our bubbles, that they're just as safe as they can be, and then just having as much fun as they can have with our bubble products.

SPEAKER_03:

So would that mean your bacon one is quote unquote vegetarian as the smell is not from actual meat? Or am I getting that one?

SPEAKER_00:

No, you're absolutely correct. It is, it's a it's a synthetic, it's a man-made fragrance that's water soluble, so it stays uh stays emulsified in the bubbles. Uh but yes, it is there is no meat product or any part of any animal that's used during the production uh of any of our products.

SPEAKER_03:

I think you answered another question that I had just from listening to you talk, and humans can smell the smells, right? Like they're strong enough for us to smell.

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely, yeah. So there's that dance that you have to do because you don't want to make it so overpowering that it is not pleasant to the human who's blowing them. Because dogs and cats, dogs and cats, their their noses are on steroids, man. You know, they can so yeah, so we want to put enough in. Mr. Smith, when he buys our bubble, says, Oh wow, yeah, these are peanut bubbles, but they're probably pretty supercharged to the, you know, I mean to the dog because they could probably smell them a mile away.

SPEAKER_03:

Nice. Yeah, cool, cool. Yeah. I was just, I'm glad you said that if you got them in your body, like they're safe because it some of them do sound delicious. And I can imagine the odd human blowing the bubbles and not having supper yet and just be like, one for the dog, one for me.

SPEAKER_00:

Right. Now there is there's another company out there that makes what they call a an edible bubble or a bubble that they put flavorings in. And we chose not to go that route because we wanted to entice the animals to play, but we did not want them in case a bottle of bubbles spilt over or something, we did not want to encourage them to like lap, like to drink this down. Um, so yeah, so we took a whole different avenue, and uh, people and our customers are just thrilled with it.

SPEAKER_03:

This is so fun. I just I so appreciate this conversation. Whimsical and fun, and we've got some science mixed in. So here, I don't know if you've ever done any quote unquote scientific tests with them to see if there's a flavor dogs more. If you ever got a uh a sample of 10 dogs and blew some bubble smells, is there one that outperforms, or is that something maybe folks at home can try?

SPEAKER_00:

You know what? Yes and yes. So when we first started doing this, again, we knew that bacon and peanut butter were gonna be probably uh great ones to start with, catnip as well. Um, we had a local doggy daycare boarding franchise system that's here in in town, and they were wonderful. We gave them like a dozen cents, and we gave them banana, we gave them apple, we gave them pineapple, we gave them sweet potato, like we gave them at least 50 cents. Yeah, you don't know. And I tell you what, I was so amazed. They actually did a spreadsheet, man. They would blow the different bubbles of dogs. So they gave us some really great feedback on on what the dog seemed to be responding to. I don't know if we have found like a certain breed or a certain type of dog, you know, might like peanut butter versus bacon or who likes pumpkin versus apple pie. I think they're pets are a lot like humans. We all have our own tastes and our own things we like. What we do know is that bubbles seem to be innately amazed with bubbles in general, and when you can scent them to entice them to go that extra mile to get involved with them, boy, wonderful things can happen.

SPEAKER_03:

That's so fun. What I can just imagine the day you you you pitched it to this place and they were just blowing bubbles at the dogs and scratching down notes. That is the most fun kind of science I can think of because I've done other science and it is not it's grudgery sometimes.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, we have this little Willy Wonka factory here, Jason. On the other side of the wall here, we were just uh banging out bottles we call it when we're filling our bottles, putting wands in them and labeling them and sending them up. Actually, pet value up in Canada has become a very good distributor for us. Oh, yeah. We I know that place, you bet. Yeah, and we actually just ship some out to them uh today. And uh, but yeah, it's it's just amazing, man. When you can go go to work and you really enjoy what you do, people ask me when I'm gonna retire. I don't know if I'll ever retire. I'm having so much fun. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

If you have purpose in life and that purpose is fun, man, that's a great combination.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, you know what? If you can find it, and I'm sure that in your work as well, being able to work with the kids and you're sharing that you you do the chemistry with the kiddos, and uh man, it's and I had a I had a college professor before I even thought I was going, and this was during my aircraft engineering, it was a business class, and we did this modeling thing where you had to create your own business and create these virtual products. And he was the gentleman who really instilled that entrepreneurialism in me. Before that class, I never I never even thought about being my own boss, and so you just never know in life sometimes, like kids in your class, you may spark that that one thing with chemistry. I'm not a chemist, but I know how to cook.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. There's a lot of similarities, I'll tell you that, between the two.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, you know what? There are a lot of similarities, and uh, but again, it's just staying staying interested, and I still have a lot more work to do. There's all kinds of things on the radar, and I think I've just scratched the surface of what we want to do with with atomic bubbles and uh pet industry and that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_03:

Awesome. Now, I just saw a couple technical things about these bubbles. Like we have uh bubble guns, like you pour it in, you press the trigger, and it shoots it out kind of thing. And we have bubble machines. Are these safe for those type of things, or would they or would they gum them up a bit?

SPEAKER_00:

That's a great question. And the cool thing about our bubble formulas is they were originally because before we got into the pet business, we were doing those glow bubbles, and we had to make those formulations for high-speed bubble machines and guns. Our products will work in anything that blows bubbles for sure. They will not gum them up, they will work beautiful, and yeah, so that's that's what really puts us on the map. Some of the alpha yeah, things that we put in our bubbles to just make them strong so that they can be blown out of the machine very effectively.

SPEAKER_03:

Nice. And what do are they stored at room temperature? Do you store them in the fridge? Yeah. In where I live, if you leave them stuff in the garage, it's gonna freeze over the winter. Just some technical things there, if you don't mind answering.

SPEAKER_00:

Sure, as a lot of products, if you can keep them from freezing, it's usually better. My bubbles can be frozen every once in a while. They get frozen on a trip going somewhere in the wintertime when they're being delivered, but they will work. It's best to keep them ambient temperature and out of direct sunlight if at all possible, just kind of ambient temperatures. Although my warehouses here in St. Louis get to be over 100 degrees in the wintertime, and that's where we will store our stocks before we ship them out. So yeah, they're uh they're pretty rugged, they really are. So you can yeah, you can do just about everything to them, but just yeah, that freezing sometimes makes them a little wonky.

SPEAKER_03:

Cool, cool. I'm intrigued about the lavender bubbles. You just mentioned that they're like they're calming ones. That for me personally, I love the smell of lavender. That seems like something you could blow just for humans to have some kind of relaxation too, not just the pets.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, you know what? We we are branching into the health and wellness side of this. If if you could think health and wellness with in the form of a bubble, but if the bubble is really when it's evaporating, it becomes almost like a floating diffuser, right? That orbit is floating around and it's losing life because uh Mother Nature is sucking the moisture out of it. But yeah, the lavender bubbles are wonderful, and that kind of gets into that health and wellness for the calming effect, and that's why we found a gentleman who's this great scientist. You'd love this guy. He uh in the 70s, he was one of the first guys to get into the flea and tick collar science. And so he has invented these pheromones, which is a man-made thing, and we infuse those into our bubbles, and it uh mimics the maternal smells like of a female dog and cat. So that's what kind of makes the young cats or cats that are stressed out and nervous, uh uh calm because hey, they think mom, man, I think mom, mom is there, and that's very calming to them. So that's what these uh pheromone bubbles are all about, and uh, we want to do some some more things in that health and wellness and get more into your world, a little more scientific, it's be see where we can push the envelope in a crazy way with bubbles. That's that's what we're gonna be working on for the years to come.

SPEAKER_03:

Nice. And maybe as we just get to close to the wrap-up of the bubble talk here, do you have any sneaky things you can tell us you're that are on the horizon beyond these getting into the health and wellness? Are there any new pet products that you're coming up with?

SPEAKER_00:

We are going to be launching some new, I'm gonna I'm gonna keep it under wraps a little bit, but they're gonna be. I understand.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I get that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, but but they're gonna be enhancements to our bubble product. So it's going to be a bottle of bubbles and then a bottle of this new mystery product that we'll be launching in the first quarter of 2026. But we're super excited about it. We think it's gonna be wonderful. I think we'll be the only bubble company that's doing anything like this. So I would encourage your I would encourage your listeners to keep an eye on atomic bubbles out there and puppy love and kitty love bubbles because we're gonna be doing some some really cool things in the first quarter of next year. So your website to get the bubbles is atomicbubbles.com is where your folks can go and see what we're doing with all of these crazy bubbles. We do human and pet bubbles. Everything we uh we do is on that, is on that site, Jason.

SPEAKER_03:

Nice. So, folks, we'll have a link to this in our show notes. Our normal show notes, everybody, you we have links there. Just click you can click to atomic bubbles within the show notes. This is fun talking about bubbles. I appreciate you sharing a little bit about the business. We do have a standard question we ask all our guests about, though, near the end, and that's for a pet story from their life. A lot of our guests are scientists or science adjacent, and what humanizes everybody is our love of pets. And I was wondering if you could share a pet story with us.

SPEAKER_00:

Sure. Growing up, we had a Shetland collie dog, and for the longest time, my mom and dad did not want a dog. Our neighbors had a litter and they had these awesome pups. And so we got a one, and his name was Romeo. And Romeo in the early days, I think that's when I really uh found that relationship between man and dog. Because when you're a kid, when you've had a bad day, maybe when you lost a baseball game or you got bullied at school, or you're in trouble with mom and dad, I realized that this furry, four-legged being didn't really care about any of that. He was always there, man, ready for that nuzzle, ready to go play fetch. I think one of my fondest memories is just uh having that having that extra companion sometimes when I was a kid and when I needed it. And yeah, I have a lot of fond memories about Romeo. He was a great dog, and I think that's what uh gave me the love of animals back in grade or so.

SPEAKER_03:

Ah, love it. Do you have any current pets today?

SPEAKER_00:

You know what we do? We have two we have a standard poodle and a poodle doodle. So Violet is is our doodle, and uh, she's awesome. She's this big old furry ball that's wonderful and she'll lick you to death. And yeah, and Gloria is a little more streamlined, so she's the standard poodle. And uh the interesting thing about Gloria is she had to slip on a stair on her staircase when we were we had her for maybe a month or two, and she broke her leg, and unfortunately, that leg had to be amputated. Gloria is our three-wheeled dog, and unless I tell so many times I will just say, Oh, yeah, that's uh violet and glow. You can tell Gloria because she has three legs, and they look down, it's like, oh my god, she's got three. Nobody even knows she gets around so well. It's amazing how she's adapted. So we have those two two furry fur balls, and uh yeah, they're uh they're wonderful, they're wonderful.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, dogs teach us a lesson about just getting on with it. They're resilient creatures, they do, man.

SPEAKER_00:

I tell you what, uh, I think every day is a man, she's been hopping around on three and just been like that's all she ever had was three legs, man, and she just gets it every day. So it's what's cool, super cool.

SPEAKER_03:

Thanks for sharing your pet stories, John. You got it, man. You got it. So we're at the end of the show. Aside from atomic bubbles, can are you on social media anywhere, or should we just direct people to atomic bubbles?

SPEAKER_00:

You know what? You can go to atomic bubbles. There's an info, info at atomic bubbles. I atomic bubbles. We do have a Instagram um and a Facebook. I if you don't have them there, I can have Dana send those to you in the morning, okay?

SPEAKER_03:

I got them right here. Awesome. John, I just want to thank you for giving up your time to talk to us. This was a very whimsical chat, very different than some of the interviews we've had, and I just so appreciate it. There's there's always room for joy in today's world, and that's what this has all been about. So thank you.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you so much, and again, thanks, thanks for having me on. And to all your listeners, I really appreciate the opportunity.

SPEAKER_03:

That's it for this week's show. Thanks for coming back week after week to listen to the science podcast, and a shout out to all the top dogs. That's the top tier of our Patreon community, the Pop Pack. You can sign up in our show notes. All right, Chris, let's hear those names that are part of the top dogs.

SPEAKER_02:

Amelia Fetting, Re Oda, Carol Hanel, Jennifer Challenge, Linnea Janet, Karen Cronister, Vicky Oteiro, Christy Walker, Sarah Brown, Wendy, Diane, Mason and Luke, Helen Chin, Elizabeth Bourgeois, Marianne McNally, Katherine Jordan, Shelly Smith, Laura Stephenson, Tracy Leinbach, Anne Uchida, Heather Burbach, Kelly, Tracy Halbert, Ben Rather, Debbie Anderson, Sandy Brimer, Mary Rader, Bianca Hyde, Andrew Lynn, Brenda Clark, Brianne Hawes, Peggy McKeel, Holly Birch, Kathy Zirker, Susan Wagner, and Liz Button.

SPEAKER_03:

For science, empathy, and cuteness.