NYT Crossword 09/17/17 (Sun.)

Cruciverbalist: Mark Maclachlan
Editor: Will Shortz

Solving time: DNF

Puzzle uniqueness: "Super Looper"

Answers in which the phrases are "looped" to be complete. Forget it.

Words I hadn't known until now: 

PRIONS - "Proteins responsible for mad cow disease"
NANOTUBE - "Tiny conductor of heat or electricity" (WTF?)

Trivia I didn't know:

SUTRA - "Collection of Hindu aphorisms" (Didn't know it means this)
UTAUSTIN - "Rex Tillerson's alma mater, for short" (This is a real reach)
ESA - "Tikkanen who won five Stanley Cups"
TONIER - "More chichi" (Have no idea of the word "chichi")
SENECA - "Roman philosopher who wrote 'All cruelty springs from weakness'"
ALTPOP - "Music genre for Weezer or the Shins"
CLOVES - "Mulled wine ingredient"
ARIE - "Singer India.____" (I can never remember this)
SULU - "The Philippines' ____ Sea" (Would have preferred a Star Trek clue)
EDERLE - "Gertrude who swam the English Channel in 1926" (Another one I can never remember)
ATE - "Homophone for the atomic number of oxygen"
IAN - "Author Rankin" (Who??)
ESTATES - "Trusts and ______ (law school class)"
ENKE - "Speed skater Karin who won eight Olympic medals)

Junk Answers:

SIE - "German pronoun"
ESA - "(See above)
STER - "Team finale?"
RNA - "Stranded cellular stuff"
ETH - "Addis Ababa's country: Abbr."
OTS - "Extra periods at TD Garden"
AGT - "007, for one: Abbr."
OOM - "___-pah-pah"
MTA - "Letters on N.Y.C. trains"
ORTH - "Straight: Prefix"
EEN - "Dark time, in poesy"
SEQ - "1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 ..., e,g,: Abbr." (ICYI, add the two end numbers to get the next number)
ARA - "Altar constellation"
OSO - "Baja bear"
ILE - "St. Pierre, par exemple"
ARTOO - "'Star Wars' droid"

Clever clues: 

PIANO - "Keys for Keys?"
LAP - "Child's seat, perhaps"
SPADES - "Quarter deck?"

Obscure (i.e., really reaching) words: 

PRIONS - (See above)