Is all that talk of “quantum” in the movies legit?

Dr Cat asks Professor Nick Menicucci about what quantum is, how close we are to getting quantum tech in our pockets, and whether its representation in movies is accurate. They collapse this complex topic of conversation into one very enlightening state. From quantum myths to cosmic time-travel dreams, they measure up some big ideas without any uncertainty.

Prof Menicucci is a senior member of the QuRMIT group at RMIT University, and a Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology. He will entangle you with his wisdom.

This episode originally aired on 2nd September, 2025.

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No detail is spored in this episode with a really fun-gal. When we think of infectious diseases, we often think of bacterial infections like pneumonia and tuberculosis, or viral ones like flu and COVID. Fungi often don’t come to mind – yet collectively, fungal infections surpass any other infectious disease on the global death toll.

There’s still mush-room for discovery to develop new treatments to tackle ever-adapting fungi that never stop moulding to suit their changing environment. Dr Cat chats to Dr Jane Usher at the University of Exeter, who investigates fungi that can infect us to ensure that they can’t.

This episode originally aired 26th August, 2025.

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Bugs are more than just “creepy-crawlies” – they can be quite beetleful. Dr Cat chats to bugging entomologist Charlie Disher.

What niche pockets of beetle species exist in the sky islands of the Australian Alpine mountains? How did empty beer stubbies once pose a threat to the golden Jewel beetles (spoiler: they were super sexy stimuli)? What can we learn from insects to better understand the natural world? Dr Cat and Charlie dig through leaf litter, scale the Aussie Alps, and discover just how speci-tacular beetles can be!

Originally aired 19th August, 2025.

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Happy National Science Week! We’re celebrating the wild, weird, and wonderful side of Australian wildlife this Science Week with a national vote for Australia’s Most Underrated Native Animal.

Dr Cat chats to her friend and colleague, A/Prof Jen Martin. An ecologist-turned-science communicator at The University of Melbourne, Jen is the perfect person to introduce you to ten Aussie animal underdogs.

From the eel-lectrifying short-finned eel to the ink-redible giant cuttlefish, the dugong that’s truly sea-riously charming, and the mole-vellous marsupial mole – this week’s episode will give you a lot of animals to skink your teeth into. These quirky critters aren’t just hiding in the shadows – they’re bat-tling for your love.

This episode originally aired 12th August, 2025.

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This Science Queeries episode goes deep – over a kilometre down below an old gold mine in an underground physics laboratory. Dr Cat chats to Dr Theresa Fruth, an astroparticle physicist at The University of Sydney who is helping to make elusive, undetectable dark matter detectable. We can’t observe dark matter at all – yet it makes up most of the universe. It takes international collaborations and sterile laboratories way deep, deep down to give us hope of ever being able to directly detect it.

Originally aired 5th August, 2025.

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Celebrating World Hepatitis Day, we have an un-bile-liver-ably great episode of Science Queeries in store for you. The 2025 theme was “Hepatitis: Let’s Break It Down” – and that’s what Jon Kok and Dr Cat are going to do.

According to the World Health Organization, around 354 million people worldwide live with hepatitis B or C, and most of them have no access to services for testing and treatment. Even in Australia.

Jon Kok is a Workforce Development and Research Officer at LiverWELL and a host of JOY’s Hide and Seek. They break down the different kinds of hepatitis, who is most at risk, and treatment options. They and Dr Cat also chat about breaking down stigma and ongoing research towards a hepatitis B cure.

Originally aired 29th July, 2025.

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Pterosaurs once ruled the skies with flap-tastic flair. Palaeontologist Adele Pentland takes us into raptors (read: raptures), digging up the world of Australian pterosaurs. She and Dr Cat also discuss dino-diets, based on a recent news story on what an Australian sauropod (a diamantinasaurus) ate as its last meal.

Adele is a final-year PhD candidate in the Western Australian Organic and Isotope Geochemistry Centre at Curtin University, has named two pterosaur species, and is an absolute Superstar of STEM. From demon pelicans to iron dragons, we soar through time and discover that the skies of ancient Australia were anything but empty.

This episode originally aired 22nd July, 2025.

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We’re talking about the animal “queendom”, because same-sex sexual behaviour is quite common among animals – in at least 1,500 species. For a crossover episode with Big Bi+ Questions, Dr Cat, and two of BBQ’s co-hosts Dave Samuels and Jason Turner, go on a wild ride through some of the animal kingdom’s queerest species. (Stay tuned for a future BBQ episode, on which they will discuss whether animals that display same-sex sexual behaviour are gay, bi+, or something else…)

They also discuss how societal views have shaped this area of research, and why it’s important to have diverse voices in STEM research. At the beginning of last century, same-sex sexual behaviour was observed among different birds (including penguins), but was dismissed or swept under the carpet. But things are changing…

This episode originally aired 15th July, 2025.

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Science Queeries is officially a toddler – it’s now one year old! The whole team congregates around the mics for this birthday episode: Dr Cat as your ever-present host, Clayton Wimshurst, who helped kick the show off and continues to help behind the scenes, and Vaughan McCarthy, who turns each episode into a podcast and is the person we can thank for all the punny titles. They replay their greatest hits, confess their “science crushes”, and discuss “confidently incorrect” scientific ideas of the past to highlight that science is ever-evolving.

Thanks for a whole year of curiosity, queerness, and questions that spiral like DNA’s double helix. Whether you’ve been listening from episode one or just dropped into the Petri dish recently, Science Queeries wouldn’t be the same without you.

This episode originally aired 8th July, 2025.

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Science meets feels on this Science Queeries episode. From cortisol chaos to serotonin slumps, Dr Cat and Jesse Crowe (aka the Travelling Scientist) take you through the science of stress and the complexities of our mental wellbeing.

While anxiety and depression can weigh heavily, remember that support and solutions are well within reach. There’s no one-size-fits-all, but there is strength in numbers – in reaching out and connecting with your people.

This episode originally aired on 1st July, 2025… Princess Diana’s birthday.

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