Science Time Podcast

What it means that artificial intelligence can now forecast the weather like a supercomputer, and measuring methane emissions from municipal waste   First up on this week’s show, Staff Writer Paul Voosen joins host Sarah Crespi to talk about how artificial intelligence has become shockingly good at forecasting the weather while using way fewer resources than other modeling systems. Read a related Science paper.   Next, focusing on municipal solid waste—landfills, compost centers, garbage dumps—may offer a potentially straightforward path to lower carbon emissions. Zheng Xuan Hoy, a recent graduate from the new energy science and engineering department at Xiamen University Malaysia, discusses his Science paper on this overlooked source of methane and some plausible solutions for reducing these emissions.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi; Paul Voosen   Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adm9783 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

First up on this week’s show: the future of science in Russia. We hear about how the country’s scientists are split into two big groups: those that left Russia after the invasion of Ukraine and those that stayed behind. Freelance journalist Olga Dobrovidova talks with host Sarah Crespi about why so many have left, and the situation for those who remain.   Next on the show: miniature, battery-free bioelectronics. Jacob Robinson, a professor in the department of electrical and computer engineering at Rice University, discusses how medical implants could go battery-free by harvesting energy from the human body and many other potential innovations in store for these internal medical devices.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi; Olga Dobrovidova   LINKS FOR MP3 META   Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adm8195   About the Science Podcast: https://www.science.org/content/page/about-science-podcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Why scientists are trying to make anemones act like corals, and why it’s so hard to make pharmaceuticals for brain diseases   First up on this week’s show, coaxing anemones to make rocks. Newsletter Editor Christie Wilcox joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss the difficulties of raising coral in the lab and a research group that’s instead trying to pin down the process of biomineralization by inserting coral genes into easy-to-maintain anemones.   Next on the show, a look at why therapeutics for both neurodegenerative disease and psychiatric illness are lagging behind other kinds of medicines. Steve Hyman, director of the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research at the Broad Institute, talks with Sarah about some of the stumbling blocks to developing drugs for the brain—including a lack of diverse genome sequences—and what researchers are doing to get things back on track.   Finally, in a sponsored segment from the Science/AAAS Custom Publishing Office, associate editor Jackie Oberst discusses with Thomas Fuchs, dean of artificial intelligence (AI) and human health and professor of computational pathology and computer science at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, the potential and evolving role of AI in health care. This segment is sponsored by the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Christie Wilcox; Sarah Crespi   Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adm6756 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

First up on this week’s show, Staff Writer Erik Stokstad joins host Sarah Crespi to talk about why it might make sense to grow shorter corn. It turns out the towering corn typically grown today is more likely to blow over in strong winds and can’t be planted very densely. Now, seedmakers are testing out new ways to make corn short through conventional breeding and transgenic techniques in the hopes of increasing yields.   Next up on the show, the last in our series of books on sex and gender with Books Host Angela Saini. In this installment, Angela speaks with Nandita Jayaraj and Aashima Dogra about their book Lab Hopping: A Journey to Find India’s Women in Science.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi, Angela Saini, Erik Stokstad Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adl5269 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Restoring land after dam removal, and phonons as a basis for quantum computing    First up on this week’s show, planting in the silty soil left behind after a dam is removed and reservoirs recede. Contributing Correspondent Warren Cornwall joins host Sarah Crespi to talk about the world's largest dam removal project and what ecologists are doing to revegetate 36 kilometers of new river edge.   Next up on the show, freelance producer and former guest Tanya Roussy. She talks with Andrew Cleland, a professor at the University of Chicago, about a Science paper from this summer on using the phonon—a quantum of sound energy—as the basis of quantum computers.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi, Tanya Roussy, Warren Cornwall Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adl4219 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Kuiper belt might be bigger than we thought, and managing the effects of wildfires on indoor pollution   First up on this week’s show, the Kuiper belt—the circular field of icy bodies, including Pluto, that surrounds our Solar System—might be bigger than we thought. Staff Writer Paul Voosen joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss the distant Kuiper belt objects out past Neptune, and how they were identified by telescopes looking for new targets for a visit by the New Horizons spacecraft.   Next up on the show, the impact of wildfire smoke indoors. Producer Kevin McLean talks with Delphine Farmer, a chemist at Colorado State University, about an experiment to measure where particulates and volatile organic compounds end up when they sneak inside during a wildfire event.   Finally, in a sponsored segment from the Science/AAAS Custom Publishing Office, Jackie Oberst, associate editor for custom publishing, discusses with Jens Nielsen, CEO of the BioInnovation Institute—an international life science incubator in Copenhagen, Denmark—about the next big leap in biology: synthetic biology. This segment is sponsored by the BioInnovation Institute.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi, Paul Voosen, Kevin McLean  Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adl3178 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Pushing ancient DNA past the Pleistocene, and linking agriculture to biodiversity and infectious disease First up on this week’s show, Staff Writer Erik Stokstad brings a host of fascinating stories, from the arrival of deadly avian flu in the Galápagos to measuring the effect of earthworms on our daily bread. He and host Sarah Crespi start off the segment discussing just how much stuff you need to avoid abject poverty and why measuring this value can help us balance human needs against planetary sustainability.   Other stories from Erik mentioned in this segment:   ●     Elephant trunk’s ‘stunning’ microscopic musculature may explain its dexterity | Science ●     ‘Mind-boggling’ sea creature spotted off Japan has finally been identified | Science   Next up on the show, as part of a special issue on ancient DNA, freelance producer Katherine Irving talks with Love Dalén, a professor of evolutionary genomics at the Centre for Palaeogenetics at Stockholm University. They talk about the longevity of ancient DNA and what it would take to let us see back even further. See the whole ancient DNA special issue here.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi, Erik Stokstad, Katherine Irving   Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adl1587 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A book on utopias and gender roles, India looks to beat climate-induced heat in cities, and how ancient Amazonians improved the soil First up on this week’s show: the latest in our series of books on sex, gender, and science. Books host Angela Saini discusses Everyday Utopia: In Praise of Radical Alternatives to the Traditional Family Home with ethnographer Kristen Ghodsee, professor of Russian and Eastern European studies at the University of Pennsylvania. See this year’s whole series here.   Also this week, as part of a special issue on climate change and health, host Sarah Crespi speaks with Vaishnavi Chandrashekhar, a freelance journalist based in Mumbai, India. They talk about how India is looking to avoid overheating cities in the coming decades, as climate change and urbanization collide.   Finally, we hear about how ancient Amazonians created fertile “dark earth” on purpose. Sarah is joined by Morgan Schmidt, an archaeologist and geographer at the Federal University of Santa Catarina. They discuss recent research published in Science Advances on the mysterious rich soil that coincides with ancient ruins, which may still be produced by modern Indigenous people in Brazil.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi, Vaishnavi Chandrashekhar, Angela Saini    Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adl0606 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The key to shrinking cartels is cutting recruitment, and a roundup of books, video games, movies, and more   First up on this week’s show: modeling Mexico’s cartels. Rafael Prieto-Curiel, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Complexity Science Hub in Vienna, joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss how modeling cartel activities can help us understand the impact of potential interventions such as increased policing or reducing gang recruitment.    Lisa Sanchez, executive director of México Unido Contra la Delincuencia, talks with Sarah about just how difficult it would be to make the model results—which show that reducing recruitment is key—a reality.   Next on the show, Science books editor Valerie Thompson and books intern Jamie Dickman discuss a huge selection of science books, movies, video games, and even new exhibits—all due out this fall. See the complete roundup here.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi, Valerie Thompson, Jamie Dickman   Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adk9453 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Receptors that give our feline friends a craving for meat, and using combustion to propel insect-size robots   First up on this week’s episode, Online News Editor David Grimm joins host Sarah Crespi to talk about why despite originating from a dry, desert environment cats seem to love to eat fish.   Next on the show, bugs such as ants are tiny while at the same time fast and strong, and small robots can’t seem to match these insectile feats of speed and power. Cameron Aubin, a postdoc at Cornell University who will shortly join the University of Michigan, discusses using miniscule combustion reactions to bring small robots up to ant speed.   Finally in a sponsored segment from the Science/AAAS Custom Publishing Office, Jackie Oberst, associate editor for custom publishing, discusses with Bobby Soni, chief business officer at the BioInnovation Institute, an international life science incubator in Copenhagen, Denmark, what it takes to bring a product from lab to market and how to make the leap from scientist to entrepreneur. This segment is sponsored by the BioInnovation Institute.   This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.   About the Science Podcast   Authors: Sarah Crespi, David Grimm   Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adk8409  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices