In this week’s episode, both of our storytellers become extremely fixated on something very specific.

Part 1: After being diagnosed with breast cancer and opting for bilateral mastectomies, Jenna Dioguardi becomes beholden to her cancer to-do list.

Part 2: As an 11-year-old kid, Luke Strathmann makes it his life mission to get rich off of Beanie Babies.

Jenna Dioguardi is an Obie & Drama Desk-award winning performer. She made her Off-Broadway debut originating the role of #13 in Sarah DeLappe's The Wolves, and can now be seen storytelling in dimly lit venues throughout New York. Her solo show, Nipples for Christmas, is currently in development and had its debut in March. By day, Jenna works as a video producer and editor, creating the ads that target you on Instagram. She co-produced, starred in, and edited Smooch the Tucc, a web series chronicling Stanley Tucci’s Searching for Italy, and she was the co-creator and co-host of two live shows: The Best Storytelling Show (we promise) and The Mister Rogers Variety Hour. Follow her work on IG @jennadio3 & at ⁠jennadioguardi.com⁠.

Luke Strathmann is an NYC-based writer and comedian, and currently leads the communications team at Yale’s Department of Economics. His writing has appeared in The New Yorker and McSweeney’s, and he is the proud host of ‘EconLOL,' the world’s first, best, and only economics-themed comedy variety show (at Caveat Theatre in NYC).

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In honor of Mother’s Day, both of our storytellers share stories about their unique relationships with their moms.

Part 1: Rita Rigano always had a complicated relationship with her mother, and it becomes even more fraught when her mother’s dementia worsens.

Part 2: In the midst of writing her PhD dissertation, Jordyn Rice embarks on one last road trip with her mother, who is dying of lung cancer.

Rita Rigano is a NYC-based storyteller who appears locally and online. Some favorite shows include Generation Woman, New Tricks, (mostly) True Things, The Moth, The Once Upon a Time Show, and Better Said Than Done. She started storytelling with her children, presenting fairy tales with a twist at libraries and schools. She loves live theatre, live music, and swing dancing with her husband.

Jordyn Rice is a postdoctoral fellow based in Vancouver, BC. She is a physical therapist and researcher dedicated to finding strategies to promote healthy aging. While she is passionate about clinical research her love of neuroscience was sparked while studying sea slugs. Outside of the lab you can find her tucked into the mountains, rock climbing, or riding her bike.

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In this week’s episode, Thomas Dixon and Rachel Robinson manage to build a friendship, despite not remembering the exact moments they shared.

Thomas Dixon is the author of "I'm Sorry... That's Awesome!: Inventing a Solution for Memory Loss", and the inventor of ME.mory (a digital memory mobile application/service). Thomas was running when struck by a car and injured so badly that he nearly died. His episodic memory (specific details like places visited, people met, what has happened recently) has been severely compromised by his TBI. Since inventing ME.mory Thomas speaks and writes on the role of technology's benefits for episodic memory. As a world traveler he has been in twenty countries and looks forward to setting foot in many more.

Rachel Robinson has lived with epilepsy for more than 20 years. To help overcome the challenges from this life-changing condition, she helps to educate those in the epilepsy community, working as a Patient Educator for a medical device company. In her spare time she enjoys bowling with her husband.

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This week we present two stories from people who stood up against a system eager to tear them down.

Part 1: After a car crash alters Emily Winn's life forever, she must relive the trauma when she testifies in a deposition.

Part 2: Geneticist C. Brandon Ogbunu contemplates the role race has played in his academic career after he is confronted by the police.

Dr. Emily Winn-Nuñez is a data scientist based in Brooklyn, NY where she lives with her husband and adorable pug. She received her AB in mathematics from the College of the Holy Cross, spent a year in the Visiting Students Programme at St. Edmund Hall at the University of Oxford, and earned a PhD in Applied Mathematics from Brown University. She’s still a Sox fan, still ergs at the gym, and still enjoys comedy - but she’ll also happily discuss the New York Liberty or the Love Island multiverse.

C. Brandon Ogbunu is a Professor at the Santa Fe Institute, and an Assistant Professor at Yale University. His research focuses on evolutionary genetics and the ecology of disease. A New York City native, Brandon enjoys film, hip-hop, jazz and science fiction. He's an ex-very mediocre light heavy weight boxer, and slightly less mediocre experimental virologist. He has higher hopes for humanity than he does the New York Knicks.

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In this week’s episode, both our storytellers’ lives are altered by an unexpected mishap.

Part 1: When teenage Ron Hart accidentally walks through a glass door, he lands in the ER on the worst possible day: a tornado drill.

Part 2: After a car accident leaves all of her teeth bent inward, Di Cai begins to rethink her life as a scientist.

Ron Hart is a television writer, a Moth GrandSlam Champion, and a recovering mascot.

Di Cai is an investment professional by day, a stand up comedian at night, and a sailboat skipper (aka “captain”) if there's good wind on the Hudson River. A former Chinese TV hostess turned PhD scientist; an investor moonlights as a comedian, going by a stage name Dr Dee in the underground New York comedy clubs. Whether it's stand up or storytelling, Di has her unique perspectives as an immigrant, a woman, and a badass.

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In this week’s episode, both of our storytellers share tales of persistence and beating the odds in order to pursue their scientific dreams.

Part 1: Determined to become an academic, Rajyashree Sen must take on a broken system to secure a spot in a PhD program in Vienna.

Part 2: Josh Barber dreams of studying fish, but when his father goes to jail and his mother is diagnosed with breast cancer, he’s left to care for his nine younger siblings.

Rajyashree Sen is a neuroscientist and postdoctoral researcher at Columbia University. She holds a PhD in neuroscience and molecular biology from the University of Vienna (Austria), and a masters degree in Biotechnology from the University of Hyderabad (India). As a graduate student with Dr. Barry Dickson, Dr. Sen dissected the neuronal pathways for evasive walking in fruit-flies. Her research focused on a set of neurons, dubbed the moonwalker neurons, that constitute the key pathway for backward walking in flies. Her work has been tweeted by MC Hammer. Dr. Sen is currently a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Nobel Laureate Dr. Richard Axel, where she investigates the neuronal basis of social memories in mice. When she is not in the lab, she does improv comedy. While science has taken her to interesting places in interesting brains, improv has taken her to the moon, hell, back and beyond. 

Josh is the Assistant Director of Aquatic Life at Columbia University where he oversees the well-being of various aquatic species in biomedical research. He's cohost of the Podcast "Gettin' Fishy With it" a podcast about fish in the wild, the hobby and the laboratory. His hobbies include improv comedy, ruining conversation flow with terrible puns, fishing, and fishing in his favorite videogame, World of Warcraft.

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Some people are meant to be together—but in this week’s episode, our storytellers discover they’re definitely not a match made in heaven.

Part 1: When Mark Pitzer gets splashed with methyl cyanide, he turns to his new girlfriend in hopes of comfort.

Part 2: Hoping to impress his scientist date, Adam Selbst plans the perfect outing: the Central Park Squirrel Census.

Mark Pitzer, Ph.D. is a Neuroscientist at the University of Portland. For the last 25 years he has worked to better understand and treat diseases of the brain, including Parkinson’s and Huntington’s diseases. Currently, his lab studies how developmental influences in the womb can alter the number of dopaminergic neurons involved in reward, movement and social behavior. Mark is also an award-winning teacher who uses the findings from the fields of learning and neuroscience to invoke enduring enthusiasm, curiosity, and deep learning in his college students.

Adam Selbst is an award-winning designer, writer and storyteller. He’s performed on The Moth, PBS, Risk!, The Artichoke and a whole bunch of other shows around NYC. He also ran the popular Big Irv’s Storytelling Roadshow from his bodega art collective in Williamsburg, Brooklyn for over 10 years, before retiring the space during the pandemic. He currently resides in a big house with, like, a thousand friends and a single problematic cat.

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This week, we present two stories about confronting threats -- whether it’s actual physical danger or a threat to your career.

Part 1: Climate scientist Kim Cobb is exploring a cave in Borneo when rocks begin to fall.

Part 2: Neurobiologist Lyl Tomlinson is startled when he's accused of stealing cocaine from his former lab.

Kim Cobb is a researcher who uses corals and cave stalagmites to probe the mechanisms of past, present, and future climate change. Kim has sailed on multiple oceanographic cruises to the deep tropics and led caving expeditions to the rainforests of Borneo in support of her research. Kim has received numerous awards for her research, most notably a NSF CAREER Award in 2007, a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers in 2008, and the EGU Hans Oeschger Medal in 2020. She served as Lead Author for the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and as a member of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board under President Biden. As a mother to four, Kim is a strong advocate for women in science, and champions diversity and inclusion in all that she does. She is also devoted to the clear and frequent communication of climate change to the public through speaking engagements and social media.

Lyl Tomlinson is a Brooklyn native and a post-doctoral researcher and program coordinator at Stony Brook University. He is also a science communication fanatic who often asks: “Would my grandma understand this?” Using this question as a guiding principle, he won the 2014 NASA FameLab science communication competition and became the International final runner-up. In addition to making complex information understandable, he has a growing interest in science policy. Lyl meets with government representatives to advocate for science related issues and regularly develops programs to tackle problems ranging from scientific workforce issues to the Opioid Epidemic. Outside of his work and career passions, he seems to harbor an odd obsession with sprinkles and is a (not so secret) comic book and anime nerd.

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In this week’s episode, both of our storytellers struggle to get the right words out.

Part 1: After living with a stutter all her life, Sara Street thinks coding might be the solution to her communication problems.

Part 2: Electrical engineer Anna Fox longs to share her work with her family, but struggles with how to explain it.

Sara Street has lived in Idaho for seven years with her mom and dad after moving from Texas in 2019; however, her hometown is Greensboro, North Carolina. She is now pursuing her undergraduate degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering. She has been very active within the STEM community for the past four years, especially within her school. She served as the Idaho State Secretary for the Technology Student Association (TSA), a student-led STEM CTSO. In her free time, she loves to read and paint.

Anna Fox is a scientist and device fabricator at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Boulder Colorado. Besides working with superconducting integrated circuits, she is an avid biker, rafter, crocheter, and reader.

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In this week’s episode, both of our storytellers explore what happens when belief systems collide—and how science and empathy can help bridge the divide.

Part 1: Neuroscientist Lauren Vetere is excited to see if real life will mimic science at an interfaith event.

Part 2: Growing up as a devout Jew, Fred Gould’s relationship with God is shaken by existential philosophy and science.

Lauren Vetere is a neuroscientist, writer, and science communicator based in NYC. She recently received her PhD in Neuroscience from Mount Sinai, where she studied how different parts of the brain communicate to make memories, and how that communication is disrupted in epilepsy and Alzheimer's disease. Outside of the lab, she works to make science accessible through writing, community outreach, and art. Lauren serves as a council member and blog writer for BraiNY, a NYC-based neuroscience outreach group. In 2023, she co-created the winning science-inspired short film for Symbiosis, a competition where scientists and filmmakers are paired to make short films in one week. She then returned as the coordinator for the 2024 Symbiosis competition. In her free time, you can find Lauren writing, baking, or listening to sci-fi and fantasy audiobooks in central park.

Fred Gould graduated from Jamaica HS in NYC and received his BS in biology from Queens College of the City University of New York.  He went on to a PhD program in ecology and evolutionary biology at the State University of NY at Stony Brook. He moved to North Carolina for a postdoc and then a job on the faculty of NC State University. Gould is now the executive director of the NC State Genetics and Genomics Academy and is co-director of the Genetic Engineering and Society Center. He conducts research on the application of evolutionary biology and population genetics to enable sustainable use of insect resistant crops and genetically engineered agricultural pests. He also does research aimed at development of strategies for engineering insect vectors of human pathogens to decrease disease. Most of Gould’s current teaching focuses on technical and societal issues related to genomics and genetic engineering. He also teaches lectures within a course on Darwinism and Christianity. Gould is a fellow of the Entomological Society of America and of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In 2011, he was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. 

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