A volcanologist imagines a world without volcanoes, and tells us how her recipe for homemade lava bombs might lead to discoveries about ancient volcanoes in outer space! It turns out that volcanoes do more for planets than create natural pyrotechnic displays. You’re guarenteed to be blown away by volcanologist Erika Rader’s EXTREME VOLCANO SCIENCE PROJECT. Spoiler alert: It involves a huge cauldron of molten rock, an aircannon, and a forklift.

Tell Erika what YOU would do with a lava machine: Email us at [email protected] with a drawing or recording, and we’ll pass your ideas on!

Join our Patreon campaign to hear more from our interview with Erika, on our ad-free podcast feed: patreon.com/tumblepodcast

Special thanks to Rob Griffiths for his help with this episode! Check out his podcast, Bedtime.FM and Peace Out on the Kids Listen app - kidslisten.org.

Join us on a field trip to the biggest bat colony in the world! Bracken Cave is home to 15 million Mexican free-tailed bats. It’s the largest concentration of mammals on the planet, and it’s made up of only mothers and their babies. On our visit, we’ll meet a real-life Batwoman. Jessica Dreyer is a bat biologist who is studying how bats learn to be bats. Now… TO THE BAT CAVE!

To see photos from our trip, as well videos of “bat rain” and the evening “batnado,” check out our blog at sciencepodcastforkids.com/blog. We’ll also have information about how you can visit Bracken Cave in person, with Bat Conservation International.

This week, our Patreon members are getting exclusive audio bonus content from our interview with Jessica! Hear her describe what it’s like to go inside the cave, as she shares tons of other stunning bat facts. Pledge today at patreon.com/tumblepodcast. You’ll also get an ad-free feed, when you sign up at just $1/month!

This summer, Tumble went live!! and we want to share the science magic with all our listeners. In this episode, you’ll hear our favorite parts of our Back-to-School Science Splash Jam from the Scottish Rite Theater in Austin, Texas. Get ready for a sea star song written by listeners, jellyfish trivia, and amazing science questions from fans.

A super huge thanks and shoutout to everyone who came to our events! If you’re curious about Tumble live events, email us at [email protected].

Our guests were SaulPaul, Elizabeth McQueen, and Juli Berwald. Sara and Michael Lentz recorded the Science Splash Jam. Thanks to our sponsors: The Headwaters School, Austin Family Magazine, Spare the Rock, Spoil the Child, and Listenwise.

Our kid contestants were Adele, Liesel, and Finn. Our question askers were Amery, Amara, and Leela.

What if you could shrink your technology down to a size that’s 100,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair? It sounds like sci-fi, but it’s not. Romain Quidant shows us how he helped shrink an entire medical laboratory down to the size of a computer chip. The “lab on a chip” uses molecular mini-detectives to track down diseases hiding within a tiny drop of blood. We’ll find out how it works, and why a tiny particle could make a big difference for human health.

To see a photo of Romain holding the lab on the chip, check out our blog at sciencepodcastforkids.com/blog.

Tumble is brought to you with support from KiwiCo. KiwiCo is offering Tumble listeners the chance to try them for free - to redeem this offer and learn more about their projects for kids, visit kiwico.com/tumble.

Love Tumble? Support us on Patreon! All you need to do is go to patreon.com/tumblepodcast and sign up to pledge. Listener support makes a HUGE difference in helping us make the show. We’d also love to give you a shoutout on our next episode!

Meet 11-year-old Sarah Galvani-Townsend! She’s our first ever kid science expert. In many ways, Sarah is a regular kid who loves science. But she’s got an unusual hobby. Sarah tells us why studying dogs and rabies is one of her favorite extracurricular activities, and how she translates “science language” into “kid language.”

To read Sarah’s paper and find out more about Science Journal for Kids, visit our blog at sciencepodcastforkids.org/blog. The original paper is called “One Health approach to cost-effective rabies control in India” and the lead author is Meagan C. Fitzpatrick.

Tumble is brought to you with support from KiwiCo. KiwiCo is offering Tumble listeners the chance to try them for free - to redeem this offer & learn more about their projects for kids, visit kiwico.com/tumble

Love Tumble? Support us on Patreon! Go to patreon.com/tumblepodcast and pledge today. Even just a $1/month means a lot to us!

We love hearing from you. Email us your questions, comments and feedback at [email protected].

It’s the tale of an epic science adventure. It’s the drama of the hunt for a dragon… a snapdragon! This isn’t the kind of dragon that breathes fire. It’s a flower! And biologists have been hunting for them every summer, in an ongoing quest to understand how species evolve and separate.

We tag along with biologist Carina Baskett on her very first day of the snapdragon hunt, in the Pyrenees mountains of Spain. Join us as we get excited about “fieldwork” - one of the coolest (and most adventurous) parts of the scientific process!

You can see photos from the snapdragon hunt and learn about fieldwork all over the world, on our blog.

We’re doing it live! Check out Tumble’s live events coming up in August, on our website.

Tumble is brought to you with help from KIND Snacks. Complete offer details are available at: https://www.kindsnacks.com/kidsoffer

Our Patrons make a WORLD of difference to us! Pledge to support at patreon.com/tumblepodcast. Rewards include ad-free episodes, free educational materials, chances to appear on the show, and more.

Joe Hanson is a scientist who hosts PBS Digital Studio’s It’s Okay to Be Smart and Hot Mess, a new YouTube show about climate change. He’s been a longtime friend of Tumble’s, so it was a no-brainer to ask him to help answer listener questions!

Joe tells us why penguins can’t fly, how animals breathe underwater, what’s beyond the universe, and why our teeth get wobbly and fall out. Plus, find out what we think Tumble: Aquatic Edition would sound like!

Watch some of our favorite of Joe’s videos on our website: sciencepodcastforkids.com/blog.

Don’t forget, a great way to support Tumble is to pledge on Patreon. You can also tell five friends about the show! Either way, we’ll love you.

We’ve got a special offer for you to try KIND Kids Bars! Go

to KindSnacks.com/science and enter code SCIENCE at checkout to receive 20% off

of your order of KIND Kids Bars.

Got a long trip coming up? Turn it into an adventure into outer space! Marshall’s headed out on an intergalactic journey. He’s lined up the best episodes on astronomy for your road trip! See what it’s like to spend a year on Mars, take a wild ride through the solar system, find out if it’s possible to ship Co2 off our planet, search for alien life, and investigate black holes with the world’s top black hole hunter. You’ll be there in no time when time is flying by at warp speed!

When we get to 150 Patrons, Marshall will do something very silly. So if you can, please pledge today: patreon.com/tumblepodcast

Hope you’re having a great summer! We’ll be back with new episodes soon.

**Recommended for listeners age 8 and up** This week, we’re presenting a new show from our friends at Gen Z Media! It’s called Young Ben Franklin, and it’s a mystery-adventure series about the 14 year old kid who went on to become one of America’s most famous founding fathers.

If you enjoy this show, you can find more like it at bestrobotever.com. Subscribe at Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts, so that you won’t miss an episode of Young Ben Franklin. The full series premiers on July 4. Independence Day!

Younger listeners might want to skip this story, due to some dramatic situations and language. We’ll be back with more Tumble soon.

Don’t forget, we’re in the middle of our Patreon pledge drive! Your support makes our show possible. Not kidding! If you value what we do, please consider making a donation at patreon.com/tumblepodcast. The first 10 fans to pledge will receive a Detective Dot megapack!

Want another option? Review us on Apple Podcasts. It really helps other people find our show!

This week, we’re taking you to visit one of most powerful computers in the world! It’s called MareNostrum 4, and it’s housed in a former chapel in Barcelona, Spain. We’ll find out how scientists are using supercomputers to tackle some of the world’s biggest problems. Researchers Eduard Porta and Claudia Rosas explain what it’s like to work with one of the fastest machines in the world.

See photos from Lindsay’s visit to MareNostrum 4, and learn more about supercomputers on our blog.

It’s the best time ever to support Tumble on Patreon! For the first ten fans who pledge $5 or more to our Patreon campaign, you’ll receive a Detective Dot megapack, along with all of our regular rewards. Check out Detective Dot here: https://www.detectivedot.org/ Then, pledge at patreon.com/tumblepodcast

Don’t forget, to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts! It really helps other people find out about our podcast.