Why cats love tuna, and powering robots with tiny explosions

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 

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