Science History Podcast

Perhaps the most overlooked scientist who played critical roles in the development of the atomic bomb was Leo Szilard. With us to explore Szilard's numerous contributions to science and society is William Lanouette. Bill is a writer and public policy analyst who has specialized in the history of nuclear energy and nuclear weapons. He received an A.B. in English with a minor in Philosophy at Fordham College in 1963, and M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Political Science at the London School of Economics and the University of London in 1966 and 1973, respectively. Bill then worked as a journalist for Newsweek, The National Observer, and National Journal, and he was the Washington Correspondent for The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. He has also written for The Atlantic, The Economist, Scientific American, The New York Herald Tribune, The Washington Post, and many other outlets. Bill also worked as a Senior Analyst for Energy and Science Issues at the US Government Accountability Office. Bill's first book was Genius in the Shadows: A Biography of Leo Szilard, the Man Behind the Bomb, published by Scribner's in 1992, with later editions published by the University of Chicago Press and Skyhorse Publications. Bill also published, in 2021, The Triumph of the Amateurs: The Rise, Ruin, and Banishment of Professional Rowing in The Gilded Age. In this episode, we discuss all things Szilard: the man, the war, the bomb, the innovations, the collaborations, the accusations of espionage, the conflicts, and even the Martians.

Explore the history of malaria research and reflections on being a scientist with Nobel Laureate Peter Agre. Topics include genetic protection against malaria, global collaboration in scientific research, aquaporins in biology, and collaborative efforts in fighting malaria in Zambia.

In 1994, while attending graduate school at the University of California, Berkeley, I had the pleasure of seeing a lecture by Oliver Sacks in which he discussed his work on sleeping sickness and various other neurological disorders. He also discussed his thoughts on the economy of a life. Today's episode is that lecture in full, with all the insights and charm that was Oliver Sacks.

Vil Mirzayanov, former Soviet chemical weapons lab scientist and whistleblower, discusses the history of Novichok, the most deadly chemical weapon ever developed. Topics include the development of Novichok, Russia's deception in negotiations, becoming a whistleblower, leaving Russia and coming to the United States, synthesizing dangerous substances, personal journey and fulfilling duty, the Soviet destruction of religion, from education to chemical weapons, living under Soviet control, Soviet assassinations and Cold War plots, and chemical weapons accidents in the Soviet Union.

How could a brilliant scientist and mathematician, an innovator in quantum theory, who worked closely with Jewish colleagues, become an ardent Nazi? How did this man, who has a field of mathematics named after him, escape the scrutiny of his colleagues? And what happened to him upon the collapse of Nazi Germany? The scientist who straddled this strange world of physics and Nazism was Pascual Jordan. With us to explain the history of Pascual Jordan is Ryan Dahn. Ryan is a writer, editor, science historian, and translator. He is the books editor at Physics Today, the flagship physics magazine of the American Institute of Physics.

Many of the most important secrets held in international contests are technological or scientific in nature, and wars are often settled due to technological superiority of one side over the other. This leads spy agencies to employ all manner of trickery and tools to obtain those secrets. With us to explore the history of scientific espionage is Eli Lake. Eli was a senior national security correspondent for The Daily Beast and Newsweek, and a syndicated columnist with Bloomberg. Eli is now a columnist for the Free Press and the host of the Re-Education Podcast on Nebulous media. Eli is also a contributing editor for Commentary Magazine.

A retrospective on the Franck-Hertz experiment, which resulted in James Franck and Gustav Hertz receiving the 1925 Nobel Prize in Physics. Image credit: By Infoczo - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=35281920

A retrospective on James Franck, recipient of the 1925 Nobel Prize in Physics.

The ability to extract DNA from ancient fragments of biological material has revolutionized our understanding of recent evolutionary history, including human evolution and phylogeography. Analysis of ancient DNA in tandem with radiocarbon dating, along with traditional archeological techniques, has led to a flurry of discoveries. With us to discuss this research is Maanasa Raghavan. Maanasa is a Neubauer Family Assistant Professor of Human Genetics at the University of Chicago.

The world just experienced a devastating pandemic, yet in the context of historical pandemics, COVID-19 was a relatively minor event in the history of disease. What do we know about the history of pandemics, including before written records, and what can we learn from this history? With us to answer these and other questions about the origins of epidemics and pandemics is Leslie Reperant. Leslie graduated with a doctorate of veterinary medicine at the National Veterinary School of Lyon, France in 2004 and obtained a PhD at Princeton University in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology in 2010. Leslie's doctoral and post-doctoral studies focused on the interplay between the pathogenesis and evolution of influenza viruses, and on factors driving pathogen emergence and spread. Leslie is the author of Fatal Jump: Tracking the Origins of Pandemics, published in 2023 by Johns Hopkins University Press.