Science, Spoken
Get in-depth coverage of current and future trends in technology, and how they are shaping business, entertainment, communications, science, politics, and society.
Latest episodes
Oct 18, 2022 • 10min
Wildfire Smoke May Carry Deadly Fungi Long Distances
Pathogens in soil are a danger to firefighters, but smoke may transport spores that cause valley fever and other infections into cities too.
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Oct 17, 2022 • 7min
It’s Time to Treat Housing Insecurity as a Health Risk
A new study shows that cancer patients in precarious living situations are twice as likely to die from their illness, underscoring the harms of unstable housing.
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Oct 14, 2022 • 7min
The FCC's Rules on Space Junk Just Got Stricter
A new and contentious five-year limit for getting rid of dead satellites could slow the growing orbital litter problem—if people actually abide by it.
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Oct 13, 2022 • 8min
A Bold Effort to Cure HIV—Using Crispr
An experiment tests whether the gene-editing technology can stop the virus from replicating, which would ultimately wipe out the infection.
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Oct 12, 2022 • 8min
Scientists Have Discovered a New Set of Blood Groups
The ‘Er’ grouping could help doctors identify and treat some rare cases of blood incompatibility, including between pregnant mothers and fetuses.
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Oct 11, 2022 • 9min
A Huge New Data Set Pushes the Limits of Neuroscience
The Allen Institute’s release includes recordings from a whopping 300,000 mouse neurons. Now the challenge is figuring out what to do with all that data.
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Oct 10, 2022 • 8min
The Problem With Mental Health Bots
With human therapists in short supply, AI chatbots are trying to plug the gap—but it’s not clear how well they work.
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Oct 7, 2022 • 12min
Sofia, the Historic Airplane-Borne Telescope, Lands for the Last Time
Astronomers mourn the end of an infrared observatory that flew aboard a jumbo jet. It was expensive, but it saw what Earth-based telescopes can’t.
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Oct 6, 2022 • 9min
The Era of Fast, Cheap Genome Sequencing Is Here
Illumina just announced a machine that can crack genomes twice as fast as its current version—and drive the cost down to $200 a pop.
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Oct 5, 2022 • 8min
Climate Change Is Burying Archaeological Sites Under Tons of Sand
Desertification can wear down ancient ruins or hide them under dunes—leaving researchers scrambling to keep track of where they’re buried.
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