Science Magazine Podcast

Sarah Richardson joins to discuss building yeast chromosomes from scratch. Topics include predicting floods using Flickr photos, ignoring cyberattacks, debunking human pheromones, genome engineering in yeast, and exploring a synthetic yeast genome.

This week, we chat about the science behind breaking the 2-hour marathon barrier, storing data in DNA strands, and a dinosaur’s zigzagging backbones with Online News Editor Catherine Matacic. And Carolina Levis joins Alexa Billow to discuss evidence that humans have been domesticating the Amazon’s plants a lot longer than previously thought.   Read Carolina Levis’s research in Science.     Listen to previous podcasts.   [Image: Carolina Levis; Music: Jeffrey Cook] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we chat about why people are nice to each other—does it feel good or are we just avoiding feeling bad—approaches to keeping arsenic out of the food supply, and using artificial intelligence to figure out what a chemical smells like to a human nose with Online News Editor David Grimm. And Stephen Brusatte joins Alexa Billow to discuss why dinosaurs evolved wings and feathers before they ever flew. And in the latest installment of our monthly books segment, Jen Golbeck talks with Bill Schutt, author of Cannibalism: A Perfectly Natural History.   Listen to previous podcasts. [Image: Todd Marshall; Music: Jeffrey Cook] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we chat about what it means if a monkey can learn to recognize itself in a mirror, injecting people with live malaria parasites as a vaccine strategy, and insect-inspired wind turbines with Online News Editor David Grimm. And Joleah Lamb joins Alexa Billow to discuss how seagrass can greatly reduce harmful microbes in the ocean—protecting people and corals from disease. Read the research.   Listen to previous podcasts.   [Image: peters99/iStock; Music: Jeffrey Cook] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we chat about why grizzly bears seem to be dying on Canadian railway tracks, slow-release fertilizers that reduce environmental damage, and cleaning water with the power of the sun on the cheap, with Online News Editor David Grimm. And David Malakoff joins Alexa Billow to discuss a package of stories on the role of science and evidence in policymaking[link TK]. Listen to previous podcasts.  [Image: tacky_ch/iStockphoto; Music: Jeffrey Cook] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we chat about how the Earth is sending oxygen to the moon, using a GPS data set to hunt for dark matter, and retrieving 80-million year old proteins from dinosaur bones, with Online News Editor David Grimm. And Philip Tetlock joins Alexa Billow to discuss improving our ability to make judgments about the future through forecasting competitions as part of a special section on prediction in this week’s issue of Science. Listen to previous podcasts. [Image: NASA; Music: Jeffrey Cook] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we chat about 50-kilogram otters that once stalked southern China, using baseball stats to show how jet lag puts players off their game, and a growing link between pollution and dementia, with Online News Editor David Grimm. Also in this week’s show: our very first monthly book segment. In the inaugural segment, Jen Golbeck interviews Helen Pilcher about her new book Bring Back the King: The New Science of De-extinction. Plus Denise Tieman joins Alexa Billow to discuss the genes behind tomato flavor, or lack thereof.   Listen to previous podcasts.    [Image: Dutodom; Music: Jeffrey Cook] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we chat about a surprising reason why killer whales undergo menopause, flipping a kill switch in mice with lasers, and Fukushima residents who measured their own radiation exposure[link tk], with Online News Editor Catherine Matacic. Plus, Science’s Alexa Billow talks to Stephen Elledge about the relationship between chromosomal abnormalities in tumors and immunotherapy for cancer.   Listen to previous podcasts.   [Image: Copyright Kenneth Balcomb Center for Whale Research; Music: Jeffrey Cook] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we chat about a blood test that could predict recovery time after a concussion, new insights into the bizarre hagfish’s anatomy, and a cheap paper centrifuge based on a toy, with Online News Editor David Grimm. Plus, Science’s Alexa Billow talks to Christian Koerner about why just planting any old tree isn’t the answer to our carbon problem.    Listen to previous podcasts.   [Image: Bureau of Land Management Oregon and Washington; Music: Jeffrey Cook] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we chat about how long dinosaur eggs take—or took—to hatch, a new survey that confirms the world’s hot spots for lightning, and replenishing endangered species with feral pets with Online News Editor Catherine Matacic. Plus, Science’s Alexa Billow talks to Megan Gannon about the dilemma presented by tissue samples collected during the Nazi era. And Sarah Crespi discusses a new test for mad cow disease with Kelly Servick.   Listen to previous podcasts.   [Image: NASA/flickr; Music: Jeffrey Cook] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices