Alle afleveringen
703 afleveringen, van nieuw naar oud
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Flu the Coop
24 november 2025 · 1 uur 5 min
The worry about whether H5N1 will trigger a human pandemic has concealed a startling reality. Avian influenza has already taken an enormous toll on the lives of other animals. Since 2005, the number of wild and domesticated birds killed is greater than the combined human populations of the United States and Russia. Bird flu is burning through wild flocks, poultry farms, and mammal populations, including those of sea mammals. We look at the places where the virus can recombine and mutate, and why this version is not simply dying out as it has in years past. At a squawking live poultry market in Brooklyn, and on a Long Island duck farm, we hear about the difficult experience of euthanizing 100,000 birds and whether a farm can recover from such a devastating loss. And finally, we ask, why poultry vaccines that could curb the spread of H5N1 aren’t being used. But we begin our episode with descriptions of the soaring global migrations of birds whose feats of endurance help us understand why H5N1 is widespread in birds worldwide. Lees meer
Guests:
Scott Weidensaul – Ornithologist, bird migration researcher, and author of "A World on the Wing: The Global Odyssey of Migratory Birds"
David Swayne – Bird flu veterinarian
Doug Corwin – Farmer and owner of Crescent Duck Farm, Aquebogue, New York
Jon Cohen – Senior correspondent with Science Magazine, where you can find his recent article, “The Pandemic Next Time,” and author of "Planning Miracles: How to Prevent Future Pandemics"
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Skeptic Check: String Theory
17 november 2025 · 54 min
The idea that the universe is made of tiny vibrating strings was once the science theory du jour. String theory promised to unite the disparate theories describing particles and gravity, and many people, not just scientists, were optimistic that a theory of everything might be within our grasp. But here we are, many years later, and string theory doesn’t seem to have delivered on its initial promise. What happened? We consider the science around string theory in this episode of Skeptic Check. Lees meer
Guest:
Brian Greene – Physicist and mathematician at Columbia University, and author of The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory.
Descripción en español
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired October 14, 2024
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
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Solar Good
10 november 2025 · 59 min
In Brazil, leaders from across the globe are gathering for COP30, the premier climate summit in the world. For the first time, the U.S. is sitting it out, after exiting the Paris Agreement. There is, however, a ray of hope in the global efforts to reduce fossil fuel emissions. Bill McKibben, an environmentalist and journalist who describes himself as a “professional bummer-out-of-people,” has good news about the solar energy industry, after years of his repeated, and alarming, reports about our failure to address climate change. For the first time ever, solar energy production is outpacing the fossil fuel industry. Momentum is gathering in surprising places. The state with the fastest growing clean energy sector is the oil and gas country, Texas. And, when energy analysts investigated Pakistan’s sudden drop in energy demand, they saw “solar panels spreading across rooftops like mushrooms after a rainstorm.” Lees meer
Guests:
Bill McKibben – environmentalist, journalist and author of “Here Comes the Sun: A Last Chance for the Climate and a Fresh Chance for Civilization”
Jon Gertner – journalist, editor, and author of “The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Katrina and the River
3 november 2025 · 1 uur 8 min
“The Mississippi River will always have its own way; no engineering skill can persuade it to do otherwise,” said Mark Twain. In this, our final episode marking the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, we consider how efforts to control the Mighty Mississippi – a river engineered from its Minnesota headwaters to its Gulf Coast outlet – have responded to the devastating storm, and how New Orleans’ relationship to the river has changed. Can the city keep up with the pressure that climate change is putting on this engineered system, or is retreat the only viable response? Lees meer
Plus, a wetland recovery project that aims to bolster protection from hurricanes and flooding in the Lower Ninth Ward.
Guests:
Boyce Upholt – Journalist and author of “The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi River”
Nathaniel Rich – Author of “Second Nature: Scenes From a World Remade” and the New York Times Op-Ed, “New Orleans’ Striking Advantage in the Age of Climate Change”
Harriet Swift – New Orleans resident
Andrew Horowitz – Historian, University of Connecticut, author of "Katrina: A History, 1915-2015"
Rashida Ferdinand – Founder and Executive Director of Sankofa Community Development Corporation, overseeing the Sankofa Wetland Park and Nature Trail in New Orleans
Jason Day – Biologist, wetland Scientist, Comite Resources in Louisiana
Descripción en español
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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The Decomposers
27 oktober 2025 · 57 min
What happens to us after we die is as much a question for anthropology and ecology as it is for theology. Death and decay are not comfortable subjects, but some scientists study them unflinchingly, knowing that doing so yields valuable scientific insights about decomposition. We hear about The Body Farm at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville where forensic anthropologists dissect how variables, such as weather and insects, affect the rate of decomposition, and why a cadaver island has its own ecology. Plus, how a mystery about Neanderthal diets was solved by studying maggots, and why a chemical element discovered by alchemists, and recycled at death in your garden, is essential for life. Lees meer
Guests:
Giovanna Vidoli – Forensic anthropologist and director of the Forensic Anthropology Center at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Dawnie Steadman – anthropologist and former director of the Center at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Melanie Beasley – Biological anthropologist in the Department of Anthropology at Purdue University
Jack Lohmann – author of “White Light: The Elemental Role of Phosphorus in Our Cells, in Our Food, and in Our World”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Shipwrecks
20 oktober 2025 · 54 min
Shipwrecks are scenes of tragedy, but they are also bits of history frozen in time that can provide insights into events and ideas from long ago. That is, if we can find them. From an 11th century Viking sailing ship to a WW II era British cargo ship with a mailbag of letters onboard amazingly preserved, an underwater archeologist takes us on a deep dive into history. Lees meer
Guest:
David Gibbins - underwater archeologist, novelist, and the author of nonfiction, including his latest book, “The History of the World in Twelve Shipwrecks”.
Descripción en español
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired September 9, 2024
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact sales@advertisecast.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Mad About Mars
13 oktober 2025 · 57 min
Long before Orson Welles provoked a panic with his 1938 radio broadcast of a Martian invasion in War of the Worlds, we were fascinated with the possibility of life on the Red Planet. We may be a step closer to finding it after the Perseverance rover turned up tantalizing evidence of possible ancient life in the form of mineral deposits in a Martian rock. But to be sure, we need to test that rock sample in a lab here on Earth, and the NASA Mars Sample Return Mission has been suspended. Still, our passion for our favorite inhabited world has not diminished. From the latest possible biosignature, to the supposed canals on Mars, to how the early 20th century Martian craze influenced vaudeville, we consider the many ways we are Mad About Mars. Lees meer
Guests:
Janice Bishop – Senior research scientist at the SETI Institute.
Adam Frank – Astrophysicist at the University of Rochester
David Baron – Author of “The Martians: The True Story of an Alien Craze that Captured Turn of the Century America”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Skeptic Check: Health Fads
6 oktober 2025 · 54 min
The tiny bean-shaped structures in your cells – mitochondria – are little powerhouses. Recent research suggests they may unlock overall good health, or, when they fail, cause diseases such as diabetes and Alzheimer’s. How strong is the science for these claims and what, if anything, should we be doing to improve our mitochondrial health? Should we take a cue from influencers who suggest drinking an industrial dye called methylene blue? Meanwhile, there have been beefed up calls for adding protein to our diets by eating high protein ice cream, energy bars and huge slabs of meat. Protein builds muscles, but is the muscle of science behind these claims? This week, we consider recent health trends on Skeptic Check. Lees meer
Guests:
Martin Picard – Professor of behavioral medicine and mitochondrial psychobiology at Columbia University, where he runs the Mitochondrial Psychobiology Group.
Howard LeWine – General internal medicine physician at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Chief Medical Editor at Harvard Health Publishing, and editor in chief of Harvard Men’s Health Watch.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
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Not Just a Phage
29 september 2025 · 54 min
We’re hurtling towards a post-antibiotic world, as the overuse of antibiotics has given rise to dangerous drug-resistant bacteria. Can we fight back using viruses as weapons? An obscure medical therapy uses certain viruses called bacteriophages to treat infection. For a century attempts to turn phage-therapy into a life-saving treatment have faltered, but today there’s renewed interest in this approach. Can we use phages to forestall the antibiotic crisis? Lees meer
Guests:
Claas Kirchhelle – Medical historian at the University College, Dublin
Tom Ireland – Journalist, editor of The Biologist and author of “The Good Virus: The Amazing Story and Forgotten Promise of the Phage”
Steffanie Strathdee – Associate Dean of Global Health Sciences at the University of California San Diego
Tom Patterson – Professor of psychiatry at the University of California San Diego
Descripción en español
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired August 12, 2024
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Spare (Body) Parts
22 september 2025 · 54 min
Strapped-on brass noses, frog skin grafts, human organs grown in pigs: The world of replaceable body parts is both amazing and a bit unsettling. But who better give us a tour of the past and present of what medical engineering considers Plan B, than the inimitable science writer Mary Roach. Lees meer
Guest:
Mary Roach – Science writer and author of “Replaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Some Chemicals are Forever
15 september 2025 · 58 min
As their name suggests, “forever chemicals” have extraordinary staying power. When these nearly indestructible compounds find their way into our soil and water, they don’t break down for hundreds or thousands of years. PFAS – the name for these synthetic chemicals – isn’t just in our natural environment. Scientists have found it everywhere, including in the blood of nearly every living being. Lees meer
In this episode, we talk to the reporter who broke open the story about a decades-long corporate coverup regarding forever chemicals, look at what we know about their health effects, and consider how a kneecapping of the EPA’s regulatory power may weaken the best tool we have for protecting ourselves from PFAS contamination.
Guests:
Nathaniel Rich – Author of “Second Nature: Scenes from a World Remade,” and the New York Times Magazine article, “The Lawyer Who Became Dupont’s Worst Nightmare”
Rachel Frazin – Energy and Environment Policy reporter for The Hill, co-author of “Poisoning the Well: How Forever Chemicals Contaminated America”
Janet McCabe – visiting professor at the Robert McKinney School of Law at Indiana University, former deputy administrator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Animal Alphabets
8 september 2025 · 54 min
Have scientists discovered an alphabet in whale calls? As researchers try to decipher the series of clicks made by sperm whales, we ask whether these cetaceans might have language, and if it follows that whales are thinking animals too. Could we one day get a peek into the thoughts of a humpback whale? Meanwhile, somewhere along the long path of evolution, one species emerged with an impressive gift for gab. Are speech and language unique human superpowers? Lees meer
Guests:
Carl Zimmer – Columnist, The New York Times, including the article, “Scientists Find an ‘Alphabet’ in Whale Songs”.
Ev Fedorenko – Cognitive neuroscientist, director of the EV Lab, MIT
Tecumseh Fitch – Evolutionary biologist at the University of Vienna
Descripción en español
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired July 29, 2024
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Aliens Now
1 september 2025 · 54 min
We are closer than ever to finding aliens according to astrophysicist Adam Frank. He isn’t alone in his optimism. Over the last two decades, the tools used to search for extraterrestrials have been advancing mightily. Where we were once only monitoring with radio telescopes, we are now actively looking for bio and technosignatures on exoplanets. Find out why scientists think new technology may be a game changer in the hunt for life off Earth. Lees meer
Guest:
Adam Frank – Astrophysicist and author of a new book “The Little Book of Aliens”
Descripción en español.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired July 1, 2024
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Don't Lighten Up
25 augustus 2025 · 54 min
A canopy of stars in the night sky is more than breathtaking. Starlight is also an important tool that astronomers use to study our universe. But the growth of artificial light and light pollution are creating dramatic changes to the nighttime environment. Let your eyes adjust to the dark as we travel to a dark sky reserve to gaze upon an increasingly rare view of the Milky Way and explore what we lose when darkness disappears. Lees meer
Guests:
Kim Arcand – Visualization scientist & emerging tech lead, NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and author of “Light: The Visible Spectrum and Beyond".
Don Jolley – Teacher of Math and Sciences at the Bolinas School in Marin, California who has been leading dark sky tours for three decades.
Christopher Kyba – Interdisciplinary Geographic Information Sciences Research Fellow at Ruhr University Bochum.
Descripción en español
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired July 8, 2024
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Katrina and the River
18 augustus 2025 · 1 uur 5 min
“The Mississippi River will always have its own way; no engineering skill can persuade it to do otherwise,” said Mark Twain. In this, our final episode marking the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, we consider how efforts to control the Mighty Mississippi – a river engineered from its Minnesota headwaters to its Gulf Coast outlet – have responded to the devastating storm, and how New Orleans’ relationship to the river has changed. Can the city keep up with the pressure that climate change is putting on this engineered system, or is retreat the only viable response? Lees meer
Plus, a wetland recovery project that aims to bolster protection from hurricanes and flooding in the Lower Ninth Ward.
Guests:
Boyce Upholt – Journalist and author of “The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi River”
Nathaniel Rich – Author of “Second Nature: Scenes From a World Remade” and the New York Times Op-Ed, “New Orleans’ Striking Advantage in the Age of Climate Change”
Harriet Swift – New Orleans resident
Andrew Horowitz – Historian, University of Connecticut, author of "Katrina: A History, 1915-2015"
Rashida Ferdinand – Founder and Executive Director of Sankofa Community Development Corporation, overseeing the Sankofa Wetland Park and Nature Trail in New Orleans
Jason Day – Biologist, wetland Scientist, Comite Resources in Louisiana
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
©2025 Big Picture Science, All Rights Reserved
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Beyond the Standard Model
11 augustus 2025 · 1 uur
Ever heard of a beauty quark? How about a glueball? Physics is full of weird particles that leave many of us scratching our heads. But these tiny particles make up everything in the quantum world and in us and are the basis of the fundamental scientific theory called The Standard Model. But it doesn’t explain everything. It can’t account for dark matter or dark energy, for example. We find out whether new physics experiments might force us to rewrite the Standard Model. Plus, we discuss a NASA proposal to fly spacecraft close to the sun in search of new physics. Lees meer
Guests:
Phil Plait – Aka the Bad Astronomer, former astronomer on Hubble, teacher, lecturer and debunker of conspiracy theories. He is also the author of a new book “Under Alien Skies: A Sightseer’s Guide to the Universe.”
Harry Cliff – Particle physicist at the University of Cambridge who works on the LHCb experiment at the largest particle physics laboratory in the world, CERN. He is the author of: “Space Oddities, The Mysterious Anomalies Challenging Our Understanding of the Universe.”
Slava Turyshev – Research scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired May 20, 2024
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Scoping Out the Universe
4 augustus 2025 · 54 min
Telescopes are like light buckets. The bigger the telescope, the more light collected for astronomers to observe. With recent advances in technology, amateur astronomers can join professionals for a chance to observe stellar nurseries and exoplanets many light-years away. But as our capabilities increase, so do the mysteries, including those around high-energy bursts coming from an otherwise unremarkable part of the universe. Understanding fast radio bursts could turn physics on its head. Lees meer
From the Vera Rubin Telescope in Chile to the backyard instruments of amateur astronomers, we share what new things we might learn about stars, the Earth, exoplanets, and the potential for life on other worlds.
Guests:
Clare Higgs – Astronomer working with the public outreach team for the Vera Rubin Observatory
Franck Marchis – Senior astronomer and director of citizen science at the SETI Institute, chief science officer and co-founder of Unistellar
Amanda Cook – Postdoctoral fellow at McGill University and member of the CHIME/FRB Collaboration
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Leave it to Beavers
28 juli 2025 · 59 min
They are known for holding branches in their paws and gnawing on them like corn cobs. They build lodges and dams which occasionally flood roads. Cute, comical, and considered pests, beavers were nearly hunted to extinction for their pelts before conservation efforts allowed their populations to rebound. Now environmentalists and engineers are reintroducing North America’s largest rodent to drought-prone habitats across the country. As the paddle-tailed animals’ dam-building has revealed itself to be a potent bulwark against climate change-induced water scarcity, the beaver is being hailed as an ecological hero. Lees meer
Join us as we stomp through soggy meadows getting to know the OG geoengineers. From their water pressure-sensing tails to their intricate branch-weaving, find out why, as our nation’s wetlands disappear, and new federal policies strip protection for many of those that remain, many think that partnership with a wild species could help build ecological resiliency.
Guests:
Leila Philip – Journalist and author of “Beaverland: How One Weird Rodent Made America”
Denise Burchsted – research scientist, and engineer, Keene State College
Clay Frazer – restoration ecologist with Native Range Ecological
Michael Waasegiizhig Price – traditional ecological knowledge specialist at the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission. He is Anishinaabe and a longtime tribal college educator serving at Leech Lake Tribal College and White Earth Tribal and Community College.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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The Play's the Thing
21 juli 2025 · 1 uur
Has children’s play become too safe? Research suggests that efforts to prioritize safety harms children’s mental and physical development during play and contribute to anxiety. One solution: introduce risk into play. We visit an adventure playground where kids play unsupervised with anything from scraps of metal to hammers and nails. Plus, what are the evolutionary benefits of play? After all, we’re not the only species who like to roughhouse, sled, or chase balls. And, reclaiming play for those who have outgrown recess. Lees meer
Guests:
David Toomey - Professor of English, University of Massachusetts. Amherst and author of “Kingdom of Play: What Ball-Bouncing Octopuses, Belly-Flopping Monkeys, and Mud-Sliding Elephants Reveal About Life Itself.”
Mariana Brussoni - Developmental psychologist who studies children's outdoor risky play, and professor at the University of British Columbia in the Faculty of Medicine
Yoni Kallai - Interim director, head playworker and co-founder of play:groundNYC
Peter Gray - Psychology researcher at Boston College and author of "Free to Learn: Why Unleashing the Instinct to Play Will Make Our Children Happier, More Self-Reliant, and Better Students for Life"
Descripción en español
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired May 13, 2024
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Nuts and Bolts
14 juli 2025 · 54 min
How frequently do you think about fasteners like screws and bolts? Probably not very often. But some of them a storied history, dating back to Egypt in the 3rd century BC. They aren’t just ancient history. They help hold up our bridges and homes today. Join us as we dissect a handful of engineering inventions that keep our world spinning and intact. Lees meer
Guests:
Roma Agrawal - structural engineer and author of "Nuts and Bolts: Seven Small Inventions That Changed the World (in a Big Way)"
Ron Gordon - watchmaker, New York City
Descripción en español
Originally aired May 6, 2024
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Coffee of the Future
7 juli 2025 · 54 min
Drinking a cup of coffee is how billions of people wake up every morning. But climate change is threatening this popular beverage. Over 60% of the world’s coffee species are at risk of extinction. Scientists are searching for solutions, including hunting for wild, forgotten coffee species that are more resilient to our shifting climate. Find out how the chemistry of coffee can help us brew coffee alternatives, and how coffee grounds can be part of building a sustainable future. Lees meer
Guests:
Christopher Hendon - Assistant Professor of Computational Materials Chemistry, University of Oregon
Shannon Kilmartin-Lynch - Associate Professor of Civil Engineering, Monash University, Australia
Aaron Davis - Senior Research Leader of Crops and Global Change, Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew
Descripción en español
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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What Moves Us
30 juni 2025 · 54 min
What physical activity gives you joy? Whether it’s walking, running, dancing or swimming, your body evolved to do it. We are made for movement. But there’s a cost, as anyone with a sore neck or aching back knows. From the tiny muscles in our skin, which raise the hair on our arms, to the intricate mix of bone, blood vessels, and nerves in our neck, natural selection has struck a delicate and sometimes wacky balance between utility and form. In this episode, we explore how parts of the body - our muscles, neck and feet - came to be, and what forces prompted the evolution of efficient yet imperfect bodies. Lees meer
Guests:
Kent Dunlap - Professor of biology at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut and author of “The Neck: A Natural and Cultural History”
Bonnie Tsui - Journalist and author of “On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters”
Jeremy DeSilva - Anthropologist at Dartmouth College and author of “First Steps, How Upright Walking Made Us Human”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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The Rights of Rivers
23 juni 2025 · 54 min
Healthy rivers and riparian ecosystems are teaming with life, but should rivers themselves be considered alive? The question is central to the growing rights-of-nature movement that claims that ecosystems and entities, like rivers, have legal rights. After Ecuador enshrined the rights of nature in its constitution, lawyers employed the new personhood status to stop mining companies from clearing a section of the Los Cedros River and its surrounding biodiverse cloud forest. Granting rivers moral standing comes as over-damming, pollution, and climate change have put them in crisis globally. Writer Robert Macfarlane explores how seeing rivers as living beings rather than just resources – a change he calls “a great act of moral imagination” – could help save our watersheds and rivers, upon which all life depends. Lees meer
Guest:
Robert Macfarlane – Writer and Professor of Literature and Environmental Humanities at the University of Cambridge, and author of “Is a River Alive?”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Lithium Valley
16 juni 2025 · 54 min
The discovery of a massive amount of lithium under the Salton Sea could make the U.S. lithium independent. The metal is key for batteries in electric vehicles and solar panels. But the area is also a delicate ecosystem. We go to southern California to hear what hangs in the balance of the ballooning lithium industry, and also how we extract other crucial substances – such as sand, copper and iron– and turn them into semiconductors, circuitry and other products upon which the modern world depends. Lees meer
Guests:
Ed Conway – economics and data editor of Sky News and columnist for the Times in London. He’s the author of “Material World, The Six Raw Materials that Shape Modern Civilization“.
Frank Ruiz – Audubon California Salton Sea Program Director.
Michael McKibben – Geologist, University of California, Riverside.
Descripción en Español
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired February 19, 2024
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Alien Says What?
9 juni 2025 · 54 min
Whales are aliens on Earth; intelligent beings who have skills for complex problem-solving and their own language. Now in what’s being called a breakthrough, scientists have carried on an extended conversation with a humpback whale. They share the story of this remarkable encounter, their evidence that the creature understood them, and how the experiment informs our Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. After all, what good is it to make contact with ET if we can’t communicate? Lees meer
Guests:
Brenda McCowan – Research behaviorist at the University of California Davis in the School of Veterinary Medicine who studies the ecological aspects of animal behavior and communication.
Fred Sharpe – Whale biologist with the Templeton WhaleSETI Team and field ecologist with Olympic Peninsula Prairies.
Laurance Doyle – Astrophysicist and information theory researcher at the SETI Institute.
Descripción en español.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired February 12, 2024
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Hurricane Comms
2 juni 2025 · 56 min
A big challenge during a hurricane or other disaster is keeping lines of communication open when the power goes out. In this episode, the second in our series tied to the 20th anniversary of hurricane Katrina, we report from the National Hurricane Conference in New Orleans about a technology used in 2005, and still employed today, to provide vital information during a crisis. In our age of growing reliance on cellphones and funding cuts to federal agencies tasked with disaster communications, could ham radio be our last antenna standing during a chaotic catastrophe? “Hams” talk about their ability to keep information flowing during a storm. Meanwhile, a very recent technology, artificial intelligence, is playing a growing role in hurricane preparedness. Emergency responders tell us how they use AI to issue warnings, describe the limits of the technology, and why – and when – humans should step in. Lees meer
Guests:
Bobby Graves – Network manager for Hurricane Watch Net amateur radio. His call sign is KB5HAV.
Julio Ripoll – A coordinator and founder of the National Hurricane Center amateur radio station, WX4NHC in Miami, Florida where he has been a volunteer for 45 years.
Matt Anderson – Call sign KT5KNZ, volunteer at the Louisiana State Emergency Operations Center for two decades. He was active during hurricane Katrina.
Todd Devoe – Emergency management coordinator for the city of Inglewood, California.
Brian Head – Chair of the fire rescue law enforcement and military track for the National Hurricane Conference; executive director with Buffalo Computer Graphics, former employee with the New York State Emergency Management Office.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
Learn more about …
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Hurricane Season
26 mei 2025 · 58 min
In the twenty years since Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast, powerful hurricanes such as Sandy, Irma, Maria and Helene have caused immense property destruction and led to thousands of deaths. If Katrina taught us anything, it was to be prepared for the unimaginable. But have we learned that lesson? Lees meer
In this episode, part of a series tied to the 20th anniversary of Katrina, we report from the National Hurricane Conference in New Orleans about what we’ve learned in the years since. Emergency management teams from the Virgin Islands reflect on the two Category 5 hurricanes that hit within just two weeks of each other in 2017, scientists describe how climate change is reshaping hurricanes and our new tools for forecasting them. Meanwhile dark clouds are gathering. As we head into hurricane season, the administration proposes to slash funding for agencies that are tasked with helping us prepare and recover from natural disasters, such as NOAA and the National Weather Service.
Guests:
Yvette Henry – Community Affairs Coordinator at the Department of Human Services in the US Virgin Islands
Abigail Hendricks – Emergency Support Function #6 coordinator on the island of St John, Virgin Islands
Meaghan Enright – executive director of the nonprofit, Love City Strong that works on disaster preparedness, response, and recovery on the island of St John, Virgin Islands
Rebeca Mueller – Director of media coordination, National Hurricane Conference
Michael Brennan – Director, National Hurricane Center, Miami, Florida
Julie Roberts – Former director of communications and Deputy Chief of Staff for NOAA during the first Trump administration.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
Learn …
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Touching a Nerve
19 mei 2025 · 54 min
Some call it your sixth sense. You refer to it when you have a “gut feeling.” With a vast fiber network running throughout your body, the vagus nerve knows about and helps regulate every critical function in it, from heart rate to digestion to your immune system. Now bioelectric medicine is tapping into that bodily omniscience by using tiny electrical pulses on the vagus nerve to help treat diseases as diverse as epilepsy, diabetes, stroke, Parkinson’s, and even depression. In the coming months, the FDA is set to make a decision about a vagus nerve stimulation device, which, if approved, could provide first-of-its-kind treatment for an autoimmune disease that affects millions of Americans. We consider the groundbreaking potential of vagus nerve stimulation and ask whether electricity could one day replace medications. Lees meer
Guest:
Kevin Tracey – Neurosurgeon, president of the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research at Northwell Health, and author of “The Great Nerve: The New Science of the Vagus Nerve and How to Harness Its Healing Reflexes”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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NASA Under the Axe
12 mei 2025 · 55 min
The White House has proposed unprecedented cuts to NASA’s budget - the largest in the agency’s history. If approved, this withdrawal of funding would force the cancellation of many major programs, including the long anticipated Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope as well as others involved in the search for life in the universe. It would also impact the agency’s ability to do fundamental research. We look at what the loss of NASA programs could mean for the future of space science and exploration. Plus, an intriguing discovery by the James Webb Space Telescope underscores the progress we’ve made - and could lose - when it comes to searching for potential biosignatures in the universe. Lees meer
Guests:
Leonard David – Space journalist and author
Nadia Drake – Freelance science journalist
Carl Zimmer – New York Times science columnist
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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The Wrong Stuff
5 mei 2025 · 58 min
By one estimate the average American home has 300,000 objects. Yet our ancient ancestors had no more than what they could carry with them. How did we go from being self-sufficient primates to nonstop shoppers? We examine the evolutionary history of stuff through the lens of archeology beginning with he ancestor who first picked up a palm-sized rock and made it into a tool. Lees meer
Guest:
Chip Colwell -
archeologist and former Curator of Anthropology at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, editor-in-chief of the digital magazine Sapiens, and author of “So Much Stuff: How Humans Discovered Tools, Invented Meaning, and Made More of Everything.”Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired February 5, 2024
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast
network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Inside Planets
28 april 2025 · 54 min
With planets and moons, it’s what’s inside that counts. If we want to understand surface features, like volcanoes, or their history, such as how the planet formed or whether it’s suitable for life, we study their interiors. Astronomer Sabine Stanley takes us on a journey to the centers of Venus, Saturn’s large moon Titan, Jupiter’s moon Io, and of course Earth, to help us understand how they, and the solar system, came to be. Lees meer
Guest:
Sabine Stanley - Planetary scientist at Johns Hopkins University and the author of What’s Hidden Inside Planets.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired January 22, 2024
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Tech in Check
21 april 2025 · 54 min
Worried that AI will replace you? It may not seem like the Hollywood writers’ strike has anything in common with the Luddite rebellion in England in 1811, but they are surprisingly similar. Today we use the term “Luddite” dismissively to describe a technophobe, but the original Luddites – cloth workers – organized and fought Industrial Revolution automation and the factory bosses who were replacing humans with cotton spinning machines and steam powered looms. Find out what our age of AI can learn from textile workers of 200 years ago about keeping humans
in the loop. Lees meerGuest:
Brian Merchant - Los Angeles Times tech columnist and author of “Blood in the Machine: The
Origins of the Rebellion Against Big Tech”Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired January 14, 2024
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
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Skeptic Check: Cryptids
14 april 2025 · 57 min
Bigfoot could get official status if proposed legislation passes making it the state cryptid of California. If nothing else, the effort shows that fascination with cryptids has an outsized footprint on our culture. We look at why mythical creatures continue to capture imaginations - as well as passions - of die-hard believers, despite no evidence for their existence. An author uncovers the origin of a beloved hoax in the American West and its unexpected ties to a real animal and historical medical breakthrough. But are we looking for creature delights in all the wrong places? A tally of Earth’s species reveals that far more remain unidentified than are currently known. Newly discovered critters such as the Yeti crab and an organism dubbed the
Flying Spaghetti Monster are so strange, it challenges us to separate fauna fact from folktale. Lees meerGuests:
Chris Rogers – Assemblymember, California’s 2nd Assembly DistrictBenjamin Radford – Deputy Editor of Skeptical Inquirer Science Magazine, author, and co-host
of Squaring the Strange podcastMichael Branch – Writer, humorist, and author of On the Trail of the Jackalope: How a Legend Captured the World’s Imagination and Helped Us Cure Cancer
Boris Worm – Marine ecologist, Professor of Biology at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Vroom!
7 april 2025 · 55 min
Self-driving cars, once a thing of science fiction, have become a reality in a handful of cities across the country. As our vehicles gain autonomy, they may provoke a profound shift not unlike the introduction of the first car in the late1800s and raise the question of whether the human driver will soon be obsolete. For a glimpse into the future of self-driving cars, we take a spin through the history of the automobile, from the Model T to the driverless taxi-cab. Along the way, we explore the rise of American manufacturing and the unmistakable but unexpected way in which we have bonded to our four-wheeled companions. Lees meer
Guests
:
Witold Rybczynski – Professor emeritus of architecture and design at the University of Pennsylvania and author of the book, The Driving Machine: A Design History of the CarTimothy B Lee – Technology journalist and writer of the newsletter, Understanding AI
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
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Skeptic Check: Asteroid Mining
31 maart 2025 · 54 min
Asteroids are rich in precious metals and other valuable resources. But mining them presents considerable challenges. We discuss these, and consider how these spinning, rocky resources might be the key to a space-faring future. But an economist points out the consequences of bringing material back to Earth, and a scientist raises an ethical question; do we have an obligation to keep the asteroids intact for science? Lees meer
Guests:
Jim Bell - Planetary scientist in the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University.Martin Elvis - Astronomer and author of “Asteroids: How Love, Fear, and Greed Will Determine Our Future in Space.”
Ian Lange - Economist and associate professor at the Colorado School of Mines and author of a paper on the feasibility of asteroid mining.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired March 18, 2024
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks
for your support!Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Disappearing Data
24 maart 2025 · 1 uur 3 min
Firing federal workers and freezing grants has upended research institutions, prompting uncertainty about their futures. We look at the real-world impacts these policy changes may have for our mechanisms for collecting and sharing important data. An NIH grant recipient considers the future of her lab’s ability to do basic research, including studying complex diseases such as Alzheimer’s and heart disease. An interruption in reliable access to CDC data comes as highly contagious avian influenza continues to evolve and spread in the U.S. And what does the gutting of NOAA imply for collecting essential weather data, including those used to forecast hurricanes? Lees meer
Guests:
Kimberly Cooper – Developmental biologist at the University of California, San Diego
Amy Maxmen – Public health reporter at KFF Health News
Alan Sealls – Retired broadcast meteorologist, adjust professor at the University of South Alabama and president-elect of the American Meteorological Society
Bernadette Woods Placky – Chief meteorologist and Climate Matters director at the nonprofit organization, Climate Central Featuring
music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Amazing Arctic
17 maart 2025 · 56 min
What’s it like to live on a block of ice, especially when it thaws? An environment writer shares his forty-year experience in the Arctic, including the time a paddling polar bear tracked him on a river. He describes the stunning beauty of America’s last truly wild place and the dramatic changes to the landscape he recently witnessed. Recent research has backed up his eyewitness accounts, as an arctic scientist presents the latest data collected from a part of world warming four times faster than the rest of the planet. Lees meer
Guests:
Jon Waterman – Author of Into the Thaw: Witnessing Wonder Amid the Arctic Climate Crisis
Twila Moon – Deputy Lead Scientist and Science Communication Liaison at the National Snow and Ice Data Center
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support!
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Preventable
10 maart 2025 · 1 uur 7 min
Two infectious diseases that we’ve been able to prevent for a half-century are re-emerging. One of the most contagious viruses in the world, measles, is spreading in the United States. Anti-vax sentiment has driven vaccination rates down leading to outbreaks in Texas and New Mexico. The U.S. has also seen an uptick in cases of tuberculosis which has reclaimed its position as the deadliest infection globally. The author John Green shares how his travels to Sierra Leone inspired his new book about TB. Through the story of a young patient, Henry, he highlights the health inequities that contribute to over a million and a half tuberculosis deaths annually despite the existence of a cure. Lees meer
Guests:
Adam Ratner – Pediatric infectious disease doctor in New York City, and author of Booster Shots: The Urgent Lessons of Measles and the Uncertain Future of Children's HealthJohn Green – Author of The Fault in Our Stars, The Anthropocene Reviewed, and Everything is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of our Deadliest Infection
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Your Mind on Movies
3 maart 2025 · 54 min
By one estimate we spend a fifth of our lives watching movies or TV. In fact, we consume entertainment almost as habitually as we eat or sleep, activities that receive scientific scrutiny and study. So why not consider the effects that watching movies and TV have on our minds and bodies too? When we do, we find that they are not mere escapism. A data scientist reveals why we are what we watch, and how scientists and filmmakers work, often with competing agendas, to create sci-fi entertainment. Lees meer
Guest:
Walt Hickey - journalist, data scientist, and author of “You Are What You Watch: How
Movies and TV Affect Everything”Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired January 8, 2024
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The Latest Buzz
24 februari 2025 · 54 min
Is your windshield accumulating less bug splatter? Insects, the most numerous animals on Earth, are becoming scarcer, and that’s not good news. They’re essential, and not just for their service as pollinators. We ask what’s causing the decrease in insect populations, and how
can it be reversed
.
Also, the story of how California’s early citrus crops came under attack – a problem that was solved by turning Nature on itself. And how chimpanzee “doctors” use insects to treat wounds. Lees meerWe investigate the small and the many on “The Latest Buzz.”
Guests:
Martin Kernan – Historian and journalist. His article, “The Bug That Saved California,” appeared in the January-February 2022 issue of the Smithsonian
Alessandra Mascaro – Evolutionary Biologist, currently working at the Ozouga Chimpanzee Project, co-author of the Current Biology paper, “Application of insects to wounds of self and
others by chimpanzees in the wild”Lara Southern – Doctoral student at the University of Osnabruck, co-author of the Current Biology paper, “Application of insects to wounds of self and others by chimpanzees in the wild”
Oliver Milman – Environment correspondent for The Guardian in the U.S. and author of “The Insect Crisis: The Fall of the Tiny Empires that Run the World”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired March 28, 2022
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks
for your support!Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Skeptic Check: Into the DeepSeek
17 februari 2025 · 59 min
When the Chinese developer of DeepSeek released its model R1, a rift opened up in Silicon Valley. The company, a relatively unknown player, appeared to have created a better and cheaper model than its American competitors. Some big voices in the tech world called it a “Sputnik moment.” Others worried that the open-source model would allow malicious actors to harness the power of this AI technology. But did the arrival of DeepSeek significantly change how artificial intelligence will unfold? We explore that question and ask whether one particular sci-fi franchise got it right when portraying our anxiety about runaway AI. Lees meer
Guests:
Alex Kantrowitz – Tech journalist and founder of the podcast and newsletter Big Technology
Kristian Hammond – Professor of computer science at Northwestern University and Director of the Center for Advancing Safety of Machine Intelligence
Dorian Lynskey – podcaster and author of “Everything Must Go: The Stories We Tell About the End of the World”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Chasing an Asteroid
10 februari 2025 · 56 min
Everyone knows that a big rock wiped out the dinosaurs. But the danger from an asteroid hitting Earth is not limited to ancient history. To deal with this threat, scientists recently ran an experiment to deflect a potential “city killer.” We’ll hear the results of that experiment, and about a visit to another asteroid. In the dusty material NASA brought back from the asteroid Bennu, scientists found the chemical building blocks of life, including many of the amino acids that are found in our cells. Could an asteroid have brought the ingredients for life to ancient Earth? In this episode, we look at our paradoxical relationship with the space rocks that taketh way – and may help giveth - life. Lees meer
Guests:
Scott Sandford - Astrophysicist and Research Scientist at NASA’s Ames Research Center
Robin George Andrews - Science journalist, volcanologist, and author of "How to Kill an Asteroid: The Real Science of Planetary Defense"
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Coming to Our Animal Senses
3 februari 2025 · 54 min
Animals experience the world differently. There are insects that can see ultraviolet light, while some snakes can hunt in the dark thanks to their ability to sense infrared. Such differences are not restricted to vision: Elephants can hear subsonic sounds, birds navigate by magnetism, and your dog lives in a world marked by odors. In this episode, we speak to science journalist Ed Yong about how other creatures sense the world. Could we ever understand what it’s like to have the hearing of a bat or the sight of a hawk? Lees meer
Guest:
Ed Yong – Science writer for The Atlantic whose coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic earned him a Pulitzer Prize in explanatory journalism. He is the author of, “An Immense World: How
Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us.”Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired September 5, 2022
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Skeptic Check: Drone Panic Revisited
31 januari 2025 · 10 min
We have an update to our recent episode, Skeptic Check: Drone Panic. If you remember, our guest astronomer Andrew Franknoi recalled the story of Jimmy Carter having seen something mysterious in the sky when he was governor of Georgia in 1969. Astronomers at the time suggested it was likely Venus, as has been the case with other sightings, and for decades that was a widely accepted understanding of what he saw. But there is more to the story, as was brought to our attention by multiple BPS listeners. So, we invited Andrew back to discuss the revised account, and its more satisfying scientific resolution. Lees meer
Guest:
Andrew Fraknoi - Professor of Astronomy at the Fromm Institute of the University of San
FranciscoBig Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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Skeptic Check: Drone Panic
27 januari 2025 · 58 min
When several mysterious objects were spotted flying over New Jersey, their unknown identity led to frightening rumors, and triggered frustration and alarm among some residents of the Garden State. What were these objects, and if they were drones, as some appeared to be, were they friendly or foe? Many of the objects have now been identified. We talk about what happened when calmer heads prevailed and consider what the Great Drone Panic might have
in common with other episodes involving objects cruising the skies. Also, why one expert thinks the event gave birth to a new UFO subculture. Lees meerGuests:
Andrew Fraknoi - Professor of Astronomy at the Fromm Institute of the University of San Francisco
Mick West - Investigator of conspiracy theories and UFO sightings
Greg Eghigian - Professor of history and bioethics at Penn State and author of “After the Flying Saucers Came: A Global History of the UFO Phenomenon”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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The Best Things in Life are Tree(s)
20 januari 2025 · 56 min
While humans were leaving the Stone Age and entering the Bronze, some Bristlecone pine trees grew from seeds to sprouts. They’ve been growing ever since. These 5,000-year-old pines are among the oldest organisms on Earth. Superlatives are also appropriate for the towering redwoods. Trees are amazing in many ways. They provide us with timber and cool us with shade, they sequester carbon and release oxygen, and are home to countless species. But they are also marvels of evolutionary adaptation. We consider the beauty and diversity of trees, and learn why their future is intertwined with ours. Lees meer
Guests:
Kevin Dixon - Naturalist at The East Bay Regional Park District, Oakland, California
Daniel Lewis - Environmental historian and senior curator for the History of Science and Technology at the Huntington Library, art museum and botanical gardens in Pasadena, California, professor of the natural sciences and the environment at Caltech, and author of “Twelve Trees: The Deep Roots of our Future”
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
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The Ocean's Genome
13 januari 2025 · 54 min
After helping to sequence the human genome more than twenty years ago, biochemist Craig Venter seemed to recede from the public eye. But he hadn’t retired. He had gone to sea and taken his revolutionary sequencing tools with him. We chatted with him about his multi-year voyage aboard the research vessel Sorcerer II, its parallels to Darwin’s voyage, and the surprising discoveries his team made about the sheer number and diversity of marine microbes and their roles in ocean ecosystems. Lees meer
Guests:
Craig Venter - Genomicist, biochemist, founder of the J. Craig Venter Institute, and co-author of “The Voyage of Sorcerer II: The Expedition that Unlocked the Secrets of the Ocean’s Microbiome.”
Jeff Hoffman - Lab manager at the J. Craig Venter Institute and expedition scientist on the Sorcerer II expedition.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired December 18, 2023
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network.
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for your support!
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Night Flight
6 januari 2025 · 55 min
Owls are both the most
accessible and elusive of birds. Every child can recognize one, but you’ll be
lucky to spot an owl in a tree, even if you’re looking straight at
it. Besides their camouflage and silent flight, these mostly nocturnal
birds, with their amazing vision and hearing, are most at home in the dead of
night, a time humans find alien and scary. Ecologist Carl Safina got to
know an injured baby screech owl well. Their relationship saved the owl’s life
and gave Safina insider’s wisdom about these aerial hunters of the night.
Guests:
Carl Safina – ecologist at
Stony Brook University, head of the non-profit Safina Center, and author of “Alfie
& Me: What Owls Know, What Humans Believe”
Tom Damiami – natural resources
interpreter, singer on Long Island, NY and leader of the Shelter Island Owl Prowl
Gordy Slack – science writer, former senior editor
of California Wild, the science and natural history magazine published by the
California Academy of Sciences
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired November
6, 2023
Big Picture Science is
part of the Airwave Media podcast
network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about
advertising on Big Picture Science.
You
can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us
on Patreon. Thanks for your
support!
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Lees meer -
Skeptic Check: Naomi Klein
30 december 2024 · 56 min
Our information age is increasingly the disinformation age. The spread of lies and conspiracy theories has created competing experiences of reality. Facts are often useless for changing minds or even making compelling arguments. In this episode, author Naomi Klein and science philosopher Lee McIntyre discuss why the goal – not simply the byproduct - of spreading disinformation is to polarize society. They also offer ideas about how we might find our way back to a shared objective truth.
Guests:
Naomi Klein - Associate professor of Geography at the University of British Columbia and a co-director at the Center for Climate Justice. Author of Doppelganger: A Trip Into the Mirror World
Lee McIntyre - Philosopher of science and a research fellow at the Center for Philosophy and the History of Science at Boston University, and author of Post-Truth and On Disinformation.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
Originally aired December 11, 2023
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You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support! Lees meerLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Extraordinary Ordinary Objects*
23 december 2024 · 54 min
“To live is to count and to count is to calculate.” But before we plugged in the computer to express this ethos, we pulled out the pocket calculator. It became a monarch of mathematics that sparked a computing revolution. But it’s not the only deceptively modest innovation that changed how we work and live. Find out how sewing a scrap of fabric into clothing helped define private life and how adding lines to paper helped build an Empire. Plus, does every invention entail irrevocable cultural loss?
Guests:
Keith Houston – author of “Empire of the Sum: The Rise and Reign of the Pocket Calculator.”
Hannah Carlson – teaches dress history and material culture at the Rhode Island School of Design, author of “Pockets: An Intimate History of How We Keep Things Close.”
Dominic Riley – bookbinder in the U.K.
Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake
*Originally aired October 30, 2023
Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science.
You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support Lees meerLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices