Science Magazine Podcast

Mar 06 2025 578 ep. 28 mins 52.9k

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Weekly podcasts from Science Magazine, the world's leading journal of original scientific research, global news, and commentary.

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Intrusive thoughts during pregnancy, paternity detectives, and updates from the Trump Tracker

Mar 06 2025 56 mins

First up this week, International News Editor David Malakoff joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss the most recent developments in U.S. science under Donald Trump’s second term, from the impact of tariffs on science to the rehiring of probationary employees at the National Science Foundation. Next, we tackle the question of extra-pair paternity in people—when marriage or birth r

Keeping transgenic corn sustainable, and sending shrunken heads home

Feb 27 2025 36 mins

First up this week, Kata Karáth, a freelance journalist based in Ecuador, talks with host Sarah Crespi about an effort to identify traditionally prepared shrunken heads in museums and collections around the world and potentially repatriate them. Next, genetically modified Bt corn has helped farmers avoid serious crop damage from insects, but planting it everywhere all the time c

Shrinking AI for use in farms and clinics, ethical dilemmas for USAID researchers, and how to evolve evolvability

Feb 20 2025 43 mins

First up this week, researchers face impossible decisions as U.S. aid freeze halts clinical trials. Deputy News Editor Martin Enserink joins host Sarah Crespi to talk about how organizers of U.S. Agency for International Development–funded studies are grappling with ethical responsibilities to trial participants and collaborators as funding, supplies, and workers dry up. Next,

Training AI to read animal facial expressions, NIH funding takes a big hit, and why we shouldn’t put cameras in robot pants

Feb 13 2025 40 mins

First up this week, International News Editor David Malakoff joins the podcast to discuss the big change in NIH’s funding policy for overhead or indirect costs, the outrage from the biomedical community over the cuts, and the lawsuits filed in response. Next, what can machines understand about pets and livestock that humans can’t? Christa Lesté-Lasserre, a freelance science

How the mantis shrimp builds its powerful club, and mysteries of middle Earth

Feb 06 2025 27 mins

First up this week, Staff Writer Paul Voosen joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss mapping clogs and flows in Earth’s middle layer—the mantle. They also talk about recent policy stories on NASA’s reactions to President Donald Trump’s administration’s executive orders. Next, the mantis shrimp is famous for its powerful club, a biological hammer it uses to crack open hard sh

Why it pays to scratch that itch, and science at the start of the second Trump administration

Jan 30 2025 27 mins

First up this week, we catch up with the editor of ScienceInsider, Jocelyn Kaiser. She talks about changes at the major science agencies that came about with the transition to President Donald Trump’s second administration, such as hiring freezes at the National Institutes of Health and the United States’s departure from the World Health Organization. Next, producer Kevin McL

Unlocking green hydrogen, and oxygen deprivation as medicine

Jan 23 2025 34 mins

First up this week, although long touted as a green fuel, the traditional approach to hydrogen production is not very sustainable. Staff writer Robert F. Service joins producer Meagan Cantwell to discuss how researchers are aiming to improve electrolyzers—devices that split water into hydrogen and oxygen—with more efficient and durable designs. Next, Robert Rogers, who was a

Rising infections from a dusty devil, and nailing down when our ancestors became meat eaters

Jan 16 2025 34 mins

First up this week, growing numbers of Valley fever cases, also known as coccidioidomycosis, has researchers looking into the disease-causing fungus. They’re exploring its links to everything from drought and wildfires to climate change and rodent populations. Staff Writer Meredith Wadman joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss her visit to a Valley fever research site in the desert n

Bats surf storm fronts, and public perception of preprints

Jan 09 2025 33 mins

First up this week, as preprint publications ramped up during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, so did media attention for these pre–peer-review results. But what do the readers of news reports based on preprints know about them? Associate News Editor Jeff Brainard joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss studies that look at the public perception of preprints in the news and how

On the trail with a truffle-hunting dog, and why we should save elderly plants and animals

Jan 02 2025 29 mins

First up this week, Newsletter Editor Christie Wilcox talks with host Sarah Crespi about truffle hunting for science. Wilcox accompanied Heather Dawson, a Ph.D. student at the University of Oregon, and her sister Hilary Dawson, a postdoctoral researcher at Australian National University, on a hunt for nonculinary truffles—the kind you don’t eat—with the help of a specially