Science Magazine Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Matching sounds to shapes, and stories from the AAAS annual meeting Feb 19, 2026

Show notes

First up on the podcast, Newsletter Editor Christie Wilcox, Associate Online News Editor Michael Greshko, and intern Perri Thaler share their experiences from the AAAS annual meeting in Phoenix.

Christie recorded on location with David Rand regarding his prize-winning Science paper on using a large language model to combat conspiracy theories. Check out the live version of his team’s Debunk Bot.

Michael chats with host Sarah Crespi about the foggy outlook of science in the United States as funding levels and graduate positions decline, and the bright sunshine of young students presenting science posters.

And finally, Perri shares her reporting on OpenAI’s contribution to theoretical physics announced at the meeting.

Next on the show, we hear about the “bouba-kiki” effect—the tendency for people, no matter their language, to associate round shapes with the nonword bouba and spiky shapes with the nonword kiki. Maria Loconsole, a postdoctoral researcher in the Comparative Cognition Lab at the University of Padova, joins the podcast to discuss why her team looked for this effect in freshly hatched chickens. It turns out these baby birds also make these associations, which suggests the effect has less to do with language and more to do with how vertebrate brains are set up to experience the world.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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Building better working dogs, and watching a black hole form Feb 12, 2026

Show notes

First up on the podcast, more than half of all dogs going through service animal training don’t make it to graduation. Producer Kevin McLean journeys with Online News Editor David Grimm to Canine Companions, one of the biggest organizations in the United States for training working dogs. At the facility, they meet puppies in preparation and learn about the behavioral testing and genetics that could be used to improve service animal schooling.

Also appearing in this segment:

Emily Bray, assistant professor in the College of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Arizona
Brenda Kennedy, chief veterinary and research officer at Canine Companions

Next on the show, Kishalay De, assistant professor at Columbia University and associate research scientist at the Flatiron Institute, talks about observing the birth of a stellar black hole in the nearby Andromeda galaxy. He recounts how his team looked for this elusive event and describes what we can learn from observing it in the decades to come.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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Engineering safer football helmets, and the science behind drug overdoses Feb 05, 2026

Show notes

First up on the podcast, host Sarah Crespi and Staff Writer Adrian Cho talk football and the latest science behind helmets engineered to reduce head injuries. Have better materials and testing led to fewer concussions and chronic traumatic encephalopathy in players?

Next on the show, more than 100,000 people die from opioid overdoses in North America per year. Although much study has gone into addiction research, less attention has been paid to the biological details of overdose itself. John Strang, a professor in the National Addiction Centre at King’s College London, joins the podcast to discuss the questions researchers could be asking about overdose, and how to partner with drug addicted people to find solutions.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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Shielding astronauts from cosmic rays, and planning the end of fossil fuels Jan 29, 2026

Show notes

First up on the podcast, how do we protect astronauts when they leave the shelter of Earth’s protective magnetic fields and face the slow, constant bombardment of space radiation? Freelance science journalist Elie Dolgin joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss what we know about the damage from high-velocity particles and the research being done to curb their biological toll.

Next on the show, modeling the fall of fossil fuels during the decarbonization of energy systems, with civil engineer and environmental sociologist Emily Grubert and historian and engineer Joshua Lappen, both at the University of Notre Dame. The pair wrote a policy forum on predicting chokepoints or “minimum viable scales” in the decline of fossil fuel networks—in effect, when a system might get too small to maintain its function. Understanding how to keep things online until they are no longer needed is important to maintain energy for all, as renewables grow and mines, pipelines, and refineries shrink.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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Tracking falling space debris via sonic booms, and getting drunk off your own microbes Jan 22, 2026

Show notes

First up with Jennie Erin Smith, Science’s new senior biomedicine reporter, we delve into: autobrewery syndrome, when microbes inside the human gut make too much alcohol; how doctors can use a public repository, the Mexican Biobank, to guide patient care; and preliminary findings that surgery on the brain’s plumbing shows promise for Alzheimer’s disease.

Next on the show, it’s tough to calculate when and where deorbiting spacecraft might enter the upper atmosphere and then eventually hit the ground. Benjamin Fernando, a seismologist and planetary scientist at Johns Hopkins University, has shown that sonic booms created by fast-moving space debris shake seismic sensors, giving clues to angle of re-entry, breakup dynamics, and final location.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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Reversing ecological destruction in the Galápagos, and finally mapping Antarctica’s surface Jan 15, 2026

Show notes

First up on the podcast, freelance science journalist Sofia Quaglia talks about her visit to the Galápagos archipelago and how researchers there are working to restore the islands to their former ecological glory.

*Note this episode has been updated to reflect that the Ecuadorian government is not responsible for primarily funding these efforts.

Next on the show, Antarctica’s deep ice coating obscures the hills and valleys on its surface, making the continent’s response to climate change one of the biggest unknowns in predicting sea level rise over the next century. Helen Ockenden, a glaciologist at Grenoble Alpes University, joins the podcast to discuss how her team used satellite imagery and the physics of ice flows to fill in the missing details of Antarctica’s subglacial surface.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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The real da Vinci code, and the world’s oldest poison arrows Jan 08, 2026

Show notes

First up on the podcast, scholars are on a quest to find Leonardo da Vinci’s DNA. With no direct descendants, the hunt involves sampling the famous polymath’s papers, paintings, and distant cousins. Contributing Correspondent Richard Stone talks with host Sarah Crespi about what researchers hope to learn from Leonardo’s genes and the new field of “arteomics.”

Next on the show, new evidence for poisoned arrows from 60,000 years ago complicates our picture of hunting during the Pleistocene. Sven Isaksson, a professor of archaeological science at Stockholm University, joins the podcast to discuss the discovery of poisonous residues on microliths—the tiny, worked stone points used on arrows and spearheads. These findings could push back the origins of this toxic technology by 50,000 years.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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Looking for continents on exoplanets, and math is hard for mathematicians, too Jan 01, 2026

Show notes

First up on the podcast, the best images of exoplanets right now are basically bright dots. We can’t see possible continents, potential oceans, or even varying colors. To improve our view, scientists are proposing a faraway fleet of telescopes that would use light bent by the Sun’s gravity to magnify a distant exoplanet. Staff Writer Daniel Clery joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss where to aim such a magnificent telescope and all the technological pieces needed to put it together.

Next on the show, expert voices columnist and Johns Hopkins University mathematician Emily Riehl discusses her recent essay on communication woes in the math community. The complex concepts, jargon, and the slow pace of understanding a proof all add up to siloed subdisciplines and potentially more errors in the literature. Alex Kontorovich, a professor in the math department at Rutgers University, also joins to discuss how proof assistant computer programs and machine learning could help get mathematicians all on the same page.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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This year’s biggest breakthrough and top news stories Dec 18, 2025

Show notes

First up on the podcast, Online News Editor David Grimm joins host Sarah Crespi to talk about this year’s best online news stories—top performers and staff picks alike. Together they journey the scientific gamut, from bird feeders’ influence on hummingbird beak evolution to the use of “artificial spacetimes” to guide tiny robots through their environments.

Next on the show, a discussion of this year’s pick for Breakthrough of the Year with producer Meagan Cantwell and News editor Greg Miller. They also touch on some other top finds from this year, including the first confirmed Denisovan skull, rice that can beat the heat, custom gene editing, and progress on xenotransplantation.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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Hunting asteroids from space, and talking to pollinators with heat Dec 11, 2025

Show notes

First up on the podcast, we’ve likely only found about half the so-called city-killer asteroids (objects more than 140 meters in diameter). Freelance science journalist Robin George Andrews joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss the upcoming launch of NASA’s Near-Earth Object Surveyor, an asteroid hunter that will improve our ability to look for large objects that might crash into Earth, particularly those hiding in the Sun’s glare.

Next on the show, freelancer producer Elah Feder talks with Wendy Valencia-Montoya, an organismic and evolutionary biology Ph.D. candidate at Harvard University, about heated conversations between plants and their pollinators. Her work suggests infrared radiation might be the oldest cue for animals to come hither, more ancient than color.

This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.

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