Science Talk

Latest Episodes:

Where Is Everybody Else in the Universe? Apr 27, 2020

Show notes

Guest host W. Wayt Gibbs talks with Jason Wright, a professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Pennsylvania State University’s Center for Exoplanets and Habitable Worlds, about what’s known as the Fermi paradox: In a universe of trillions of planets, where is everybody?

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Why Exercise Is So Good For You Apr 24, 2020

Show notes

Health journalist Judy Foreman talks about her new book Exercise Is Medicine: How Physical Activity Boosts Health and Slows Aging.

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COVID-19: What the Autopsies Reveal Apr 23, 2020

Show notes

Pathologists are starting to get a closer look at the damage that COVID-19 does to the body by carefully examining the internal organs of people who have died from the novel coronavirus.

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COVID-19: The Need for Secure Labs--and Their Risks Apr 03, 2020

Show notes

Coronavirus research requires high-containment labs. Journalist Elisabeth Eaves talks with Scientific American contributing editor W. Wayt Gibbs about her article “The Risks of Building Too Many Bio Labs,” a joint project of the New Yorker and the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

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Flat Earthers: What They Believe and Why Mar 27, 2020

Show notes

Michael Marshall, project director of the Good Thinking Society in the U.K., talks about flat earth belief and its relationship to conspiracy theories and other antiscience activities.

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COVID-19: Predicting the Path and Analyzing Immunity Mar 24, 2020

Show notes

Scientific American contributing editor W. Wayt Gibbs continues to report on the coronavirus outbreak from his home in Kirkland, Wash., site of the first U.S. cases. In this installment, he talks with researchers about what their models show for the future of the pandemic and on research to create tests to see who has developed immunity.

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COVID-19: How and Why the Virus Spreads Quickly Mar 23, 2020

Show notes

Scientific American contributing editor W. Wayt Gibbs reports from the original U.S. epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak: Kirkland, Wash. In this installment of our ongoing series, he talks with researchers about the properties of the virus and why it spreads so quickly.

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COVID-19: The Wildlife Trade and Human Disease Mar 19, 2020

Show notes

Christian Walzer, executive director of global health at the Wildlife Conservation Society, talks about how the wildlife trade, especially for human consumption, can lead to disease outbreaks.

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David Quammen: How Animal Infections Spill Over to Humans Mar 18, 2020

Show notes

In this 2012 interview, David Quammen talks about his book Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic, which is highly relevant to the emergence of the coronavirus that has changed our lives.

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COVID-19: Dealing with Social Distancing Mar 16, 2020

Show notes

Judy Moskowitz, a professor of medical social sciences at Northwestern University, talks about ways to cope during this time of missing out on our usual diet of social interactions.

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