IFLScience - Break It Down
Episodes
Artemis II Records, Neanderthal Not-Hybrids, And Introducing “Moon Joy” | Break It Down
01 May 2026
Contributed by Lukas
This month, on Break It Down: Artemis II heads to the Moon and back, taking astronauts farther from Earth than any human before, some seriously impre...
The Science Behind “Project Hail Mary”, Ghost Elephants, And Womb Transplants
27 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
This month, on Break It Down: The world’s largest coral colony has been discovered at the Great Barrier Reef, we’re all a little bit disappointed ...
AI Assassins, Inside A De-extinction Lab, And Life On Mars? | Break It Down Podcast
27 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
This month on Break It Down: Why are there over 8 million pickled fish in some WWII-era bunkers in Louisiana? We ask Tulane University Biodiversity...
Deep-Space Toilet, Mega-Stegosaurus, And The Only Venomous Primate
30 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: How a transplant patient lived for two days without lungs, the Artemis II Orion Capsule is probably smaller than you’re ...
3I/ATLAS, CKM Syndrome, And Mosquitos’ Final Frontier
24 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: a potential environmental trigger for autism has been identified, interstellar object 3I/ATLAS is doing weird things with ...
A Two-Headed Fossil, 50/50 Spider, And World-First Butt Drag
10 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: 3I/ATLAS is a 10 billion-year-old time capsule, a world-first fossil captures the moment a rock hyrax dragged its butt 126...
Mummified Cheetahs, Skin Cells Turn Into Eggs, And Almost Life On Enceladus
03 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: the second oldest use of the color blue ever has been discovered in Europe dating back 13,000 years, “chemical fossils”...
Neanderthal Noises, Dome-Headed Dinosaurs, And Mystery Larvae
19 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Homo habilis might not have been the apex predator we thought it was, the oldest and most complete pachycephalosaur reveal...
Tropical Mammoths, Dazzling Brain Map, And Perfectly Preserved Pterosaurs
05 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Queen ants are throwing the rules of reproduction out of the window by producing offspring of two different species, for t...
Glowing Plants, Punk Ankylosaur, And Has The Wow! Signal Been Solved?
29 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Think you know Earth? Think again; a new campaign is trying to overturn the highly erroneous map we were all taught in sch...
Shaman Training Cave, Uranus's New Moon, And A Bright Orange Shark
22 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Tracks left in ancient rock suggest fish crawled out of the seas 10 million years earlier than we thought, a 140,000-year-...
Orange Crocodiles, New Human Species, And Death By Meteorite
15 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: The discovery of some fossilized human teeth reveals the oldest known members of our genus weren’t alone; their neighbor...
Dancing Cockatoos, Spider Schlongs, And Will I Be Hit By An Asteroid?
08 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: cockatoos have added 17 new dance moves to their official tally, we may finally know where the ancient “hobbit” humans...
Moa De-Extinction, Fashionable Chimps, And Robot Surgery – No Human Required
11 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: just a week after the discovery of our third-ever interstellar visitor we may know where it came from, ancient enamel prov...
Interstellar Object, Cheesy Nightmares, And Smooching Orcas
04 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: We’ve just seen our third-ever interstellar object whizzing though the Solar System, eating cheese really might give you...
Wellness Whales, A New Blood Type, And A DJ Set From Space
27 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: feast your eyes on the stunning first images from the world’s largest digital camera, capturing millions of galaxies and...
Artificial Eclipse, Dancing Dinosaurs, And 50 Years Of “JAWS”
20 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Two spacecraft just created the first ever artificial solar eclipse, thanks to some impressive drone photos we know now da...
Ice Age Puppies, Sauropod’s Last Supper, And A First Look At The Sun’s Butt
13 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Seeing the Sun’s south pole for the first time ever, Ice Age puppies frozen in permafrost turn out to be wolves, a world...
Space Explosions, Dead Sea Scrolls, And Why It's So Hard To Sex A Dino
06 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: A great big explosion in space is the most energetic since the Big Bang, AI reveals the Dead Sea Scrolls could share the s...
Oldest Fingerprint, AI Decoding Wolf Language, And Injecting Life On Other Worlds?
30 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: The oldest fingerprint in the world might be left by a Neanderthal hoping to complete a face, scientists propose seeding l...
Capuchin Kidnappers, Spinosaurus Daddy, And A New Member Of The Solar System
23 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: the Solar System just got a new member, capuchins have started stealing howler monkey babies on a remote island, the US ra...
T. Rex Leather, Glow-In-The-Dark Gas Clouds, And Musical Sea Lions
02 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: a new kind of leather is borrowing its foundations from fossil T. rex collagen, we’ve just discovered an enormous glow-i...
Tattooed Tardigrades, Doomed Lava Planet, And Meet The “Bone Collector”
25 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week, on Break It Down: a planet with a very rare tail is being boiled apart, the first physical evidence of a gladiator fighting a lion discover...
Dire Wolves, Intersex Whales, And That Dangerous Asteroid’s Unusual Origin
11 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: old skin samples have revealed the first-ever evidence for an intersex Southern right whale, a dangerous asteroid that mig...
Near-Death Experiences, Loch Ness Camera Trap, And Why No Frozen Dinosaurs?
04 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: study uncovers the biological basis of near-death experiences, what a camera trap captured after 55 years in Loch Ness, wh...
Magic Mushroom Medicine, Neptune’s Aurora Confirmed, And First-Ever Shark Sounds
28 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: a new study has become the first to document what sound a shark makes, Neptune has been confirmed to have an aurora thanks...
Unknown Lifeforms, How To Live To 117, And Handstanding Sauropods?
21 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: An unknown lifeform has been making micro-burrows in the Namibian desert, the secret to living until 117 has been revealed...
Woolly Mice, 3D-Printed Penises, And The World’s Worst Sting
07 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Colossal Biosciences creates the “woolly mouse” in their mission to de-extinct the mammoth, scientists 3D-print functi...
Rat Sommeliers, Glass Brain, And Internet On Mars
28 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: the curious tale of a lump of glass that turned out to be a human brain, the US sees its first measles death in 10 years, ...
Most Dangerous Animal, Tomb Discovery, And How To Break Habits
21 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: the first ancient Egyptian royal tomb has been discovered since Tutankhamun over 100 years ago, a brand new ‘dangerous a...
Dolphin Pee Party, Inside Asteroid Response, And That Ancient Mummy Smell
14 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Amazon river dolphins are saying it with urine proudly sprayed directly into the air, an inside look at the planetary defe...
Science Under Attack, Dino-Era Ducks, And Do We Own Our Bodies?
07 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: the world's oldest runestone might have been carved by a woman in a language that predates the Vikings, asteroid 2024 YR4 ...
Covid Lab Leak, Mouse With Two Dads, And Are We Living In A Simulation?
31 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: A CIA report says the origins of COVID being a lab leak is “likely” but what does that really mean? The Doomsday Clock...
Pompeii’s Worst Day, Peeing Together, And The GOAT Dinosaur Movie?
24 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: a new timeline shows exactly when and how the eruption of Vesuvius spread, chimps have been observed going to the bathroom...
Thylacine De-Extinction, Tattooed Mummies, And A Meteorite World-First
17 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: lasers revealed 1,200-year-old mummies’ sweet tats, the mission to de-extinct the thylacine takes a leap forward, video ...
Precious Penis Bone, North America’s Oldest Dino, And The Mystical Metal Of "Atlantis"
10 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: unexpected and unexplained structures have been discovered hiding under the Pacific Ocean, the oldest equatorial dinosaur ...
Saiga Mega Victory, 2025 Predictions, And A Coming Star Explosion
03 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: one of the most significant mammal recoveries ever recorded (and four other wildlife wins), a once-in-a-lifetime event is ...
A New North Pole, Bubble-Butt Turtles, And Testing Ancient Hangover Cures
20 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Earth’s magnetic pole is in a new position, the second most cited paper to ever be withdrawn is finally retracted, Charl...
Deep-Sea Creep, Jupiter's New Ring, And Inter-Hominid Hook-Ups
13 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: fishers discover a mysterious tablet bearing an unknown language, sequencing the oldest human genome reveals when we first...
Cannibal Paddington, Glowing Wood, And A New Human Species?
06 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: scientists may have discovered a new ancient relative of humans, collar cameras from Andean bears reveal Paddington may ha...
Killer Whale Fashion, Dinosaur Poop, And Pluto’s Birthday
29 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: killer whales have been wearing salmon hats (again) and sucking out the livers of the world’s largest shark, 1.5-million...
World’s Thinnest Spaghetto, Earth’s Frozen Core, And A Shark-Hunting Dog?
22 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, astronomers have taken the first-ever close-up photo of a star outside of the Milky Way, putting weight back on after losi...
Uranus Is Windy, Saber-Toothed Baby, And Is Animal Testing Necessary?
15 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: turns out the one time we saw Uranus it was having an uncharacteristically windy moment, new meanings behind the Amazon’...
A Murder Solved From The Grave, Chernobyl Frogs, and Cat Physics
08 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down: clues inside Pompeii victims' casts reveal they're not who we thought they were, the frogs of Chernobyl are doing just fin...
Quantum Cats, Drunk Monkeys, And Happy Birthday Godzilla
01 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: a quantum cat experiment breaks a record for surviving over 23 minutes, Voyager 1 encountered a glitch but fixed itself wi...
Tiniest Dino Eggs, Hungry Black Holes, And Why People Believe In Ghosts
25 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: the discovery of the smallest-ever dinosaur eggs reveals teeny tiny bones, first black hole triple is changing our underst...
Solar Storm Season, Dolphin Breath, And Resurrecting The Thylacine
18 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: the Sun has entered its solar maximum bringing new auroras and geomagnetic storms, a chance find of a thylacine head in a ...
Fusing Jellies, Bad Robot Jokes, And Elephants Evolve Before Our Eyes
11 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: two comb jellies become one, how Hurricane Milton grew so intense, superpowered scans reveal COVID’s impact on the brain...
Glowing Crystals, Radioactive Storms, And A “Google Maps” For The Brain
04 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: resurrecting Cold War spy planes to explore radioactive storms, the most detailed brain wiring diagram we've ever seen, my...
Biblical Seeds, World’s Oldest Cheese, And A Fish With Tongues For Legs
27 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: the major African civilization the world forgot, the world’s oldest cheese gets found on mummies, blasting asteroids wit...
Gorilla Dicks, Life After Death, And Earth's New (Mini) Moon
20 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down: Earth's about to get a new mini-moon (if only for a while), ancient rock art may have been based on a fossil, "third state...
Pyramid Plasma, “Killer” Whales, And An Illegal Spacewalk?
13 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, the first-ever private spacewalk makes history and also maybe a crime, a plasma bubble over the pyramids is spotted by sna...
Introducing 'We Have Questions' Our New Science Podcast
10 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Coming soon: join IFLScience as we explore the questions nobody thought to ask but everyone wants the answers to. Get the behind-the-scenes conversati...
Tossing Puffins, Python Vs Python, And Homeopathy. Is. Not. Science.
06 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, “dangerous” asteroid Apophis has a slightly increased risk of hitting Earth, a pig in Hong Kong undergoes an operation...
Killer Whale Pirates, Hunting Aliens, And Flying Spaghetti Monsters
30 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: orcas disable another boat as a new theory is put forward for the behavior, bacteria pass “memories” of perturbed gene...
Tool-Wielding Whales, Earth’s New Ring, And Wow! Signal Solved?
23 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: Earth has a snazzy new radiation belt, the Wow! signal finally has an explanation and spoiler: it’s still not aliens, wh...
Earth Sausage, Pompeii Panic, And The Disco Planet
16 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: two new victims discovered at the site of Pompeii tell a vivid story, Stonehenge’s altar stone reveals a surprising poin...
Space Archaeology, Titanium Hearts, And The Russian Sleep Experiment
09 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, the first archaeological study takes place outside of Earth, the oldest calendar might show a comet impact, a new study th...
Wonky Giraffe, Hamster Vaccines, And Wildlife Rock Art
02 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: a wonky-necked giraffe is somehow still alive, an extraordinary fossil find shows a tyrannosaur with a stubby snout, a vac...
Singing Elephants, Animal Olympics, and A Popcorn-Covered Neanderthal
26 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: deep-sea potatoes just shook foundational ideas about life on Earth, NASA plans to launch an artificial star, elephants si...
$44 Million Stegosaurus, Air Butter, And Life On Venus?
19 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down: why Venus just got very exciting as a potential site of extra-terrestrial life, how you make butter out of thin air, a Ste...
Mammoth Jerky, Endangered Language, And Rocket Science In The Jungle
12 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down we report live from a rocket launch, freeze-dried skin gets us a step closer to bringing back mammoths, “polar rain” au...
Flying Hippos, Talking Animals, And Palaeolithic Underpants
05 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, why dinosaurs had to die so that we could have wine, the world’s oldest narrative art, the flying skills of hippos, evid...
Popsicle Wolves, Primordial Black Holes, And A Fleshy Robot’s Smile
28 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, a puppy gets a post-mortem 44,000 years after being frozen in permafrost, altruism found among Neanderthals in Down Syndro...
Disco Dinosaur, Ancient Wine, And A $17 Billion Shipwreck
21 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, white wine with a hint of human remains becomes the oldest ever discovered, Jupiter’s Red Spot may be younger than the U...
Corpse Flowers, Grolar Bears, And “Alien Signals” From Mars
14 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, elephants have names, the ISS just scared the bejesus out of everybody, how to Benjamin Button yourself in space, grolar b...
Shingray Update, Seahenge, And The Longesssst Rock Art
07 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, Charlotte the stingray is back and it’s not good news, a zig-zagging snake stretching over 40 meters might be the world’...
Colossal Squid, A Titanic Trip, And Debunking Star Signs
31 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, a mystery sighting in the deep ocean could be the first-ever footage of a colossal squid baby, orca attacks are more misc...
Sexy Neanderthals, Head Transplants, And Dark Extinction
24 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, we now know when humans and Neanderthals hooked up, could a human head transplant ever be realistic, a dino fossil skin pr...
Hot Dinosaurs, Alien Megastructures, And Reaching Point Nemo
17 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week on Break It Down, COVID’s new FLiRT variants, when and which dinosaurs went warm-blooded, could a lost river explain the pyramids, the sea...
Talking Whales, Dinosauroids, and Psychedelic Milk Toads?
10 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, scientists discover the “sperm whale phonetic alphabet”, AstraZeneca pull their COVID vaccine from the shelves, why a ...
Alpaca Sex, Brainy T. Rex, And Could Earth Have Rings?
03 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, the debate on T. rex intelligence rages on, a world-first video shows an orangutan applying leaves as medicine, the most c...
Gassy Uranus, Giant Megaraptors, And The Pharaoh's Curse
26 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, we explore why Uranus might contain more methane than we thought, just what is happening to bacteria on the ISS, quite how...
Tiny Titanosaurs, Giant Snakes, And Transatlantic Heart Transplants
19 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, a new species of tiny titanosaur is compared to a cow, a 47-million-year-old snake becomes the largest ever, an RNA breakt...
More Whale Sex, Pet Foxes, And The B.O.A.T
12 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, 12-million-year-old snails reveal the oldest preserved fossil pigments, the violent mating dance of blue whales is caught ...
Space Rainbows, Ancient Animal Art, And Heart-Eyed Toads
05 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, a rainbow-like glory is detected beyond our Solar System, a sand-slab stingray may be the oldest animal art, ancient etchi...
Black Holes, Barbie Pigs, And The Apocaclipse
28 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, why the solar eclipse can be fatal, Barbie pigs 5,000 meters below the sea, world-first cooperative mimicry in two spiders...
Scandalous Pyramids, Quantum Tornadoes, And The Longest Eclipse
22 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, a hill becomes a pyramid and then a hill again, quantum tornadoes teach us about black holes, a living human gets a pig ki...
Superb Nova, Space Crime, And Eclipse Tortoises
15 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see a nova, astroforensic science, why everybody thinks male mammals are so big, the w...
De-Extincting Mammoths, The Oldest Fossil Forest, And Elephant Burials
08 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, we talk de-extincting the mammoth, the world’s oldest fossil forest, elephant burials, hypervaccination (and by hyper, w...
Whale Sex, Smashing Asteroids, And More (Giant) Whales
01 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, the first-ever photographs of humpbacks humping involves two males, NASA changes the shape of an asteroid, a tiny fish mak...
Giant Anacondas, Small Stars, And Lab-Grown Testicles
23 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, we discuss how a Will Smith series led to the discovery of a new species of giant anaconda, plus the smallest star ever di...
Shingrays, Space Lasers, And Pink Fairy Armadillos
16 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week in Break It Down, we discuss whether or not an aquarium in the US is about to become home to the world’s first “shingray,” how scienti...
Break It Down Trailer
14 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A little teaser for our upcoming podcast, Break It Down.