Short Wave

What Made Hilary Such A Weird Storm

23 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

One name has been on millions of minds — and all over the news — in the past week: Hilary.It's been decades since a storm like this has hit Southe...

Fixing Our Failing Electric Grid... On A Budget

21 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It's no secret that our electric grid is a flaming hot mess — and in order to reduce emissions, the U.S. needs to get a lot more renewables onto the...

The Key To Uncovering An Ancient Maya City? Lasers

18 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today we enter into the plot of a summer blockbuster adventure movie. Regina talks to NPR reporter Emily Olson about the recently uncovered ancient Ma...

Is Math Real?

16 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Kids ask, "Why?" all the time. Why does 1+1=2? Why do we memorize multiplication tables? Many of us eventually stop asking these questions. But mathem...

Sperm Can't Really Swim And Other Surprising Pregnancy Facts

14 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

There's the birds and the bees. And then there's what happens after. The process that leads to the beginning of pregnancy has a lot more twists and tu...

The Fish That Conceal Themselves To Hunt

11 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

All Things Considered host Juana Summers joins Regina G. Barber and Berly McCoy to nerd-out on some of the latest science news buzzing around in our b...

The Science Of Happiness Sounds Great. But Is The Research Solid?

09 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

How do we really get happier? In a new review in the journal Nature Human Behavior, researchers Elizabeth Dunn and Dunigan Folk found that many common...

Black Metallurgists, Iron And The Industrial Revolution

07 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The ability to create wrought iron cheaply has been called one of the most significant innovations in the British Industrial Revolution. It's known to...

This Sausage-Shaped Part Of Your Brain Causes Out-Of-Body Experiences

04 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Ever felt like you were watching yourself and the rest of the world from outside of your body? Or floating above yourself? Well, scientists finally kn...

The Secrecy Of The Horseshoe Crab Blood Harvest

02 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

For decades, humans have harvested the blood of horseshoe crabs, which is used to test whether many of our vaccines and medicines are contaminated wit...

Christmas in July! Celebrate With Hilarious Research

31 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Would you survive as a doctor in The Sims 4? What's the appropriate amount of free food to take from a public sample station before it's considered gr...

The Jackson Water Crisis Through A Student Journalist's Eyes

29 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this special episode, we hear from the high school grand prize winner of NPR's Student Podcast Challenge: Georgianna McKenny. A rising senior at th...

Peanuts, Pets And Poopy Shores

28 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

For most infants, introducing peanuts early can help prevent allergies later on — but a new study reveals most caregivers don't know that. Why? Plus...

Why Babies Babble And What It Can Teach Adults About Language

26 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In which we metaphorically enter the UCLA Language Acquisistion Lab's recording castle, guided by linguistics researcher Dr. Megha Sundara. NPR scienc...

The Scorpion Renaissance Has Arrived

24 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Scorpions: They're found pretty much everywhere, and new species are being identified all the time. Arachnologist Lauren Esposito says there's a lot t...

'Oppenheimer' And The Science Of Atomic Bombs

21 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Christopher Nolan's new film 'Oppenheimer' chronicles the life and legacy of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the first director of Los Alamos National Laborato...

This Cellular Atlas Could Lead To Breakthroughs For Endometriosis Patients

19 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

For people with endometriosis—a mysterious disease where endometrial tissue grows outside of the uterus—medical visits can be especially frustrati...

Meet The Residents Of The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

17 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Trash from humans is constantly spilling into the ocean — so much so that there are five gigantic garbage patches in the seas. They hang out at the ...

Sea squirts and 'skeeters in our science news roundup

14 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Science in the headlines: An amazingly preserved sea squirt fossil that could tell us something about human evolution, a new effort to fight malaria b...

This Is Canada's Worst Fire Season In Modern History. It's Not New

12 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Canada is having its worst fire season in modern history. The fires have burnt more than 20 million acres, casting hazardous smoke over parts of the U...

The Only Nuclear-Powered Passenger Ship EVER

10 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In the Port of Baltimore, a ship is docked that hasn't transported passengers for more than 50 years. It's the NS Savannah and it's designated a Natio...

What Geologists Love — And Lament — About Cult Classic 'The Core'

07 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

20 years ago, the cult classic movie 'The Core' was released in theaters. From the start, it's clear that science is more a plot device than anything ...

Tick Check! Meet Your Backyard Bloodsuckers

05 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

We hope you had a restful holiday! Maybe even got outside for some relaxing fresh air. If so, you might've come across cute and not-so-cute critters l...

The Chemistry Behind A Perfect Barbeque

03 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Chefs will tell you, cooking is not just an art — it's a science. And the spirit of summer barbecues, NPR science correspondent Sydney Lupkin brings...

Why This Gravitational Waves News Is A Big Deal

30 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

New gravitational waves, why orcas might be attacking boats and a new robot prototype inspired by animals: it's all in our latest roundup of science n...

An unexpected forest in the ocean

28 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Salomé Buglass discovered an unexpected kelp forest while studying underwater mountains in the Galapagos. Kelp—a type of seaweed—usually grows in...

A Smarter Way To Use Sunscreen

26 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Sunscreen: we should all be using it, but we might not all be using it the right way. In fact, the type of sunscreen you use may not be nearly as impo...

Rethinking The Lab Rat

23 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

For generations, scientists have leaned on seven key species, including rats and mice, for research. They're called model organisms and they've been s...

This Satellite Could Help Clean Up The Air

21 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In pockets across the U.S., communities are struggling with polluted air — often in neighborhoods where working class people and people of color liv...

New Star Trek Season, Same Ol' Sci-Fi

19 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Season 2 of the critically acclaimed Star Trek: Strange New Worlds premiered June 15 (streaming on Paramount+). So today, Short Wave Scientist in Resi...

A Newly-Discovered Asteroid And What's Beneath The Ice On Enceladus

16 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

All Things Considered host Ari Shapiro returns to nerd-our with Short Wave hosts Emily Kwong and Regina G. Barber on three science headlines from spac...

Give Rivers Space: The Simple Flood Risk Fix

14 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

With much of California's massive snowpack yet to melt, downstream communities remain on high alert for flooding. Hundreds of homes were destroyed or ...

Life Lessons From Supernovae

12 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

For many scientists, science isn't something they check in and out of — it permeates their whole lives. That's true for Sarafina El-Badry Nance, an ...

How To Stay Safe Amid Wildfire Smoke

09 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Smoke from Canadian wildfires is causing poor air quality in parts of the U.S. This smoke can have dangerous health effects because it carries fine pa...

Behold! The Dulcet Tones Of Cosmic Rays

07 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Teppei Katori loves two things: particle physics and music. Naturally, he combined the two. Today on Short Wave, Teppei talks to host Regina G. Barber...

The Rise Of The Dinosaurs

05 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Dinosaurs ruled the earth for many millions of years, but only after a mass extinction took out most of their rivals. Just how that happened remains a...

Helping A Man Walk Again With Science

02 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This week's science news roundup reunites All Things Considered host Ailsa Chang with Short Wave hosts Emily Kwong and Regina G. Barber to dig into th...

Why Melting Ice In Antarctica Is Making Hurricanes Worse In Texas

31 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Ice in Antarctica is melting really quickly because of climate change. That's driving sea level rise around the world, and the water is rising especia...

What Happens When An Infant Loses Half Their Brain?

29 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Mora Leeb was 9 months old when surgeons removed half her brain. Now 15, she plays soccer and tells jokes. Scientists say Mora is an extreme example o...

Galaxies Are Older Than We Thought — That's A Big Deal

26 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

If you ask a physicist or cosmologist about the beginnings of the universe, they'll probably point you to some math and tell you about the Big Bang th...

When Your Body Rejects The Kidney It Needs

24 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In February 2021, pandemic restrictions were just starting to ease in Hawaii, and Leila Mirhaydari was finally able to see her kidney doctor. Transpla...

Two Squirrely Responses To Climate Change

22 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Kwasi Wrensford studies two related species: the Alpine chipmunk and the Lodgepole chipmunk. The two have very different ways of coping with climate c...

The Physics Behind The Perfect Gummy Candy

19 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This week for our science news roundup, superstar host of All Things Considered Ari Shapiro joins Short Wave hosts Emily Kwong and Regina G. Barber to...

Why You Can't Tell Your Race From A DNA Test

17 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Race is a social construct — so why are DNA test kits like the ones from 23andMe coded like they reveal biological fact about the user's racial make...

Long COVID Scientists Try To Unravel Blood Clot Mystery

15 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The COVID-19 public health emergency has ended, but millions across the globe continue to deal with Long COVID. Researchers are still pursuing basic q...

Move over, humans—lemurs have rhythm, too

12 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

There's a lot for scientists to learn about the origins of humans' musical abilities. In the last few years, though, they've discovered homo sapiens h...

We Need To Talk About Teens, Social Media And Mental Health

10 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This week, the American Psychological Association issued its first-of-kind guidelines for parents to increase protection for children online. It comes...

What Could We Do With A Third Thumb?

08 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today on the show, we meet a prosthetic designer and a neuroscientist fascinated with understanding how the brain and body might adapt to something we...

Some people get sick from VR. Why?

05 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Another week comes by, and luckily so does our roundup of science news. This time, we've got some questions about better understanding our health: Why...

Will Artificial Intelligence Help — Or Hurt — Medicine?

02 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A doctor's job is to help patients. With that help, often comes lots and lots of paperwork. That's where some startups are betting artificial intellig...

Shoring Up The Future With Greener Batteries

01 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today on the show, next-generation energy innovators Bill David and Serena Cussen challenged us to think about the future of clean energy storage. The...

SUPERBLOOM: An Upside To The California Downpours

28 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

California's wet winter has devastated many local communities. It has also benefited some of the state's endangered ecosystems. Those benefits are on ...

Worm Blobs In The Bowels Of The Earth

26 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In the toxic waters of Sulphur Cave in Steamboat Springs, Colo. live blood-red worm blobs that have attracted international scientific interest. We do...

The News Roundup Goes Intergalactic

24 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It's our latest roundup of science news! This time, with Ailsa Chang of NPR's All Things Considered, who joins us to discuss three stories that take u...

Fire And Ice: Linking Intense Wildfire And The Melting Arctic

21 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In the Arctic Ocean, sea ice is shrinking as the climate heats up. In the Western U.S., wildfires are getting increasingly destructive. Those two phen...

The Race To Protect Millions Of People From Melting Glaciers

19 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Melting glaciers are leaving behind large, unstable lakes that can cause dangerous flash floods. Millions of people downstream are threatened. In toda...

Where are the whales? Scientists find clues thousands of miles away

17 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Endangered North Atlantic right whales are disappearing from their native waters, a serious danger for a species with only 340 animals left. The myste...

Are Rats Running This Podcast?

14 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This week, New York City crowned Kathleen Corradi its first rat czar. The new position is part of a multipronged approach from city officials. Reporte...

Peep The Delightful Science Of Chickens

12 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

When Tove Danovich decided to dabble in backyard chicken keeping, she embraced a tried and true journalistic practice — reading everything there is...

Launching Into Space — Sustainably!

10 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In 1957, the Space Age began with the launch of Sputnik, the first artificial satellite. Since then, the number of objects humans have hurled toward t...

News Round Up: Mammoth Meatballs, Stressed Plants And Apologetic Robots

07 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this Friday round up of science news we can't let go, not everything is as it seems. Meatballs are not made of fresh meat from the cattle range. Ro...

Allergies Are Weird. So Are Cats

05 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Katie Wu is a bona fide cat person. She has two of them: twin boys named Calvin and Hobbes. Every night, they curl up in bed with her, bonking their l...

Why We Should Care About Viruses Jumping From Animals To People

03 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The phenomenon of zoonotic spillover — of viruses jumping from animals to people — is incredibly common. The question is: which one will start th...

Eunice Foote: The Hidden Grandmother Of Climate Science

31 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today, most climate science is done with satellites, sensors and complicated computer models. But it all started with a pioneering female physicist an...

Why Scientists Just Mapped Every Synapse In A Fly Brain

29 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

To really understand the human brain, scientists say you'd have to map its wiring. The only problem: there are more than 100 trillion different connec...

Perennial Rice: Plant Once, Harvest Again And Again

27 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Rice is arguably the world's most important staple crop. About half of the global population depends on it for sustenance. But, like other staples suc...

News Round Up: Algal Threats, An Asteroid With Life's Building Blocks And Bee Maps

24 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

After reading the science headlines this week, we have A LOT of questions. Why did the Virgin Islands declare a state of emergency over a large blob o...

Why Pandemic Researchers Are Talking About Raccoon Dogs

23 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A few weeks ago, raw data gathered in Janaury 2020 from Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan, China — the early epicenter of the COVID-19 pandem...

If ChatGPT Designed A Rocket — Would It Get To Space?

22 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

From text churned out by ChatGPT to the artistic renderings of Midjourney, people have been taking notice of new, bot-produced creative works. But how...

What we lose if the Great Salt Lake dries up

21 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Dotted across the Great Basin of the American West are salty, smelly lakes. The largest of these, by far, is the Great Salt Lake in Utah.But a recent ...

Venus And Earth: A Tale Of Two 'Twins'

20 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Planetary scientists announced some big news this week about our next-door neighbor, Venus. For the first time, they had found direct evidence that Ve...

Tweeting Directly From Your Brain (And What's Next)

18 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Our friends at NPR's TED Radio Hour podcast have been pondering some BIG things — specifically, the connection between our physical, mental, and spi...

Flying Into Snowstorms ... For Science!

17 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

For the past few winters, researchers have been intentionally flying into snowstorms. And high in those icy clouds, the team collected all the informa...

Could de-extincting the dodo help struggling species?

16 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As a leading expert on paleogenomics, Beth Shapiro has been hearing the same question ever since she started working on ancient DNA: "The only questio...

It's Boom Times In Ancient DNA

15 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Research into very, very old DNA has made huge leaps forward over the last two decades. That has allowed scientists like Beth Shapiro to push the fron...

How To Bake Pi, Mathematically (And Deliciously)

14 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This March 14, Short Wave is celebrating pi ... and pie! We do that with the help of mathematician Eugenia Cheng, Scientist In Residence at the School...

How Well Does A New Alzheimer's Drug Work For Those Most At Risk?

13 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A new drug for Alzheimer's disease, called lecanemab, got a lot of attention earlier this year for getting fast-tracked approval based on a clinical t...

Ocean World Tour: Whale Vocal Fry, Fossilizing Plankton and A Treaty

10 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Reading the science headlines this week, we have A LOT of questions. Why are more animals than just humans saddled — er, blessed — with vocal fry?...

'Are You A Model?': Crickets Are So Hot Right Now

09 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Have you ever wondered how biologists choose what animal to use in their research? Since scientists can't do a lot of basic research on people, they s...

The Race To Save A Tree Species

08 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The whitebark pine is a hardy tree that grows in an area stretching from British Columbia, Canada south to parts of California and east to Montana. It...

The $20 Billion Deal To Get Indonesia Off Coal

07 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Indonesia is the world's largest exporter of coal for electricity. And it's also an emerging economy trying to address climate change. The country re...

Rome wasn't built in a day, but they sure had strong concrete

06 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Roman Colosseum is a giant, oval amphitheater built almost two thousand years ago. Despite its age and a 14th century earthquake that knocked down...

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein's Disordered Cosmos

03 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein is a theoretical physicist at the University of New Hampshire. It's her job to ask deep questions about how we — and the re...

Honoring The 'Hidden Figures' Of Black Gardening

02 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

When Abra Lee became the landscape manager at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, she sought some advice about how to best do the job. T...

This Navy vet helped discover a new, super-heavy element

01 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As a kid, Clarice Phelps dreamed of being an astronaut, or maybe an explorer like the characters on Star Trek. Her path to a career in science turned ...

What DNA kits leave out: race, ancestry and 'scientific sankofa'

28 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Population geneticist Dr. Janina Jeff is the host and executive producer of In Those Genes, a hip-hop inspired podcast that uses genetics to uncover t...

Measuring Health Risks After A Chemical Spill

27 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This week, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will hold a public hearing about its remediation plan for cleaning up chemicals in and around Eas...

Ancient Seeds: A Possible Key To Climate Adaptation

24 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In the Bekaa Valley region of Lebanon, there is a giant walk-in fridge housing tens of thousands of seeds. They belong to the International Center for...

Seriously...what IS life?

23 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this Back To School episode we consider the "List of Life": the criteria that define what it is to be a living thing. Some are easy calls: A kitten...

Understanding Earthquake Aftershocks

22 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Monday another earthquake struck southeastern Turkey, near the Syrian border. This time, the quake registered as a magnitude 6.3 — an order lower th...

The Fungal Science Behind HBO's 'The Last of Us'

21 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The video game series that spawned the new hit HBO drama, The Last of Us, is the zombie genre with a twist. Instead of the standard viral pandemic or ...

Life Kit: Help Save The North American Bird Population

20 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Many of us are off today for President's Day. In the meantime, we want to share this episode from our friends at NPR's Life Kit podcast. In it, they d...

News Round Up: Chocolate, A Solar Valentine And Fly Pheromones

17 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

After reading the science headlines this week, we have A LOT of questions. Is chocolate really that good for your health? How do solar flares affect l...

The Science Fueling Disney's 'Strange World'

16 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Disney's new animated feature 'Strange World,' a band of multigenerational explorers journeys to the center of their fantastical homeland. Along th...

Congrats! It's A Tomato

15 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A few years ago, a team of scientists set out on a field expedition in the rugged, dry Northern Territory of Australia. There, they found a plant that...

Mix Up LOVE, And You Get V-O-L-E

14 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

You may have heard of the "love hormone," or oxytocin. But you may not know that scientists have relied on cuddly rodents like the prairie vole to hel...

Meet One Engineer Fixing A Racially Biased Medical Device

13 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

During the COVID-19 pandemic, one measurement became more important than almost any other: blood oxygen saturation. It was the one concrete number tha...

Lightning Protection: Lasers, Rockets or Rods?

10 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Every year, lightning is estimated to cause up to 24,000 deaths globally. It starts forest fires, burns buildings and crops, and causes disruptive pow...

The Social Cost of Carbon Is An Ethics Nightmare

09 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

One of the most important tools the federal government has for cracking down on greenhouse gas emissions is a single number: the social cost of carbon...

Why Can't We Predict Earthquakes?

08 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In the wake of the massive earthquake in Turkey and Syria, many scientists have been saying this area was "overdue" for a major quake. But no one knew...