The Pulse
Episodes
Sharks — From Fear to Fascination
26 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Before dinosaurs, before trees — even before Saturn had its rings – there were sharks. The fierce predators have been swimming in our oceans for h...
How Money Shapes Medicine
19 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Health care is a billion dollar industry in the U.S. — one of the biggest in the country. The business aspect of medicine is an invisible force in t...
Unearthing the Secrets of Volcanoes and Rocks
12 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
It's easy to forget that the earth below us is always changing and shifting — but sometimes, we get a dramatic demonstration of exactly that, like w...
Degrees of Freedom
05 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
On this rebroadcast of The Pulse: Freedom sounds great as an idea. Who doesn't want to be free to do what they want? But when you take a closer look, ...
How Amazon Revolutionized Shopping and Changed the World
28 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Amazon caught the wave of the early internet at a time when very few people even understood what the internet was. Launched in a garage 30 years ago, ...
Making Faces
21 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Imagine looking at a crowd of people, and they either all look vaguely familiar, or like complete strangers. It doesn't matter if this is a group of c...
The DIY Medicine Movement
14 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
DIY culture is all about empowerment — teaching yourself new skills to do things on your own, like retiling your bathroom or fixing a leaky faucet. ...
The Search for Modern Masculinity
07 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Competent. Capable. Strong. Stoic. Provider. Protector. Leader. Patriarch. These are the kinds of words that we've long associated with masculinity an...
10th Anniversary Show: The Science Changing Our Lives
31 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
When it comes to science, it's often the flashiest stories that grab headlines — the cancer breakthroughs, the tech innovations, the discoveries of ...
How Art and Science Intersect
24 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
On this rebroadcast of The Pulse - We often think of art and science as existing in different — even opposite — spheres. One revolves around creat...
When Being 'Gifted' No Longer Feels Like a Gift
17 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
When psychologist Lewis Terman launched his decades-long study of high-IQ children in 1921, he had a specific goal in mind: to prove that "gifted" peo...
Lightening the Load of Motherhood
10 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We hear all the time about the joys of motherhood — the incomparable sense of love, the magic of watching your kids discover the world, the pride an...
Rediscovering America's War on Bad Posture
03 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In January 1995, the New York Times Magazine published a bombshell story with the headline: "THE GREAT IVY LEAGUE NUDE POSTURE PHOTO SCANDAL." The art...
Breaking the Silence on Medical Mistakes
26 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
When medical mistakes happen, patients and their families often find themselves at a loss trying to figure out exactly what went wrong. Something bad ...
Living Greener — One Decision at a Time
19 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Every day, we hear about countless environmental threats — from air pollution and microplastics, to deforestation and global warming. And a lot of u...
Bridging the Gaps for Latino Health
12 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Over the past few decades, Latinos have become the largest racial or ethnic minority in the United States, making up nearly 20 percent of the country'...
Boredom in the Age of Information Overload
05 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
It sneaks up on us while we're sitting in traffic, or waiting at the doctor's office, or doing our taxes — boredom, that restless feeling of dissati...
Chasing the Eclipse
29 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
On April 8, a swath of North America will be treated to a rare and spectacular sight — a total solar eclipse; in some places, the first in more than...
Discovering your True Identity
22 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Identity's a complicated thing — a mixture of nurture and nature, ethnicity, gender, culture, conscious decisions, coincidences, and more. In many w...
The Lasting Impacts of COVID-19
15 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
It's been four years since COVID-19 struck, transforming our modern world in ways we'd never seen before — and we're still processing the aftershock...
The New Mental Health Landscape
08 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Know the signs of depression. Recognize symptoms of anxiety. Pay attention to your friend's changing moods. There's been a push to raise mental health...
Atomic Angst and the Teenage Spy
01 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In 1944, a brilliant, young Harvard physics student named Ted Hall was recruited to work on the super-secret mission that had already assembled the co...
Bodies for Science
23 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
If you're training to become a physician, your first patient is usually dead. In fact, "first patient" is what med students call the human cadavers th...
All the Rage
16 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
You can feel it coming on — your face flushes hot, maybe your fists clench, your heartbeat speeds up and blood pressure rises. It's rage — and it ...
The Mysteries of Attraction
09 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
It can show up as a spark or a lightning bolt; a glance or a touch; an easy rapport or butterflies in your stomach. Attraction — it's a feeling we k...
Setting the Medical Record Straight
02 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Medical records are an important part of health care. They create a history of past issues, test results, and medications. They paint a picture of som...
Inside Facebook: A Conversation with Jeff Horwitz
31 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
After covering the 2016 U.S. presidential election, reporter Jeff Horwitz knew that "something really weird was going on," that social media sites, es...
Facebook at 20
26 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Twenty years ago, a group of college sophomores created a website that would end up changing the world — fundamentally altering how we connect with ...
When Healing Happens But We Don't Know Why
19 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
More than a third of Americans use complementary and alternative medicine, ranging from acupuncture to herbalism, Ayurveda to homeopathy. But despite ...
How to Live with Uncertainty
12 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Humans crave certainty — in science and politics, in our lives and our leaders, in our decisions and our futures. We find comfort in knowing the fac...
Virtual Worlds, Virtual Lives
05 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We're in a major technological revolution where artificial intelligence, gaming, and virtual reality allow us to create and enter totally new spaces a...
Why We Love and Hate Exercising — And How to Do It Either Way
29 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We all know that exercise is good for us — for both our bodies and our minds — but motivating yourself to hit the gym, take a run, or even go for ...
The Transformative Power of Awe
22 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It's the goosebumps you get at the crescendo of your favorite song; the stupefying wonder that comes with witnessing a birth or a death; the astonishi...
The Blurred Line Between Life and Death
15 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We think of life and death as clear cut — you're alive or you're not; your heart's beating or it isn't; your brain functions or it doesn't. But when...
Lowering Barriers to Care
08 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Lots of things can get in the way of taking care of your health, catching medical issues early on, and getting treatment. Navigating insurance woes, t...
Uncovering the Inner Workings of the Oceans
01 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
What comes to mind when you think of the ocean? Maybe a day at the beach — swimming in the waves, snorkeling through coral reefs, fishing, surfing, ...
How Gene Therapy is Offering Hope — Once Again
24 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
For decades, the idea that you could attack genetic illnesses right at the root — that you could modify people's genes to treat or cure disease — ...
Changing Tastes
17 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
What we make for dinner, grab as a snack, or have for breakfast changes all the time — and there are some major forces at play: consumer tastes and ...
Salty, Crunchy, and Addictive: A Physician's Fight Against Ultra-Processed Foods
15 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Sugary cereals for breakfast, a protein bar as a snack, a microwave lasagna for lunch, and a frozen pizza for dinner sounds like a teenager's dream di...
Getting Better at Resolving Conflicts
10 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In March of 2022, the war in Ukraine was weighing heavily on Fabian Falch, a Norwegian tech entrepreneur. The Russian government had started to censor...
Why Rejection Hurts So Much — And How to Cope
03 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Rejection, or even the thought of it, can strike fear into our hearts, and leave a bad taste in our mouths. It often leads to a mix of sadness, shame,...
How We Talk About Death
27 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
For most of the big moments in life, we have rituals — proposals, weddings, births, graduations, and anniversaries. We know how to talk about them, ...
How UFOs Went from Fringe to Mainstream
20 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Flying saucers, little green men, and the X-Files — for years, that's what most people associated with unidentified flying objects, or UFOs. They we...
Shame and Blame: How Stigma Impacts Health
13 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Dealing with a serious or chronic health condition is hard enough — but what happens when that condition comes with moral judgment? That's the case ...
How Science is Transforming Weight Loss
06 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Most of us have been there — feeling our jeans get tighter, watching the numbers on the scale creep up, declaring that this time we're going to lose...
Space Pioneers
29 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In 1978, NASA recruited six candidates out of thousands of applicants for a special, groundbreaking mission: to become the first American women in spa...
Boredom in the Age of Information Overload
22 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It sneaks up on us while we're sitting in traffic, or waiting at the doctor's office, or doing our taxes — boredom, that restless feeling of dissati...
Face Recognition and What it Means for our Privacy
20 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In November of 2019, New York Times tech reporter Kashmir Hill got a tip that immediately had her on high alert. It was about a secretive tech company...
How Art and Science Intersect
15 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We often think of art and science as existing in different — even opposite — spheres. One revolves around creativity and imagination; the other ar...
Finding Happiness
08 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We spend a lot of time thinking about happiness. Wondering if we are truly happy, and how we could get there. We try to predict what will make us happ...
Helping Teens Navigate Mental Health Challenges
01 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The teenage years can be an emotional rollercoaster. One moment everything is great, it's amazing, then suddenly life is terrible, and all is ruined. ...
Remote Working vs. the Office — Which is Better?
25 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Over the past few years, remote working has transformed millions of people's lives — giving them more time for family, more control over their sched...
Bringing Physics from Theory to Practice
18 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Science is all about observing the world. But how do you study something you can't see, smell, or hear — like the tiniest particles all around us? H...
Will A.I. Take Your Job — or Make It Better?
11 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Whether you're a student or a doctor, a plumber or a truck driver, a university lecturer or a radio reporter, artificial intelligence is changing the ...
Skin Care and the Quest for Eternal Youth
04 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It seems like every day, new skin care products hit the market: lotions, serums, collagen boosters, light therapy, at-home lasers — potions and proc...
What's Behind Health Care Shortages?
28 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
If you've tried to book a doctor's appointment lately, chances are, it's been challenging. Many practices are not taking new patients, or open slots a...
Searching for Utopia
21 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
For centuries, writers and philosophers have imagined what a perfect world might look like — if only we had a chance to start over, build it all fro...
Behind the Scenes — Challenges in Medicine
14 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When you're at the doctor's office or a hospital, it's easy to get frustrated. Why is this taking so long? Why do the nurses look so tired? Why does m...
Inside the Minds of Thrill Seekers
07 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Skydiving, BASE jumping, climbing the highest peaks, adventuring to remote parts of the world — pushing the boundaries of safety. For thrill-seekers...
Degrees of Freedom
30 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Freedom sounds great as an idea. Who doesn't want to be free to do what they want? But when you take a closer look, freedom becomes more complicated. ...
Buried Secrets, Buried Waste
23 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In October of 1947, a navy reserve pilot named George Earle IV received strange orders: He was to pick up several 55-gallon barrels at the Philadelphi...
Black Health: Finding Solutions to End Disparities
16 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Health disparities between Black and white Americans run deep in the U.S. Black people are more likely to suffer from chronic conditions like diabetes...
The Social Self
09 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It's a simple question with lots of answers: Who are you? You might answer with your name, age, gender, or race. Or you might define yourself by your ...
The Benefits of Knowing When to Quit
02 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The messages we receive around quitting are usually straightforward — don't do it. It's something we hear everywhere — from greats like Michael Jo...
How K-Beauty Revolutionized Skincare — And Became Obsessed with Perfection
30 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When NPR host Elise Hu moved to South Korea to be an international correspondent, she ended up getting a crash course on Korean beauty and the country...
Communicating with Animals
26 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Humans have long been fascinated by the idea of communicating with other species — not just teaching animals to mimic human words, but truly underst...
The Mind-Body Feedback Loop
19 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We all know how stress — or anger, or pangs of anxiety — can affect the body. Your heart rate increases; your blood pressure rises; maybe your pal...
When Healing Happens But We Don't Know Why
12 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
More than a third of Americans use complementary and alternative medicine, ranging from acupuncture to herbalism, Ayurveda to homeopathy. But despite ...
Managing the Challenges of Motherhood
05 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
If you look around for Mother's Day gifts, you'll probably see stuff like bubble baths, spa days, yoga classes — a whole slew of things aimed at pro...
Neurotech and the Growing Battle for Our Brains
28 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Have you ever wanted to figure out when you're the most focused? Or how your moods change throughout the day? How "fit" your brain is, or whether your...
Why Rejection Hurts So Much — And How to Cope
21 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Rejection, or even the thought of it, can strike fear into our hearts, and leave a bad taste in our mouths. It often leads to a mix of sadness, shame,...
Why We Love and Hate Exercising —And How to Do it Either Way
13 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We all know that exercise is good for us — for both our bodies and our minds — but motivating yourself to hit the gym, take a run, or even go for ...
Taking the Temperature of Climate Science
07 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We hear about the big picture of climate change almost every day — the threats it poses, the effects on our world and lives, the fight to stop it. A...
Call Me — Maybe? 50 Years Since the First Cell Phone Call
31 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
On April 3, 1973, an engineer named Martin Cooper stood nervously along a busy midtown Manhattan street, about to make a phone call. It was a call tha...
Bringing Physics from Theory to Practice
10 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Science is all about observing the world. But how do you study something you can't see, smell, or hear — like the tiniest particles all around us? H...
Black Health: Finding Solutions to Disparities
10 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Health disparities between Black and white Americans run deep in the U.S. Black people are more likely to suffer from chronic conditions like diabetes...
The Therapist in your Pocket
03 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Finding the right therapist — or, sometimes, any therapist — can be a grueling process. Someone with the right expertise, who is still taking new ...
Transformative Power of Awe
13 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It's the goosebumps you get at the crescendo of your favorite song; the stupefying wonder that comes with witnessing a birth or a death; the astonishi...
Changing the Way We Think About Chronic Pain
02 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Pain is powerful — and when it becomes chronic, it can be all-consuming. It takes over our minds, saps our energy, and becomes the focus of our exis...
Thrills & Chills: The Psychology of Fear
28 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
It's that time of year when we celebrate something we usually hate: fear. We visit haunted houses and corn mazes or binge-watch the scariest horror mo...
From Polio to COVID — the Evolution of Intensive Care
12 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The modern ICU, or Intensive Care Unit, was born out of a time of crisis. It was 1952, and polio was raging in many places — especially the city of ...
Inside the Minds of Thrill Seekers
20 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Skydiving, BASE jumping, climbing the highest peaks, adventuring to remote parts of the world — pushing the boundaries of safety. For thrill-seekers...
Finding a Way to Live With Grief
09 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The death of a loved one can be shattering — especially when it's unexpected. It destroys our feeling of safety, warps our sense of reality, and oft...
Chasing Sleep
28 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Sleep — we all need it, but most people aren't getting enough of it. Ideally, we spend about a third of our lives asleep. When we're well rested, we...
Talking Therapy
07 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The process of therapy can sometimes seem a bit opaque. What exactly happens in therapy? How does it work? And which approach is right for which issue...
How We Process Information
26 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The human brain has an incredible capacity for processing information, from sensory data, to casual conversations, to everything we hear and read — ...
What Will it Take to Diversify Medicine?
12 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Who becomes a physician in this country — and who never gets that chance? It's a question a lot of medical schools are grappling with, as groups lik...
Science of Love
05 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
What is love? Is it that warm and fuzzy feeling, that crazed obsession, that deep sentiment of trust and good will? It's all of those things, but wher...