The Quanta Podcast
Episodes
New Life Found That Lives Off Electricity
07 Jul 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists have figured out how microbes can suck energy from rocks. Such lifeforms might be more widespread than anyone anticipated. The post New Lif...
Simple Set Game Proof Stuns Mathematicians
17 Jun 2016
Contributed by Lukas
A new series of papers has settled a long-standing question related to the popular game in which players seek patterned sets of three cards. The post ...
How Neanderthal DNA Helps Humanity
09 Jun 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Neanderthals and Denisovans may have endowed modern humans with genetic variants that helped them thrive in new environments. The post How Neanderthal...
New Support for Alternative Quantum View
02 Jun 2016
Contributed by Lukas
An experiment claims to have invalidated a decades-old criticism against pilot-wave theory, an alternative formulation of quantum mechanics that elimi...
New Evidence for the Necessity of Loneliness
26 May 2016
Contributed by Lukas
A specific set of neurons deep in the brain may motivate us to seek company, holding social species together. The post New Evidence for the Necessity ...
Tiny Tests Seek the Universe’s Big Mysteries
12 May 2016
Contributed by Lukas
The search for exotic new physical phenomena is being led by huge experiments like the Large Hadron Collider. But at the other end of the spectrum lie...
A Secret Flexibility Found in Life’s Blueprints
05 May 2016
Contributed by Lukas
A new study reveals that individual genes can create many different versions of the molecular machinery that powers the cell. The post A Secret Flexib...
Physicists Hunt for the Big Bang’s Triangles
28 Apr 2016
Contributed by Lukas
The story of the universe’s birth — and evidence for string theory — could be found in triangles and myriad other shapes in the sky. The post Ph...
Debate Intensifies Over Dark Disk Theory
21 Apr 2016
Contributed by Lukas
In the new, free-for-all era of dark matter research, the controversial idea that dark matter is concentrated in thin disks is being rescued from scie...
Mapping the Brain to Build Better Machines
14 Apr 2016
Contributed by Lukas
A project to decipher the brain’s learning rules could revolutionize machine learning. The post Mapping the Brain to Build Better Machines first app...
Sphere Packing Solved in Higher Dimensions
07 Apr 2016
Contributed by Lukas
The Ukrainian mathematician Maryna Viazovska has solved the centuries-old sphere-packing problem in dimensions eight and 24. The post Sphere Packing ...
The Beasts That Keep the Beat
31 Mar 2016
Contributed by Lukas
New insights from neuroscience — aided by a small zoo’s worth of dancing animals — are revealing the biological origins of rhythm. The post The ...
A Life in Games
24 Mar 2016
Contributed by Lukas
The mathematician John Horton Conway’s myriad accomplishments — including the Game of Life, sprouts and the surreal numbers — are the product of...
Mathematicians Discover Prime Conspiracy
24 Mar 2016
Contributed by Lukas
A previously unnoticed property of prime numbers seems to violate a long-standing assumption about how they behave. The post Mathematicians Discover P...
After Black Holes Collide, a Puzzling Flash
10 Mar 2016
Contributed by Lukas
A satellite spotted a burst of light just as gravitational waves rolled in from the collision of two black holes. Was the flash a cosmic coincidence, ...
The Quantum Secret to Superconductivity
03 Mar 2016
Contributed by Lukas
In a virtuoso experiment, physicists have revealed details of a “quantum critical point” that underlies high-temperature superconductivity. The po...
How to Build Life in a Pre-Darwinian World
25 Feb 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Perhaps chemistry played a more instrumental role in the origin of life than scientists thought. The post How to Build Life in a Pre-Darwinian World f...
Gravitational Waves Discovered at Long Last
18 Feb 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Ripples in space-time have been detected a century after Einstein predicted them, launching a new era in astronomy. The post Gravitational Waves Disco...
Scientists Debate Signatures of Alien Life
11 Feb 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Searching for signs of life on faraway planets, astrobiologists must decide which telltale biosignature gases to target. The post Scientists Debate Si...
New Clues to How the Brain Maps Time
04 Feb 2016
Contributed by Lukas
The same brain cells that track location in space appear to also count beats in time. The research suggests that our thoughts may take place on a ment...
Quantum Weirdness Now a Matter of Time
28 Jan 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Bizarre quantum bonds connect distinct moments in time, suggesting that quantum links — not space-time — constitute the fundamental structure of t...
Landmark Algorithm Breaks 30-Year Impasse
14 Jan 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Computer scientists are abuzz over a fast new algorithm for solving one of the central problems in the field. The post Landmark Algorithm Breaks 30-Ye...
Math Quartet Joins Forces on Unified Theory
17 Dec 2015
Contributed by Lukas
A new breakthrough that bridges number theory and geometry is just the latest triumph for a close-knit group of mathematicians. The post Math Quartet ...
The Incredible Shrinking Sex Chromosome
10 Dec 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Nature offers species a panoply of ways to determine an organism’s sex. That flexibility suggests we need not be concerned about losing sex chromoso...
Nature’s Critical Warning System
26 Nov 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists are homing in on a warning signal that arises in complex systems like ecological food webs, the brain and the Earth’s climate. Could it h...
How Humans Evolved Supersize Brains
19 Nov 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists have begun to identify the symphony of biological triggers that powered the extraordinary expansion of the human brain. The post How Humans...
Mongrel Microbe Tests Story of Complex Life
12 Nov 2015
Contributed by Lukas
A newly discovered class of microbe could help to resolve one of the biggest and most controversial mysteries in evolution — how simple microbes tra...
A Twisted Path to Equation-Free Prediction
22 Oct 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Complex natural systems defy analysis using a standard mathematical toolkit, so one ecologist is throwing out the equations. The post A Twisted Path t...
The Mutant Genes Behind the Black Death
15 Oct 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Only a few genetic changes were enough to change an ordinary stomach bug into the bacteria responsible for the plague. The post The Mutant Genes Behin...
A New Map Traces the Limits of Computation
08 Oct 2015
Contributed by Lukas
A major advance in computational complexity reveals deep connections between the classes of problems that computers can — and can’t — possibly d...
Visions of Future Physics
01 Oct 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Nima Arkani-Hamed is championing a campaign to build the world’s largest particle collider, even as he pursues a new vision of the laws of nature. T...
How the Body’s Trillions of Clocks Keep Time
25 Sep 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Cellular clocks are almost everywhere. Clues to how they work are coming from the places they’re not. The post How the Body’s Trillions of Clocks ...
Einstein’s Parable of Quantum Insanity
16 Sep 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Einstein refused to believe in the inherent unpredictability of the world. Is the subatomic world insane, or just subtle? The post Einstein’s Parabl...
A New Design for Cryptography’s Black Box
10 Sep 2015
Contributed by Lukas
A recent cryptographic breakthrough has proven difficult to put into practice. But new advances show how near-perfect computer security might be surpr...
How Mutant Viral Swarms Spread Disease
03 Sep 2015
Contributed by Lukas
A new understanding of viral swarms is helping researchers predict how viruses will evolve and where disease is likely to spread. The post How Mutant ...
A Surprise Source of Life’s Code
27 Aug 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Emerging data suggests the seemingly impossible — that mysterious new genes arise from “junk” DNA. The post A Surprise Source of Life’s Code f...
How Life and Luck Changed Earth’s Minerals
20 Aug 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Did the minerals on our planet arise in a predictable fashion, or did they result from chance events? The answers could eventually help scientists ide...
At Tiny Scales, a Giant Burst on Tree of Life
06 Aug 2015
Contributed by Lukas
A new technique for finding and characterizing microbes has boosted the number of known bacteria by almost 50 percent, revealing a hidden world all ar...
The New Laws of Explosive Networks
30 Jul 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Researchers are uncovering the hidden laws that reveal how the Internet grows, how viruses spread, and how financial bubbles burst. The post The New L...
New Letters Added to the Genetic Alphabet
30 Jul 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists hope that new genetic letters, created in the lab, will endow DNA with new powers. The post New Letters Added to the Genetic Alphabet firs...