Science Friday Folgen

Deep in an active nickel mine near Sudbury, Ontario, researchers are installing and calibrating a set of sensitive detectors. They hope that the location roughly 6,800 feet underground will screen out much of the ordinary radiation and cosmic rays felt on the surface, and allow their detectors to sense tiny disturbances caused by a dark matter particle passing close to the nucleus of one of the germanium atoms in a target material. If successful, the SuperCDMS SNOLAB experiment may shed some light on the nature of dark matter, an unseen something that is thought to make up around 85% of the matter in the universe. Priscilla Cushman, a physicist who has been working on the project for over 20 years, joins Host Flora Lichtman to describe the hunt, the timeline of the experiment, and the big unknowns facing the SuperCDMS team.  Guest:  Dr. Priscilla Cushman is spokesperson for the SuperCDMS SNOLAB experiment, and a professor in the School of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Minnesota. Other episodes you may enjoy: Listening for the cosmic ‘dark ages,’ from the lunar far side Most Powerful Neutrino Ever Is Detected In the Mediterranean Transcripts for each episode are available within 1-3 days at sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Follow our show on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Bluesky @scifri and sign up for our newsletters. Got a science question that’s keeping you up at night? Call us: 877-472-4374 Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hurricane season officially begins in June. And in the event of a big storm, local and state governments often rely on help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency or FEMA. But, President Trump has questioned the value of the agency.   “I've never been a big fan of FEMA. I like to keep it local. I like to see governors and neighboring states help each other as opposed to FEMA,” Trump said in March. We’ve heard this from the administration about other federal agencies, but FEMA is a special case. People have mistrusted this agency since its founding in the late 1970s.   Host Flora Lichtman talks with Micah Loewinger, co-host of the show “On The Media,” who traced FEMA’s history in a new series called “American Emergency: The Movement to Kill FEMA.” Guest:  Micah Loewinger is co-host of On The Media.Other episodes you may enjoy: As Disasters Escalate, What’s The Future Of FEMA? Can We Geoengineer Our Way Out Of A Natural Disaster? Transcripts for each episode are available within 1-3 days at sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Follow our show on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Bluesky @scifri and sign up for our newsletters. Got a science question that’s keeping you up at night? Call us: 877-472-4374 Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Animal neuroaudiologist Pete Scheifele joins us to answer some burning questions from SciFri listener Paul: Why can dogs and cats hear a wider range of frequencies than we do? Is it in their ears, their brains? And what would life be like if you had dog ears or cat ears? And, scientists have created the first “smell map” of the nose using a mouse model. Host Flora Lichtman talks with neurobiologist Bob Datta about this latest research, and what it tells us about olfaction. Guests:  Dr. Pete Scheifele is a neuroaudiologist at the University of Cincinnati and executive director of the FETCHLAB, an animal audiology clinic and lab. Dr. Bob Datta is a neurobiologist at Harvard Medical School. Other episodes you may enjoy: What’s That Smell? An AI Nose Knows Blood In The Water: Shark Smell Put To The Test Transcripts for each episode are available within 1-3 days at sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Follow our show on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Bluesky @scifri and sign up for our newsletters. Got a science question that’s keeping you up at night? Call us: 877-472-4374 Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.