Advertise on podcast: Curious by Nature

As you are driving around and rushing to arrive at your next destination, is it worth it? Bharat Jayaprakash is a fifth-year PhD student in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Minnesota, where he studies vehicles, driving behavior, energy consumption, and emissions. Today, we explore just how much our everyday driving habits affect fuel consumption, why speeding may save far less time than we think, and what millions of real-world driving trips can teach us about the future of transportation and autonomous vehicles.

What if changing just a few atoms inside a material could completely change what that material can do? Something far too small to see could have enormous consequences for the way we produce chemicals, treat water, and build cleaner energy technologies.  Dr. Joselyn Del Pilar Albaladejo is a professor of chemistry at the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez, where she studies materials at the atomic and crystal level.

Leaving your country doesn’t need to mean leaving its politics behind. Often when people leave, their voice is lost as well, and for mass drains of a country this can have serious effects on the political environment.  Dr. Chipo Dendere is a professor of political science in the Africana Studies Department at Wellesley College and the author of ‘How to Stay After Leaving’. We explore the surprising political consequences of migration, why people who leave may still have a powerful connection to their home countries, and how the loss of voters, professionals, and entire communities can actually strengthen the political systems they hoped to escape.

Every day, diseases like cholera and malaria affect millions of people around the world. But what if we could predict how these diseases spread before outbreaks get worse?  Professor Romain Glèlè Kakaï is a Professor of Biostatistics at the Université d’Abomey-Calavi, where he studies how diseases spread through people, animals, and the environment. His mathematical models help researchers understand outbreaks of diseases like cholera and malaria, and are used by organizations like the World Health Organization and GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance.

Imagine needing a feeding tube just to get the nutrition your body needs, but having to be connected to bulky equipment that limits where you can go and what you can do. For thousands of families, that’s part of everyday life. But what if tube feeding could be as simple as carrying a smartphone?  Neal Piper is the Founder and CEO of Luminoah, a medical technology company developing a wearable feeding system designed to give patients more freedom while helping caregivers and doctors better track their nutrition. Inspired by his own son’s battle with cancer, Neil set out to make tube feeding easier, safer, and more personal.

Today, we’re sharing a special Newswise event hosted by our COO, Thom Canalichio, with Dr. Rakesh Suri, Regional Director of Cardiac Surgical Robotics and Innovation at Corewell Health, along with his patient, Patrick O’Brien. Together, they discuss a breakthrough in robotic heart surgery that could make repairing damaged heart valves less invasive, helping patients recover faster and get back to their everyday lives sooner. You’ll also hear Patrick’s firsthand experience of becoming the first patient to undergo this innovative procedure and how it gave him a new outlook on life.

You’ve probably heard people talking about peptides lately. They’re everywhere on social media, promising everything from anti-aging to better fitness. But what are peptides really, and could they become one of the biggest breakthroughs in medicine?  Karsten Eastman is the Co-founder and CEO of Sethera Therapeutics, a biotechnology company developing new ways to build peptide-based medicines. By using enzymes to reshape these tiny proteins, his team hopes to create treatments that last longer, work better, and one day help tackle diseases that have been difficult to treat.

Joining the panel are Ella McCarthy, Co-founder of Sci_Burst and former Communication Specialist at the Australian National University; Dr. Will Grant, Associate Professor at the Australian National Centre for the Public Awareness of Science; Dr. Isabel Freiling, Assistant Professor of Communication at the University of Utah and Responsible AI Fellow; and Shelley Wunder-Smith, Director of Research Communications at Georgia Tech. Together, they answer audience questions, share practical tips for communicating science more effectively, and discuss how researchers can better connect with the people they want to reach.

At Newswise, we host a monthly webinar series, and this month’s webinar is titled “Are You Talking to Me?” Today, we’re bringing together science communication researchers and professionals to share the latest research on communicating science more effectively and, most importantly, how those ideas can be put into practice. We’re featuring presentations from Ella McCarthy, Co-founder of Sci_Burst and former Communication Specialist at the Australian National University. Dr. Will Grant, Associate Professor at the Australian National Centre for the Public Awareness of Science. And Dr. Isabelle Freiling, Assistant Professor of Communication at the University of Utah and Responsible AI Fellow. They’ll discuss why understanding your audience is one of the most important parts of science communication, how researchers define and think about audiences, and how today’s online world, from social media algorithms to AI generated content, is changing the way people discover, understand, and trust science. Tune in next week for part two with Shelley Wunder-Smith, Director of Research Communications at Georgia Tech, joining the panel for a discussion of practical strategies based on the research presentations. You’ll hear a lively discussion about best practices for communicating science in today’s ever changing media landscape.

Every pet owner wants to know the absolute best food to put in their dog or cat's bowl, but the endless rows of grocery store options have turned feeding time into a total guessing game. From raw diets and sous vide to traditional kibble, picking the right option isn't just about what looks delicious, it's about protecting an invisible internal ecosystem. Dr. Kelly Swanson is a professor of animal sciences and the director of the Division of Nutritional Sciences at the University of Illinois, where he has spent over twenty years studying pet health. His lab is uncovering the deep connection between what our pets eat and how their gut microbiome regulates everything from their immune systems to their weight.

Dr. Siniša Hrvatin is an assistant professor of biology at MIT and a member of the Whitehead Institute. His lab is uncovering the biological secrets of hibernation and frozen stasis, not just to understand these animals, but to discover how we can copy their tricks to save human lives.

For decades, the standard medical advice for treating a concussion was to go sit in a dark room, turn off your phone, and do absolutely nothing until you felt better. But modern science has completely flipped the script, revealing that hiding out in the dark might actually make your brain recover slower. Dr. Kouros Emami is a clinical and sports neuropsychologist at the Hospital for Special Surgery, where he works on the cutting edge of head injury recovery. He treats everyone from elite athletes to everyday people, using active movement and specialized exercises to help the brain heal itself.

Dr. Brian Southwell is a Distinguished Fellow at RTI International, where he researches science communication, public trust, and the spread of misinformation. His work focuses on helping researchers and institutions better connect with the communities they serve.

Michael Schutz is a Professor of Music, Cognition, and Percussion at McMaster University, where he researches how auditory alerting systems in healthcare can be vastly improved. By applying centuries of musical composition insight and psychophysical research, he is exploring how healthcare sounds can be re-engineered to cut through critical room noise without being unnecessarily jarring.

Dr. Raihan Khan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Health Sciences at James Madison University, and Madalynn Nofplot is a JMU Honors College alumna and nursing student.  They launched a fascinating study to look into how different music genres affect the academic performance and GPAs of college students with and without attention deficit disorder.