Science, Spoken

An experiment at the Large Hadron Collider suggests there’s a chance of catching this elusive evidence as it floats through our galactic neighborhood. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Internet-connected thermometers can quickly show how influenza is spreading—so measures to control the disease can be targeted more effectively. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

US nuclear scientists have achieved the long-sought goal of a fusion ignition—but don't expect this clean technology to power the grid yet. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A briefcase-sized satellite will ping lasers at the lunar South Pole to locate ice and map it for future human explorers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The craft survived a 26-day voyage and a scorching descent. Now it’s time for NASA engineers to learn what went wrong—and what went right. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Physicists study starlight to find whether the fine structure constant, whose value makes our universe possible, really is the same everywhere. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fentanyl-related substances have a bad reputation, but they could also save lives. In the US, a legislative battle to expedite research is heating up. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How did a lunch last underwater for 10 months? The answer relates to how carbon moves in the deep sea, and has implications for fighting climate change. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Audiology screening can be inaccessible for kids in low-resource areas. By utilizing off-the-shelf products, these scientists are trying to change that. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Flexible e-skins could be used to measure wearers’ blood pressure, temperature, and oxygen levels in real time, assisting with diagnoses and health care. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Gene therapies promise long-term relief from intractable diseases—if insurers agree to pony up. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Medtech firm Earli is working on a way to make tumors announce themselves as they appear—and even provide directions to where they are in the body. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Interstellar Lab’s inflatable BioPod is designed to help plants survive inhospitable conditions on Earth and allow explorers to settle on the Red Planet. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As carbon concentrations rise, conditions are becoming more like they were 3 million years ago, when the area was wetter and the rain was heavier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The fuel can be produced by adding bacteria to spent drill holes—meaning there are thousands of potential hydrogen sources worldwide. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For years, potential therapies that attack this brain protein have failed to help patients in clinical trials. Now—surprisingly—a new drug shows promise. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Indoor agriculture promises to massively reduce the water and land needed to support crops. But at the moment, it only works for a tiny percentage of foods. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

By firing pulses quintillionths of a second long, physicists study the fleeting motion of an electron leaving two bonded atoms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

New evidence indicates that an effort to stamp out disease-carrying insects is working. The key? Mosquitoes genetically engineered to kill off their own kind. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fossil fuels are rapidly heating the planet, but their aerosols also help cool it. Just how much, though, is a major uncertainty in climate science. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The moniker, which honors a former agency administrator accused of enforcing anti-LGBTQ policies, has long been controversial. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Any smartphone in any car can pick up a span’s unique vibrations. Tracking how that changes over time reveals hidden structural problems. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The sprawling mass of suburbia has been a disaster for the environment. But now smaller, denser cities herald a renaissance in city living. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Despite efforts to reduce emissions, the 2022 FIFA tournament is highly carbon-intensive. And its road to net-zero relies on questionable carbon credits. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After 30 years of talk about forcing wealthy polluters to compensate those bearing the brunt of climate damage, the COP27 conference seems poised to act. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices