Let's Talk SciComm

This week we had the best time chatting with Belinda (Bel) Smith, science writer extraordinaire. Belinda became a science journalist after realising she wasn't going to cut it as a scientist. Based in Melbourne, she's currently science reporter at the ABC. Her work appears on the ABC News website and has featured in the Best Australian Science Writing 2016 and 2018. You can also hear her t...

Welcome to another season of Let’s Talk SciComm! We’re very excited to be back with Season Eight, podcasting about our very favourite topic – science communication. We’re kicking off the season talking with the brilliant Julia Cleghorn about approaches to getting kids excited about science. Julia is an extroverted science geek, science communicator, project manager and performer at heart. Her care...

It’s the end of another season of Let’s Talk SciComm and it’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for. It’s the end of our countdown of our most popular how-to episodes and coming in at number one is…… How to get your thesis written. Writing a thesis is hard! It’s probably the longest document you’ve ever had to write, and the experience is often accompanied by a tendency to procrastinate and feelin...

We’re continuing our countdown of our most listened-to episodes and this week we’ve made it to number two. It came as no surprise to us that science writing is a topic so many of our listeners want to learn more about – being able to write clearly is such an essential skill! In 2014, Steven Pinker published a piece in The Chronicle of Higher Education titled ‘ Why academic writing stinks’ . While...

We’ve hit the middle of Season 7 and we’re continuing to explore our 6 most listened-to episodes. Each episode has a new introduction in which Jen and Michael reflect on why the topic resonated so much with our listeners and what we’ve learned about the topic in the interim. Coming in at number 3 is ‘How to NOT be boring’ and the title pretty much says it all. We’re sure you can all remember sitti...

This is Season 7 and we’re excited to be revisiting our 6 most listened-to episodes. Each episode has a new introduction in which Jen and Michael chat about why we think the topic resonated so much with our listeners and what we’ve learned about the topic since it was first published. Coming in at number 4 is ‘How to tackle imposter syndrome’. On the outside you appear confident, composed and on t...

We’re very excited to hit episode 50 today!! This is Season 7 and for something a bit different, we’re excited to be revisiting our 6 most listened-to episodes. Each episode has a new introduction in which Jen and Michael reflect on why the topic resonated so much with our listeners and what we’ve learned about the topic in the interim. Coming in at number 5 is ‘How to give a better science talk’....

Welcome to Season 7: for something a bit different, we’re excited to be revisiting our 6 most listened-to episodes. Each episode has a new introduction in which Jen and Michael reflect on why the topic resonated so much with our listeners and what we’ve learned about the topic in the interim. Coming in at number 6 is ‘How to tackle procrastination’. It comes as no surprise that many of us want adv...

Nerves are a completely normal part of giving a talk and as you’ve probably heard many times – nerves are a good thing! Feeling nervous means you care about this presentation which will help you to do a great job. But nerves can also be very unsettling and even completely debilitating. The good news is that there are plenty of things you can do to help manage your nerves. In this episode, Michael...

This week we had a fascinating conversation with Dr Graham Phillips focused on how to talk about controversial or divisive science topics – like aliens. Graham is a much-loved Australian science communicator and journalist and has plenty of experience communicating about tricky topics, especially when he was the host and a producer-reporter on ABC TV’s science program Catalyst. Graham began his ca...

This week we had the great pleasure of talking with Dr Josh Chu-Tan who until very recently was the Business Development Manager for the College of Health and Medicine (CHM) based in the ANU Office of Business Engagement and Commercialisation as well as a Research Fellow at JCSMR with the Clear Vision Research Group. Josh completed his PhD in 2019 and was hired as a postdoc and lecturer in Medical...

This week we had an absolute blast speaking with Christian Williams, who is an expert teacher in Melbourne, Australia. He has been recognised nationally and internationally for his expertise as a National Excellence in Teaching Award Winner, Finalist for the Global Teacher Prize and a Finalist for Young Australian of the Year. At Mentone Girls’ Grammar School, Christian manages the award-winning E...

This week we loved catching up with award-winning science communicator, marine biologist and graphic designer Dr Tullio Rossi. As founder of the science communication agency "Animate Your Science", he helps researchers tell their story to the world. His engaging video animations and eye-catching graphics make science understandable for everyone, reaching millions of people around the world, thereb...

This week we had a lot of fun chatting with, and learning from, Dr Jarrod McKenna. Jarrod is a reproductive biologist turned zookeeper turned science educator and has had quite a mixture of jobs. As a PhD student at Monash University, he investigated early pregnancy and assisted reproduction in the world’s only known menstruating rodent: The Egyptian Spiny Mouse. He then went on to work as a zooke...

This week we were so fortunate to talk with Andrew Kelly, environmentalist, convenor of The Waterway Network, and former Yarra Riverkeeper. Among other things, Andrew has worked as an editor, publisher, spokesperson, advocate and author. He played a key role in formulating the formulation the Yarra River Protection (Willip-gin Birrarung murron) Act which was passed unopposed. He has also written a...

Happy New Year and welcome to another season of Let’s Talk SciComm! We’re excited to be back for another year of podcasting about our very favourite topic – science communication. And we’re launching Season Six with a bang, talking with Associate Professor Suzie Sheehy. Suzie is an accelerator physicist who specialises in novel particle accelerators and beam dynamics, with a current focus on medic...

For our final episode of the season, we were absolutely thrilled to speak with Christine Burns. Christine (BA Psych, PG Dip Sport Bus Mngt, MIPPA) is the CEO and Co-Founder of WALT Institute. As a former elite athlete in hockey for New Zealand, she has over 20 years of coaching, sport psychology and performance expertise which she brings to the global arena of Authentic Leadership. Typically, she...

This week we absolutely loved talking with Isolde Gottwald (AKA Issie), an exchange student from the University of Vienna who spent semester 2 this year studying with us at the University of Melbourne. Listen to the podcast to hear how we got to know Issie! Within her degree, Issie is particularly interested in environmental psychology and cognitive neuroscience. Out of her deep curiosity for scie...

This week we had the enormous pleasure of speaking with the one-and-only Professor Natalie Hannan. Natalie is an ARC Future Fellow, the Associate Dean, Diversity and Inclusion in the Faculty Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences and leads the Therapeutics Discovery and Vascular Function in Pregnancy Group, in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, at the University of Melbourne. She is pa...

This week we had the great pleasure of chatting with Dr Malini Devadas about all things writing. After completing her PhD at the Australian National University in the 1990s, Malini did a postdoc and then realised that she enjoyed the writing part of the job more than the lab work! In 2004 she started working as a professional editor, becoming accredited in 2009. In 2013 Malini launched MD Writing...

This week we loved talking with Dr Kylie Quinn, who is a Vice-Chancellor’s Research Fellow and leads the Ageing and Immunotherapies Group at RMIT University. Her group is developing ways to improve immune responses in older people during vaccination and new cell-based cancer therapies. Immune cells from older people become more difficult to activate, so her team are identifying factors that limit...

This week we loved chatting with two more researchers from Deakin University’s Institute for Physical Activity and Nutrition (IPAN): Associate Professor Megan Teychenne and Dr Niamh Mundell. Megan’s PhD is in Behavioural Epidemiology and she’s currently an NHMRC Emerging Leadership Fellow at IPAN. For more than 15 years Megan has investigated the role of health-related behaviours (e.g. physical ac...

This week we’re so pleased to have had the opportunity to talk with Deakin University researchers Dr Helen Macpherson and Sara Dingle about a topic we’re fascinated by: the intersection of mental health and nutrition. Helen is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Physical Activity and Nutrition (IPAN), at Deakin where she co-leads the Exercise and Nutrition for Brain Health group. She has...

Welcome back to season 5 of Let’s Talk SciComm! We’re thrilled to be sharing another season of great episodes with you and we know you’re going to love this first episode with the one-and-only Sue Pillans. Sue is a marine scientist, artist, children’s author/illustrator and graphic recorder who specialises in creative and visual communications. As a graphic recorder Sue draws out ideas with people...

For our final episode in Season Four, we wanted to talk about another major barrier many of us experience to being able to do the work we care about: good mental health. So we asked our colleague Professor Sandra Radovini if she would have a chat with us. Sandra is a Consultant Psychiatrist and Director of Mindful, the Victorian state-wide Child & Adolescent Mental Health teaching and training...