Universe of Art

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Being able to belt out a tune like Adele or Pavarotti is not just about raw talent. The best singers in the world have to work on their technique—like how to control their breath and develop the stamina to hit note after note for a two-hour concert. But pop stars and opera singers aren’t the only vocalists who have figured out how to harness their voices for maximum impact. Death metal vocalists a...

Imagine you’re diving into a cell. You’re paddling around in the cytoplasm, you’re climbing up a mitochondria. If you’re having a hard time picturing this, that’s okay! There are professionals who do this for a living. We wanted to learn more from expert science interpreters, who take the results section of a research paper and translate it into something tangible, like a 40-foot dinosaur skeleton...

What is it actually like to work in an emergency room? To deal with overcrowded waiting rooms, a shortage of hospital beds, and a constant flow of life-and-death health conditions—while trying to maintain your sanity at the same time? That’s the focus of “The Pitt,” a new medical drama on Max from the creators of “ER,” starring one of that show’s key actors, all grown up: Noah Wyle. The first seas...

If you’ve played Rollercoaster Tycoon, Cities: Skylines, the Civilization series—even Animal Crossing—you’re probably familiar with this gameplay pattern: extract some kind of resource from the land, industrialize it into a theme park or a city, and (step three) profit, ad infinitum.  But Terra Nil , a new game from the studio Free Lives , fundamentally challenges this oft-used game loop. Instead...

The widespread infection of roughly four million virtual characters all started with a giant snake demon. In 2005, the massively multiplayer online video game World Of Warcraft introduced a special event raid, where groups of players could team up to fight a giant snake demon named Hakkar the Soulflayer. Hakkar would cast a spell called “Corrupted Blood” on players, which would slowly whittle down...

In the new Adult Swim show “Common Side Effects,” an eccentric scientist has a secret: He’s discovered a strange mushroom that can cure any illness or injury, and he wants to get it to people in need. The only problem is that a pharmaceutical company doesn’t want that secret to get out and will do anything to make sure he’s stopped. Joining Host Flora Lichtman to break down this fungal drama, and...

From down here on Earth, life on the International Space Station seems magnificent: floating through the day, enjoying stunning views out your window, having an experience only a handful of other people will ever get. But what’s it really like to live up there? How does experiencing 16 sunrises and 16 sunsets every day change your perception of time? How do you cope with being so far from the peop...

The science fiction film “Interstellar” turns 10 years old this month. For many of us, it was our first encounter with some pretty advanced astrophysics, taking sci-fi concepts like wormholes and time warping, and backing them up with actual science . Now, we’re revisiting the impact that movie’s science had on pop culture, and how astrophysics has advanced in the past decade. If it were made toda...

People are finding all sorts of uses for mushrooms these days, but we’re going to focus on two of them: how scientists are using them in robots and how playwrights are using them in theater. A few weeks ago, SciFri producer and host of our “Universe of Art” podcast Dee Peterschmidt moderated a panel at the Science In Theater Festival in Brooklyn, New York. The festival is put on by a company calle...

It’s that time of the  year when you’re making your list, checking it twice, for gifts that spark a love of science for the kids in your life.  Ira talks with Mahnaz Dar , young readers’ editor at Kirkus Reviews and Carrie Wolfson , collection development librarian at the Boulder Public Library to  round up some of the top kids’ science books of 2024 and make recommendations based on listener ques...

Here at Science Friday, we’re big fans of metaphors. They can make complicated scientific concepts easier to understand, for both non-experts and scientists themselves. For example, “the big bang” helps us visualize the beginning of the universe. Or we can understand DNA’s role better as a “building block of life.” But some of these scientific metaphors also have a downside, and can even set resea...

Did you know that there are ten quintillion—or 10,000,000,000,000,000,000—individual insects on the planet? That means that for each and every one of us humans, there are 1.25 billion insects hopping, buzzing, and flying about. A new book called The Insect Epiphany: How Our Six-Legged Allies Shape Human Culture celebrates the diversity of the insect world, as well as the many ways it has changed o...

Before the pandemic, Peter Kiesewalter didn’t think much of moths. Like a lot of people, he’d thought of them mostly as pests. But when his brother Tobi, an interpretive naturalist for Ontario Parks and moth enthusiast, showed him macro photos he’d taken of them, he was blown away. “[They were] absolutely stunning,” Peter says. “The amount of colors and hair were just extraordinary.” Peter is a Gr...

When you think of famous scientists of the early United States, you likely think of Benjamin Franklin, inventor of the lightning rod, bifocal glasses , and even the glass harmonica . He and his son are the subject of the play “ Franklinland .” It explores their sometimes contentious relationship, Benjamin Franklin’s accomplishments as a scientist, and how the scientific method can be used to under...

Would you be interested in a cookie infused with smog from your favorite city? Maybe a loaf of sourdough made from wheat tainted by wildfires? Those are just a few of the projects from the Center for Genomic Gastronomy, based in Amsterdam and Portugal, where artists use innovative ingredients to represent environmental crises and imagine what the future of food could look like. Ira talks with Zack...

Octopus mating behaviors can be quite deadly. Many species are cannibalistic, making the entire prospect of mating dangerous, and female octopuses often die after laying one clutch of eggs. Their cannibalistic tendencies mean that octopuses don’t socialize as much as other animals. But the larger Pacific striped octopus (LPSO) is different. For one, they live together in colonies. And mating is no...

In July, researchers discovered the oldest known cave art . It was found in a cave on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, and it shows three human-like figures and a wild pig. The painting was dated at 51,200 years old— 5,000 years older than any other known cave art. The finding continues a trend of researchers unearthing older and older examples of human-made art, including those found outside of...

Looking into space can be pretty daunting. How do we make sense of the vast expanse above our heads, the millions of stars we might be able to see, and the billions more we can’t? Now, what about listening to space? That’s the task that Sam Harnett and Chris Hoff gave themselves, for their series “Cosmic Visions.” They’re the team behind “The World According to Sound,”  a podcast that’s brought ou...

When you think about connections between science and war, the obvious links are in technology—advanced radar, spy satellites, more powerful explosives—and in medical innovations that seek to heal the wounds caused by conflict. But in a new book, Stories are Weapons: Psychological Warfare and the American Mind , author Annalee Newitz says that stories and narrative can be weapons too, used in battl...

“Twisters,” the long awaited follow-up to the 1996 movie “Twister” is out now. It’s about a scientist (Daisy Edgar-Jones) who goes back to her home state of Oklahoma to try and stop a massive tornado outbreak from wreaking havoc on its citizens. On the way, she meets a quirky cast of storm chasers, and butts heads with a band of unorthodox “tornado wranglers” led by a YouTube personality (Glen Pow...

It’s officially summertime, and the season of reading is finally here! Two science writers and voracious readers have compiled their summer reading recommendations, just for Science Friday fans. Before you head out for a week at the beach, start packing for that road trip, or stock up for a long staycation, we’ve got the list of science-y summer reads, straight from those familiar with the best on...

In the 2015 film “Inside Out,” audiences met 11-year-old Riley and her team of emotions: Joy, Sadness, Fear, Disgust, and Anger, each represented by a different character. They lived inside Riley’s mind to help guide her feelings and actions, and towards the end of the film, their emotional control center gets an upgrade with a puberty button. That’s where the new film “Inside Out 2” picks up. Ril...

For decades now, one music star has managed to show up on tracks spanning multiple genres and appear alongside many famous artists—while also remaining bafflingly under-recognized. Any guesses? Of course, we’re talking about none other than the common loon—a waterbird with striking red eyes and black-and-white checkerboard plumage. This bird’s calls have been used in songs by artists like Michael...

One of the biggest, most intriguing questions in the world is quite simple: Are we alone in this universe? Astronomer and astrobiologist Dr. Aomawa Shields looks for signs of life in outer space by analyzing the climate and habitability of small exoplanets far beyond our solar system. Shields’ path to science was a winding one. Through childhood and into her adult years, she toggled between two lo...