podcasts

The Quanta Podcast

Every Tuesday, editor in chief Samir Patel sits down with writers and editors to discuss our most thought-provoking stories in science and math. Audio editions of Quanta’s stories with Susan Valot will appear biweekly on Thursdays.

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An animated illustration shows a person looking at a scalloped shape with three rounded projections peeking out above a brick wall. The person's head is depicted as containing a paper label that is blank. On the label, different words appear — clown, tree, balloons, sheep — one at a time. Just a moment after the word appears, the illustration of the object, including the scalloped shape, appears on the wall.

PODCAST

A New Framework for How the Brain Compresses Our Noisy World

An illustration shows a scientist standing beneath a spectrum of life — including a rock (not alive), virus, cell and cat.

AUDIO EDITION

A Cell So Minimal That It Challenges Definitions of Life

PODCAST

‘Huge Breakthrough’ in the Math of Imbalance

PODCAST

Theory of Fluids Enters the 21st Century

A complicated surface that looks like a loofah.

AUDIO EDITION

New Proofs Probe Soap-Film Singularities

PODCAST

Is AI Reasoning Right for the Wrong Reasons?

PODCAST

Why Am I Left-Handed?

An illustration of a flashlight shining on a chalkboard covered in sketches and equations, including an illustration of a particle with a question mark next to it.

AUDIO EDITION

Old ‘Ghost’ Theory of Quantum Gravity Makes a Comeback

Two dark hands touching surrounded by a universe

PODCAST

A Dark Dimension Could Link Two of the Universe’s Great Unknowns

PODCAST

Is Life Just Different?

Circuit board with a snowglobe inside

AUDIO EDITION

‘World Models,’ an Old Idea in AI, Mount a Comeback

PODCAST

Seven Perfect Shuffles Randomize a Deck of Cards. But How Many Sloppy Ones?

PODCAST

Will We Ever Be Able To Forecast Volcanic Eruptions Like Weather?

Light microscopy image of fibroblast cells. The cell nuclei are stained purple; parts that make up the rod-like structures of the cytoskeleton are stained cyan for actin filaments and yellow for the microtubule filaments.

AUDIO EDITION

Tiny Tubes Reveal Clues to the Evolution of Complex Life

An illustration of a scientist surrounded by biological symbols

PODCAST

Are Memories Transferable — or Edible?

PODCAST

How Many Elementary Particles Are There, Really?