Podcasts · Science

Asimov Press

Asimov Press

111 episodes

Audio recordings of Asimov Press essays and science fiction, focused on the science and technologies that promote a flourishing future.

Episodes page 1 of 3

  1. A Recipe for Cells

    · 19 min

    By breaking cells apart, all the way down to molecules, researchers hope to recreate the recipe from which they are built. But their efforts may prove futile. The latest essay from our ongoing book, "Biology is a…

  2. Species Have Blurry Boundaries

    · 24 min

    A bacterium can acquire new genes without acquiring a new name, or acquire a new name without changing whatsoever. By Kevin Blake Read all our work at press.asimov.com

  3. Great Leaps in Biological Theory

    · 23 min

    Two of biology’s greatest theories completely predate direct experimental evidence. Tracing their origins could help us understand how to make the next ones.

  4. On the Role of Theory in Biology

    · 42 min

    Biology is often seen as a primarily experimental science, with theory serving merely to generalize patterns from empirical data. But history reveals that theory plays a more generative role in the process of…

  5. A Brief History of Bioinformatics Software

    · 15 min

    How computer scientists on the fringes of biology made sense of sequencing data. By Ella Watkins-Dulaney.

  6. That's All, for Now

    · 5:57

    Asimov Press is pausing.

  7. Designing AI for Disruptive Science

    · 26 min

    Why scaling AI won’t automatically lead to paradigm shifts. By Alvin Djajadikerta. Read all our work at press.asimov.com.

  8. Culture Shift

    · 22 min

    We tend to think of fermented foods as something humans invented and then chose to eat. But the evidence shows the opposite: fermented foods shaped human biology. By Rachel Dutton. Read all our work at press.asimov.com.

  9. Why Lab Coats are White

    · 20 min

    How a blood-stained surgeon's frock evolved into a pristine symbol of modern science. By Donna Vatnick Read all our work at press.asimov.com.

  10. The Quest for Oral GLP-1s

    · 22 min

    In a recent survey, three-in-four respondents said they would prefer a once‑daily oral pill over a weekly injection of GLP-1s. So why aren't there more oral options? By David S. Kim Read all our work, for free, at…

  11. How Φ80 Infiltrates Research Labs

    · 28 min

    While some bacteriophages play vital roles in laboratory research, others are bent on sabotage. By Antoine Vigouroux. Read all our work, for free, at press.asimov.com.

  12. Why Are Viral Capsids Icosahedral?

    · 28 min

    Viral capsid structure is a geometric packing problem under genetic constraints. By Ulkar Aghayeva Read all our work for free at press.asimov.com.

  13. Dead Reckoning

    · 39 min

    Bioarchaeologists recently identified a murdered medieval royal. Now, they are trying to shed light on other ancient deaths. By David Brzostowicki Read all our work for free at press.asimov.com.

  14. Working in Glass

    · 20 min

    How a twisted triangle of glass tubing helped democratize chemistry and build the modern laboratory. By Spencer Wright. Read all our work for free at press.asimov.com.

  15. The Legibility Problem

    · 13 min

    What happens in a world where AIs make scientific discoveries that humans cannot understand? By Matthew Carter Read all our work at press.asimov.com.

  16. The Origins of Agar

    · 20 min

    First introduced into laboratories in 1881, agar remains indispensable as a culture medium. By Corrado Nai. Read all our work, entirely for free, at press.asimov.com.

  17. Baseline Drift

    · 11 min

    [Fiction] A eulogy to the reference human. By Eliomer H. Kaas. Read all our work, for free, at press.asimov.com.

  18. Scent, In Silico

    · 33 min

    Once a primal instinct, olfaction is now being mapped, measured, and modeled by machines. By Taylor Rayne. Read all our work, entirely for free, at press.asimov.com.

  19. Making the Vortex Mixer

    · 9:00

    The forgotten story of an invention found in every biology lab. By Ella Watkins-Dulaney. Read all our work, entirely for free, at press.asimov.com.

  20. A Brief History of Xenopus

    · 21 min

    From early experiments on fertility and embryonic development to becoming the first cloned eukaryote from an adult cell, Xenopus frogs have had an outsized influence on the life sciences. By Matt Lubin. Read all…

  21. What It's Like To Be A Worm

    · 40 min

    Finding evidence of “sentience” is fraught, whether in a comatose patient, an animal, or a neural net. By Ralph Stefan Weir. Read all our articles for free at press.asimov.com.

  22. Building Brains on a Computer

    · 33 min

    A roadmap for brain emulation models at the human scale. By Max Schons. Read all our work, entirely for free, at press.asimov.com.

  23. Mystery of the Head Activator

    · 37 min

    A biological puzzle that made one researcher and ruined another might never be solved. By Brady Huggett. Read all of our articles, entirely for free, at press.asimov.com.

  24. Solving the Electroporation Bottleneck

    · 16 min

    Cultivarium, a focused research organization, has built a custom electroporator to engineer non-model organisms at scale. By Niko McCarty. Read all our work for free at press.asimov.com.

  25. Inventing the Methods Section

    · 43 min

    What the evolution of scientific methods says about their future. By Andrew Hunt. Read all our work for free at press.asimov.com.

  26. Why Do Research Institutes Often Look the Same?

    · 11 min

    Despite attempts at variation, many new research organizations are canalized into just a handful of forms. By Sam Arbesman. Read all our work, entirely for free, by visiting press.asimov.com.

  27. How Nature Became a 'Prestige' Journal

    · 38 min

    Since launching in 1869, Nature has evolved from a periodical offering commentary on pigeons to the prestige journal in science. But how did Nature build its reputation, and can it last? By Robert Reason. Read all of…

  28. Clinic-in-the-Loop

    · 16 min

    Clinical trials are engines for scientific discovery. Better drugs require not just more trials, but also improved data collection, to create therapeutic feedback loops. By Ruxandra Teslo. Read all our work, for free,…

  29. Why the FDA Is Slow to Remove Drugs

    · 38 min

    On the 90-year saga of oral phenylephrine. By Michael DePeau-Wilson. Read all articles from Asimov Press, for free, by visiting press.asimov.com.

  30. A Most Important Mustard

    · 12 min

    On the origins of Arabidopsis thaliana, the premier model for plant biology. By Xander Balwit. Read all of our articles for free at press.asimov.com.

  31. The Penicillin Myth

    · 38 min

    Competing theories seek to explain inconsistencies surrounding Alexander Fleming’s famed discovery. By Kevin Blake. Read all of our work for free at press.asimov.com.

  32. How to See the Dead

    · 32 min

    A retinal implant designer must decide if translating mourning into light is progress or a refusal to let go. By Spencer Nitkey. Read all of our articles, entirely for free, at press.asimov.com.

  33. Animalcules and Their Motors

    · 15 min

    Advances in cryo-electron microscopy are revealing the molecular intricacies of cell movement. By Niko McCarty. Read all of our articles, entirely for free, at press.asimov.com.

  34. What Makes an Experiment Beautiful?

    · 32 min

    A beautiful experiment is not just a reflection of human ingenuity but also efficient science. Written by Ulkar Aghayeva. Read all of our articles, entirely for free, at press.asimov.com.

  35. The Power of Limit Thinking

    · 15 min

    To make things better, first prove how good they can possibly be. By David Jordan. Read every article, for free, at press.asimov.com.

  36. An Antivenom Cocktail, Made by a Llama

    · 19 min

    A new broad-coverage antivenom, made by mixing eight different nanobodies, protects mice against snakebites from 17 of 18 deadly species in Africa. By Xander Balwit. Read all of our stories for free at press.asimov.com.

  37. Making the Electron Microscope

    · 45 min

    In a little over a century, the electron microscope evolved from a tool barely capable of resolving virus particles into one able to capture atomic detail. By Smrithi Sunil. Read every article from Asimov Press by…

  38. How Nigeria Accepted GMOs

    · 25 min

    Genetically modified crops are finding a foothold in the Global South, producing some unlikely leaders in agritech. By Dr. Alex Wakeman. Read every article, for free, at press.asimov.com.

  39. Atomic-Scale Protein Filters

    · 12 min

    How aquaporin and potassium channels filter hundreds of millions of water molecules or ions each second, by positioning the correct amino acid in the perfect place. By Niko McCarty. Read every essay from Asimov Press…

  40. A Liver on Ice

    · 58 min

    How a liver goes from a brain-dead donor to a living recipient. By Donna Vatnick. Read every article from Asimov Press, for free, at press.asimov.com.

  41. A Shift from Animal Testing

    · 37 min

    There has been a push toward animal-free alternatives in scientific research. But the success of such alternatives hinges upon whether and where they can outperform standard animal models. By Celia Ford. Read all…

  42. Seeing Microbes from the Sky

    · 14 min

    Biotechnology needs more and better transducers. A column by Niko McCarty. Read all our articles by visiting press.asimov.com.

  43. The World’s Most Common Surgery

    · 31 min

    In 4,000 years, cataract surgery went from a crude procedure involving thorn instruments to a 20-minute operation with a 95 percent clinical success rate. The next step is broadening access. By Dr. Sangeetha Aravinda…

  44. AI-Designed Phages

    · 19 min

    A new paper from Arc Institute shows that a generative AI model can be used to design viable bacteriophages. By Niko McCarty. Read all of our work for free at press.asimov.com.

  45. What We Find in the Sewers

    · 1 h 01 min

    Our ancestors once spread their excess effluent on their fields; now we mine it for vital molecules. By Calum Drysdale. Visit press.asimov.com to read all articles.

  46. Pausing Insect Activity

    · 42 min

    Seasonal dormancy features in the life cycle of many insects. We can harness it for biological control, insect farming, and disease vector management at scale. By Ulkar Aghayeva. Read every article from Asimov Press…

  47. The Weight of a Cell

    · 9:55

    A single yeast cell weighs about one million times less than a grain of sand. But how do we know this? By Niko McCarty. Visit press.asimov.com to read all of our articles for free.

  48. Leeches and the Legitimizing of Folk-Medicine

    · 24 min

    While we’ve derived useful molecules from the leech, live leech therapy has been largely marginalized in the West. It is time we reevaluate why. By Khushi Mittal & Xander Balwit. Read every article by visiting…

  49. The Flower Designer

    · 13 min

    A plant biologist’s quest to design and create 1,000 unique flowers, mostly in his spare time. By Niko McCarty. Read every article from Asimov Press by visiting press.asimov.com.

  50. The Sunlight Budget of Earth

    · 15 min

    Sunlight represents a seemingly endless source of largely untapped energy. Just how endless is it? Written by Sam Clamons. Visit press.asimov.com to read all of our articles.

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