Shows / Core Memory
Core Memory
Core Memory is a podcast about science and technology hosted by best-selling author and filmmaker Ashlee Vance. Vance has spent the past two decades chronicling advances in science and tech for publications like The Economist, The New York Times and Bloomberg Businessweek. Along with the stories, he's written best-selling books like Elon Musk’s biography, made an Emmy-nominated tech TV show watched by millions and produced films for HBO and Netflix. The goal has always been to bring the tales…
Episodes
Core MemoryThe Boy Wonder Of India’s New Tech Scene - EP 95 Naman Pushp
This week’s guest is Naman Pushp, the founder and CEO of Airbound. Pushp is all of 21 years old and trying to build an aerospace giant in India. His company…
Core MemoryThe Man Who Sees The Future - EP 94 Neal Stephenson
Neal Stephenson came on the podcast. What else do I have to tell you? The man has a weird mind portal into how technology will develop and has influenced…
Core MemoryThe Future Of Fighter Jets - EP 93 Hermeus With Zach Shore And A.J. Piplica
We’re heading into fighter jet territory this week with Zach Shore (CEO) and A.J. Piplica (Co-Founder and Executive Chairman) of Hermeus. Founded in 2018…
Core MemoryRobots Like Us - EP 92 Andrew Kiguel and Matt McMullen From Realbotix
Our guests this week are Andrew Kiguel and Matt McMullen from Realbotix. Realbotix makes humanoid robots that actually look like humans. McMullen, who founded…
Core MemoryHe Bought A Ghost Town And Became A YouTube Star - EP 91 Brent Underwood
This week’s guest is Brent Underwood, the proud owner of Cerro Gordo Mines. That’s right. In 2018, Underwood bought the ghost town of Cerro Gordo, located near…
Core MemoryHe’s Here To End Death - EP 90 Dr. Emil Kendziorra
A few years ago, some people put me in a van and drove me to the edge of Moscow. And by “the edge of Moscow,” I mean where things started to get a bit rural…
Core MemoryThe Wordcel Queen Of Silicon Valley — EP 89 Anna Gát
We’ve heard a lot of moonshot ideas on this podcast, but this week’s guest may have the most impossible one yet: making tech more cultured. In this episode…
Core MemorySolar Energy's Second Act — EP 88 Joel Jean
In this episode, Ashlee sits down with Joel Jean, CEO of Swift Solar, a San Carlos-based startup trying to create new solar technology using perovskite. We…
Core MemoryThe Xbox Nearly Destroyed Him - EP 87 Seamus Blackley
This episode is nerd catnip unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. Ashlee sat down with Seamus Blackley, who you might know as the man who talked Microsoft…
Core MemoryGene Therapies That Work? - EP 86 Adrian Veres
We have been promised glorious gene therapies for decades. This is supposed to be the stuff of reprogramming the body to blunt or cure diseases with something…
Core MemoryThe Realest Longevity Guru - EP 85 Alex Colville
Over the past five years, Alex Colville has become one of the most influential figures in the longevity and aging fields. There’s a decent chance you have not…
Core MemoryAI Will Cure Us All!! Or Not!! - EP 84 Abhi Mahajan
Every couple of days, a new AI-meets-biotech startup sends me a pitch, and the pitches all sound the same. AI is amazing, and it can now tame biology. We’re on…
Core MemoryThe Google Engineer Who Set The Skydiving Record At 58 - EP 83 Alan Eustace
Most people think that the Red Bull guy Felix Baumgartner holds the skydiving record. But this is not the case. The real record-holder is Alan Eustace. In…
Core MemoryAn Implant That Tracks And Treats Cancer Tumors - EP 82 Ben Woodington
Treating cancer remains a crude practice. We cut, burn and poison tumors, and we do all this with relatively little precision around both the initial treatment…
Core MemoryInside The Media Marvel That Is TBPN
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.corememory.com Running a media business is hard. You’re competing for people’s attention. You…
Core MemoryQuantum Everything Explained - EP 81 Prineha Narang
Prineha Narang is one of the rising stars of science and the field of quantum technology. She earned her PhD in applied physics at Caltech, taught materials…
Core MemoryHe Came From Oz To Save American Manufacturing - EP 80 Chris Power
A few years ago, I was lunching with a young Australian man who told me he hoped to modernize manufacturing in America. This man seemed enthusiastic and…
Core MemoryThe Manufacturing Phenomenon That Is SendCutSend - EP 79 Jim Belosic
If you spend any time inside a company that actually makes things in the U.S., then you’ll hear about SendCutSend. Started in 2018, SendCutSend has become an…
Core MemoryBody Scanners, Banned Models, and DeepMind's Space Game Obsession - EP 78 Ashlee Vance And Kylie Robison
Did Kylie and I attend the Midjourney Scanner event? Yes, we did. Did Kylie compare notes on her skincare routine with Bryan Johnson at the event? Also, yes…
Core MemoryThe Future Of Our Brains And Bodies - EP 77 Max Hodak Live Event
Max Hodak is back. The co-founder and CEO of Science Corp. joined me for our first-ever live podcast recording, which took place at the Brex headquarters in…
Core MemoryThe Space Race Is So Back — EP 76 Ashlee Vance And Kylie Robison
The theme for this week’s episode is tick, tick, boom. America is running out of time to catch up with China on manufacturing, and we’re physically incapable…
Core MemoryRedwood Materials Has Built A Recyling Empire
A couple of months ago, we went out to Nevada to hang with JB Straubel, the founder and CEO of Redwood Materials and the co-founder of Tesla. JB took us on a…
Core MemoryCan You Reverse Decades of Drinking Damage? Perhaps. - EP 75 Jacob Kimmel Is Back
Jacob Kimmel returns to the show. And he might have cured the hangover and liver disease. NBD. Kimmel is the co-founder and president of NewLimit and one of…
Core MemoryThe Startup Trying to Save Us From AI Bioweapons- EP 74 Hannu Rajaniemi
Our guest this week is the renowned science fiction author Hannu Rajaniemi. And he has come to terrify and then perhaps comfort you. Rajaniemi made an…
Core MemorySchmidt Out of Luck — EP 73 Ashlee Vance And Kylie Robison
We are back with another episode of Ashlee and Kylie gossiping about the latest in Silicon Valley. First, a re-cap of our Alexandr Wang interview — his first…
Core MemoryThe Freshman Who Took Down Stanford's President And Its Perfect Image - EP 72 Theo Baker
As a freshman, Theo Baker signed up to write for The Stanford Daily on a lark. He thought it might be a fun way to spend some time when he wasn’t busy studying…
Core MemoryMeta's AI Chief On AI Beef, New Models And Life With Zuck - EP 71 Alex Wang
Last June, Meta pried Alex Wang away from Scale AI, the company he co-founded and ran, in a deal valued at $14 billion. Zuck could feel Meta fading in the AI…
Core MemoryEverything You Need To Know About The Nuclear Energy Boom - EP 70 James Krellenstein
We’re in the midst of a new nuclear energy boom. Start-ups – both fusion and fission – abound, and the U.S. government has cleared the way to build again…
Core MemoryThe Cyborgs Commeth - EP 69 Connor Glass
It is time to talk about robotic body parts. Connor Glass, this week’s guest, has a company called Phantom Neuro, and it makes a human machine interface. By…
Core MemoryIs America Cooked? — EP 68 Ashlee Vance And Kylie Robison
We’re trying something new. Ashlee and Kylie dishing on Tech Land and dishing hard. The Core Memory podcast you didn’t know you needed but now can’t live…
Core MemoryThe Great Reset At OpenAI — EP 67 Sam Altman And Greg Brockman
Sam Altman and Greg Brockman came on Core Memory together for a ten-year look back at OpenAI. It’s also the first time they’ve done a media podcast together…
Core MemoryThe $50,000 Underwater Drone - EP 66 Ulysses
Guinness. Sharks. American manufacturing. These are a few of the interests I share with the founders of Ulysses, a San Francisco startup building autonomous…
Core MemoryThe Very Wild, Very Real Plan To Build AI Data Centers In The Ocean - EP 65 Garth Sheldon-Coulson
We’re in a moment of insatiable desire for more energy and more computing. And so the ideas of how to provide said energy and computing are getting ever more…
Core MemoryThe Company Helping Paralyzed People Move And Thrive Again - EP 64 Dave Marver
Three years ago, I’d caught some videos online of paralyzed people walking again. This struck me as miraculous. It also confused me. If paralyzed people were…
Core MemoryHe Hacked Finance And Is Now Building An AI CEO - EP 63 Pedro Franceschi
Pedro Franceschi taught himself to code when he was eight years old. At 12, he began receiving legal notices from Apple, asking him to stop hacking iPhones. By…
Core MemoryHere Come The Space Lasers - EP 62 Baiju Bhatt
Baiju Bhatt is trying to pull an Elon Musk. About 25 years ago, Musk sold his finance tech company PayPal and left dot-com life to get into rockets with the…
Core MemoryThe Aussie Man Who Used AI To Create A Cancer Cure For His Dog
We have tracked down the man and dog of the hour. Paul Conyngham and his dog Rosie gained worldwide attention over the past week for breaking new medical…
Core MemoryInside The Race To Reboot Human Cells - EP 60 Nabiha Saklayen
The mainstream media says almost nothing about induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs). So, you’re lucky that we’re here to help. These cells with a clunky name…
Core MemoryHe Thinks AI Code May Break Everything - EP 59 Will Wilson
Will Wilson paints a bleak picture for where we’re heading with code written by AIs. He thinks the world will fill with poorly written code that no one…
Core MemoryShe Survived Being Shot, Bombed And Working At Google - EP 58 Anna Prouse
Anna Prouse has survived multiple assassination attempts. She’s been tapped by General David Petraeus to get work done in Iraq that U.S. troops couldn’t…
Core MemoryThe Grand Quest To Simulate Life - EP 57 Ed Boyden
Ed Boyden has spent the last twenty or so years building the technology needed to create a working simulation of living systems. Put another way – he’s been…
Core MemoryWhat's Real And What's Fake In Tech - EP 56 Peter Barrett
We do not usually do venture capitalists on the Core Memory podcast. They can be a lot and like to hear themselves talk a bit too much. (Not you! The other…
Core MemoryThe Joy And Doom Of New San Francisco - EP 55 Jayden Clark
The center of the universe has been born again. The most insufferable posters on our timeline, including myself, are enjoying the abundance found in San…
Core MemoryThe Present And Future Of Gene Editing - EP 54 Jennifer Doudna
Let’s get right to the point: Nobel Prize winner Jennifer Doudna is on the pod this week. Doudna won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry alongside Emmanuelle…
Core MemoryHe Left OpenAI To Think Bigger - EP 53 Jerry Tworek
On January 5th, famed AI researcher Jerry Tworek stunned world+dog by announcing his departure from OpenAI. A few days later, he hopped over to the Core Memory…
Core MemoryWelcome To The Chinese Peptide Underground - EP 52 Jasmine Sun
Biohacking has gone through a lot of different phases. Implanting an NFC chip in your hand is old school and having a blood boy is passé. Among Silicon…
Core MemoryNew, More Precise Cancer Therapies Could Soon Be Here - EP 51 Richard Fuisz
We have a guest host and some breaking news for this episode. Eryney Marrogi, the scientist and soon-to-be doctor who writes for us now and again, has taken…
Core MemoryIs The Era Of AI-Designed Drugs Actually Here? - EP 50 Josh Meier and Jack Dent
We have been talking about computer-aided drug discovery for well more than a decade. It used to be the case that start-ups pitched their ability to use…
Core MemoryThe Next Step Toward Understanding The Nature Of Intelligence - EP 49 Sebastian Seung
Well, here we are. It’s brain uploading time. As we’ve just reported, famed neuroscientist Sebastian Seung has created a new start-up called Memazing. The…
Core MemoryAttacking Cancer With Code And Winning - EP 48 Jake Becraft
Jake Becraft was working on mRNA way before it was cool. In fact, Becraft’s advisors at MIT told him trying to develop therapies with mRNA would be a colossal…
Core MemoryAmerica Has A Steel Start-Up. Yes, Really - EP 47 Laureen Meroueh
America has a new steel company, which is sort of a weird thing to write in 2025. It’s called Hertha Metals, and it’s based in Houston. It’s also run by a…
Core MemoryOpenAI's Research Chief On The Soup Wars, Poker And The Next Models - EP 46 Mark Chen
One must not feel sorry for Mark Chen. He gets paid very well to work in one of the most exciting fields imaginable. That said, as OpenAI’s Chief Research…
Core MemoryThe Famed Hacker Trying To Find The World's Best Inventors - EP 45 Pablos Holman
Pablos Holman has one of the most-watched TED Talks of all time, and that’s sort of the least interesting thing about him. For the past 30 years or so, Holman…
Core MemoryThe Open Source AI Model For The West - EP 44 Misha Laskin
In December of 2024, the Chinese start-up DeepSeek shocked the world with the release of an AI model that appeared much cheaper to make and run than those from…
Core MemoryAliens, AI, and Saving the Planet - EP 43 Will Marshall
Well, I wrote a book and made a movie about this week’s guest, so he must be fascinating. (Otherwise, I wasted six years of my life.) Will Marshall has done…
Core MemoryHe Bought The First Tesla Roadster 2 In 2013 - EP 42 Konstantin Othmer
Over the past week or so, Elon Musk has started hyping up the launch of the long-, long-awaited Tesla Roadster 2. Musk appeared on the Joe Rogan podcast last…
Core MemoryTrump's Cyber Czar on China's Infiltration of America - EP 41 Joshua Steinman
Joshua Steinman spent four years (2017-2021) working for President Trump and had a very broad remit. He shaped all cyber, telecommunications, cryptocurrency…
Core MemoryShe's Here To Make Dogs (And Then Humans) Live Longer - EP 40 Celine Halioua
Celine Halioua and her company Loyal are on track to deliver a drug next year that could help dogs live longer. Loyal’s therapy is aimed at senior dogs (10+…
Core MemoryNow We Shall Mine The Oceans - EP 39 Gerard Barron
We know that there are trillions of dollars’ worth of minerals sitting on the ocean floor. The big question is whether humans should start hoovering them up…
Core MemoryHe's Building A Space Station For $1 Billion - EP 38 Jed McCaleb
Jed McCaleb grew up in Arkansas where he lived in a cabin in the woods that had no electricity or running water. Now, he’s a billionaire building a space…