Shows / UnDisciplined
UnDisciplined
Each week, UnDisciplined takes a fun, fascinating and accessible dive into the lives of researchers and explorers working across a wide variety of scientific fields.
Episodes
- UnDisciplined
UnDisciplined: could anemone venom be our saving grace when it comes to chronic pain?
We love to identify good guys and bad guys–in cartoons, movies, and nature. Nature’s good guys, for example, pollinate our crops. The bad guys are venomous…
- UnDisciplined
UnDisciplined: how does science move from the lab to your living room?
New scientific discoveries are the purview of researchers, but that vital information is important to everyone.
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UnDisciplined: researchers are coming together to address society's grand challenges
When we think of research universities, we imagine lab scientists hunkered in their labs, or marine biologists in their research ships, pursuing ever-narrower…
- UnDisciplined
UnDisciplined: could the genes associated with autism be a driving factor in human ingenuity?
Autism is a word that many people fear, but much of that fear is driven by the fact that the United States has classified autism as a disorder. What if we…
- UnDisciplined
UnDisciplined: new road map of lung development lays the groundwork for progress on lung diseases
The life process that is most fundamental to our well-being is the simple act of breathing. But it’s not so simple! Our lungs are one of the most complex and…
UnDisciplinedUnDisciplined: these two marine species are sticking together to battle climate change
Some tidal species just don't do very well in the heat — and these organisms are at obvious risk as our planet warms up. But new research is pointing to a…
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UnDisciplined: dog whistlers
About 3.2 million people watch Tucker Carlson each night on Fox News. Think about that number this way: it's the equivalent of every person in the state of…
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UnDisciplined: the evolution of evolution
Most of us don’t think about evolution often, if at all, and when we do we often conjure up images of Charles Darwin in the Galapagos Islands. Today, the study…
UnDisciplinedUnDisciplined: mosasaurs and me
This week we take a deep dive into the ancient, exploring the world as it existed over 66 million years ago, in an attempt to understand our present and our…
UnDisciplinedUnDisciplined: the "bear" facts
We have a complicated relationship with bears. Ask any hiker what their greatest fear is, and running into a bear will be at the top of that list. But we want…
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UnDisciplined: the methane matter
Methane. It's more than just the gas released when cows... release gas. It has a warming potential 25x higher than carbon dioxide. Researchers in Utah's Uinta…
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UnDisciplined: Let's Talk Toads
They've got warts, they sometimes smell like roasted peanuts, and in Wyoming, they're changing how they move because of a fungus. This week, we'll be…
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UnDisciplined: a parasocial pandemic
Just about everyone has experienced a shift in their relationships during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some people we didn't get to see as much, some people we saw a…
- UnDisciplined
UnDisciplined: Drunk Flies And Stoned Dolphins
If you started your day with a cup of coffee, kept it going with a cup of cola, or ended it with a glass of wine, you are part of a long human tradition of…
- UnDisciplined
UnDisciplined: underground allies
There's a lot more going on beneath the forest floor than you might realize. A vast underground network of fungi help some 95% of plants survive, helping them…
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UnDisciplined: online coping: the Goldilocks effect
This week on UnDisciplined we're talking about teens and their smartphones. You've likely heard about how social media is making teens more depressed, anxious…
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UnDisciplined: we're in it for the long haul
This week on UnDisciplined, we're talking about a breakthrough in our understanding of long COVID. Some 30% of COVID patients will have lingering symptoms for…
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Undisciplined: climate change is for the birds
Climate change is profoundly affecting animals, but not only in the ways you might be thinking of. Compelling new research suggests that animals are…
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UnDisciplined: The Transatlantic Epidemic(s)
Covid-19 is not the first virus to travel around the globe. This week on UnDisciplined, we'll be talking about how the slave trade brought new viruses to the…
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UnDisciplined: The Architecture Of Access
This week on Undisciplined we're talking about disability and accessibility in ancient Greece. You might think that accommodations for disabled people are a…
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UnDisciplined: Dreams Can Come True
We all dream, but why? And what do our dreams reveal about our waking lives? Since the beginning of human history, dreams have played a pivotal role in helping…
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UnDisciplined: Politics: All The Rage
The events of the past several months, and even years suggest that anger is a driving force in American politics. Are politicians stoking the flames and making…
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UnDisciplined: City-Living Bees
This week we are talking about urban bees and how converting vacant lots into green spaces doesn't only benefit humans. With a few adjustments, green spaces…
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UnDisciplined: Sick And Tired
This week we're talking about fatigue. And no, it's not the same as being tired. Despite it being the top complaint among people with chronic conditions and…
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Undisciplined: Better Testing With Bayesian
When the COVID-19 pandemic first emerged, tests were hard to come by, and you often had to wait days or even weeks for the results. We’ll be talking with an…
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Undisciplined: Nature Is Healing
University of Utah researchers set out to measure changes in Park City’s air quality during the ski season and Sundance Film Festival. Then COVID-19 hit. And…
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Undisciplined: Years of the Woman
Since 2016, more women have run for political office than ever before, from the governor’s race to local school board elections. With this came an influx of…
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Undisciplined: The Great Shark Extinction
Researchers recently uncovered the biggest mass extinction event since the dinosaurs. About 19 million years ago, the shark population was decimated by roughly…
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Undisciplined: Women And Wikipedia
Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, is one of the first sources Google provides for many different searches. From notable figures to new technology, historical…
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Undisciplined: Climate Change And Me
How much do your personal choices affect climate change? Does promoting the use of energy efficient light bulbs take away from pushing for bigger policy…
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Undisciplined: Man's Best Friend
There are few things sweeter than a puppy staring back at you. But how does the puppy understand what you're saying, and when exactly do they start picking up…
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Undisciplined: Police Violence And Public Schools
The frustration over police use of force has been simmering for years in the United States. A new study, published in the February 2021 issue of the Quarterly…
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Undisciplined: Fund Black Scientists
Despite calls for increasing diversity, scientific researchers are still predominantly white. One of the main reasons: a substantial disparity in research…
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Undisciplined: Movie Magic
Could watching your favorite movie be a successful form of therapy? Researchers are looking into the ways that movies influence their viewers, and they're…
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Undisciplined: Cyberbullying Yourself
We all know about cyber bullying. We know how pervasive it is. We know how damaging it can be. But there’s still a lot we don’t know about this relatively new…
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Undisciplined: The Future Of Fertilizers
It’s no longer revolutionary to point out that bacteria can be beneficial in many ways. But until recently, we haven’t had a good handle on the role…
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Undisciplined: When Ideology Trumps Science
Political scientists Erika Allen Wolters and Brent Steel have written that the United States is experiencing a political era in which facts are fluid and the…
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Undisciplined: Asian-American Women In STEM And White Men Named John
When Athena Castro thinks about the makeup of research spaces, she sees a paradox. Asian women are simultaneously overrepresented in one way and under…
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Undisciplined: Social Media And Suicide Risk
A recently published study has confirmed what a lot of people have long suspected: increasing social media use is correlated to suicidal thoughts among some…
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Undisciplined: Combatting Vaccine Misinformation
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic there was a lot of misinformation about vaccines floating around on social media. Public health agencies have been trying to…
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Undisciplined: Death In The Soil
There is nothing more damaging to a nation’s economy than a war on its own soil. But the way we think about the long-term economic consequences of war is often…
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Undisciplined: COVID-19 And Compounding Trauma
As a counselor and a researcher, Stacey Litam had focused her career on helping victims of sex trafficking to work through their trauma. Then the COVID-19…
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Undisciplined: Of Puppets And Punishment
Even if you’re a judge, a prosecutor or a police officer, you might not have given a lot of thought to the question of why we punish people. You might simply…
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Undisciplined: Innocent Bystanders?
What is your responsibility when you see injustice being done? For Amos Guiora, this is a deeply personal question stemming from his family’s experiences in…
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Undisciplined: National Security Now
The last time the United States Capitol was breached was in 1814, when British troops burned the building using furniture and books from the Library of…
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Undisciplined: 2020 Year In Review
There are a lot of ways 2020 is going to be remembered and, to be honest, a lot of us will probably remember it as a pretty terrible year, for very obvious…
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Undisciplined: The Sounds Of Space
No human has ventured farther than 250,000 miles from earth. So what we know about what lies beyond us is limited to what we can see through data collection…
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Undisciplined: The Absurdity Of Academia
In philosophy, the absurd refers to the conflict between the human desire to find meaning in life and the fact that the more you search, the harder it is to…
- UnDisciplined
Undisciplined: Oh, You Tease
Have you ever found it strange that one of the ways that we let people know we care about them is by gently making fun of them? Teasing is a weird sort of…
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Undisciplined: November Science News Roundup
This week on Undisciplined, we’re talking about monarch caterpillars, ancient big-game hunters, and of course we’ll be talking about the biggest news in…
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Undisciplined: Healthy Forests, Healthy People
Stopping the decimation of rainforests is unquestionably important to slowing climate change. But simply protecting forests often excludes and disenfranchises…
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Undisciplined: Senses and Sensibility
Without having a really good reason for doing so, nobody in their right mind would put a dead fish into a ziploc bag, attach it to wires to an electric…
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Undisciplined: The Bear Necessities
2020 has been rough. I don’t know about you, but there were a lot of times this year that I just wanted to go to sleep and wake up a few months later. Well, it…
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Undisciplined: October Science News Roundup
Although the national election and COVID-19 pandemic continue to dominate the news cycle, there is other news out there — and the worlds of science…
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Undisciplined: Devil With The Blue Jeans
About 150 years ago, Jacob Davis went into business with Levi Strauss, and the era of blue jeans was underway. Today, at any given moment, about half of the…
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Undisciplined: Here Come The Cyborg Locusts
Since the dawn of agriculture, locusts have been a scourge for farmers around the world. But a new study suggests that while we’ve long been focused on the…
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Undisciplined: Don't Say Yes To The Stress
For millions of years, evolution has shaped our behavior — we do what we’re designed to do. Or, at least, we did. Because today’s world stresses and confuses…
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Undisciplined: September Science News Roundup
We’re talking about fires and fossils, sea butterflies and stonehenge, and parasitic plants and saving the planet — well, saving ourselves, anyway. Our guests…
- UnDisciplined
Undisciplined: Save The Parasites
We can’t save every plant and animal that we’ve put into danger. But we know from experience that we can have a big effect on the ones we choose to protect…
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Undisciplined: Cops And Scholars
The Los Angeles Unified School District funds the largest independent school police department in the nation. Last year, the department was funded to the tune…