Short Wave

Vikram Chib, a biomedical engineer and neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins who studies rewards, motivation and performance. He breaks down brain differences between mental and physical fatigue. He explains how incentives can both boost effort and sometimes turn into loss anxiety that disrupts performance. He outlines brain circuits involved and offers reframing strategies to ease pressure.

Chris Krupenye, a cognitive scientist who studies animal minds, discusses experiments with Kanzi the bonobo. He explains how researchers adapted child pretend-play tests into tea-party trials. They probe whether apes can imagine invisible outcomes and what that means for the evolution of imagination.

Ari Daniel, a freelance science reporter who covered an innovative Pan-Africa HIV vaccine trial, shares field reporting from South Africa and Zanzibar. He describes lab work with long-term blood samples. He recounts a funding freeze that threatened the trial and how researchers regrouped with new, smaller funding. He follows the launch of the scaled-back trial and community reactions in Cape Town.

Matilda Brindle, an evolutionary biologist at Oxford who studies primate social and sexual behaviour, explores why mouth-to-mouth contact evolved. She covers surprising kissing across animals. She traces deep primate origins. She contrasts platonic and sexual kissing and considers mate assessment, microbiome sharing, bonding and cultural learning.

Geoff Brumfiel, an NPR science editor who visited robotics labs, reports on AI moving from text into physical robots. He describes lab demos of neural nets teaching robots simple tasks. He explores why robots still fail, how simulation and self-training could scale learning, and which practical, incremental uses are already working.

Amy Pope, a physics lecturer who teaches Physics of Sports, explains Winter Olympic mechanics. Short takes cover ski mountaineering and how skins change friction uphill. She talks ski jump aerodynamics, V position and suit tweaks that affect lift. There’s also a quick look at bobsled energy, push starts and why sprinters help speed.

Nathalie Balaban, biophysicist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem known for work on bacterial persistence, explains new findings about dormant bacteria. She describes chaotic, 'car crash' dormancy and how stress-induced dormancy helps bacteria survive. The conversation highlights leakier membranes in these cells and the idea of pairing treatments to target both growing and dormant populations.

Juana Summers, NPR political reporter and program host, joins to explore science stories. She walks through newborns’ surprising ability to track complex rhythms but not melody. Discussion also covers reptiles that can sleep through meals and how dreaming may boost problem solving. Short, curious, and full of quirky science tidbits.

Peter McCarthy, a neurophysiologist who built helmet sensors to measure G-forces, and Aaliyah Snyder, a neuropsychologist and former skeleton athlete, discuss sled head. They talk about dizziness, nausea and blackouts after high-speed runs. They describe helmet sensor data, how the brain moves under extreme G, clinical signs and rehabilitation, and calls for monitoring and safety changes.

Jon Hamilton, NPR science correspondent who covers neuroscience and health, clears up persistent myths about autism. He tackles claims about who can have autism, prenatal Tylenol links, and proposed vitamin fixes. He also outlines diagnostic behaviors, genetic and environmental research, and how brain studies may point to biological subtypes.