Earth Science podcasts

Alexandra Delbot reçoit Laurent Chauvaud et Frédéric Olivier pour explorer les coquilles de bivalves comme archives des milieux marins. La discussion explique comment les stries de croissance et leur composition chimique renseignent sur l’âge, la température, la salinité et les climats passés. Elle aborde aussi les pollutions, les perturbations acoustiques et les réponses biologiques des mollusques, envisagés comme indicateurs des changements de leur habitat.

Hosted by Alexandra Delbot

Robin George Andrews discusses Japan’s planned sampling mission to Phobos and what returned material could reveal about the moon and Mars. Ashton Flinders explains how camera observations, geochemistry and geophysical monitoring revealed patterns in Kīlauea’s lava fountains. Economist Javier Birchenall examines a historical prediction of runaway population growth and the broader difficulty of forecasting major crises.

Hosted by Sarah Crespi

Torgeir Andersen explains how continental rocks in western Norway were dragged roughly 100 kilometres into the mantle during the collision of Baltica and Laurentia, and then returned to the surface. Coesite inclusions provide evidence of ultrahigh-pressure metamorphism. The conversation examines subduction, slab break-off, exhumation and whether isolated diamond-bearing rocks record local overpressure rather than greater burial depth.

Hosted by Oliver Strimpel

This Nature Podcast explores how anonymized banking records can reveal patterns of financial abuse and inform support for victim-survivors. A second segment examines how opposing forces within Earth’s core can change the planet’s rotation and the length of a day. Research highlights cover Mercury’s contraction and cognitive resilience in predicting Alzheimer’s dementia.

Nature staff discuss geophysical evidence that could indicate hidden chambers beyond Tutankhamun's tomb and what the findings might imply for the search for Nefertiti's burial place. The episode also examines a multifunctional brain-computer interface that translates neural activity into both speech and gestures, highlighting how one implant can support several forms of communication.

Chris Smith and Rachael Ralph explore the mechanisms and forecasting of El Niño and its consequences for weather, livelihoods and health. Contributions from Aidan McGivern and Peter Gibbs explain the climate dynamics; Vicky Pryce discusses economic disruption; Rachel Tolhurst and Teresa Zakaria examine health vulnerabilities and preparedness. The episode connects climate science with the decisions facing public-health services and communities.

Hosted by Chris Smith, Rachael Ralph

Brian Wernicke explains lithospheric extension and the origins of the Basin and Range Province. The discussion explores how geologists reconstruct large-scale stretching of the crust and what these observations reveal about deformation and continental evolution.

Hosted by Oliver Strimpel

Nature reporters explain why record ocean temperatures associated with an intensifying El Niño could weaken marine carbon sinks. The episode also covers radiation protection for astronauts, thunder-based underground geology and experimental mitochondrial injections for vision loss.

Nature's podcast explores genetically engineered probiotic bacteria that sense elevated glucose and release therapeutic factors, lowering blood sugar in animal studies. The episode also covers ecological research on pumas, geological erosion, and how a solar eclipse can help researchers probe the Sun's magnetic corona.

Bernhard Steinberger examines whether volcanic hotspots provide a fixed reference frame for plate motion. The discussion combines paleomagnetic records, island-chain ages and mantle-flow models, showing how plumes can drift with mantle circulation. Contrasting the Hawaiian and Louisville tracks helps distinguish hotspot motion from changes in plate direction and illustrates the limits of treating hotspots as stationary.

Hosted by Oliver Strimpel

Nature staff revisit the landmark cloning of Dolly the sheep from an adult cell and discuss the first direct observation of ocean-floor crust being created.

Climate scientist Mathew Barlow explains why warming can intensify both drought and extreme rainfall. The episode follows water through a warmer atmosphere, connecting increased moisture capacity and evaporation with dry soils and stronger downpours. It distinguishes changes in average conditions from the most damaging extremes and discusses why infrastructure faces growing flood risks.

Hosted by Madison Goldberg

Polar scientist Sarah Das describes fieldwork on the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, from expedition logistics and ice-core drilling to transporting frozen samples to the laboratory. The conversation explains how ice cores preserve climate records and how repeated visits reveal retreating glacier margins and earlier melt seasons. It connects the practical work of glaciology with measured changes in polar landscapes.

Hosted by Madison Goldberg

Steve Brusatte discusses the dinosaurs that survived the end-Cretaceous asteroid impact: birds. The episode follows fossil evidence for feathered dinosaurs and the emergence of avian traits, then considers how surviving bird lineages diversified after the extinction. Publisher illustrations connect fossils, anatomy and evolutionary relationships.

Hosted by Oliver Strimpel

Sarah Das explains how polar ice sheets, sea ice and mountain glaciers respond to climate warming. Drawing on decades of research in Antarctica and Greenland, the episode examines ice-sheet mass balance, glacier flow, satellite measurements and the consequences of ice loss for sea level and communities. It connects observations of rapidly changing frozen landscapes with their global effects.

Hosted by Madison Goldberg

Alec Brenner explains how palaeomagnetic measurements reveal independent motion of the East Pilbara and Kaapvaal cratons about 3.5 billion years ago. The evidence moves the detection of relative plate motion much earlier and constrains models of early Earth tectonics. It rules out a permanently stagnant surface without establishing that modern plate tectonics already operated, and also informs questions about the core and atmosphere.

Steve Jacobsen describes how laboratory experiments reproduce the extreme pressures and temperatures found inside planets. He explains how the behaviour of minerals under those conditions informs models of planetary interiors and discusses work at the NSF Center for Matter at Atomic Pressures.

Esther Sumner describes direct observations of turbidity currents and the challenge of instrumenting active submarine canyons. Smart boulders and acoustic current measurements reveal how these large, long-lasting underwater flows transport sediment. The discussion includes an underwater robot’s accidental encounter with an active current in California’s Mendocino Canyon.

Samantha Burgess explains how researchers estimate the Earth’s temperature and monitor a changing climate. The episode examines the observations and international scientific collaboration behind global temperature records, and the work involved in assessing the planet’s changing conditions rather than treating a single local measurement as a global answer.

Hosted by Madison Goldberg

Sara Pruss discusses archaeocyath sponges, the first multicellular reef builders, and their relationship to diversification during the Cambrian. The episode traces successive reef-building groups through the geological record and asks why reefs repeatedly emerge despite environmental disruption and extinction.