Description
Radiolab is on a curiosity bender. We ask deep questions and use investigative journalism to get the answers. A given episode might whirl you through science, legal history, and into the home of someone halfway across the world. The show is known for innovative sound design, smashing information into music. It is hosted by Lulu Miller and Latif Nasser.
Episodes
- 2026 / 10 / 16The Smell of HellThroughout human history, there’s been one element we’ve always associated with death. Just the smell of it is an alarm bell that says, “something here is dangerous.” But what if our noses have been wrong all...
- 2026 / 10 / 9Math Vs MachineIn less than four years, mathematician Steve Strogatz watched AI go from flailing at basic arithmetic to solving problems that baffle the world’s best mathematicians. In September of 2026, Open AI announced...
- 2026 / 9 / 25Grass ApesWhen you think about grass, what do you think of? Pool parties? Suburbs? Allergies? What about: human history? It turns out, unassuming grass, which exists on every continent, has an epic story to tell. One...
- 2026 / 9 / 18The Sweetest Thing“What is the sweetest thing in the world?” After co-host Latif Nasser’s sons ask him this deceptively simple question, he goes on a quest to find it. Is it a West African Katemfe berry? Or an industrial sugar...
- 2026 / 9 / 1123 Weeks 6 DaysWhen Kelley Benham and her husband Tom French finally got pregnant, after many attempts and a good deal of technological help, everything was perfect. Until it wasn't. Their story raises questions that, until...
- 2026 / 8 / 28Dolly Parton's America: Sad Ass SongsThe world lost a legend recently, and we wanted in some small way to pay tribute to the great Dolly Parton. So we’re playing you an episode from a series we had a small part in back in 2017, Dolly Parton’s...
- 2026 / 8 / 14Nigel and the Real GannetIn 2016, Chris Bell, a ranger with New Zealand’s Department of Conservation, was the sole human inhabitant of a small island off the west coast of the country, called Mana Island. He was there to take care of...
- 2026 / 7 / 31The Shoe ThrowerWhen no one seems to be listening, how far do you go to be heard? In December 2008, George W. Bush made a surprise visit to Baghdad for a press conference. And at the very end of his remarks, a shoe came...
- 2026 / 7 / 10The Holy ShiverLauren Brown gets goosebumps. A lot. Sometimes several times a day. When her partner, writer Carmen Maria Machado, noticed it...she couldn't stop thinking about it. Why does she get them in so many different...
- 2026 / 6 / 19This is Your Brain on HormonesAfter reading something that said her menstrual cycle changes her brain each month, Senior Correspondent Molly Webster goes on a reporting mission to see if that’s true, and, if so, how. This journey into sex...
- 2026 / 6 / 18Bonus: Wild Animal Dads from TerrestrialsIn honor of Father's Day, here is a family friendly bonus episode from our kids' podcast Terrestrials. What does it really mean to be a dad? In the animal world, fathers have long been painted as aggressive...
- 2026 / 6 / 12On the Media: American EmergencyA little while back, our friends over at On the Media released a gripping and immersive reporting series about FEMA, the agency that is supposed to be there for all of us in the wake of disaster. In American...
- 2026 / 5 / 29This American RoachA couple summers ago, Radiolab reporter Alex Neason got out of the shower and almost stepped on her worst nightmare: an American Cockroach. It was flipped onto its back, struggling, and for a split second,...
- 2026 / 5 / 15Your Friendly Neighborhood HookwormsFor most of human history, people went about their daily lives with a worm or two (or fifty) in their guts. Only in the past century, with pharmaceuticals and sanitation practices, have we made significant...
- 2026 / 5 / 1What is a Pig Worth?In 2017, Wayne Hsiung and a crew of animal rights activists from Direct Action Everywhere broke into a Utah pig farm run by Smithfield Foods, one of the largest pork distributors in the world. They were there...
- 2026 / 4 / 17The Resistance of a CowThere’s something rotten in the cows of Denmark. And Minnesota. And Wisconsin. And Idaho. What could cause a previously thriving herd of majestic dairy cattle to stop drinking water and start drinking …...
- 2026 / 4 / 10The BuildersIn an episode first aired back in 2025 on our sister show, Terrestrials, we take you on a musical journey all about beavers. Few mammals have a bigger positive impact on the planet than the beaver. With its...
- 2026 / 3 / 27Antibiotic ApocalypseDoctor and special correspondent Avir Mitra takes Executive Editor Soren Wheeler, plus a live studio audience, on a journey from the operating room to inside the body to the farm to the sewers and back...
- 2026 / 3 / 13Return of the Flesh-EatersIf a species is horrible enough, do we have the right to kill it forever? Seventy years ago, a nightmare parasite feasted on the live flesh of warm-blooded creatures in North America: the screwworm. That is,...
- 2026 / 3 / 13Return of the ScrewwormsIf a species is horrible enough, do we have the right to kill it forever? Seventy years ago, a nightmare parasite feasted on the live flesh of warm-blooded creatures in North America: the screwworm. That is,...
- 2026 / 3 / 6Snail Sex TapeIn this episode, we consider a creature we often don’t think much about—the snail. And not just snails, but their sex lives. Which, as it turns out, is epic. There is persuasion and subterfuge, spaghetti...
- 2026 / 2 / 13Time is HoneyIn the early 2000s, Sunil Nakrani felt stuck. Back then, websites crashed all the time. When Sunil noticed this, he decided he was going to fix the internet. But after nearly a year of studying the...
- 2026 / 1 / 30Song of the CerebellumOne spring evening in 2024, a science journalist named Rachel Gross bombed at karaoke. The culprit was a bleed in a fist-sized clump of neurons tucked down in the back and bottom of her brain called the...
- 2026 / 1 / 23You and Me and Mr. Self-EsteemMost of us spend some part of our lives feeling bad about ourselves and wanting to feel better. But this preoccupation is a surprisingly new one in the history of the world, and can largely be traced back to...
- 2026 / 1 / 23You and Me and Mr. Self-esteemMost of us spend some part of our lives feeling bad about ourselves and wanting to feel better. But this preoccupation is a surprisingly new one in the history of the world, and can largely be traced back to...
- 2026 / 1 / 9Brain BallsWhen neuroscientist Madeline Lancaster was a brand new postdoc, she accidentally used an expired protein gel in a lab experiment and noticed something weird. The stem cells she was trying to grow in a dish...
- 2026 / 1 / 2Moon TreesIn 1971, a red-headed, tree-loving astronaut named Stu ‘Smokey’ Roosa was asked to take something to the moon with him. Of all things, he chose to take a canister of 500 tree seeds. After orbiting the moon 34...
- 2025 / 12 / 26Fertility CliffAs she -- and her friends — approached the age of 35, senior correspondent Molly Webster kept hearing a phrase over and over: “fertility cliff.” It was a short-hand term to describe what she was told would...
- 2025 / 12 / 12The Alien in the RoomIt’s faster than a speeding bullet. It’s smarter than a polymath genius. It’s everywhere but it’s invisible. It’s artificial intelligence. But what actually is it?Today we ask this simple question and explore...
- 2025 / 12 / 5Shell Game: Minimum Viable CompanyA year ago we brought you a show called Shell Game where a journalist named Evan Ratliff made an AI copy of himself. Now on season 2 of the show, Evan’s using AI to do more than just mimic himself — he’s...
- 2025 / 11 / 28Fela Kuti: Enter the ShrineOur original host Jad Abumrad returns to share a new podcast series he’s just released. It’s all about Fela Kuti, a Nigerian musician who created a genre, then a movement, then tried to use his hypnotic beats...
- 2025 / 11 / 21Our Common Nature: West Virginia CoalToday on the show, we’re bringing you an episode from Our Common Nature (https://link.podtrac.com/v7mx144d), a new podcast series where cellist Yo-Yo Ma and host Ana González travel around the United States...
- 2025 / 11 / 14Quantum RefugeQasem Waleed is a 28-year-old physicist who has lived in Gaza his whole life. In 2024, he joined a chorus of Palestinians sharing videos and pictures and writing about the chaos and violence they were living...
- 2025 / 10 / 31The Glow BelowA call to oceanographer Edie Widder about a fish with a very odd immune system quickly becomes something else: a dive into the deep sea, into a world of brilliant light. But down there, the light doesn’t...
- 2025 / 10 / 17Content WarningOver the past five years TikTok has radically changed the online world. But trust us when we say, it’s not how you’d expect.Today we continue our yearslong exploration of what you can and can’t post online....
- 2025 / 10 / 10Creation StoryElla al-Shamahi is one part Charles Darwin, one part Indiana Jones. She braves war zones and pirate-infested waters to collect fossils from prehistoric caves, fossils that help us understand the origin of our...
- 2025 / 9 / 26VoiceOver the course of millions of years, human voices have evolved to hold startling power. These clouds of vibrating air carry crucial information about who we are–and we rely on them to push ourselves up and...
- 2025 / 9 / 19The Spark of LifeIn the 1920s, a Russian biologist studying onion roots made a surprising discovery: underground, down in the darkness, it seemed like the cells inside the onion roots were making their own … light. The “onion...
- 2025 / 9 / 12Los FrikisHow a group of 80’s Cuban misfits found rock-and-roll and created a revolution within a revolution, going into exile without ever leaving home. Reporter Luis Trelles brings us the story of punk rock’s...
- 2025 / 9 / 5Screaming Into the VoidIn August we performed a live taping of the show from a theater perched on the edge of Manhattan, overlooking the Hudson River, overshadowed by the wide open night sky. Three stories about voids. One about a...
- 2025 / 8 / 29Music HatWith this episode, we’re putting on our music hat. For a program that relies so much on scoring and sound, it’s not often we talk about the musicians and the music they make that inspire us. Today, that...
- 2025 / 8 / 22The Medical Matchmaking MachineAs he finished his medical residency exam, David Fajgenbaum felt off. He walked down to the ER and checked himself in. Soon he was in the ICU with multiple organ failure. The only drug for his condition...
- 2025 / 8 / 15Weighing Good IntentionsIn an episode first released in 2010, then-producer Lulu Miller drives to Michigan to track down the endangered Kirtland’s warbler. Efforts to protect the bird have lead to the killing of cowbirds (a species...
- 2025 / 8 / 8The Menopause MysteryUntil recently, scientists assumed humans were the only species in which females went through menopause, and lived a substantial part of their lives after they were no longer able to reproduce. And they had...
- 2025 / 8 / 1Galaxy QuenchingThis week: the story of astrophysicist Charity Woodrum. Charity is an extragalactic astronomer who studies the life and death of galaxies, why some galaxies burn bright and others dim and sputter out. And in...
- 2025 / 7 / 25The Nothing Behind EverythingThis week, two conversations from the archives about parts of the world that are imperceptible to us, verging on almost unthinkable. We start with a moment of uncertainty in physics. Inspired by an essay...
- 2025 / 7 / 18More Perfect: The Hate DebateBack in 2017 our colleagues at More Perfect gathered a room full of people together to debate a straight forward question: Can free speech go too far? Today, eight years have passed and plenty has changed,...
- 2025 / 7 / 11Desperately Seeking SymmetryThis hour of Radiolab, former co-hosts Jad and Robert set out in search of order and balance in the world around us, and ask how symmetry shapes our very existence -- from the origins of the universe, to what...
- 2025 / 7 / 4On [The Divided Dial]: Fishing In The NightHave you heard On the Media’s Peabody-winning series The Divided Dial? It’s awesome and you should, and now you will. In this episode they tell the story of shortwave radio: the way-less-listened to but...
- 2025 / 6 / 27Sex, Ducks and the Founding FeudJilted lovers and disrupted duck hunts provide a very odd look into the soul of the US Constitution.What does a betrayed lover’s revenge have to do with an international chemical weapons treaty? More than...