94. Plutonium: Weapons-Grade

Many episodes have incorporated geology, but this one is more about geography. (And amateur nuclear science.) 

To the person who said, "the episodes are never too long," I'm terribly sorry. 

Time for the most traditional holiday celebration: A science lesson. 

On February 15, 2013, a fireball streaked over the Russian city of Chelyabinsk and exploded. The residents below worried it was a missile—but really, it was a meteor that struck the earth with the force of multiple nuclear bombs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastcho ... Show More

NASA has a record of Earth observations going back more than 50 years. What might be in store for the next 50 years? In this finale of our Earth series, we hear from two scientists helping to chart the course of NASA Earth science. There are still many unanswered questions about ... Show More

In A Ritual Geology: Gold and Subterranean Knowledge in Savanna West Africa (Duke University Press, 2022), Robyn d’Avignon, Assistant Professor of History at NYU, retraces the history of gold mining and orpaillage along the geological formation known as the West African Birimian ... Show More

The magma chambers at the heart of volcanoes are very deep and very hot. So naturally, some researchers want to build an observatory in one. Guests: Mike Poland, scientist-in-charge of the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory; Yan Lavallée, chair of magmatic petrology and volcanology ... Show More

Magma is the hot, molten rock found beneath the Earth’s crust. It’s so plentiful that it got Greek listener Dimitrios wondering whether we could harness this heat. Could we drill directly into the magma and use it to power our homes, he asks presenter Marnie Chesterton? And from ... Show More

The Ring of Fire is a loop around the Pacific Ocean that's a literal hotbed of volcanoes, earthquakes, hydrothermal vents, and other geologic activity. Learn how the interactions among tectonic plates cause all this mayhem in today's episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: ... Show More

In the year 79 CE, Mt. Vesuvius erupted, burying the Roman city of Pompeii. The ruins were only rediscovered in the the late 1700s, and have been under excavation ever since. In this episode we discuss written references and the archaeology of Pompeii, Vesuvius and the day the vo ... Show More

<p>What's so special about Wolf-Rayet stars? Do we even know how they work? And what does this all have to do with Paris? I answer these questions and more in today's Ask a Spaceman!</p> <p>Support the show: <a href= "http://www.patreon.com/pmsutter">http://www.patreon.com/pmsutt ... Show More

Find out about the geological science behind glaciation studies, the effect that ice ages have had on our ancestors and the story of Napi being chased across Canada by a sixteen thousand tonne quartzite rock.