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Do you have a predilection for beef? Forget to flick off the lights? Or maybe you're a much-too-frequent flier? Call in to confess your climate sins.
A biologist takes shadow puppetry to the next level.
Try your hand at homemade sunscreen, water bottle rockets, and “cooler corn.”
“People have described my office as an eight-year-old’s daydream,” says SETI scientist Jill Tarter.
Chris Tack made seven unloading trips to Goodwill before moving into the tiny home he and his wife Malissa designed and built.
Valid Cycles makes handcrafted bamboo bikes in Woodinville, Washington.
Comet Lovejoy grazed the sun’s corona and lived to tell the tale. Its tail movements were the most telling.
A student tells his former professor how much a class meant to him.
Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods is this month’s book club read.
A visit with psychologist Daniel Kahneman, who won the Nobel Prize in economic sciences in 2002.
Brewmasters discuss how to get the most out of your grinds.
Brooklyn residents Michele Bertomen and David Boyle designed and built a house made of shipping containers.
Every year at this time, the greater sage-grouse performs a striking dance routine each morning at dawn.
Researchers turned tiny water droplets into cooperating networks that can change shape and pass electrical signals.
If you thought a smoke ring was fancy, check out these fluid knots.
Water bears, a.k.a. tardigrades, can withstand boiling, freezing, and the vacuum of space.
MC Frontalot makes a living rapping about data encryption, rare diseases, video games and the nerd life.
Why do cockroaches spend so much time cleaning themselves?
Dian Fossey’s classic account of her fieldwork is on the reading list this month.
"This is geek central," says artist Toni Dove of her New York City studio.
How do these birds turn their heads 270 degrees without damaging their blood vessels?
Mold has become a concern for residents of a Sandy-damaged neighborhood in Queens.
The Science Friday book club chats about Michael Crichton's 1969 classic sci-fi thriller.
Catfish eating pigeons, water travelling uphill, a blue whale barrel roll -- and other science cinema highlights from the year.
Photographer Colin Legg makes time-lapse movies of celestial scenes.
The book club reviews Dava Sobel’s 2005 homage to the solar system.
Edwin Land, the inventor behind Polaroid, is the subject of a new book by Christopher Bonanos.
A perennial holiday mystery: will alcohol kill bacteria in homemade eggnog?
Join the SciFri Book Club regulars for a look back, er...up, at 'The Right Stuff.'
“I’m pure geek, pure logic,” says Grandin, an animal scientist at Colorado State University.
The physics and neuroscience of jumping off cliffs.
The Science Friday Book Club discusses the classic book “Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!”
Gravity doesn't behave as expected in a new art exhibition in New York City.
We’ll check in with biologists studying American kestrels, prairie falcons, red-tailed hawks, and other raptors that nest in Idaho's Snake River Birds of Prey National Conservation Area. Plus, bringing back the California condor.
A Kickstarter-funded project aims to build a machine to print micro solar panels.
Mathematician Ian Stewart joins the September book club meeting for a look at Edwin Abbott’s ‘Flatland.’
This convention is for mushrooms and the people who love them.
Nickolay Hristov uses a long-range laser scanner and portable thermal cameras to see bats in new ways.
Researchers use time-lapse photography and a prosthetic plant to understand why cucumber tendrils twist.
Peer into the anxious mind of writer Daniel Smith with the SciFri Book Club.
The stars of these films usually have only one cell.
Floors that generate electricity from footsteps. A GPS that outsmarts traffic jams. Innovations like these could be the next big thing--and we have student inventors to thank.
Philadelphia’s Mütter Museum has a lot of heart, and other organs too.
A moray eel, a flock of geese, and a shrunken head are just a few of things found in and around Her Deepness’ office.
The winner of Alan Alda’s ‘Flame Challenge’ draws on animation, song and a physics background.
Forget the fireflies, some millipedes glow in the dark too.
How about some rooftop honey or dandelion flower jelly? A look at city harvests.
When a hard-boiled egg is spun in a pool of milk, the milk will wick up the sides of the egg and spray off at the equator.
Maurizio Porfiri designed a robotic fish that attract real fish. Now he’s trying to understand why.
Kelly Ward, of Walt Disney Animation Studios, was tasked with bringing Rapunzel's locks to life.
E.O. Wilson discusses evolution and natural selection in The Social Conquest of Earth.
Wildlife biologist Mark Weckel is documenting coyote immigration through camera traps in city parks.
Ira Flatow and guests share science funnies and discover an element of humor (pun intended).
A sticky question that has plagued arachnologists for decades is finally untangled.
Why does looking a picture of a human embryo elicit strong feelings?
Raul Oaida sent the payload to space by way of a large helium balloon.
For some scientists, a regular day at the office is training a guinea fowl to run on a treadmill.
In Space Chronicles, Tyson argues that space exploration is vital to human progress.
Photographer Edward Aites zoomed in on ice and found a beautiful and foreign landscape.
Biologist Sarah Zylinski studies how cuttlefish see the world by looking at their skin.
Our pupils change size in response to light, and thoughts.
Two experts--an ice sculptor and an ice researcher--explain why ice is cool.
A high-speed video camera is a must for biologist Sheila Patek.
By directing bubbles through etched pathways, bubbles can act as bits and be used to solve computations.
Using a powerful magnet, physicists are levitating insects to study the effects of zero gravity on biological systems.
Tim Gallagher’s expedition to save a woodpecker became a trip about his own survival.
With a speaker and homemade paper aircraft, researchers are studying the mysteries of flight.
A pickup basketball game inspired a mathematical exercise.
Researchers at Harvard caught pigeons in a parking garage and filmed them with high speed cameras.
Robert Sabin grew a 1000-pound pumpkin in his Long Island backyard.
With the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade less than a week away, it’s crunch time for the balloon technicians.
In 1956, a dentist and amateur ornithologist captured the Imperial woodpecker on 16 mm color film. It’s the only known photo-documentation of the bird.
Hawk moths feed like hummingbirds. Ty Hedrick wants to know how they hold steady in the air.
With no shortage of special effects, a new four-part TV series looks at big questions in cosmology.
Master carvers share tips on how to bring your pumpkin to the next level this Halloween.
Two engineers are videoing fire with high speed cameras to try to make a 3D reconstruction of a flame.
The “algal turf scrubber” uses algae to boost water quality.
Record-breaking rain in the northeast means more mushrooms, mycologists say.
Mechanical engineer David Hu filmed water striders gliding on food coloring and built his own robostrider.
Maxwell von Stein, a 22 year-old Cooper Union grad, built a bicycle that uses a flywheel to store energy.
In less than a second, cephalopods can change the color, pattern and shape of their skin.
A rooftop farm in Brooklyn, NY does more than produce food.
Physicists fabricated a simple version of cilia that will flap spontaneously and even synchronize their movements.
How will energy efficiency standards affect light bulb design?
Composting-pioneer Malcolm Beck explains the art and science of fertilizing organically.
Underwater digital tags show humpback whales use bubbles to trap schools of fish.
High school engineering students describe their award-winning invention.
When it comes to engineering tissues, the cells are doing the work, says bioengineer Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic.
High resolution images from the Swedish Solar Telescope gives scientists a new view of a sunspot’s penumbra.
Hummingbird tongues are long, forked, muscle-less and excellent at grabbing liquid.
Theoretical physicist and futurist Michio Kaku takes Science Friday on a tour of his office.
Even if cheap pyrotechnics isn't your thing, the physics behind how this works is relevant to anyone with eyes.
From the psychology of trash talk to frustrated magnets, a new book asks if science can explain life's annoyances.
The pick of the week turns to insect engineers.
Science Friday celebrates the shuttle with some of our favorite space videos.
A well designed bicycle traveling at the right speed will steer itself--no rider required.
Rats don't have sharp vision, relying on whiskers to help them navigate.
How do bees know when to emerge from hibernation? And what do they do all winter?
Orchid-growing tips from a master orchid grower.
This week's video pick looks at a robotic printer that can produce books to order.
Why some physicists think there can be more than one universe.
We move our eyes three times a second, over 100,000 times each day. Why isn't life blurrier?
It's a mystery that has bugged flea experts for decades.
Bring the ocean into your living room with a coral reef aquarium.
How much of someone else’s work should artists be able to use? How much should they pay for it? Is copyright law stuck in the age of analog?
High school students from Miami Beach film a cautionary tale about trashing the beach.
We'll take a look at Eodromaeus, a newly-discovered small predator that lived about 230 million years ago.
3D printers allow rapid prototyping of designs, and computer-aided construction of complex shapes.
Leaf-cutter ants rely on their razor sharp mandibles to snip leaves to pieces. What happens when the ants can't cut it?
It's holiday news you can use - a holiday rebroadcast of our research into alcohol content and eggnog food safety.
A new book profiles the life of Carl Akeley, a pioneering taxidermist responsible for the look of natural history museum displays around the country.
It's the time of year when people think about snow. We'll tell you how you can grow your own snowflakes. Well, sort of.
Neurologist Oliver Sacks talks with Ira about vision, the brain, and how the two can work together -- or can work against each other.
It's a question that's kept many a physicist and beautician up at night (well, maybe not.)
A new study looks at the early-flying brush turkey.
How big does YOUR pumpkin grow? And, more importantly, how does it get so big?
New research looks at the twisted paths the immune system uses to clear diseased cells.
Ira goes for a spin in Nissan's upcoming electric car.
A look at the pioneering science fiction of...Mark Twain?
How do police artists get accurate depictions of a suspect, based on the hazy recollections of a handful of witnesses? Our video looks at the artistry -- and psychology -- of creating a good composite sketch.
People use tools. Other primates use tools. But... crows?
New research tackles a difficult subject: what makes a man a good (or bad) dancer?
We meet a newly discovered dinosaur that researchers describe as a 'stocky dragon' -- with claws that could pack a real punch.
They come out at night to hunt for blood. We'll talk about the science and psychology of bedbugs.
It swims and can lead a school of fish -- but it's a robot.
The sun has been in a relatively quiet period in recent years -- but astronomers say that's going to change soon.
The upcoming James Webb Telescope is set to go on beyond Hubble.
Listeners react to last week's suggestion that it's time to rebrand the 'geek.'
This weekend is Father's Day - but instead of wrapping up tools or a tie, how about sharing a geeky family activity?
High-speed, high-definition video reveals the secret world of popping bubbles.
Naval researchers are at work on a humanoid robot named 'Octavia.'
How do tree frogs get the word out? New research published this week says male red-eyed treefrogs communicate with one another in aggressive contests by using vibrations they send through their plant perches.
A trip to a geologic attraction: a boulder field.
Several newly-discovered species of caterpillar in Hawaii function equally well in water or on land.
New research tackles the question of how one species of aquatic microorganism has managed to survive without the benefit of sexual reproduction for millions of years.
SciFri’s scientist-film critics weigh in on the science behind the Hollywood tec...
From miniatures and matte paintings to motion capture, a look at how movie techn...
We'll look at how Hollywood became a driving force in the invention of new techn...
Astronauts separate fact from fiction in Alfonso Cuarón's 3-D space epic, Gravit...