Category Archives: Podcast

Podcasts, webcasts, online video and audio on science and engineering topics.

Berkeley and MIT courses online

Huge amount of University of California Berkely webcasts of course lectures. Subscribe to RSS feeds and listen to podcasts or listen online.

Courses include: General Biology, Solid State Devices and Introductory Physics. Course websites include handouts for the lectures.

A great open access resource.

I can’t believe I have mentioned MIT open courseware before but a search didn’t find anything. MIT’s effort is an excellent resource, many on science and engineering: Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Materials Science and Engineering, etc..

MIT also includes the excellent: Visualizing Cultures – a gateway to seeing history through images that once had wide circulation among peoples of different times and places by John Dower (author of National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize winning: Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II) and Shigeru Miyagawa.

CERN Tour webcast

Tour the underground accelerator at CERN – webcast led by the scientists who work there.

Featuring interviews with physicists Brian Cox (University of Manchester), Jon Butterworth (University College London) and Albert de Roeck (Antwerp University), Lords of the Ring explains why so many scientists are pinning their hopes on this experiment’s potential to answer some of the biggest questions in science.

More science and engineering webcast posts.

Google Tech Talks

Webcasts of great engineering talks at Google via: Google TechTalks

Videos include:

Weekly Science Podcasts

This Week in Science offers podcasts of around an hour covering many topics. Recent topics include:

  • July 4th: Kangaroo Repellent, Gazelles Give Up, Super Jellyfish To the Rescue!, CO2 Sludge, Neurons Need Love Too, Circus Ants, Interview w/ William Gurstelle re: Thing That Go Boom
  • May 2nd: Pollen Pretenses, Sonar Beach, Big Wierd Booms, Oil No More, Body Power Alternatives, Baby Alcoholics, Birth Canal Benefits, and Two Interviews!!! Interview with Joel Primack and Nancy Abrams, Authors of “The View from the Center of the Universe”, and with Marine Geologist, Dr. Steven Scott, about Deep Sea Mining.
  • March 21st: Callers Galore!, Slimy Sexy Snails, Earth-spermia?, Talk to Aliens, Sexy Healthy Birdies, Rubbernecking Dino, Justin’s Glass Ceiling, Interview w/ Dan McCleese, Chief Scientist for Mars Research at JPL

via: Easternblot

Bonobo’s Using Language?

bonobo with a symbols board she uses to communicate

A Voluble Visit with Two Talking Apes by Jon Hamilton, NPR.

But linguists still weren’t satisfied. They pointed out that humans invent metaphors and figures of speech when literal meanings aren’t enough.

Savage-Rumbaugh says the bonobos pass this test, as well. For example, Panbanisha once used the symbol for “monster” when referring to a visitor who misbehaved.

Bill Fields, a researcher at the Great Ape Trust and a close friend of Kanzi, recalls another time when Kanzi used language creatively.

Fields says it was during a visit by a Swedish scientist named Par Segerdahl. Kanzi knew that Segerdahl was bringing bread. But Kanzi’s keyboard had no symbol for Segerdahl the scientist. So he got the attention of Savage-Rumbaugh’s sister, Liz, and began pointing to the symbols for “bread” and “pear,” the fruit.

“Liz got it immediately,” Fields says. “She says, ‘What do you mean Kanzi? Are you talking about Par or pears to eat?’ And he pointed over to Par.”

The site also includes more photos and video and audio webcasts.

The Brine Lake Beneath the Sea

octopus in the brine lake

This stunning octopod, Benthoctopus sp., seemed quite interested in ALVIN’s port manipulator arm. Image courtesy of Bruce Strickrott, Expedition to the Deep Slope – larger photo.

The Brine Lake by Harry Roberts:

As we took the sub into the brine lake, the pressure wave from the sub’s movement across the lake created waves on the interface between the brine and the overlying normal-density sea water.

We watched these waves break on the “beach” like storm waves approaching and breaking on a sandy coastline.

NOAA researchers include a video from the adventure. Also read more about the Expedition to the Deep Slope, in the Gulf of Mexico.

Toyota Robots

photo of Toyota partner robot

Toyota Announces Overview of “Toyota Partner Robot”

Toyota wants its partner robots to have human characteristics, such as being agile, warm and kind and also intelligent enough to skillfully operate a variety of devices in the areas of personal assistance, care for the elderly, manufacturing, and mobility. Furthermore, since each area requires a special set of skills, Toyota is promoting the development of three different types of partner robots (walking, rolling, and mountable), each with its own areas of expertise.

Read posts about the Toyota Productions System (TPS) on the Curious Cat Management Improvement Blog.

Others are making progress on human like robots including Sony and Honda. See Sony QRIO Robots in action in this flash video below:

And read more about Honda Robots: ASIMO and P3.

Birds Fly Early

Spring Is Early, and So Are the Birds, NPR webcast

This is short real life example of the scientific method. Spring is coming earlier to Europe, thanks to global warming. Scientists figured migrating birds in southern Europe would be able to adjust to the change and leave early (because the early warming would also be obvious where they wintered). But the scientists expected that birds from Africa would not be able to tell that they should leave early.

However, they studied what actual took place and found that the migrating birds from Africa were actually arriving early while those in southern Europe were not. So now they are revising their theories and will do more study to try and determine what is happening and why (for example, how are the birds in Africa deciding to leave early?).

Tour the Carnegie Mellon Robotics Lab

Robert Scoble videotaped his visit to the Carnegie Mellon Robotics Lab and posted the video to Microsoft’s channel 9 – which has quite a few interesting videos.

They have some of the coolest people I’ve ever met and the robotics might surprise you (two of the students were building soccer-playing robots on top of Segways, other students were building surgery tools, really great stuff).

More robotics webcasts from Channel 9.

Swimming Robot Aids Researchers

Swimming Robot

Swimming Robot Tests Theories About Locomotion in Existing and Extinct Animals

An underwater robot is helping scientists understand why four-flippered animals such as penguins, sea turtles and seals use only two of their limbs for propulsion, whereas their long-extinct ancestors seemed to have used all four.

Don’t miss the video of the robot swimming and an informative interview with professor, John H. Long, Jr., Ph.D., who is researching with the robot.

More robot posts