This Podcast Will Kill You18 Jun 2024

Special Episode: Dr. Noah Whiteman & Most Delicious Poison

The word “poison” is much more subjective than it may first appear. It’s likely you’ve come across the phrase, “the dose makes the poison”, referring to some compounds that are beneficial in small amounts but deadly in others - such as digitalis. And then there’s the intended recipient of the “poison”; a poison to one animal might be a boon to another, like milkweeds and monarch butterflies. Our own relationships to poisons can be unpredictable. Attracted, addicted, healed, repelled, harmed, neutral - all are possible alone or in combination. Why do organisms produce caffeine, penicillin, alcohol, capsaicin, opioids, cyanide, and countless other poisons, and why are our responses so varied? That’s exactly what author Dr. Noah Whiteman explores in his book Most Delicious Poison: The Story of Nature's Toxins--From Spices to Vices. Dr. Whiteman, who is Professor of Genetics, Genomics, Evolution and Development and Director of the Essig Museum of Entomology at UC-Berkeley, takes us through the evolution, chemistry, and neuroscience of plant- and animal-derived poisons and explores the fine line between healing and harm. Weaving together personal narratives with stories of scientific discovery and evolutionary biology, Dr. Whiteman presents an expansive view of the world of these poisons and what they mean to us. Tune in today!

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Episoder(292)

Ep 214 Boogers: Digging for treasure

Hard and crusty. Green and gloopy. Clear and watery. Boogers come in a veritable rainbow of colors and a full spectrum of textures from liquid to solid. They’re really quite impressive if you think ab...

30 Jun 1h 2min

Special Episode: Dr. Carl Elliott & The Occasional Human Sacrifice

Stories of unethical medical experimentation often center around the individuals who spearheaded such atrocities or highlight how patient protection laws were changed in response to the studies. But r...

23 Jun 57min

Ep 213 Burns Part 2: It’s like sci-fi but real

At the turn of the 20th century, a severe burn was often a death sentence. Today, that is no longer the case. Over the past eighty years, burn care has undergone a profound transformation thanks to cr...

16 Jun 58min

Ep 212 Burns Part 1: The first million or so years

Burns have been a part of the human experience since our hominin relatives began controlling fire 1.5 million years ago. Until very recently, we’ve been limited in our ability to manage burn wounds wi...

9 Jun 55min

Special Episode: Alexandra Sifferlin & The Elusive Body

An accurate diagnosis can give us so much. It can give us a path forward. It can give us answers to long-standing questions. And it can give us much-needed hope. Yet many people around the world wait ...

2 Jun 51min

Ep 211 Motion Sickness: It comes in waves

It comes on sneakily. You become aware of your stomach. You break out in a cold sweat. Your mouth fills with saliva. And before you know it, you’re leaning over the side of the boat (or out of the car...

26 Mai 1h 16min

Ep 210 Histoplasmosis: Bats, birds, and budding yeast

Once thought to be a rare, always fatal disease, histoplasmosis is now recognized as one of the most prevalent fungal infections in North America. It infects hundreds of thousands of people every year...

19 Mai 1h 18min

Special Episode: Dr. Olivia Weisser & The Dreaded Pox

In a time when smallpox, tuberculosis, measles, and typhus ran rampant through the streets of London, there was another disease that instilled even more fear than these other killers: syphilis. So fea...

12 Mai 51min