Biopedia

Don't worry, you have not in fact stumbled onto a physics podcast. However, the Laws of Thermodynamics do have a rather significant connection to evolutionary biology. This is because, at first glance...

23 Mars 20256min

Quick correction: I call the episode on sibling species episode 37 in the audio, but it's actually episode 47! Way back in the early days of Biopedia, we discussed the concept of sibling species. Now,...

9 Mars 20256min

2023 was a warm year. But let's put it into context. To do that, a 2024 study looked at temperature and tree core data to assemble summer temperatures all the way back to 1 CE. As for the result- the ...

23 Feb 20256min

A bit of an unusual one this year- I was recently given a Dr Who book featuring Charles Darwin. So, let's examine the historical details of this novella and see how they represented Darwin. Have they ...

12 Feb 20256min

Your number of ancestors double every generation. Two parents, four grandparents, and so on. If we compare these numbers to the total number of people alive on the planet as we go back in time, what d...

9 Feb 20255min

For a podcast which has talked several times before about global warming and climate change, we haven't addressed fossil fuels yet. So, let's redress that today! Sources for this episode: Hine, R. ...

26 Jan 20255min

In episode 71, we treated a galactic cycle of about 220 million years as a unit of time with which to view evolution. Today, we'll be picking up where we left off and seeing the story through all the ...

12 Jan 20254min

In 1986, the nuclear power plant at Chernobyl- then in the USSR, now in Ukraine- experienced meltdown. This disaster is one of the worst in nuclear history. However, there are some biological conseque...

29 Dec 20246min