Have you ever had the urge to sneak behind the cordoned off areas of a museum?

Or roam the halls after closing time?

The Smithsonian's flagship podcast, Side Door, will sneak you behind the scenes of the world's

largest museum and research complex.

Come learn about the ghosts that supposedly walk the museum halls after dark.

How a train robbery gave rise to criminal forensics,

why leeches are actually the coolest thing ever, and how to get away with murder in the Arctic.

Maybe.

You'll discover stories of history, science, art, and culture you won't find in a display case.

You can listen to Side Door wherever you get your podcasts, or find us online at sI.edu slash sidedoor.

We all want what's best for our kids. So we tried to feed them well and sign them up for art

classes and read articles about the best way to talk to them when they're struggling. At least some

of us do this. Parenting is hard. So we do the best that we can and we make all sorts of mistakes. The biggest thing that we

give our offspring, though, is something we have more or less no control over. That's our DNA. It's the

biological baseline that they're going to work with for their entire lives, and we can't change that.

But is that strictly true? We know beyond DNA that maternal health, for example, has a big impact on developing children,

and that must have something to do with the molecular mechanisms that turn genes on and off.

Is it possible that that applies to paternal contributions as well?

Could the father's habits in the weeks and months before conception have an impact on resulting kids?

Welcome to the Quantum Podcast where we explore the frontiers of fundamental science and math.

I'm Samir Patel, editor-in-chief of Quantum Magazine.

If you recall health class, you might remember something about the egg and the sperm.

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