Farming maize in ice age Michigan, predicting the future climate of cities, and our host takes a quiz on the sounds of science

Science Magazine Podcast

Science Podcast

News Commentary, News, Science

4.2 • 791 Ratings

🗓️ 5 June 2025

⏱️ 40 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

First up on the podcast, we hear from Staff Writer Paul Voosen about the tricky problem of regional climate prediction. Although global climate change models have held up for the most part, predicting what will happen at smaller scales, such as the level of a city, is proving a stubborn challenge. Just increasing the resolution of global models requires intense computing power, so researchers and city planners are looking to other approaches to find out what’s in store for cities. Next on the show, a visit to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, where researchers have found evidence that the Indigenous Menominee people cultivated maize for 600 years, even during an ice age. Madeleine McLeester, assistant professor in the department of anthropology at Dartmouth College, talks about using lidar to search among the heavily forested lands for striations that indicate corn farming and the anthropological conundrums raised by such extensive agriculture without nearby urban centers. Finally in this episode, producer Kevin McLean quizzes host Sarah Crespi on some mysterious sounds that have appeared on the site as part of news stories. No clues here so be sure to play along. This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy. About the Science Podcast Authors: Sarah Crespi; Paul Voosen; Kevin McLean Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This podcast is supported by the Icon School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, one of America's leading research medical schools.
0:07.4	The school is the academic arm of the Mount Sinai Health System in New York City.
0:11.6	It's consistently among the top recipients of NIH funding.
0:15.3	Researchers at the Icon School of Medicine in Mount Sinai have made breakthrough discoveries in many fields vital to advancing the
0:21.7	health of patients, including cardiology, cancer, immunology, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence.
0:28.9	The Icon School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, we find a way.
0:34.9	This is the science podcast for June 5th, 2025.
0:38.3	I'm Sarah Crespi.
0:39.3	First up, staff writer Paul Vousin talks about the tricky problem of regional climate prediction.
0:45.3	Although global climate change models have held up, for the most part, predicting what will happen at smaller scales, like the level of a city, is proving a stubborn challenge.
0:55.7	Next on the show, evidence in the upper part of Michigan that indigenous peoples once cultivated
1:01.1	maze for 600 years, even during an ice age. Researcher Madeline McLeister talks about using
1:07.0	LIDAR to search among the trees and the anthropological conundrums raised by such
1:12.0	extensive agriculture without nearby urban centers. Finally, producer Kevin McLean quizzes me on
1:19.6	some mysterious sounds that have appeared on the site as part of news stories. I am not going
1:24.2	to give any clues so you can play along.
1:35.5	Climate change is happening, and scientists are working tirelessly to model the global changes in temperatures,
1:40.6	effect on polar ice, sea levels, all these planet scale effects.
1:45.5	But these models don't contain the detail needed for a lot of local decisions that have to be made. How much will this river in this city rise or fall? Will we have more droughts
1:51.7	in this particular county? This kind of information helps if you need to decide on what
1:56.7	infrastructure to build. This week in science, staff writer Paul Voussin takes us through the challenges
2:01.7	of regional climate prediction. Hi, Paul. Welcome back. Hi. Thanks. Sure. One thing that really struck
	...

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