This is the science podcast for July 31st, 2025. I'm Sarah Crespi.

First up, contributing correspondent Rich Stone joins us to talk about his recent visit to Ukraine,

the toll of the ongoing conflict there, and how researchers have been mobilized to help the war effort.

Next on the show, isotopic ratios in our teeth and bones record the chemistry of what we eat.

When anthropologists apply this technique to Neanderthals, they were surprised to find our hominin cousins

appeared to be as carnivorous as lions.

Researcher, Melanie Beasley, describes why Neanderthals might chemically look like hypercarnobores,

but they were possibly just eating a lot of maggots.

Finally, in a new installment of our series of books on science and death,

this month books host Angela Saini talks with sociologist Ravi Nandan Singh about his book, Dead in Benaris,

an ethnography of funeral traveling.

We have Katribating correspondent Rich Stone here.

He's traveled this summer to Ukraine for a reporting trip.

And actually, this is the third time we've had you on this show to talk about what's going on in Ukraine.

The first time was back in this show to talk about what's going on in Ukraine. The first time was back in

December 2022 to talk about the state of science and how scientists were doing in that country under attack.

And then in January 2024, we talked about the toll on the environment that all of these bombardments,

you know, all this war has

had on Ukraine. You're back. You were there in June 2025. How was Ukraine different on this

visit than those earlier ones? Well, the mood really has changed, Sarah. My first trip was in

October 22, and the Ukrainians had just attacked this bridge

between Crimea, occupied Crimea, and Russia. There was a lot of jubilation, and they had taken back a big

...