People Behind The Science Podcast - Stories From Scientists About Science, Life, Research, And Science Careers

Dr. Philip Metzger is a Planetary Scientist in the Florida Space Institute at the University of Central Florida. He received his Masters degree and PhD in Physics from the University of Central Florida. He worked on the Space Shuttle launch team before entering the planetary research world. Philip recently retired from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, where he co-founded the KSC Swamp Works and led the Granular Mechanics and Regolith Operations Laboratory. He also co-founded NASA’s biannual Workshop on Granular Materials in Lunar and Martian Exploration and is a founding member of the ASCE Technical Committee for Regolith Operations, Mobility and Robotics. He received the astronaut's Silver Snoopy award in 2010 and was selected as the Kennedy Space Center’s NASA Scientist/Engineer of the Year for 2011. Philip is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. Vincent Racaniello is the Higgins Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University. He received his PhD in Biomedical Sciences from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine of the City University of New York and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at MIT before joining the faculty at Columbia. In addition to his academic research career, Vincent is also a co-creator of BioCrowd (a social network for scientists), he runs the Virology Blog at virology.ws, and he hosts the fantastic “This Week in Virology”, “This Week in Parasitism”, and “This Week in Microbiology” podcasts. Vincent is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. Joel Levine is an Associate Professor of Biology and the Canada Research Chair in Neurogenetics at the University of Toronto, Mississauga. He received his PhD in Dr. Richard Miselis Anatomy and Structural Biology from the University of Pennsylvania. He then completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship with Rob Jackson at the Worcester Foundation for Biological Research, a postdoc fellowship with Dr. Steven Reppert at Harvard University, and a postdoc with Dr. Jeffrey Hall at Brandeis University before joining the faculty at the University of Toronto. Joel is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. Michael Cole is an Assistant Professor at the Center for Molecular and Behavioral Neuroscience at Rutgers University. He received his PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University. Afterward he completed postdoctoral research at Washington University In St. Louis before joining the faculty at Rutgers. Michael is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. Sharon Swartz is a Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and the School of Engineering at Brown University. She received her Masters and PhD in Evolutionary Biology from the University of Chicago. Afterward, she served as a faculty member at Northwestern University for a few years before joining the faculty at Brown University. Sharon has received many awards and honors during her career, including the Distinguished Alumni Service Award from the University of Chicago, the Karen T. Romer Prize for Excellence in Advising, the Dean's Excellence in Teaching Award from Brown Medical School, the American Medical Women's Association Gender Equity Award, and the Mary Putnam-Jacobi Award for the Outstanding Woman Medical Faculty Member from Brown University Women in Medicine. Sharon is with us today to tell us all about her journey through life and science.

Dr. Charles Nelson is the Richard David Scott Chair in Pediatric Developmental Medicine Research and Director of Research of the Developmental Medicine Center at the Boston Children's Hospital. He is also a Professor of Pediatrics and Education at Harvard University. Charles received Masters Degrees in Psychology and Educational Psychology from the University of Wisconsin and his PhD in Child and Developmental Psychology from the University of Kansas. Afterward, he completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Univeristy of Minnesota. Charles served on the faculty at Purdue University and the University of Minnesota before moving up to Boston where he remains today. Charles has received a number of awards and honors during his career, including an honorary doctoral degree from Bucharest University, an honorary masters degree from Harvard University, and he is an Honorary Member of the Romanian Academy of Medical Sciences. He is also a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Charles is here with us t

Dr. Sara Soderstrom is an Assistant Professor of Organizational Studies and Program in the Environment at the University of Michigan. She received her Bachelors and Masters Degrees in Chemical Engineering from the University of Michigan. Afterward, Sara worked as a consultant at McKinsey & Company before entering graduate school, receiving her PhD from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. She completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Erb Institute at the University of Michigan before joining the faculty there. Sara is with us today to tell us all about her journey through life and science.

Dr. Irene Newton is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biology at Indiana University in Bloomington. She received her Masters and PhD in Organismic and Evolutionary Biology from Harvard University where she was a Howard Hughes Predoctoral Fellow. Afterward, she completed an NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship at Tufts University and served briefly on the faculty at Wellesley College before joining the faculty at Indiana University. Irene has received many awards and honors, including a Woodrow Wilson Foundation National Fellowship awarded this past year. Irene is with us today to tell us all about her journey through life and science.

Dr. Chris Rowan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geology at Kent State University. He received his Masters Degree in Earth Science from the University of Cambridge and his PhD in Geology from the National Oceanography Centre of the University of Southampton. Afterward, Chris worked as a Research Technician at the National Oceanography Centre in Southampton. He then served as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Johannesburg, a Marie Curie Fellow at the University of Edinburgh, and a Canadian Institute for Advanced Research Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Chicago before joining the faculty at Kent State. Chris is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. Joan Strassmann is the Charles Rebstock Professor of Biology at Washington University in St. Louis. She received her PhD from The University of Texas at Austin. Joan was a member of the faculty of Rice University for over 30 years before joining the Biology Department at Washington University where she remains today. Joan has a long-standing interest in science education and Joan has received many awards and honors during her career. She is also a former President of the Animal Behavior Society and former President of the North American Section of the International Union for the Study of Social Insects. In addition, She is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a Fellow of the Animal Behavior Society, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, and recipient of a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial fellowship. Joan is with us today to tell us all about her journey through life and science.

Dr. Christelle Wauthier is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geosciences at The Pennsylvania State University. She received a Masters Degree in Geological Engineering from the University of Liege in Belgium as well as a Masters Degree in Volcanology from the University of Blaise-Pascal in France. Christelle completed her PhD in Engineering Sciences at the University of Liege and recently finished her work as a Carnegie Postdoctoral Fellow in Terrestrial Magnetism at the Carnegie Institution of Washington. Christelle is with us today to tell us all about her journey through life and science.

Dr. Mike Brown is the Richard and Barbara Rosenberg Professor of Planetary Astronomy at the California Institute of Technology. He received his Masters and PhD in Astronomy from the University of California, Berkeley. Afterward, he completed a Hubble Postoctoral Fellowship at the University of Arizona andCaltech. He then joined the faculty at Caltech. Mike has received many awards and honors during his career, including the Urey Prize for best young planetary scientist from the American Astronomical Society's Division of Planetary Sciences, a Presidential Early Career Award, a Sloan Fellowship, the 2012 Kavli Prize in Astrophysics, and election to the National Academy of Sciences. Mike and his research have been featured in the New Yorker, the New York Times, Discover, and numerous other media outlets. He has been named one of Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People and one of Los Angeles magazine's Most Powerful Angelinos. You may know Mike for his discovery of a dwarf planet called Eris that lead to the

Dr. Kate Clancy is an Assistant Professor in the Departments of Anthropology and Animal Biology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. She received her PhD from Yale University and worked as a Preceptor Faculty for the Expository Writing Program at Harvard University before joining the faculty at the University of Illinois. Kate is with us today to tell us all about her journey through life and science.

Dr. Mark Martin is an Associate Professor of Biology at the University of Puget Sound. He received his Bachelor's Degree in Biology from the University of California, Los Angeles and his PhD in Biological Sciences from Stanford University. Mark then completed postdoctoral training at the University of California, San Diego. Afterward, Mark worked in the biotech industry for several years. He spent some time as a science fiction author before accepting a teaching position at Occidental College in LA where he worked for about 10 years before joining the faculty at the University of Puget Sound. Mark is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. Woodward Fischer is an Professor of Geobiology at the California Institute of Technology. He received his PhD in Earth and Planetary Sciences from Harvard University and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Caltech before joining the faculty there. Woody is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. David Baltrus is an Assistant Professor in The School of Plant Sciences at the University of Arizona. He received his PhD in Ecology and Evolution from the University of Oregon, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dave is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. Murray Blackmore is an Assistant Professor in Biomedical Sciences at Marquette University. He received his undergraduate degree from Stanford University and his PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Minnesota. He then completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Miami Project to Cure Paralysis at the University of Miami, where he remained for two additional years as a Research Assistant Professor before assuming his current position. Murray is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. Laurence Packer is a Professor of Biology at York University. He received his PhD in Zoology from the University of Toronto. He completed a postoctoral fellowship at the University of Calgary and then joining the faculty at York University. He leads one of the largest wild bee research labs in the world and looks after an impressively large collection of over 300,000 bees. Laurence is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.

Dr. Christine Floss is a Research Professor in Physics at Washington University in St. Louis. She received her PhD in Geochemistry from the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, and spent five years working as a research scientist at the Max Planck Institute in Heidelberg before joining the faculty at Washington University. Christine is with us today to tell us all about her journey through life and science.

Dr. Richard Hardy is a Professor of Biology and Associate Chair of Teaching at Indiana University, Bloomington. He received his PhD from the University of Alabama at Birmingham and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Washington University in St. Louis before joining the faculty at Indiana University. Richard has received a number of awards and honors during his career, including the Indiana University Trustees' Teaching Award three times. Richard is here with us today to tell us all about his journey through life and science.