RSS • Apple PodcastsDescription (podcaster-provided):
Hear the untold stories of mind-blowing achievements in science and tech. “CBS Sunday Morning” correspondent and six-time Emmy winner David Pogue takes you behind the scenes into the creation stories of the world’s greatest advances and the people behind them. From transportation, food, space, internet, and health, creators reveal their inspirations and roadblocks they encountered in bringing their breakthroughs to the public. Hear all-new episodes of the award-winning Unsung Science podcast every other Friday.Themes and summary (AI-generated based on podcaster-provided show and episode descriptions):
➤ Origin stories of science/tech breakthroughs • Space exploration and astronomy • Climate, conservation, and sustainability solutions • Digital platforms, mapping, and standards • AI, deepfakes, and online trust • Health, genetics, and medical innovations • Accessibility techThis podcast tells behind-the-scenes origin stories of scientific and technological breakthroughs, focusing on how big ideas become practical tools, products, and systems that reshape daily life. Hosted by journalist David Pogue, it centers on interviews with inventors, engineers, researchers, and other key participants who explain the inspirations, technical hurdles, institutional resistance, and unexpected turns involved in getting an innovation to work outside the lab.
Across the episodes, the subject matter ranges widely: space exploration and planetary defense, navigation and mapping at global scale, electrified transportation, and the hidden engineering behind everyday standards and interfaces. It also explores health and biology through topics like genetics, vaccines, wearables that infer sleep and disease signals, and novel applications of DNA data. Several stories examine information integrity and the modern internet, including challenges from spam, synthetic media, and AI-generated text, along with industry efforts to authenticate what’s real.
Environmental and climate-related themes recur, with episodes looking at emissions, biodiversity, plastics, water scarcity, wildfire preparedness, and conservation technologies. The show also highlights less obvious corners where science and tech intersect with culture—such as accessibility tools for people with disabilities, the craft and linguistics of constructed languages for film and television, and technology’s role in contemporary music production.
Overall, the series emphasizes the human side of innovation: persistence, tradeoffs, and the complex mix of science, business, policy, and ethics that determines whether a breakthrough reaches the public.
| Episodes: |
Grand Finale: A Pop Song is Born2023-Dec-08 52 minutes |
Electric Planes Take Off2023-Nov-24 40 minutes |
Genetics, Votes, and Colin Firth2023-Nov-10 41 minutes |
How Does Google Maps Do It?2023-Oct-26 32 minutes |
How Cool Tech is Saving the Whales2023-Oct-13 40 minutes |
How the Webb Telescope Sees Back in Time2023-Sep-29 43 minutes |
Inside Elon Musk's Brain2023-Sep-16 39 minutes |
Screaming Babies, Noise Canceling, and You2023-Sep-01 41 minutes |
The Pulse-Pounding Origin Story of USB-C2023-Aug-18 44 minutes |
CeCe Moore Cracks Cold Cases with Genealogy2023-Aug-04 43 minutes |
What if Placebos ARE the Medicine?2023-Jul-21 34 minutes |
The Man Who Invented QR Codes2023-Jul-07 37 minutes |
Inside the Lost Titanic Sub: An Update2023-Jun-23 46 minutes |
How Doug Lindsay Invented His Own Surgery2023-Jun-09 41 minutes |
The Power of an Empty Metal Box2023-May-26 39 minutes |
From Klingon to Dothraki: Constructed Languages for Hollywood2023-May-12 39 minutes |
The Million-Dollar Toothpaste Tube2023-Apr-28 41 minutes |
The Rewilded Farm2023-Mar-31 37 minutes |
NASA Redirects an Asteroid2023-Mar-17 35 minutes |
How They Found the Shipwreck Endurance2023-Mar-03 43 minutes |
Deepfakes: Big Tech Fights Back2023-Feb-17 31 minutes |
The Mars Helicopter That Would Not Die2023-Feb-03 50 minutes |
ChatGPT and the End of Writing2023-Jan-20 35 minutes |
Introducing: Season 2 of Unsung Science with David Pogue2023-Jan-13 4 minutes |
Back to Titanic Part 22022-Dec-19 38 minutes |
Back to Titanic Part 12022-Nov-27 40 minutes |
The Secret of Baby Carrots2022-Nov-20 30 minutes |
How Impossible Meats Might Save the Earth2022-Feb-11 40 minutes |
The Man Who Stopped the Spammers2022-Feb-04 32 minutes |
Where Emoji Come From2022-Jan-28 36 minutes |
How the Fitbit Knows You're Dreaming2022-Jan-21 36 minutes |
Subtitles for the Blind2022-Jan-14 52 minutes |
Chainsaws, Women, and the Cape Town Drought2022-Jan-07 40 minutes |
How to Prepare for Wildfires2021-Dec-31 59 minutes |
Where to Live in the Climate-Change Era2021-Dec-24 60 minutes |
Leap Seconds, Smear Seconds, and the Slowing of the Earth2021-Dec-17 39 minutes |
How the Cellphone was Born: Three Months of Craziness2021-Dec-10 37 minutes |
How Apple and Microsoft Built the Seeing-Eye Phone2021-Dec-03 49 minutes |
How to Prepare for Climate Change: Intro2021-Nov-26 7 minutes |
Who Makes the Fake Languages for Hollywood?2021-Nov-19 39 minutes |
How NASA's $2 Billion Rover Landed Itself on Mars: "Seven Minutes of Terror"2021-Nov-12 43 minutes |
Tornado Alley is Shifting Eastward—and We're Not Ready2021-Nov-05 34 minutes |
Audio Deepfakes and the End of Trust2021-Oct-29 45 minutes |
How We Almost Blew the Vaccine2021-Oct-22 41 minutes |
What Happened to the Mosquitoes in Fresno?2021-Oct-15 38 minutes |
Introducing: Unsung Science with David Pogue2021-Sep-27 3 minutes |