Listen to Episode 185 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!
These plants are so well-adapted for arid habitats that they’re practically synonymous with deserts. This episode, we explore the diversity, special adaptations, and mysterious evolution of Cacti.
Listen to Episode 177 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!
Thousands of years ago, our ancestors weren’t the only humans around. This episode, we discuss the deep history and culture of some of our closest extinct relatives, Neanderthals.
Listen to Episode 175 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!
Herbivores, pathogens, and parasites all present problems for plants, but the plants aren’t just sitting there passively. This episode, we discuss the incredible (and sometimes terrifying) diversity of Plant Defenses.
Listen to Episode 165 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!
Faced with the problem of dispersing seeds, flowering plants developed special seed-carrying structures that are perhaps most familiar to you from your visits to the grocery store. This episode, we discuss the evolution, functions, and incredible diversity of Fruit.
Listen to Episode 155 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!
For many millions of years, cone-bearing plants and their relatives were among the most successful and important plants on Earth. In some places, they still are, such as the coniferous forests of the Northern Hemisphere. This episode, Aly joins us again to discuss the diversity and history of Gymnosperms.
Listen to Episode 145 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts!
We live in a solar-powered world. This episode, we discuss the process that provides the energy that every organism on the planet relies on, as well as the oxygen that characterizes the atmosphere that allows life as we know it to thrive: Photosynthesis.
Listen to Episode 135 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or any other way you’d like!
Every plant starts somewhere, and often that somewhere is a small, secure, sturdy container capable of protecting, nourishing, and carrying a plant embryo until it’s time to sprout. This episode, we discuss the biology, evolution, and incredible paleontological importance of Seeds.
Listen to Episode 132 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or your podcast-player of choice!
They are two of the biggest names in the history of paleoanthropology and human evolution, and they’re one of history’s most impressive scientific duos. This episode, we discuss the science and stories of Mary and Louis Leakey.
Our guest this episode is Meredith Johnson, Communications Director at the Leakey Foundation and host of Origin Stories! Learn more here!
Listen to Episode 125 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or anywhere you can find it!
This one family of plants can be found in nearly every environment on Earth, and yet their deep history is nearly entirely unknown to us. This episode, we discuss the diversity, evolution, and strangeness of Orchids.
Listen to Episode 115 on PodBean, YouTube, Spotify, or pick your favorite place for podcasts!
The Earth is covered in ecosystems, but what lives where is dependent on the local climate and landscape. This variation creates vast patterns in the distribution of life, patterns that scientists can use to understand ecology, and patterns that have changed over time as the Earth’s surface has transformed. This episode, we discuss the modern state and ancient history of Biomes.
The Common Descent Podcast 