Predatory Plant: Lure of the Cobra Lily
The cobra lily (Darlingtonia californica) uses deception and patience to trick unsuspecting insect prey into its highly specialized pitcher traps.
Mar 03, 2014•6 min
KQED Science Video Podcast
KQED Science explores science and environment news, trends and events from the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond with its award-winning features and reporting on television, radio and the Web.
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Episodes
Science of Beer: Tapping the Power of Brewer's Yeast
Whether it’s a lager or ale, sour or bitter, dark or light, most beer has one thing in common: yeast. KQED Science visits a commercial yeast laboratory and a local brewery to reveal how this key ingredient is a major player in both science history and beer production.
Feb 11, 2014•7 min
200 Geeks, 24 Hours: Science Hack Day in San Francisco
What happens when you fill up a giant space with over 200 eager science fans from around the Bay Area for a weekend? You get Science Hack Day San Francisco, a two-day event where a diverse group of "hackers" -- from developers and designers to scientists and students -- works side-by-side to see what they can quickly create within 24 consecutive hours.
Dec 03, 2013•7 min
Fighting Food Waste
Forty percent of the food produced in the U.S. goes uneaten. From "farm to fork", there are many reasons for food waste, including consumer demand for perfect produce and confusion over expiration dates printed on packaged foods. This massive waste occurs as one in six Americans struggles with hunger every day, even in affluent regions such as Silicon Valley.
Oct 31, 2013•6 min
ZomBees: Flight of the Living Dead
Something strange and unsettling is happening to Bay Area honeybees. Entomologists at San Francisco State University have identified the culprit: a tiny parasitic fly is causing the bees to exhibit bizarre nocturnal behaviors before suffering a gruesome demise.
Oct 31, 2013•6 min
Stanford Students Debut Solar-Powered Prefab Home
Stanford University students set out to revolutionize home design by entering a solar powered prefab house into the Department of Energy's biennial Solar Decathlon competition.
Oct 02, 2013•3 min
Chasing Pumas: Science on the SPOT
Join a research team from University of California, Santa Cruz as they track, tranquilize and collar a wild puma. The special GPS collars collect data on the puma’s location and behavior, and they reveal how the big cats survive in their shrinking habitat in the Bay Area.
Sep 13, 2013•6 min
Next Meal: Engineering Food
More than a million visitors visit Alcatraz every year, but a recent discovery has revealed another attraction that lives within the shadows of this historic prison.
May 07, 2013•26 min
The Glowing Millipedes of Alcatraz: Science on the SPOT
More than a million visitors visit Alcatraz every year, but a recent discovery has revealed another attraction that lives within the shadows of this historic prison.
Mar 19, 2013•6 min
Preserving the Forest of the Sea: Science on the SPOT
The University Herbarium at the University of California - Berkeley boasts one of the largest and oldest collections of seaweed in the United States, dating back to the time of the U.S. Civil War. Kathy Ann Miller, a curator at the herbarium, is leading a massive project to digitize nearly 80,000 specimens of seaweed collected from the west coast of North America.
Feb 05, 2013•8 min
Shadows and Spiders-- A Secret Cave in California: Science on the SPOT
The rural foothills along the Santa Cruz County Coast hold an ancient secret. Deep below the redwoods, White Moon Cave extends for nearly a mile -- making it one of the longest caves in California. But few people have ever been in it. Join the KQED Science team as we squeeze through the narrow clandestine entrance, and meet the uncanny cave inhabitants to bring new light to this hidden realm.
Nov 20, 2012•8 min
Why I Do Science: Stephen Palumbi
In this edition of "Why I Do Science", we hear from Stephen Palumbi, a world-renowned marine biologist and director of the Hopkins Marine Station in Pacific Grove, California.
Oct 10, 2012•2 min
Some Bugs Like it Hot: Climate Change and Agricultural Pests
Scientists and farmers are starting to notice that, as California's winters warm up, the state is becoming more hospitable to destructive agricultural pests.
Oct 10, 2012•2 min
Your Videos on QUEST: Steve Fyffe
Motion-activated cameras at Stanford University's Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve provide scientists a window into the secret lives of the animals that roam around Jasper Ridge at night.
Sep 26, 2012•2 min
Black Holes: Objects of Attraction
Black holes have been the stuff of science fiction since their discovery in the late sixties. But now a new, nimble NASA telescope is using its powerful x-ray vision to hunt for these abundant yet invisible, massive space oddities.
Sep 26, 2012•10 min
What's Next for Nuclear?
Can nuclear power be produced safely and affordably? A scientist at the University of California, Berkeley, is working to do just that.
Sep 19, 2012•11 min
Field Notes: Dan Costa in Antarctica
QUEST Producer Sheraz Sadiq interviews Bay Area filmmaker and musician Jesse Hiatt about the experience of filming in one of the world's most extreme environments. See his footage in the QUEST segment, "Field Notes: Dan Costa in Antarctica."
Sep 19, 2012•2 min
Your Photos on QUEST: Rogelio Bernal Andreo
SOFIA is more than a telescope tucked into a re-purposed commercial airliner. It's a complete flying astronomical observation platform which carries a dozen or Astrophotographer Rogelio Bernal Andreo's colorful wide field images of deep sky objects like galaxies, nebulae, star clusters has garnered him dozens of photography awards including the Royal Observatory of Greenwich's 2010 Best Astrophotographer of the Year.
Sep 12, 2012•2 min
X-ray Microscope: Seeing Cells in 3-D
At the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, scientists are using a cutting-edge microscope, the first of its kind in the world, to image whole cells in 3-D with the penetrating power of x-rays. The new images generated by the microscope are offering a deeper, more precise understanding of cellular structures and how they change with diseases.
Sep 12, 2012•10 min
Up all Night with SOFIA, NASA's Flying Observatory: Science on the SPOT
SOFIA is more than a telescope tucked into a re-purposed commercial airliner. It's a complete flying astronomical observation platform which carries a dozen or more astronomers, observers and crew far above the clouds to observe objects and phenomena too cold to be seen in visible light.
Jun 27, 2012•8 min
Your Videos on QUEST: Kip Evans
Kip Evans is a natural history documentary filmmaker and photographer from Pacific Grove, California. This is an excerpt of his short film, "Isla Holbox: Whale Shark Island."
May 15, 2012•3 min
The Science of Riding a Bicycle
Their basic design hasn’t changed much, but scientists still don’t fully understand the forces that allow humans to balance atop a bicycle. QUEST visits Davis – a city that loves its bicycles – to take a ride on a research bike and explore a collection of antique bicycles.
May 15, 2012•9 min
Field Notes: Oakland Zoo in Uganda
In this "Field Notes" segment, Amy Gotliffe, director of conservation at the Oakland Zoo, shares her photographs and stories from Uganda, where the zoo's Bodongo Snare Removal Project works to protect endangered chimpanzees from illegal poaching.
May 08, 2012•3 min
Exploring Corals of the Deep
Off California's coastline, thousands of feet below the deep blue ocean where the sun's rays don't reach, teems a diverse community of deep sea corals. Armed with unmanned submarines equipped with robotic arms, sensors and HD cameras, scientists are exploring this treasure trove of corals and the rich marine life living among them.
May 08, 2012•10 min
Rushing to Save Heart Attack Patients
By rushing heart attack victims to the operating table and opening their blocked arteries while their heart attacks are underway, doctors are now able to save 95% of those who make it to the hospital.
May 01, 2012•5 min
Pump It Up: Heart Health Special Report (FULL SHOW)
This half-hour program looks at heart disease – the number one killer in the United States – from the point of view of a teenager trying to lower her risk, a heart attack survivor, and a scientist working to rebuild damaged hearts.
May 01, 2012•27 min
Childhood Obesity: Kids Fight Back
One in six kids in the United States is obese, a condition that doubles their risk of heart disease. Lorena Ramos, 14, a patient at the Healthy Hearts clinic at Children's Hospital Oakland struggles to lose weight. Will she succeed?
May 01, 2012•14 min
Your Photos on QUEST: Simon Christen
Photographer Simon Christen shares his passion for observing the environment through the process of time-lapse photography. By training his lens on natural events as fog and the orbiting moon, he discovers things about the natures of these seemingly ubiquitous elements of our world that few have seen before.
Apr 24, 2012•2 min
Edible Insects: Finger Lickin' Grub
"Insects do not taste like chicken," said Daniella Martin, a charismatic advocate of eating low - make that really low - on the food chain. Through public lectures, cooking demonstrations and her 'Girl Meets Bug' website, Martin preaches the gospel of why, in her opinion, more people should munch on mealworms, crunch a cricket or feast on plump bee larvae.
Apr 24, 2012•10 min
Amateur Rocketeers Reach For The Stars
For decades amateur rocket builders, or "rocketeers," have been trying to reach space. Now with advances in materials and technology, they're able to do it. QUEST travels to rocket launches in fallowed fields and barren deserts to learn more about this addictive hobby and to meet a group of passionate high school rocketeers.
Apr 24, 2012•11 min
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