Skip to content
How ‘Science Interpreters’ Make Hidden Science Visible episode artwork

Apr 17, 2025 18 min

How ‘Science Interpreters’ Make Hidden Science Visible

from Science Friday Hosted by Dee Peterschmidt, Flora Lichtman

Imagine you’re diving into a cell. You’re paddling around in the cytoplasm, you’re climbing up a mitochondria. If you’re having a hard time picturing this, that’s okay! There are professionals who do this for a living. We wanted to learn more from expert science interpreters, who take the results section of a research paper and translate it into something tangible, like a 40-foot dinosaur skeleton or a 3D animation of cellular machinery too small to see. At a live event in Salt Lake City in March, Host Flora Lichtman spoke with Dr. Janet Iwasa, head of the University of Utah’s Animation Lab and director of the Genetic Science Learning Center; and Tim Lee, director of exhibits at the Natural History Museum of Utah, about how they bring these out-of-reach worlds to life. Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Follow our show on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Bluesky @scifri and sign up for our newsletters. Got a science question that’s keeping you up at night? Call us: 877-472-4374

Episode details come from the podcast's RSS feed.

Embed this episode

A cell animator and a museum designer tell us how they translate scientific findings into visual experiences.

Ready to play

How ‘Science Interpreters’ Make Hidden Science Visible

0:00 18:53

No transcript yet.

Requests help us decide what to transcribe next.

Frequently asked questions

How long is this episode of Science Friday?

This episode is 18 minutes long.

When was this Science Friday episode published?

This episode was published on April 17, 2025.

Can I download this Science Friday episode?

Yes. Use the download control on the episode player to save the publisher-provided media file.