June 15, 2021
Marco Pasqua (he/him) is Creatively Using his Best Energy (CUBE) to advocate for accessibility in workplaces and community spaces. In this episode Marco shares how living with a disability has shaped his career as an entrepreneur, accessibility and inclusion consultant, and inspirational speaker. We discuss how Marco works with companies, clients, and communities to use principles of universal design to meet the needs of everyone, and how you can advocate for more accessible spaces in your community. And in this last episode of Season 2, we nerd out about a show worth watching, how a hobby led to new pen pals, and what Season 3 has in store. A transcript of the episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/2Ubv5GP
To learn more about Marco and his work, visit https://www.marcopasqua.com/
Follow Marco @Marco_Pasqua
June 8, 2021
This week we've got a Bonus Episode in your feed! You may have heard on a previous episode that Nerdin' About co-host Michael Unger hosts another podcast called "Let's Innovate". This week we're sharing the very first episode. In it you will meet Braxton Chan. Braxton developed an innovative treatment for osteochondral defects using fibrocartilage transplantation and the 16-year-old from Cranbrook, BC was a finalist in the 2020 Youth Innovation Showcase. We learn how he came up with his idea and what he's been up to since the competition. A transcript of the episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/3w7W6ZW
To listen to other episodes of Let's Innovate, visit https://www.sciencefairs.ca/let-s-innovate!-podcast/
![S2E9 Spice Up Your Life with Sri Lankan Cooking]()
May 25, 2021
If you’ve ever had Sri Lankan cuisine, on the surface it may seem similar to Indian cooking, but author Ruwanmali Samarakoon-Amunugama (she/her) is here to tell you otherwise! In her new book “Milk, Spice and Curry Leaves: Hill Country Recipes from the Heart of Sri Lanka” Ruwanmali takes us on a journey into the hills and lays out the foundation of Sri Lankan food, something that is still underrepresented on cookbook shelves in North America. What is Sri Lankan food? What is curry really? How does food intersect with identity? Kaylee and Michael explore these questions with Ruwanmali and we have our first call-in nerd out! A transcript of the episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/3ugGe5u
Learn more about “Milk, Spice and Curry Leaves” and try Ruwanmali’s small-batch Sri Lankan spice blend at https://www.savouringserendipity.com/
Check out the Fraser Valley BatPack program: https://www.fvrl.bc.ca/batpacks.php
Nerd Herd call-in jingle by Pramodh Senarath Yapa
Audio editing by Elise Hall-Meyer
![S2E8 Conservation is the Bees Knees]()
May 11, 2021
At Nerdin' About, we're bee-witched by pollinators, but the fate of our fluffy, flying friends is threatened by climate change. Peter Soroye (he/him), a conservation biologist and PhD student at the University of Ottawa, shares why bees are all the buzz and how climate change and land use change are placing pollinator populations in peril. Using this information, Peter points to some ways for us to protect our local pollinators and enjoy our backyard biodiversity. A transcript of the episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/3bCI3n1
Follow Peter @PeterSoroye on Twitter and @puffypete on Instagram
Learn more about pollinator gardens at: https://www.pollinator.org/guides and https://beecitycanada.org/pollinator-resources/
And you can get involved with backyard bio here: https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/backyardbio
To read Kaylee's article "Location, Location, Location: Rats, Real Estate and Public Health" visit the BioOne website here: http://www.bioonepublishing.org/BioOneAmbassadorAward/2021/Kaylee-Byers.html
April 27, 2021
What are some of the first things that come to mind when you think about evolution? What arguments have you heard to challenge it? From the famous monkey-to-human diagram, to the assertion that “evolution is just a theory”, we’ve got our evolution education superhero Dr. Greg Bole (he/him) to help us debunk some of these common misconceptions. Greg is an Associate Professor of Teaching in the Departments of Zoology and Botany at the University of British Columbia. He’s heard it all, so by the end of this episode you’ll be equipped with a little more information about what evolution really is. A transcript of the episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/3gKz8mA
April 13, 2021
What happens in a galaxy far, far away, doesn’t stay there. In this episode Corey Gray (he/him) explains how LIGO (The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) detects cosmic events unfolding across the universe. Corey is a detector operator at LIGO in Washington State. He is also Scottish and Blackfoot and a member of the Siksika Nation of Alberta, Canada. We get into gravitational-wave astronomy and the story of how Corey recruited his Mom to translate the historic press release of the first gravitational-wave detection into the Blackfoot language! Plus your nerd herd questions, and our wavey, possibly musical nerd outs! A transcript of the episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/3dfm8U4
March 30, 2021
Math needs a makeover. So often, people put themselves into a category of being “not a math person”, but Vanessa Vakharia (she/her) is working to change math culture so that everyone can embrace their inner mathematician. In this episode we learn about how failing Grade 11 math twice changed Vanessa’s life, why there’s “no such thing as a math person”, and Kaylee and Michael get a little math therapy. Vanessa is a math education expert and the founder and director of The Math Guru, a math tutoring studio in Toronto. Vanessa is also the host of the podcast Math Therapy, and author of the new book Math Hacks working to make math fun for kids and parents. A transcript of the episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/3rGDihc
March 16, 2021
With an ongoing global pandemic, many of us have had to rethink how we access health care. In this episode Dr. Alison Müller (she/her) explains how virtual health can not only help to fill the void of in-person health care, but also encourage us to seek care sooner. Alison is a postdoctoral fellow at The University of British Columbia studying how virtual health interventions can facilitate health care communications with patients during COVID-19. In addition to nerding out about virtual health, Kaylee, Michael, and Alison share a 'nerd out' theme of TV/film, but with a science twist. A transcript of the episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/3eQX6f0
March 2, 2021
From pufferfish to Arctic char, we’re diving in with Amy Liu (she/they) to learn more about these fishy friends. Amy is a pufferfish enthusiast who teaches us a thing or two about why we should admire pufferfish. Spoiler: there’s much more stuff than just the puff! Amy is also a graduate student studying Arctic char genomics, and we discuss why this tool is so important to identifying species within the Arctic char complex. A transcript of this episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/3b4hNC2
February 16, 2021
“Science communication is hard, and scientists aren’t making it any easier” says Jay Ingram (host of CBC’s ‘Quirks and Quarks’, and Discovery Channel Canada’s ‘Daily Planet’). Whether it’s overuse of acronyms, or inaccessible communication, there are many pitfalls scientists and science communicators can fall into. Kaylee and Michael dig in with their former science communication mentor from Banff Beakerhead to find some solutions, which as it turns out is exactly what you’ll hear in this episode: a fun in-person conversation! A transcript of the episode can be found here: https://bit.ly/3jWkgBg
