The Pulse

Series produced by WHYY

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Weekly subscribable series.

Host Maiken Scott leads this one-hour, weekly tour of the people and places at the heart of health and science.

The Pulse is a show for curious people who ask: "Yeah, why is that?" Often surprising and always captivating, The Pulse makes science and discovery personal. Produced at WHYY in Philadelphia, the show features scientists, doctors, innovators and storytelling from across the country.

For information about The Pulse please contact Steve Martin at steve@sfmconsulting.com or call 703.715.0827.

For help subscribing please contact PRX at prxhelp@prx.org.


373 Pieces

Order by: Newest First | Oldest First
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Throughout the darkest hours of this pandemic, the world kept its gaze trained on the light at the end of the tunnel: a vaccine. Just over a year i...

  • Added: Mar 04, 2021
  • Length: 59:00
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Humans have long tried to mitigate their own destructive impact on the planet through conservation efforts. Often, those efforts are attached to on...

  • Added: Feb 25, 2021
  • Length: 58:59
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School closures during the pandemic have pushed education for millions of kids into a virtual setting. The sudden changes have caused some people t...

  • Added: Feb 18, 2021
  • Length: 58:59
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Every time you get a prescription drug, you’re dealing with a middleman you’ve probably never heard of — one who has had a hand in how much your dr...

  • Added: Feb 11, 2021
  • Length: 58:59
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On this rebroadcast of The Pulse — What is love? Is it that warm and fuzzy feeling, that crazed obsession, that deep sentiment of trust and good wi...

  • Added: Feb 11, 2021
  • Length: 58:59
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When we think of “the future,” it sounds like something abstract and faraway — we imagine new inventions, cutting-edge innovations, life on other p...

  • Added: Jan 28, 2021
  • Length: 59:00
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Who are you? There are dozens of ways to answer that question, from your name and nationality, to your relationships and job, all the way down to t...

  • Added: Jan 21, 2021
  • Length: 58:59
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Plastic gets a bad rap — over the years, it’s become synonymous with environmental destruction, cheap fakery, needless consumption, and mass-produc...

  • Added: Jan 14, 2021
  • Length: 59:00
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Owning a pet means making decisions that affect their health — from what they eat, to whether and how much they exercise, to how they spend their d...

  • Added: Jan 04, 2021
  • Length: 58:59
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On this rebroadcast of the Pulse - The pandemic has changed the way a lot of us understand and experience happiness. In normal times, we think of h...

  • Added: Dec 28, 2020
  • Length: 58:59
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On this rebroadcast of the Pulse - We all know that drinking a lot of alcohol is bad for your health. It’s tied to heart disease, heightened risk f...

  • Added: Dec 21, 2020
  • Length: 58:59
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Most of us trust our doctors to figure out what’s wrong with us — but pinpointing illness isn’t always that easy. Sometimes, getting the right diag...

  • Added: Dec 16, 2020
  • Length: 58:59
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One in five Americans live in a multigenerational household — that means at least two separate adult generations share the space. Think grandparent...

  • Added: Dec 10, 2020
  • Length: 58:59
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Suicide is a tough topic — it can feel frightening, and sad, and hard to talk about — but it’s also one we can’t afford ignore. Over the past 20 ye...

  • Added: Dec 04, 2020
  • Length: 58:59
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On this rebroadcast of the Pulse- Are you an introvert or an extrovert? Open to new experiences, or comforted by routine? Shy or the life of the pa...

  • Added: Nov 24, 2020
  • Length: 59:00
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Thanksgiving usually means we’re going big — way over the top. Twice the size bird we could possibly eat; more side dishes than the table can hold;...

  • Added: Nov 19, 2020
  • Length: 59:00
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We’ve all been there — you start out Googling local pharmacy hours, and all of a sudden you find yourself reading about how to construct a pool fro...

  • Added: Nov 12, 2020
  • Length: 58:59
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Not even a year after SARS-CoV-2 was first identified, several coronavirus vaccines are now in the final stages of testing. Some people worry we’re...

  • Added: Nov 05, 2020
  • Length: 58:59
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There’s not a lot to laugh about right now. But throughout the pandemic, we’ve managed to joke about our shared misery — like making fun of toilet ...

  • Added: Oct 29, 2020
  • Length: 58:59
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On this rebroadcast of The Pulse - Think about the millions of details stored in your memory: what you had for breakfast; how to get to work; the s...

  • Added: Oct 19, 2020
  • Length: 59:00