What we discuss in this episode

• Chemical Linguistics: Why spiders rely on scent and taste rather than sight.
• The "Love Letter" Degradation: How pheromones break down over weeks to signal timing to males.
• Aggressive Courtship: Why males destroy and "box up" the female’s web during mating.
• Pheromone Costs: The evolutionary trade-offs of producing nitrogen-rich compounds.
• Deceptive Signaling: How starved or aging females "cheat" by altering pheromone release rates.
• Spider Defense: Debunking myths about black widow aggression and the reality of their "dry bites."
• Advanced Analysis: Using Liquid Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (LC-MS) to detect nanogram-scale compounds.
• Citizen Science: How bioacoustics and neural networks are tracking marine life, similar to chemical detection in arachnids.

Why spider chemical communication matters

Understanding pheromone systems is a cornerstone of pest management. By identifying these chemical markers, researchers can develop strategies to control insect and arachnid populations without relying on broad-spectrum pesticides. Furthermore, this research demonstrates that "attraction" in nature is a function of chemistry, resource management, and honest (or occasionally deceptive) signaling.

Key questions explored

• How do spiders "smell" with their legs?
• Why do black widows use a time-sensitive chemical signal rather than a constant one?
• Is it true that black widows are aggressive? (Spoiler: They prefer running away).
• What is the "Handicap Principle" and how does it apply to spider pheromones?
• Can spiders "cheat" to attract mates when they are old or starved?

Guest: Andy Fisher

Dr. Andy Fisher is an Assistant Professor at the Animal Metabolics and Ecology Lab at Griswold University. An SFU alumnus, Dr. Fisher specializes in the chemical ecology of arachnids. His research combines advanced analytical chemistry—including LC-MS and NMR spectroscopy—with field biology to untangle how spiders communicate in the dark, silent environments of the Pacific Northwest.

Episode context

This episode continues the show’s mission to unpack how "invisible" biology shapes behavior. From the beaches of Tsawwassen to laboratory experiments on web-building, we see how spiders navigate the challenges of mating as sessile organisms. This discussion highlights the intersection of analytical chemistry, behavioral ecology, and the often-misunderstood nature of the black widow.

Chapters

(00:00) 2026 Podcast of the Year!
(01:05) Warning: Arachnophobia
(03:30) Guest: Dr. Andy Fisher
(05:55) How Spiders "See" with 8 Eyes
(08:50) Electrostatic Communication
(12:35) Pest Management vs. Pesticides
(14:35) The Western Black Widow
(17:00) Field Work: How Not to Get Bitten
(22:30) Web Chemistry: Stinky Pheromones
(25:45) Why Males Destroy the Web
(29:50) The Metabolic Cost of Love
(33:15) Deception: The Cheating Widow
(38:10) Mass Spec: Smashing Chemical Legos
(41:40) Seasonality of Sex Signals
(44:55) Sub-Social Web Sharing
(48:20) Black Widow Science Joke

Frequently asked questions

• What is a "dry bite"? A defensive bite where the spider chooses not to inject venom, often occurring when the spider is not threatened.
• Do black widows really kill their mates? In Lactrodectus hesperus, sexual cannibalism is relatively rare (roughly 10% chance), contrary to popular folklore.
• How do spiders communicate without ears? They rely heavily on substrate-borne vibrations and chemical chemoreception (smell/taste).
• Why study pheromones? Beyond arachnology, these pathways provide blueprints for non-toxic pest control in agriculture.

Sources and further reading

•  https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2415468121 
•  https://www.cell.com/iscience/fulltext/S2589-0042(24)01947-3 
•  https://animal-metabolomics.com/ 
  

Episode details

• Podcast: Whimsical Wavelengths
• Style: Interview
• Season: 2 | Episode: 13
• Category: Entomology · Arachnology · Analytical Chemistry · Chemical Ecology

What we discuss in this episode

• Phreatomagmatic Paradox: Why water plus magma doesn't always equal an explosion (and the role of the Leidenfrost effect).
• The Carrot in the Crust: Understanding Diatremes, the carrot-shaped volcanic "guts" that extend deep underground.
• Distributed Volcanic Fields: Why these eruptions don't happen on giant peaks like Olympus Mons, but are scattered across regions like Nepenthes Mensae.
• Thermal Inertia: Using day-night temperature changes to distinguish volcanic ash from solid lava flows on a planetary scale.
• Sediment Popsicles: Experimental "goofing" with lava and ice to understand how permafrost reacts to extreme heat.
• Secondary Craters vs. Maars: The detective work required to tell the difference between a volcanic vent and a meteorite's "splash."
• Methane Explosion Holes: A comparison to the non-volcanic craters found in Siberian permafrost.

Why "Maars on Mars" matter

Maars are more than just holes in the ground; they are environmental sensors. Because a Maar requires water to form, each one we find on Mars acts as a "confidence point" for past environmental conditions. By projecting the angles of these craters downward into the "diatreme" structure, geologists can estimate exactly how deep the water or ice table was at the moment of eruption. This research is a critical pillar in the broader hunt for water—and potentially past life—on the Red Planet.

Key questions explored

• How do you pronounce "Maar" without sounding like you're talking about the planet?
• Why is water such an efficient "coolant" for magma?
• How does Martian gravity (38% of Earth's) change the shape of an eruption?
• What can "Mickey Mouse" shaped craters tell us about moving volcanic vents?
• Can we use "carrots" (Diatremes) to map the Martian water table?

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  Chapters

  (00:00) Maars on Mars: A Tongue Twister
  (02:10) Phreatomagmatic Diatremes Defined
  (03:45) Guest: Dr. Allison Graettinger
  (05:15) Sociology: Permission to Study Lava
  (06:40) Field Work: Dust, Ash, and Gas
  (08:30) Why Study Maars? Hazards and Risks
  (10:45) Scaling Eruptions: VEI vs. St. Helens
  (12:35) Distributed Volcanic Fields Explained
  (17:15) Physics of Magma-Water Interaction
  (21:50) The Marvelous Database Project
  (26:50) Remote Sensing: Thermal Inertia
  (30:10) Mars vs. Earth: Gravity and Shape
  (34:40) Searching for Craters on Mars
  (36:40) "Goofing" with Lava and Ice Popsicles
  (41:10) Methane, Permafrost, and CO2 Ice
  (43:55) Mapping Water for Future Missions
  (48:25) Ducky: The Scientist’s Companion
  (51:00) The Science Joke

Guest: Dr. Alison Graettinger

Dr. Alison Graettinger is a Professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. A veteran of the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory and Masaya Volcano in Nicaragua, Dr. Graettinger is a world expert in experimental volcanology and the creator of the MaarVLS (Marvelous) databse. Her work involves everything from pouring molten lava onto "sediment popsicles" to mapping the volcanic history of Mars. She is almost always accompanied in the field by her world-famous "companion," a yellow rubber duck that has survived more volcanic plumes than most geologists.

Episode context

This episode reconnects two colleagues who first met in the gas plumes of Nicaragua in 2007. It highlights the collaborative nature of planetary science—where Earth-based fieldwork in the Seward Peninsula of Alaska provides the necessary analogs for interpreting data from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) orbiting Mars.

Frequently asked questions

• Is there still active volcanism on Mars? While most activity ceased millions of years ago, "recent" in geologic terms (the last 100 million years) still shows potential for small-scale events.
• What is a "Phreatic" explosion? A steam-driven explosion that doesn't include new magma, unlike the phreatomagmatic "Maars" discussed here.
• Why are Martian volcanoes bigger? Lower gravity and a lack of plate tectonics allow magma to pile up in the same spot for billions of years.
• What is the "MaarVLS " Database? A systematic catalog of 435+ Maars on Earth used as a training set for planetary identification.

Sources and further reading

• Primary Paper: Identification of candidate Martian Maars in the area of Coales and Nepenthes Mensae (Graettinger et al.)
• The  MaarVLS Database: A global resource for Maar volcano locations and shapes.
• Volcanic Analogs: Research on the Espenberg Maars, Seward Peninsula, Alaska.

Episode details

• Podcast: Whimsical Wavelengths
• Season: 2 | Episode: 14
• Category: Volcanology · Planetary Science · Geomorphology · Mars Exploration

What we discuss in this episode

• The Strepsiptera Problem: Why 19th-century entomologists couldn't decide if these were wasps, flies, or beetles.
• Extreme Dimorphism: The visual contrast between the iconic mobile males and the stationary, bag-like females.
• Genomic Detours: How sequencing the wrong genes originally told the wrong evolutionary story.
• Traumatic Insemination: The visceral reality of how these parasites reproduce through the host's abdominal wall.
• Behavioral Hijacking: How infected wasps stop acting like social hive members and start acting as "zombie" nurseries.
• Life Extension: The cutting-edge research at the University of Rochester into why infected workers live significantly longer than their healthy counterparts.
• Museum Lifeblood: Why the "back catalog" of natural history museums is essential for modern DNA research.

Why the "Obscure" matters

Strepsiptera might be a small group (only 650 species), but they are heavy hitters in the world of evolutionary biology. Beyond their role in the food web and as natural pest controllers for rice-paddy plant-hoppers, they are now being used as models for aging research. By understanding the specific genes the parasite "turns on" to keep its host alive longer, scientists hope to unlock fundamental secrets of longevity that could eventually influence mammalian science.

Key questions explored

• Why do they have "twisted" wings?
• How does a parasite breathe when it’s buried inside another insect’s blood?
• What is a "cryptic species" and how did DNA find them hiding in plain sight?
• Can a parasite really make its host live 600 "human-equivalent" years?
• How do you count 750,000 larvae crawling out of a single insect's head?

Guest: Dr. Rebecca Jean Miljana

Dr. Rebecca Jean Millena is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Rochester’s TropBio Lab. A lifelong "bug kid" who began her journey with a wayward pet tarantula, Dr. Miljana obtained her PhD from the American Museum of Natural History’s Richard Gilder Graduate School. She is a specialist in the systematics and evolution of Strepsiptera and a passionate science communicator who has lectured on the biological parallels of the Alien film franchise.

Episode context

This episode explores the "sausage making" of taxonomy—the grueling, detail-oriented work of staring at insects under microscopes to determine species boundaries. It highlights the transition of science from purely morphological judgment to the robust, data-driven world of phylogenomics.

Frequently asked questions

• Do they infect humans? No. Strepsiptera only parasitize other insects (bees, wasps, ants, and grasshoppers).
• What is a "parasitoid"? Unlike a standard parasite, a parasitoid eventually kills or sterilizes its host as a necessary part of its development.
• What is "Matrophagy"? A process where the young consume the resources (and sometimes the tissue) of the mother.
• Where are they found? Everywhere! If you have paper wasps or mining bees in your backyard, you likely have Strepsiptera nearby.

Sources and further reading

• Primary Paper: Strepsiptera's Systematics, Past, Present, and Future.
• Phylogenetic Overhaul: Genomic and Morphological Evidence Converge to Resolve the Enigma of Strepsiptera (2012).
• Host Longevity: Research from the University of Rochester on Xenos peckii and Polistes fuscatus.

Chapters

(0:00) Universal Obscure: Welcome to Strepsiptera
(1:30) Xenomorphs in RL: Parasitoids vs. Parasites
(3:50) "Strepsiptera Problem" in Academia
(5:15) Dr. Rebecca Millena’s "Bug Kid" Origins
(8:00) Twisted Wings & Raspberry Eyes: Anatomy 101
(11:15) Dimorphism: Males vs. Worm-like Females
(14:35) Sexual Hijacking: Pheromones & Ant-Crickets Hosts
(17:40) Cephalothorax: Breathing & Living In a Host
(20:30) Traumatic Insemination & Bag of Larvae
(23:45) Matrophagy: When Young Consume the Mother
(26:50) Taxonomy’s 150-Year Detective Story
(30:50) Genetics vs Morphology: Fly-Beetle Debate
(36:10) Genomic Revolutions: 2012 the Shift to Beetles
(41:40) Cryptic Species: Hiding in Plain Sight
(46:40) Parasites of Parasites: Wolbachia Connection
(53:30) Fountain of Youth? Lifespan Extension in Wasps
(59:45) Museum Research: "Sausage-Making" of Science
(1:05:00) Millipedes & the Science Joke

Episode details

• Podcast: Whimsical Wavelengths
• Season: 2 | Episode: 15
• Category: Entomology · Evolutionary Biology · Phylogenomics · Parasitology

What we discuss in this episode

• The Recruitment Crisis: Why Earth Science is struggling to attract new students and how high school curricula play a role.
• The Vancouver Workshop: The logistics of running a fully accessible trip from Stanley Park to Whistler, including the unexpected barriers (like bus insurance!).
• Multi-Sensory Exploration: Moving beyond the "look at the rock" model to engaging all senses in the field.
• Universal Design: How features meant for accessibility—like high-contrast slides or automatic doors—benefit the entire student body.
• Mission Control Model: A look at NASA-style field schools where students participate via remote "away teams."
• The "Bag of Meat" Philosophy: Why scientists need to remember their physical state (hunger, cold, fatigue) affects the quality of their data.

Why accessibility is academic merit

Making geoscience inclusive isn't just about being "nice"—it's about cognitive diversity. When we exclude students with physical or sensory disabilities, we lose the unique spatial reasoning and problem-solving perspectives they bring to the table. As Brett notes, an accessible field trip isn't a "watered-down" version of geology; it's often a more rigorous and collaborative environment than the traditional "professor-led lecture" in the rain.

Key questions explored

• Does fieldwork have to be a rugged rite of passage to be valid?
• How can a student with low vision "see" an intrusive dyke or a fossil?
• What is the "medical model" of disability vs. the social/identity model?
• Why is the "describe, describe, describe" mantra the key to re-interpretation?
• Is geology really just "rock collecting" for people who aren't good at science? (Spoiler: No.)

Guest: Brett Gilley

<a id="S2E16-guest"></a> Brett Gilley is a Professor of Teaching in the Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences at the University of British Columbia (UBC). Known to his students as "GeoDude," Brett is a master of pedagogy and a champion for inclusive education. He is a founding member of the International Association for Geoscience Diversity (IAGD) and has spent over a decade researching how to make the field—and the classroom—a place where every student can succeed.

Episode context

This episode serves as a "lens turn" on the scientific process itself. While geophysicists spend their time mapping the sub-surface, Brett spends his time mapping the barriers in our institutions. We dive into the qualitative data (phenomenology) of the student experience to understand how a single day in the field can transform a student's entire professional identity.

Frequently asked questions

• What is a "Maar-diatreme"? (Referencing the Mars episode link): A volcanic crater formed by an explosive interaction between magma and groundwater.
• What is the IAGD? The International Association for Geoscience Diversity, which recently launched a Canadian chapter.
• Can you be a geologist if you can't hike? Absolutely. Modern geoscience involves everything from satellite remote sensing and lab-based geochemistry to "mission control" style field operations.

Sources and further reading

• Primary Paper: Making geoscience fieldwork inclusive and accessible for students with disabilities.
• IAGD Resources: The IAGD Website
• Video: "Brett GeoDude Gilley" Frequently Asked Questions on YouTube.
• Universal Design: Universal Design for Learning (UDL) in Post-Secondary Education.

Chapters

(00:00) Intro: Rethinking the Degree
(01:50) Fieldwork as a Rite of Passage
(03:20) Guest: The "Rate My Prof" Legend
(06:10) Why High Schools Skip Geology
(09:30) Funding and Enrollment at UBC
(13:20) Why Geoscience is Unique for DEI
(15:15) Designing the Vancouver Workshop
(17:40) Inspiration: Mammoth Cave
(21:00) Redefining "Disabled" in the Field
(23:45) Data: Transforming the Experience
(28:00) "Hold My Dog": Scrambling Blind
(31:20) Multi-Sensory Exploration
(35:30) Meta-Discussion: Validating Disability
(39:00) Universal Design for Learning
(42:20) Silly Putty and 3D Models
(45:45) Post-COVID: Mission Control Learning
(50:00) Geodude: The IMDB Mystery
(53:30) Call-outs: Join the IAGD
(55:00) The Punchline: Geologists vs. Engineers

Episode details

• Podcast: Whimsical Wavelengths
• Season: 2 | Episode: 16
• Category: Pedagogy · Geosciences · Accessibility · Diversity & Inclusion