The Knowmads Podcast

In the 1920s, physicists like Schrödinger, Heisenberg, Einstein, Planck—and many others—realized something deeply unsettling and beautiful: the universe at microscopic scales is nothing like what we observe in everyday life. This was the era when quantum mechanics was discovered. And I’m intentionally saying discovered, not born, because that word choice matters. Quantum mechanics isn’t just a framework we invented—it’s closer to the idea that we uncovered something that was already true about reality.

What makes this discovery so fascinating is that quantum mechanics feels so far away from how we perceive the...

Recently, I came across a definition of a good theory: it should explain as much as possible, with as few ingredients as possible, and with as much accuracy as possible. I think that is something every serious physicist can relate to. And really, that is what modern theoretical physics is striving for — not just identifying what the universe is made of, but understanding the mathematical framework that makes the laws of nature hang together. That is why the mathematical formulation of quantum field theory is so important. It reveals the hidden structures behind particles, forces, symmetry, and even space it...

Most of what we know about the universe actually comes from what we can’t see.
Only a tiny fraction of the cosmos is made of “normal” matter—the stuff that makes up stars, planets, and us. The rest is a mysterious combination we call dark matter and dark energy, which, although invisible to our telescopes, is absolutely crucial for how the universe expands and how structures form over billions of years.

So how do we even study something we cannot see?

One of the most powerful tools we have is weak gravitational lensing. As light...

Hello Everyone, welcome to The Knowmads Podcast. I'm your co-host Prachi, and I'm your co-host Bhavay. `Chaos' is one of those words that has escaped physics and entered everyday language. We use it to describe messy rooms, traffic, even our inboxes. But in physics, chaos has a very precise meaning, (or it doesnt). Well, classically,  chaotic systems are those, that even though they are completely deterministic, they are extremely sensitive to their initial conditions. Even the tiniest change in the initial conditions can lead to wildly different outcomes.\\ But when we move to the quantum world, things become a l...

Imagine: it’s a lazy Sunday morning, you’re sipping your raspberry-flavored iced latte, and an interstellar traveler lands in your backyard. It starts walking toward you—what do you do? Are you terrified or calm? If you’re a scientist stuck on a problem for years, do you ask for help? If you’re an influencer, are you already crafting your next post? If you’re a cook, are you hunting for new recipes? Honestly, with our limited human experience and understanding, it’s hard to even imagine such an encounter.
To help us out, today’s podcast guest, D...

The universe is about 14 billion years old. Ever wondered—how do we even know the age of the universe? How can we look up at the sky and read time itself? We do this by studying the afterglow of the Big Bang, called the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR)—relic radiation from the very beginning of the universe. Physicists build ultra-cold microwave telescopes—cryogenic cameras with incredibly sensitive detectors—that can spot tiny temperature changes and faint polarization, and even see how gravity bends that light.
In this episode, Dr. Eve Vavagiakis, an experimental cosmologist at Duke University, takes us...

Science and philosophy have always been woven together. Some of history’s greatest minds—Aristotle, Galileo, Aryabhata and even Einstein—were as much philosophers as they were scientists.

This has also been true for ancient Indian civilization, where science and philosophy were explored with extraordinary depth, not as separate pursuits, but as complementary paths to knowledge. 

These insights were preserved in Sanskrit, a language whose precision allowed complex ideas to be recorded with remarkable clarity. But centuries
of invasions and nearly a thousand years of foreign rule made this knowledge less accessible, and its nua...

Imagine walking deep into a dense forest without a map or GPS. Initially, you kind of know where you started. But as you wander further, eventually, it's impossible to tell where you came from — every direction looks the same. That's thermalization.

 The initial state's details get scrambled across all degrees of freedom and as a result local observables settle into a stable, time-independent state called the equilibrium state. The fact that macroscopic objects equilibrate with their environments is such a ubiquitous experience that understanding it doesn't seem very interesting. Although it's absolutely non-trivial. At Equilibrium these local obs...

Modern physics rests on two foundational frameworks that describe our universe at different scales. The first is General Relativity, Einstein’s theory of gravity, which describes gravity not as a force but as the curvature of spacetime itself. Massive objects bend the geometry of spacetime, and this curvature dictates how all massive objects move,  from planets to black holes.
   At the microscopic scale, we have quantum mechanics which describes the probabilistic nature of particles like electrons and photons. Quantum mechanics also laid the foundation for Quantum Field Theory where particles are no longer seen as standalone objects but as ex...

The world we live in is believed to be divided into two fundamental families of particles--Fermions and Bosons. Today, we're sitting in Dr. Kaden Hazzard's beautiful office at Rice University in Houston, who along with his student, proposed a robust third class of particles called paraparticles. An astonishingly simple operation of swapping any two particles, is what it takes to reveal their nature. We know that Bosons obey BE statistics and Fermions obey Fermi-Dirac statistics. But what about paraparticles? What statistics do they obey? Where do they show up? And what could their existence mean for physics? If you're...

Hello everyone, welcome to season 2 of the Knowmads podcast. Since Season 2 was long overdue, we had to start with someone who’s not just had a remarkable academic journey in physics, but also someone who’s been a great mentor to all his students and really, to everyone who walks into his office. So in this episode, we’re sitting in the office of Professor René Bellwied — a leading experimental physicist and a core member of the ALICE collaboration — which stands for A Large Ion Collider Experiment — one of the major experiments at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider or the...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 15 of The Knowmads Podcast.
The mother’s Mental health during the time of pregnancy is extremely crucial. Studies suggest that prenatal stress and trauma have the capacity to propagate through generations. Our guest today is a UH graduate student at the Laboratory of early experiences and development studying cognitive and behavioral neuroscience. 

Livia Merrill’s  research studies the impact of prenatal stress on the cognitive development of the new born. She has strong opinions about policies surrounding such tangible research and the dissemination of scientific findings. You’re all in for an ex...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 14 of The Knowmads Podcast.
Whether you're a parent searching for that delicate equilibrium between responsibilities and aspirations, or someone looking for a force of motivation to go back to school, start a different journey, or simply someone seeking a tale of inspiration, you're in for a treat.

From her humble beginnings, serving tirelessly for a non-profit organization in the vibrant heart of Latin America, to the classrooms where she ignited young minds as an educator, and now juggling between being a grad student and a mother. Kristen's journey has been a...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 13 of The Knowmads Podcast.
Most of us who grew up in bilingual or a multilingual homes
often wonder if the new babies in the family will be able to understand
these different language(s). In this episode we dive deep into the fascinating
world of early language development in children. Our guest today
Christina Diaz Griep is a psychologist from University of Houston where her research involves understanding how children growing up in bilingual and monolingual households navigate the intricate journey of language acquisition. 

So let's go...

Hi Everyone,
This is Episode 12 of The Knowmads Podcast.
Long after abolishment of Slavery in the US, in the late 1800s the effects are still seen in different forms. The unbalanced dynamics of power between prison authorities and prisoners illustrates hints of slavery even today and remains ignored. Our guest today is a historian from Rice University and in her research she particularly highlights the oppressive experiences of incarcerated black women in the late 20th century in jails in Texas. She talks about various forms of abuse that is witnessed even today in Texas Jails. It’s a...

Hi Everyone,
This is Episode 11 of The Knowmads Podcast.
Have you ever wondered why do we dream, are we conscious while
we are sleeping?
How is our brain able to generate a 3 dimensional visual image every night while our eyes are closed? Our guest today Adriana Alcaraz Sánchez is a philosopher, from University of Glasgow. In new recent work. She talks about objectless sleep awareness
and compares the ideologies of western philosophy regarding consciousness while one
sleeps with various different philosophical traditions from other parts of the world.
This is an e...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 10 of The Knowmads Podcast.
Political discussions and associated ideologies almost always resolve in thinking about national leaders and the large scale effects of policies that finally lead to geo politics. The conversations often lack the microscopic details and the penetrative effects of policies at the lowest local level, where ‘in principle’ it actually matters. 
Studies suggest that such discussions ,amongst young students, who are these future leaders, are completely missing in recent times. The drive and necessity of social acceptance and the high sensitivity surrounding these topics renders the young mind extrem...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 9 of The Knowmads Podcast. 
Right before getting into the double digits of episodes we decided to do an ask us anything episode. Although we weren't able to answer all the questions that you guys had asked we answered ones that were most interesting and kind of captured many details in the questions that we missed. We would like to thank you all for the wonderful questions and support and we're truly grateful. We'll keep doing the ask us anything episodes since it is a great way to get feedback from our audience an...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 8 of The Knowmads Podcast. 
During the academic stages of our lives we spend most of our time developing tools and skills that aid our research and problem solving ability and this is true for all fields of study. Now most students think that this is it! This is how you can essentially get your dream position. 
Well what is often missed are the soft skills that are absolutely crucial to provide us that edge over others when applying for jobs. Our guest today is almost at the end of his PhD and...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 7 of The Knowmads Podcast. 
Every rational human has once in their life thought about the implications of porn on oneself and the society. Gail Dines, an anti-porn sociologist and professor at Wheelock college claims in her work that due to the adverse implications of pornography, it has become a public health issue and perhaps a solution is to enforce a complete ban on the porn industry. Our guest today Andrew Baldassarre is a philosopher and his current work is in response to this idea. He believes that it is important to acknowledge th...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 6 of The Knowmads Podcast. 
The path to self-exploration is very unique for everyone. Our passion, ambition and relationships play an instrumental role in shaping our lives. Our guest today found his true expression and self in literature. His humility and empathy allowed him to overcome all the challenges that life threw at him. With exploring literature, friendships, love, life and lots of laughter, this was one of the most heartfelt conversation in a very long time. 

P.S. This was an online podcast so the listener may experience some glitching onc...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 5 of The Knowmads Podcast. 
A lot of students all around the world
leave their home country and move to another
county to prsue higher education. We often
talk about their learnings and success but in
reality what goes behind all that enlightenment is mostly never talked about. Our guest today has a PhD in physics who left his country, his family
in Nepal, to pursue his career in the states.
Even though this journey was not ideal, his
sanguine nature lead him to where he is...

Hi Everyone, 
This is Episode 4 of The Knowmads Podcast. 
We all know PhD one complete adventure like none other. There exist factors that we don't know anything when we begin our PhD. You can never expect how drastically the research project, advisor and the overall situation can change. Our guest today faced all such challenges and it only made him more strong, mature and confident. 
From having material science as his primary interest he now works in the Quantum Gravity Group.  
Hope you enjoy the episode.  

xoxo 
The Knowmads 

Hi Everyone, 
This is EP3 of The Knowmads Podcast. 
In Life one finds it difficult to find what truly makes them happy. 
Our guest today is someone who did not have such a problem. He is a physics graduate student, but that's not how his journey began.  Caleb Broodo left his basketball career, his dream to play in the NBA and his engineering pursuit to pursue his other dream of becoming a physicist.
Hope you enjoy the episode.  

xoxo 
The Knowmads 

Hi Everyone, 
This is EP2 of The Knowmads Podcast. 
 Have you ever found yourself in a situation when you you're passionate about something, you love something and you've learn to appreciate it from a very very young age but then life happened. 
Our guest today did his undergrad in mechanical engineering and physics but had to make a circumstantial switch to the finance industry. He then spent more than six year and found his was back to physics. This is a fun, fascinating and a very exciting episode. We hope to inspire people in similar situations and...

Hi Everyone, 
This is EP1 of The Knowmads Podcast. 
 You've already seen our Vlogs and enjoyed our nomadic side. 
We have been planning to do this Podcast for a very long and finally we found the time to make it happen. We finally justify the 'Know' of Knowmads and we kickstart this podcast by addressing a common question that we always get: 
"How do you manage your relationship being in the same profession? How do you manage your personal and professional life? and much more.." 
We come out completely honest about what bothers us and ho...