Just breathe. Yes, you. Wow, you’re doing science. Student farmer Ella DeRosier asks our host what happens to the sugars we eat and Morty the Mitochondrion (UW–Madison BioCore Coordinator Daniel Parrell) talks about his job in the big cell, and our host talks about ATP (again). Then we take away the oxygen and see what kind of cool stuff we can make.

Botanist/mom Aisha Goodman convinces our host plants are so important they need a whole episode and biochemistry professor Chris Gisriel takes her on a tour of photosynthesis to learn about where plants get their matter. Things go a little haywire when the miniaturizer is broken and our host and her guest are flung backwards in time to learn why plants matter.

Welcome to Energy 101, the podcast where Wisconsin Energy Institute communications intern Nalina Cherr brings experts questions both nebulous and microscopic about energy and leaves with more than she came with. 

Our new podcast, Energy 101, is a truly unique and fun podcast that explores principles of energy through the lenses of chemistry, botany, and biology that blends science and creativity.

A fourth-year PhD student in biochemistry, Rose Lizzo studies proteins that regulate production of enzymes that enable a bacterium called Zymomonas mobilis to turn plant sugars into sustainable fuels and chemicals.

A team of international researchers led by the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center used alternate NMR methods to produce clearer pictures of molecular structures in lignin, a complex matrix of potentially-valuable molecules found in plant cell walls.

As a graduate researcher at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, Sydney Bradley studies microbiology in pursuit of better biofuels. But she’s not just interested in publishing her findings in scientific journals.