Christopher Intagliata was Science Friday’s senior producer, which means he was chief cheerleader for all the radio and podcast projects. He helped to select and shape stories, or put them to a gentle death if necessary. He was also the coordinating producer for Science Friday’s live stage events around the nation, and has skated Olympic ice and served as a prop in an optical illusion for SciFri.
Christopher started at Science Friday as an intern in summer 2008, until the day Ira Flatow called him at home, triggering enormous anxiety about the latest script he’d written, to ask if he wanted to be a producer. His favorite stories usually involve microbes or food or both, but anything can pique his interest—other than ocean chemistry. Sorry.
He also reports regularly for Scientific American‘s “60-Second Science” podcast, and was a 2015 Woods Hole Ocean Science Journalism fellow. Prior to becoming a science journalist, he taught English to soldiers and bankers in Verona, Italy, and traversed the Sierra Nevada mountains as a field biologist, on the lookout for mountain yellow-legged frogs. He speaks fluent Italian, awkward Japanese, and passable Ira Flatowese.
He is now an editor for All Things Considered.
12:28
The Great Salt Lake Is An ‘Oasis’ For Migratory Birds
Ten million birds stop at Utah’s Great Salt Lake every year to feed, fatten up, and relax.
17:44
The Exotic Life Above The Forest Floor
For years, tree canopies were the last frontiers of the forest—until ecologist Nalini Nadkarni pioneered innovative ways to explore them, with hot air balloons and cranes.
12:28
Bringing Back An Endangered Crow
How researchers are working to save a nearly extinct Hawaiian crow, the ʻAlalā.
17:43
Endless Spiders And Snails Most Beautiful
A look at some of the unique biodiversity found in the Hawaiian islands, and efforts to preserve some species found nowhere else on Earth.
17:39
A Tiny Martian Colony, Here On Earth
Researchers sequester six volunteers on the side of a Hawaiian volcano to simulate a mission to Mars.
6:02
What Really Killed The Dinosaurs?
The prevailing theory says a meteorite led to the demise of the dinos. But one holdout scientist isn’t buying it.
34:32
How Strong Is The Human-Robot Bond?
Why we want to protect some robots and destroy others.
25:28
A Deep Ocean Dive Is Training NASA For Space
NASA is exploring a deep-sea volcano off the coast of Hawaii as a test run for human and robotic missions to Mars and beyond.
25:39
How A Humble Microbe Shook The Evolutionary Tree
The discovery that a methane-burping microbe was not a bacterium, added a new, third branch to the tree of life: The Archaea.
22:29
One Force Driving Deadlier Wildfires? People
A population boom in forests and other wild areas is leading to deadlier, more destructive blazes. How do we cope with worsening wildfires?