Further Together the ORAU Podcast
Join your host Michael Holtz as he discuss all things ORAU, through interviews with our experts who provide innovative scientific and technical solutions for our customers. Michael and his guests will talk about ORAU’s storied history, how we’re impacting an ever-changing world, as well as our commitment to our community.
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Recent Episodes
Searching for the origins of life one RNA molecule at a time: A conversation with Alberto Vazquez-Salazar, Ph.D.
Alberto Vazquez-Salazar, PhD, is a NASA postdoctoral fellow working at UCLA in the lab of Professor Irene Chen. He studies how life may have started on Earth by focusing on a molecule called RNA, or ribonucleic acid, which is a critical molecule that exists in all living things. His work is a part of astrobiology that explores how life began on Earth and how we might find signs of life elsewhere in the universe. In this episode of Further Together, Vazquez-Salazar talks to host Michael Holtz about how science has always seemed to be part of his life. Growing up in Mexico City, his mom, a botanist, kept books and plant specimens everywhere. “Science was just part of everyday life,” he says. “It was as normal as finding cereal in the pantry.” Listen to learn more about Vazquez-Salazar’s journey to NASA. To learn more about the NASA Postdoctoral Program and when applications open, visit https://npp.orau.org/index.html
Making America healthy again will take all of us: A conversation with Brenda Blunt, senior director of health policy
Brenda Blunt, ORAU senior director of health policy, is passionate about the connections between nutrition and both physical and mental health. She is a mom, grandmother, wife, nurse, primal health coach, farmer and policy wonk. Blunt says all of those roles together make health and how we can better care for ourselves important to her. As Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., the Secretary of Health and Human Services, rolls out his plan to Make America Healthy Again, much of the focus is on the role of better nutrition and its connection to health. Blunt was MAHA before it was cool, and often leans into the teachings of Florence Nightingale, who advocated for a holistic view of health that emphasized the importance of fresh air, clean water, efficient drainage, cleanliness of patients and care areas, and sunlight. In this conversation, Blunt and hosts Michael Holtz and Matthew Underwood discuss how we got to being one of the richest countries in the world and one of the least healthy, how we didn’t get here overnight, how government agencies can work together to help Americans make better choices, and how we can individually and collectively take steps to make ourselves and the country healthier.
So much left to discover: A conversation with Ben Hord, PhD, NASA Postdoctoral Fellow
Looking up at the night sky can make anyone feel small, but for Ben Hord, Ph.D., a NASA Postdoctoral Program Fellow, looking at the sky is also a reminder of how much there is left to discover, and how many people can be part of that journey. Hord is in his second year of his Fellowship, working on the Pandora SmallSat mission. Set to launch in fall 2025, Pandora will study at least 20 exoplanets, planets outside our solar system, and their stars to figure out what their atmospheres are made of. In this episode of Further Together, Hord discusses his research, his career trajectory, how he became a scientist and more. To learn more about the NASA Postdoctoral Program and when applications open, visit https://npp.orau.org/index.html
Science and art are two sides of the same coin: Ali Hyder, Ph.D., NASA Postdoctoral Fellow
Ali Hyder, Ph.D., was raised in a family of artists and is himself a musician, which seems a far cry from his research modeling the hydrodynamics of the surfaceless planet Jupiter but he believes art and science fuel each other. Science is also art because you have to be creative in a specific way, he says in this interview for Further Together: The ORAU Podcast. Hyder takes a deep dive into why modeling Jupiter's hydrodynamics is important for better understanding Earth, as well as how he became interested in science and the NASA Postdoctoral Fellowship Program. To learn more about the NASA Postdoctoral Fellowship and to apply for the next application cycle, visit https://npp.orau.org/
Extreme humidity events and how to better prepare for them: A NASA Postdoctoral Fellowship conversation
Casey Ivanovich, Ph.D., is a NASA Postdoctoral Fellow studying extreme humid heat, particularly focused on the dynamics of where events happen and why they happen across the globe. These dynamics are very different from extreme dry heat events, she says, and she is really trying to understand why they come about and how we can better prepare for them. Ivanovich talked about her research with guest host Bryan Campbell. Together they talk about the early days of Ivanovich's fellowship, how she became interested in science, the trajectory of her career, and much more. To learn more about the NASA Postdoctoral Fellowship Program, visit https://npp.orau.org/
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