Gradcast Radio

Episode 561 | Popping the Bubble: International Experiences at Western

In this week’s episode, Anthony Cruz and Maris Schneider are joined by our newly reappointed international commissioner, Lucas Ferreira Marques dos Santos. Lucas is a PhD candidate in the Department of Chemistry, but today he is telling us all about his experience moving to Canada, conducting research as an international student, and sharing the exciting new opportunities he pours his heart and soul into to help make Western a welcoming community for all. Tune in and get ready to think about how your soul is doing!

Listen to Lucas’ episode at the link in our bio!

Episode 559 | : Feminism and the Digital Hispanosphere

In this week’s episode, hosts Chrishma Perera and Mark Ambrogio interview Pilar Rodriguez Mata, a PhD Student in Digital Humanities and Hispanic Studies. Pilar is studying Spanish-language tweets written from 2009 to 2022. Rooted in the humanities, Pilar studies the digital form, utilizing coding – to study the more than 3.5 million tweets she collected, with a focus on learning what enormous amounts of data can tell us about feminism in the Spanish-speaking world.

Chrishma and Mark talk with Pilar about what brought her to Western, her journey learning computational tools for her research, and how therapeutic music and reading can be for graduate students.

Episode 558 | How do we think about cells? There isn’t one right way

Doing science is never about a single approach. Join hosts Bruno Mesquita and Rafaela Platkin as they chat with guest Camdyn Holmes, a MSc student in Biochemistry whose research compares two different approaches in examining what makes us human.

Most people know that our DNA is an important part of who we are, but not all genes are active everywhere in our body. How do scientists study and measure the different ways our genes express throughout our cells?

Listen to Camdyn’s episode at the link in our bio!

Episode 552 | Understanding the Abstract & Each Other: How Mentalizing Shapes the Way We Think

In this week’s episode, PhD student Hannah Corenblum joins hosts Rafaela Platkin and Spencer Schmitz to talk about her research on abstract mental state concepts. Hannah is interested in understanding the individual differences in mentalizing abilities and how these relate to people’s capacities to process cognitive concepts. Mentalizing is the ability to understand one’s own and others’ mental states.

Hannah hopes her clinical research will help improve how mentalization is measured, with the goal of identifying impairments and developing ways to better target and treat them across a wide range of clinical populations.

Listen to Hannah’s episode at the link in our bio!