Abstract: Astro[sound]bites (A[s]b) is a biweekly podcast hosted by four astrophysics graduate students from academic institutions around the world. A[s]b aims to bring cutting-edge research normally hidden behind advanced concepts and specialized language to early-career scientists and the public. Each episode involves the co-hosts diving into two articles from our sister site, Astrobites - a group of roughly 100 graduate students who publish daily articles on modern astrophysics research. By exploring the methods, findings, and connections to the state of the field as a whole in an informative, approachable, and entertaining manner, the co-hosts lower barriers to the study and understanding of modern astrophysics. Each episode centers around a theme, ranging from planetary science to cosmology, and the podcast regularly employs interviews with academics at every career stage. The podcast also often tackles Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion issues in our “Beyond” episodes. Each episode contains a “space sound” segment where the co-hosts examine (and guess the source of) a sonification of astrophysical data, advancing the cause of alternate methods of analysis for visually impaired astronomers. Now running over 90 episodes, >24 thousand downloads, and entering its third generation of co-hosts, astro[sound]bites provides a crucial resource for auditory STEM learning that is freely accessible around the world. In this talk, we’ll introduce the podcast, the Astrobites format, our mission, and how the program has expanded over five years and will continue to develop in the future.
.jpg "Cole Meldorf (he/him/his) photo")
