Every person reading this is participating in the same atmospheric experiment. The air you breathe in New York contains particles from wildfires in Canada, dust from the Sahara, and emissions from factories in China. We're all connected by the same thin layer of atmosphere that surrounds our planet.
The pollution crisis forces us to confront an uncomfortable truth: individual action alone won't save us from collective problems. You can buy the best air purifier money can buy, but you still have to breathe the same air as everyone else when you step outside.
Climate-Driven Wildfires are Reversing Clean Air Progress
Impacts of Aging and Relative Humidity on Properties of Biomass Burning Smoke Particles
The persistence of smoke VOCs indoors: Partitioning, surface cleaning, and air cleaning in a smoke-contaminated house
Anna Alari et al, Quantifying the short-term mortality effects of wildfire smoke in Europe: a multicountry epidemiological study in 654 contiguous regions, The Lancet Planetary Health (2025). DOI: 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101296
This is Heliox: Where Evidence Meets Empathy
Independent, moderated, timely, deep, gentle, clinical, global, and community conversations about things that matter. Breathe Easy, we go deep and lightly surface the big ideas.
Disclosure: This podcast uses AI-generated synthetic voices for a material portion of the audio content, in line with Apple Podcasts guidelines.
We make rigorous science accessible, accurate, and unforgettable.
Produced by Michelle Bruecker and Scott Bleackley, it features reviews of emerging research and ideas from leading thinkers, curated under our creative direction with AI assistance for voice, imagery, and composition. Systemic voices and illustrative images of people are representative tools, not depictions of specific individuals.
We dive deep into peer-reviewed research, pre-prints, and major scientific works—then bring them to life through the stories of the researchers themselves. Complex ideas become clear. Obscure discoveries become conversation starters. And you walk away understanding not just what scientists discovered, but why it matters and how they got there.
Independent, moderated, timely, deep, gentle, clinical, global, and community conversations about things that matter. Breathe Easy, we go deep and lightly surface the big ideas.
Spoken word, short and sweet, with rhythm and a catchy beat.
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