OU Tulsa's Chad Johnson joins Matt Smith and Brian Cross to go tripping through the doors of perception as the team takes on the therapeutic use of psychedelics and the sometimes-tricky line between "psychedelic scientist" and "spiritual guru." Also, Matt gets in touch with his alchemical roots as he dephlogisticates the element oxygen. In the headlines, Moas rear their lofty heads, the Parker Solar Probe catches the solar wind, and scientists attempt to fix the "Matthew Effect."
Got a question, comment, or correction? Yack right back at us at YacketyScience@gmail.com.
Theme music: “Funky Machine” (ID874) by Lobo Loco (Accessed through FreeMusicArchive.org.; CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
Production help provided by Public Radio Tulsa's Scott Gregory.
Yackety Science is recorded at the studios of Public Radio Tulsa, Kendall Hall, University of Tulsa, and at the Center for Creativity at Tulsa Community College.
(Bio for our Guest Host: Dr. Chad Johnson is an Associate Professor in the Clinical Mental Health Counseling program at the University of Oklahoma and a Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the OU College of Medicine. He earned his Ph.D. in psychology from Penn State and completed his psychology internship at Vanderbilt University. He's a licensed psychologist with over 20 years of experience in psychotherapy, consultation, training, supervision, research, and teaching. Johnson's work centers on themes of personal and spiritual growth, psychedelics, grief, trauma, and advocacy.)
Links for this episode:
Psychedelics —
Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies
The emergence of psychedelics as medicine (APA; June 1, 2024)
https://www.apa.org/monitor/2024/06/psychedelics-as-medicine
Moas —
Effort to revive New Zealand’s extinct moa stirs controversy (Science; July 11, 2025)
https://www.science.org/content/article/effort-revive-new-zealand-s-extinct-moa-stirs-controversy
TRNS and Boosting Math Skill
Functional connectivity and GABAergic signaling modulate the enhancement effect of neurostimulation on mathematical learning
(PLOS; July 1, 2025)
https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pbio.3003200
Parker Solar Probe and Solar Wind —
NASA’s Parker Solar Probe Snaps Closest-Ever Images to Sun (Jul 10, 2025)