Danni Washington - Apple Podcasts

The Genius Generation

The Genius Generation

Seeker and TRAX from PRX

08/11/2022

Tavish Sharma

After witnessing a mismatch in food bank donations — massive lines at one, and barely any supply at others — Tavish Sharma created Solve Hunger (https://www.solvehungercorp.org/). His app aims to address food shortages and rally communities around their local food banks, and it’s already recruited over 60 food banks, pantries, and soup kitchens.

15 min
03/22/2022

Science Pioneers with Danni Washington

Who proved the existence of dark matter? On this episode, Neil deGrasse Tyson and comic co-host Chuck Nice learn about hidden figures of science you need to know about with author and science communicator Danni Washington. NOTE: StarTalk+ Patrons can watch or listen to this entire episode commercial-free here: https://www.startalkradio.net/show/science-pioneers-with-danni-washington/ Thanks to our Patrons Robert Anderson, Meagan Patrice, cael maurer, Marc-Anthony Serrano, Emily McKnight, Dave Fulton, lily_neko739, Josh Wyner, Tyler Mutchie, and Vanefede for supporting us this week. Photo Credit: Acagastya, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ to listen to new episodes of StarTalk Radio ad-free and a whole week early.Start a free trial now on Apple Podcasts or by visiting siriusxm.com/podcastsplus. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

50 min
06/23/2022

Angela Zhan

What if there were a way to biodegrade plastic, instead of having it collect in landfills and pollute oceans? Angela Zhan discovered bacteria that can do just that. The microscopic organisms that she found naturally eat up plastic, turning it into much more environmentally friendly products. Next, she’s scaling up her experiments from lab beakers to an entire bioreactor.

12 min
04/08/2021

Neil Suri

When 16-year-old Neil Suri went on a hiking trip to California, he witnessed firsthand the devastation caused by forest fires. The image of the charred mountainside inspired him to look deeper into wildfires - how they start, and how they burn out of control. Through his research, Neil discovered the way we detect forest fires hasn’t changed all that much over the years. And that traditional methods are expensive and out of date. So Neil got to work and invented a completely new, affordable way to detect forest fires - before they get out of control. It’s called FireWatch and it’s amazing.

12 min
04/10/2025

Get to Know Danni Washington

Meet science communicator Danni Washington, who brought us the story of environmental activist Xiye Bastida. Danni shares her love of the sea and how she began her science career. And tells the story of meeting Xiye in person at a climate march. This podcast is a production of Rebel Girls. It’s based on the book series Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls. This episode was produced by Isaac Kaplan-Woolner, with sound design and mixing by John Marshall Media. Our executive producers were Katie Sprenger and Jes Wolfe. Original theme music was composed and performed by Elettra Bargiacchi. A special thanks to the Danni Washington and the whole Rebel Girls team, who made this podcast possible. Until next time, stay rebel! [This episode originally aired on April 20, 2021]

8 min
06/02/2022

Jonathan Tamen

Jonathan Tamen wants to be an upstander and not a bystander, and so far, he’s succeeding. He and his twin brother founded Helping Hands MB (https://www.helpinghandsmb.org/), a nonprofit whose mission is to change children’s lives through 3D-printed prosthetic limbs. After extensive quality checks, their first shipment of prosthetics is on its way to Haiti.

16 min
03/25/2021

Anisha Musti

15-year-old Anisha Musti isn’t your average teenager. After she lost her great-uncle to Parkinson’s disease, she was inspired to do something to help others. Using the power of quantum computing, Anisha created a revolutionary technique to detect Parkinson’s disease based solely on the sound of a person’s voice. Now, Anisha runs a non-profit organization whose mission is to teach young people about the power of quantum computing. You can learn all about it at qmunity.tech.

10 min
07/07/2022

Ela Gokcigdem

A concussion left Ela Gokcigdem with time on her hands and plenty of ideas. Drawing from white noise therapy that helped her recover, she designed ePearl Technologies, a wireless, noise-canceling pair of earbuds made from recyclable materials. Since then, she’s become involved in climate activism and documentary filmmaking.

12 min
07/28/2022

Neil Deshmukh

Neil Deshmukh learned the hard way that building trust with a community is crucial to an invention’s success. He developed PlantumAI (https://www.neildeshmukh.com/plantumai) to help farmers in India connect with researchers at agricultural universities to diagnose and treat plant diseases. His app has now detected disease in over 3,000 plants and saved countless farmers’ crops.

12 min
03/11/2021

The Genius Generation Trailer

Have you ever wondered what it would feel like to change the world? From creating a robot that can sniff out plastic in the ocean to coding an algorithm that detects Parkinson's disease, our host Danni Washington sits down with inventors, entrepreneurs, and explorers to hear the stories behind their amazing discoveries. Oh, and there’s one more thing: they accomplished all of this before they turned 18. You’re never too young to change the world. New episodes every Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts.

1 min
07/14/2022

Samyak Shrimali

Hand-washing is an easy way to prevent the spread of germs, but many people (even doctors!) aren’t doing it correctly. Samyak Shrimali created Sanjeevani, a system to solve this problem in hospitals. Sanjeevani combines sensors and a computer model to track whether health care workers wash their hands according to World Health Organization guidelines.

13 min
07/21/2022

Khloe Thompson

Khloe Thompson is an expert at giving back. As the founder of Khloe Kares (https://www.khloekares.com/), she has given out basic resources to people experiencing homelessness since she was 8. She is also the designer of PeachTree Pads, which are sustainable and eco-friendly menstrual pads.

12 min
06/24/2021

Anna Du

For as long as she can remember, 14-year-old Anna Du has had a deep love for the ocean. One day while collecting sea glass, Anna had an epiphany about how much plastic was polluting it. And she got to work. Since her realization Anna has developed an underwater robot that can detect microplastics deep in the ocean, started developing a model to predict where plastic pollution will occur, and written a book about her journey. Did we mention she’s 14?

13 min
06/10/2021

Adithi Raghavan

At just 16 years old Adithi Raghavan founded her organization BEEducated (https://www.thebeeducated.org/) when she learned just how serious the plight of the honeybee is (their populations are declining sharply). Through BEEducated, Adithi has created “The Million Pollinator Garden Challenge” to empower young people all over the country to create bee-friendly gardens in their very own backyards using kits that Adithi and her team send out.

12 min
07/15/2021

Peter Gordon

Peter was a freshman in high school when he learned that monarch butterflies are disappearing at an alarming rate, so he decided to act. He formed an organization called Homes4Monarchs (https://homes4monarchs.wixsite.com/milkweed) which has distributed 10s of 10,000s of milkweed seed packets all around his native city of Chicago. If you've never heard of milkweed, that’s okay. The one thing you need to know is that it's essential to the survival of the species.

13 min
05/06/2021

Zachary Siegel

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit and schools closed, high school junior Zachary Siegel found himself with a lot more time on his hands. He used that free time to explore his passions (like computer programming), but quickly realized this was also an opportunity to share his passions with others. So he founded The Youth Passion Project (https://www.youthpassionproject.org/). It’s a platform for high school students to teach classes to young learners about the things they are most passionate about. The classes are completely free and cover a huge variety of topics from video game design to philosophy to Bollywood dance. Since its founding in March of 2020, Zach’s organization has grown exponentially, with thousands of students enrolled and chapters across the US, Canada, and South Korea!

13 min
08/05/2021

Anugreh Sehtya

Anugreh, at just 17 years old founded a technology company called Hybrid Idea to solve some of the problems he saw in his home country of India. But his company isn’t just dedicated to one interest. Everything from visual impairment to autism to clean water, Anugreh has taken them all on.

10 min
07/29/2021

Emily and Kyle Tianshi

Emily and Kyle are a brother and sister duo who founded an environmental advocacy organization called Clear Water Innovation (https://www.clearwaterinnovation.org/) that’s dedicated to solving the global water crisis. Through their organization, they encourage young people to solve environmental problems. Emily and Kyle are also quite the pair of scientists and conduct experiments out of their own garage science lab.

13 min
05/26/2022

Sarah Park

When 14-year-old Sarah Park moved a close family member to tears by playing the violin for them, she realized the huge potential that music can have on a person’s emotions. She created Spark Care+ (https://www.thesparkcare.com/) to harness the healing power of music therapy and create personalized experiences powered by artificial intelligence.

13 min
08/04/2022

Emily Flores

Representation matters to Emily Flores. She founded Cripple Media (https://cripplemedia.com/) to train and uplift young, disabled journalists. She and her staff mythbust misconceptions, call out ableism, and write about the issues they care about most.

12 min

Danni Washington on Apple