Middle schooler, Aanya, has an up-close encounter with a squirrel in the school yard, which leads her to an obsession with one of North America's most common critters. She tells host Lulu Miller all about the overlooked superpowers of squirrels, including one squirrel who lives way up in the Arctic, where the weather gets so cold the squirrels who live there drop their body temperatures down below freezing and somehow, miraculously, survive.

Host Lulu travels to Alaska to meet one of these squirrels as it sleeps, and Lulu talks with biologists Dr. Kelly Drew and Dr. Brian Barnes about why this humble squirrel holds potential for treating Alzheimers, brain injury, and even helping astronauts hibernate on the long journey to Mars.

Check out the making of this episode here! Video by Amy Pearl.

This episode features a song with a cameo from Chicago-based musician Tasha. Check out our songs page for 'On The Other Side (ft. Tasha)' and more new singles every week.

Special thanks to Aanya and her mom Roli for bringing us this story, and to Amy Loeffler, Clara Goulet, Loi Goulet, Ellie Bell and Ferris Jabr, the writer who first made the “pop-squirrel" joke. We came across it in a wonderful article he wrote in Scientific American. Also, check out this Wired article by Brendan I. Koerner for more on arctic ground squirrels.

Terrestrials was created by Lulu Miller with WNYC Studios. This episode was produced by Ana González, Mira Burt-Wintonick, Alan Goffinski, Joe Plourde and Lulu Miller, with help from Tanya Chawla, Sarah Sandback and Valentina Powers. Fact checking by Natalie Middleton. Transcription by Caleb Codding.

Our advisors are Ana Luz Porzecanski, Andy J. Pizza, Anil Lewis, Dominique Shabazz, Liza Demby, Princess Daazhraii Johnson and Tara Welty.

Learn more about storytellers, listen to music, and dig deeper into the stories you hear on Terrestrials with activities you can do at home or in the classroom on our website, Terrestrialspodcast.org.

Badger us on social media: @radiolab and #TerrestrialsPodcast or by emailing us at terrestrials@wnyc.org.

Visit the Terrestrials website to learn more about the show, meet our team, listen to the songs and discover fun activities, drawing prompts, music how-tos and games that educators, parents and families might enjoy together.

If you’d like to “badger” a future expert, suggest story ideas or feedback, email us at terrestrials@wnyc.org.

Listen to just the songs from Terrestrials.

Sign up for Radiolab’s newsletter! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up here.

Radiolab for Kids and Terrestrials are supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab today.

Follow Radiolab on Instagram, X and Facebook @radiolab.

Support for Terrestrials is provided by the Simons Foundation, the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, the Kalliopeia Foundation and the John Templeton Foundation.

As dead as they seem, tree stumps are hubs of life and relationships. From stumps to snags, deadwood provides habitat for rodents, falcons, insects, and even humans! Stumps hold together the forest floor, give hunting perches to birds of prey in flatlands, prevent erosion and the encroachment of invasive species, usher in sunlight, provide nutrients, can be wells of renewable fuel, and hold onto stories human beings might have forgotten. Without these ghosts of trees past, nothing would be the same. Scottish author, artist and lover of tree stumps, Dr. Amanda Thomson, leads host Lulu Miller on a “tour de stumps,” a journey across space and time to learn about some of the most magical stumps on the planet. We learn how these overlooked dead things actually sustain the living.

For more, check out:

• Bob Dolgan’s documentary about Tyler Funk and “The Magic Stump.”
• Amanda Thomson’s book “Belonging: Natural histories of place, identity and home.”

Terrestrials was created by Lulu Miller with WNYC Studios. This episode was produced by Ana González, Mira Burt-Wintonick, Alan Goffinski, Joe Plourde and Lulu Miller, with help from Tanya Chawla, Sarah Sandback and Valentina Powers. Fact checking by Natalie Middleton. Transcription by Caleb Codding.

Our advisors are Ana Luz Porzecanski, Andy J. Pizza, Anil Lewis, Dominique Shabazz, Liza Demby, Princess Daazhraii Johnson and Tara Welty.

Learn more about storytellers, listen to music, and dig deeper into the stories you hear on Terrestrials with activities you can do at home or in the classroom on our website, Terrestrialspodcast.org.

Badger us on social media: @radiolab and #TerrestrialsPodcast or by emailing us at terrestrials@wnyc.org.

Visit the Terrestrials website to learn more about the show, meet our team, listen to the songs and discover fun activities, drawing prompts, music how-tos and games that educators, parents and families might enjoy together.

If you’d like to “badger” a future expert, suggest story ideas or feedback, email us at terrestrials@wnyc.org.

Listen to just the songs from Terrestrials.

Sign up for Radiolab’s newsletter! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up here.

Radiolab for Kids and Terrestrials are supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab today.

Follow Radiolab on Instagram, X and Facebook @radiolab.

Support for Terrestrials is provided by the Simons Foundation, the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, the Kalliopeia Foundation and the John Templeton Foundation.

Terrestrials is Radiolab's spin-off nature show for families and for people of all ages that explores the strangeness that exists right here on Earth. Each episode feels like a fairytale that is 100% true. Host Lulu Miller (co-host of Radiolab) leads you on a nature walk to encounter incredible creatures, wild storytellers, and original songs from "The Songbud" Alan Goffinski. That's right! We sing on this show; don't worry, good voices not required. Listen in with your whole family. Or all alone.

This season, we are tackling the overlooked – the treasures, secrets, and wildness waiting right underneath our noses. From tree stumps, to lichen, to humble squirrels that fade into the background so easily. When you look close at the creatures we usually ignore, you’ll find all kinds of secrets hidden inside.

Terrestrials welcomes entomologist Dr. Sammy Ramsey as the show’s official “Bug Correspondent.” The show’s “Songbud,” composer Alan Goffinski, returns with new songs featuring guest performances from Laura Jane Grace, Tasha, Timbre and Mike Kinsella of American Football. Over the course of the season, Lulu Miller talks to poets, painters, NASA scientists, Indigenous bee hunters, 11-year old skaters, arctic biologists, and “The Badgers” — a panel of kids who badger experts with their pressing questions.

The seven-episode season begins on Sept. 19 in the Radiolab for Kids podcast feed. Episodes come out every Thursday.

Visit the Terrestrials website to learn more about the show, meet our team, listen to the songs and discover fun activities, drawing prompts, music how-tos and games that educators, parents and families might enjoy together.

If you’d like to “badger” a future expert, suggest story ideas or feedback, email us at terrestrials@wnyc.org.

Listen to just the songs from Terrestrials.

Sign up for Radiolab’s newsletter! It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up here.

Radiolab for Kids and Terrestrials are supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab today.

Follow Radiolab on Instagram, X and Facebook @radiolab.

Support for Terrestrials is provided by the Simons Foundation, the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, the Kalliopeia Foundation and the John Templeton Foundation.