Atomic Radio

This episode is about dramatically magnified molecules – specifically, it’s about molecular forms that have been translated into architectures that dwarf the human body. We hear from cultural historian Celeste Olalquiaga on the ruin of a helical mall in Caracas, Venezuela, and the historian of science Soraya de Chadarevian illuminates the fantastical molecular forms broadcast on television during the Cold War. For this week’s show we’ve also created our own molecular architecture – one perceivable only through sound. It’s a virtual reverb space build by ATOMIC radio sound designer Sam Conran, inspired by the model below of a molecule of a sperm whale’s myoglobin, a protein found in the whale’s muscle tissue. Inside this myoglobin molecule we stage a new radio play written just for this molecular sound space by the writer Daniel Marrone, performed by Janina Lange and Edwina Attlee. Find out more about this episode at http://atomicradio.org.