Oceanside student’s podcast ‘questions the world’

An Oceanside student has taken a passion project to a whole new level. Fifteen-year-old Ariella Rukhlin began a podcast last spring with the goal to tackle some of life’s most interesting scientific questions.

Rukhlin’s podcast, entitled “Chit-Chatting and Questioning the World,” incorporates her passion for science and curiosity about the world. She was able to launch her podcast after her teacher, Talia Madden, gave her students a unique opportunity to explore what they love the most.

“I started the podcast last year, around March as a part of a passion project Ms. Madden started, where we could do anything we’re passionate about for a month in our class,” said Rukhlin. “I didn’t want to take it as a joke.”

She explained that her podcast was born because, “I’m curious about random things. It’s always hard for me to find something specific that I want to focus on. I had the idea of doing this podcast where I would interview people and talk about random things. At first, it sounds arbitrary but then I got into the groove of it.”

Rukhlin’s podcast comes out every month with a new episode on the third Wednesday of each month, giving her time to balance school and plan each episode and to book guests. So far, she has booked a host of unique talent, including the drummer for singer Adele, Derrick Wright, and senior vice president of the San Diego Padres, Tom Seidler.

“I interview people of different professions and my main topics are scientific phenomenons, like genetic engineering or optogenetics and I also talk to people and interview them about their lives and what they do for their jobs,” said Rukhlin. “I’ve gotten to interview really incredible people… I really liked Adele and I wanted to learn about the magic behind her performances. There’s a lot of work that goes into it that her drummer puts in, and he explains that in the episode.

“Tom Seidler talked about his experience of running that whole business with the Padres,” she added. “I got to interview a geneticist and we talked about genetic modification and CRISPR, a powerful tool for editing genomes.”

Last month’s episode, she said, featured Edward Boyden, who pioneered optogenetics and expansion spectroscopy, expanding the brain to see neurons and proteins responsible for Alzheimer’s Disease and blindness. “In that episode, we talked about how blindness was reversed in a man using expansion spectroscopy and optogenetics,” she said. “One of my favorite episodes was The Fermi Paradox, which is the phenomenon that there might be aliens out in space. That was the first one that was a big hit that I did with my uncle.”

Rukhlin’s podcast has an audience of 730 listeners, and although she’s only 15, the mature and complex topics she discusses with her guests draw an audience ranging from 15 to 30 years old. With episodes posted monthly, Rukhlin keeps her listeners engaged with posts on her social media accounts, such as Snapchat, Instagram, TikTok and Youtube, where she includes podcast clips and random interesting facts.

Rukhlin explained some of the hesitancy she had when she started podcasting and the people that inspired her to continue, as well as other podcasts that inspire her to continue.

“Miss Madden and her husband, who is my guidance counselor, are a huge inspiration,” she said. “I was a little nervous, and they encouraged me to keep going.”

“I look up people that are interested in the topic that I’m going to do and research about them in advance. I find their Instagram and their email and send them a personalized message, introducing myself as a high school student that’s curious and interested in random things. At first, I didn’t do that because I thought that would be a disadvantage. People who are famous get tons of requests for interviews. But if anything, it has been an advantage because they’re used to getting these emails, but not from a high schooler and that increased the number of people who answered me.”

Rukhlin does all the preparation for her podcast herself and recently hired an editor to help her. Although Rukhlin makes some money from her podcast, she said there’s more to it than just the money. “I would love for more people to listen because I feel a lot of people my age are curious about random things. Creativity can help you in so many different ways. My uncle told me to make sure I stay curious because he said there are so many jobs requiring curiosity which is what my podcast is all about. My slogan is to ‘Stay curious.’ I want to grow my platform because I want other people to learn.”

Rukhlin’s podcast, “Chit-Chatting and Questioning the World,” can be found on Spotify and Apple Podcasts with 12 episodes currently posted.