Physics World Weekly Podcast

This episode of the Physics World Weekly podcast features Todd McNutt, who is a medical physicist at Johns Hopkins University and the founder of Oncospace. In a conversation with Physics World’s Tami Freeman, McNutt explains how an artificial intelligence-based tool called Plan AI can help improve the quality of radiation therapy plans for cancer treatments.

As well as discussing the benefits that Plan AI brings to radiotherapy patients and cancer treatment centres, they examine its evolution from an idea developed by an academic collaboration to a clinical product offered today by Sun Nuclear, a US manufacturer of radiation equipment and software.

This podcast is sponsored by Sun Nuclear.

This episode of the Physics World Weekly podcast features a conversation with the plasma physicist Debbie Callahan who is chief strategy officer at Focused Energy – a California and Germany based fusion-energy startup. Prior to that she spent 35 years working at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the US.

Focused Energy is developing a commercial system for generating energy from the laser-driven fusion of hydrogen isotopes. Callahan describes LightHouse, which is the company’s design for a laser-fusion power plant, and Pearl, which is the firm’s deuterium–tritium fuel capsule.

Callahan talks about the challenges and rewards of working in the fusion industry and also calls on early-career physicists to consider careers in this burgeoning sector.

This episode of the Physics World Weekly podcast features a conversation with Tim Prior and John Devaney of the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), which is the UK’s national metrology institute.

Prior is NPL’s quantum programme manager and Devaney is its quantum standards manager. They talk about NPL’s central role in the recent launch of NMI-Q, which brings together some of the world’s leading national metrology institutes to accelerate the development and adoption of quantum technologies.

Prior and Devaney describe the challenges and opportunities of developing metrology and standards for rapidly evolving technologies including quantum sensors, quantum computing and quantum cryptography. They talk about the importance of NPL’s collaborations with industry and academia and explore the diverse career opportunities for physicists at NPL. Prior and Devaney also talk about their own careers and share their enthusiasm for working in the cutting-edge and fast-paced field of quantum metrology.

This podcast is sponsored by the National Physical Laboratory.

Further reading

Why quantum metrology is the driving force for best practice in quantum standardization

Performance metrics and benchmarks point the way to practical quantum advantage

End note: NPL retains copyright on this article.

This episode of the Physics World Weekly podcast features Alex May, whose research explores the intersection of quantum gravity and quantum information theory. Based at Canada’s Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, May explains how ideas being developed in the burgeoning field of quantum information theory could help solve one of the most enduring mysteries in physics – how to reconcile quantum mechanics with Einstein’s general theory of relativity, creating a viable theory of quantum gravity.

This interview was recorded in autumn 2025 when I had the pleasure of visiting the Perimeter Institute and speaking to four physicists about their research. This is the last of those conversations to appear on the podcast.

The first interview in this series from the Perimeter Institute was with Javier Toledo-Marín, “Quantum computing and AI join forces for particle physics”; the second was with Bianca Dittrich, “Quantum gravity: we explore spin foams and other potential solutions to this enduring challenge“; and the third was with Tim Hsieh, “Building a quantum future using topological phases of matter and error correction”.

This episode of the Physics World Weekly podcast features Pat Hanrahan, who studied nuclear engineering and biophysics before becoming a founding employee of Pixar Animation Studios. As well as winning three Academy Awards for his work on computer animation, Hanrahan won the Association for Computing Machinery’s A M Turing Award for his contributions to 3D computer graphics, or CGI.

Earlier this year, Hanrahan spoke to Physics World’s Margaret Harris at the Heidelberg Laureate Forum in Germany. He explains how he was introduced to computer graphics by his need to visualize the results of computer simulations of nervous systems. That initial interest led him to Pixar and his development of physically-based rendering, which uses the principles of physics to create realistic images.

Hanrahan explains that light interacts with different materials in very different ways, making detailed animations very challenging. Indeed, he says that creating realistic looking skin is particularly difficult – comparing it to the quest for a grand unified theory in physics.

He also talks about how having a background in physics has helped his career – citing his physicist’s knack for creating good models and then using them to solve problems.