A video podcast

Two Penn students simplify the work of the smartest people in the world.

And explain how you can use it to make your own life better.

Hosted by Aly Bazzi and Mo Alkhayyat

first episode, late October 2026

Penn does some of the best research in the world. Almost none of it reaches you.

The people teaching us are among the best in the world at what they do. But their work almost never reaches a normal person, because it lives in journals written for other academics.

Aly with a coffee and Mo with a tablet, sitting back to back on the floor. — “I tried reading their papers. I couldn’t follow them.”Mo, on why we started the show

So we pull one piece of research apart on camera, until it makes sense.

Here’s how that goes, using a real Penn sleep study.

Abstract

We examined the effects of continuous broadband acoustic stimulation on polysomnographic sleep architecture in healthy adults (N = 25) across seven consecutive nights. Exposure to pink noise at 50 dB was associated with a significant reduction in rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. Earplug use attenuated noise-related losses of slow-wave sleep.

Sleeping with steady noise like rain sounds cost people about 19 minutes of dream sleep a night.

One thing to try:if you need noise to fall asleep, try earplugs for a week instead, and see how you feel.

Aly, drawn as a cartoon, holding a microphone — Aly asks the blunt questionSo should I turn my noise machine off tonight?

Mo, drawn as a cartoon, hands in his hoodie pocket — Mo asks the simple oneHang on. What even is REM sleep?

Example built from a real Penn Medicine sleep study, published in February 2026. The abstract is our own rewrite in journal style, and none of this is medical advice.

Aly asks the blunt question. Mo asks the simple one.

Between the two of us, a guest can’t hide behind their own vocabulary.

Aly Bazzi: He asks what nobody else will, and he’s funny while he does it. He gets answers out of people that a polite interviewer never would.
Mo Alkhayyat: If a ten-year-old couldn’t follow the answer, he asks it again.

More about us

Aly playfully landing a boxing glove on Mo’s cheek.

Professors whose work would change how you live, and who will argue back.

Open one to see the questions we’d ask.

Sleep scienceThe sleep scientist whose study found that the rain sounds you fall asleep to can cost you dream sleep.
Aly would ask“Should I turn my noise machine off tonight?”
Mo would ask“What is dream sleep, and why does losing some of it matter?”
SociologyThe sociologist who drove a truck for six months to find out who really employs Amazon’s drivers.
Aly would ask“So who is my Amazon driver’s actual boss?”
Mo would ask“What does it mean to be someone’s employer?”
Medical ethicsThe doctor who wrote that he wants to die at 75. He’s 69 now, and he still means it.
Aly would ask“Do you still mean it, now that 75 is six years away?”
Mo would ask“Why 75, and not 80 or 90?”

Episode ideas from our own research files, September 2026. Nobody is booked yet.

See all 5 ideas

Pull up a chair.

The empty one in the middle is for the people we interview. There are a few other ways in, too.

Aly and Mo standing either side of an empty director’s chair with two microphones, inviting someone to sit.