In high school, Jamie Harvey wanted to be a scientist.

Then they discovered that science is a ruthless, cutthroat game and decided to be a humanities major instead.

But they say once you fall in love with science, you can never truly lose that spark. So they decided to combine their passion for science and their journalism and sociology skills to produce “Modern Memetics,” a podcast about the scientific words and phrases that inhabit the public consciousness.

In this episode, Jamie asks and answers the questions, why do so many people remember the phrase the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell? Is it true? What does it mean? Journalist and total dweeb Jamie Harvey chats with mitochondrial biologist Song-Young Park, doctoral candidate Liz Pekas, and Tumblr expert Juliet Clark to find answers to all these questions and more in this flagship episode of Modern Memetics.

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