This episode is all about Chile Peppers! I traveled to southern New Mexico to the Chile Pepper institute at New Mexico State University. I talk with Danise Coons and Dr. Denise Lozada who are two researchers with the institute. In the episode we discuss the origins of Chile Peppers, the factors that affect Chile pepper production, the Scoville scale to measure the heat of peppers, mechanization of agricultural functions, multi omics, methods to improve pepper yields and the best dishes that go with Chile peppers. I hope you enjoy!

VIDEO:

Pepper X: Sean Evans, Chili Klaus & Smokin' Ed Currie Eat the New World's Hottest Pepper | Hot Ones: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUYtDA7j19c

PAPERS:

Diversification of chiles (Capsicum, Solanaceae) through time and space: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9622771/

Chile Consumers and Their Preferences Toward Region of Production-Certified Chile Peppers: https://pubs.nmsu.edu/research/economics/RR790/

Chile Pepper (Capsicum) Breeding and Improvement in the "Multi-Omics" Era: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35592583/

ARTICLES:Scoville scale: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scoville_scaleNMSU investigates how peppers get their punch: https://www.lcsun-news.com/story/news/education/nmsu/2016/01/31/nmsu-investigates-how-peppers-get-their-punch/79607342/

RESTAURANTS:

Chope's Bar & Cafe in La Mesa, NM

La Posta De Mesilla in Mesilla, NM

Andele Restaurant Mesilla, NM

Si Señor Restaurant in Las Cruces, NM

El Parasol in Española, NM

El Paragua Restaurant in Española, NM

Tomasita's Santa Fe New Mexican Restaurant in Santa Fe, NM

Owl Cafe in Albuquerque, NM

CONNECT:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrian-dolinay-frm-96a289106/

GitHub: https://github.com/ad17171717

X: https://twitter.com/DolinayG

Odysee: https://odysee.com/@adriandolinay:0

Medium: https://medium.com/@adriandolinay

PODCAST:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-aspiring-stem-geek/id1765996824

Audible: https://www.audible.com/podcast/The-Aspiring-STEM-Geek/B0DC73S9SN

iHeart Radio: https://iheart.com/podcast/202676097/

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/60dPNJbDPaPw7ru8g5btxV

|-Video Chapters-|

0:00 – Intro

1:08 – What are Chile Peppers and where do they come from

2:24 – Ideal climate to grow Chile Peppers

6:20 – Disease affecting Chile Peppers

7:22 – Why has there been a drop in Chile Pepper production

8:42 – Measuring the spiciness of Chile Peppers

13:37 – How to cool off from a hot Pepper

15:34 – Does Pepper X have potential competition from New Mexico?

18:05 – Green vs. Red

20:43 – NuMex Twilight Ornamental Chile

21:44 – Ristra

25:01 – The best times to visit the Chile Pepper Institute

27:35 – The International Pepper Conference

29:54 – The Chile Pepper Institute’s global partners

31:52 – Defining Capsicum

32:17 – Multi-Omics

36:08 – The phenotyping bottleneck

38:06 – Speed Breeding

38:59 – Robots in the Pepper fields

42:40 – Chile vs Chili

44:26 – Favorite food to add Chile too

46:50 – Hottest Chile Pepper Danise has tried

49:28 – Best New Mexican dishes with Chile Pepper

50:38 – New Mexico restaurant recommendations

54:43 – The natural beauty of New Mexico

In this episode I talk to Dr. Eric Masanet. Eric is the Professor and Mellichamp Chair in Sustainability Science at the University of California Santa Barbara. The core focus of the episode is Data Centers. In the episode we start at a high level where Eric defines what a Data Center is, the stakeholders of a Data Center, GPU vs CPU compute, the lifecycle of chips, the potential energy efficiency gains of compute, Data Center water usage, the sparse data on Data Centers and the best and worst case scenarios for Data Center sustainability in the future. I hope you enjoy!

VIDEO: Eric’s Testimony to Congress: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WE0be5uqjuw

PAPERS:

Eric’s PhD Thesis on E-waste (paywalled behind ProQuest): https://www.proquest.com/docview/305213050

GPU Lifetimes on Titan Supercomputer: Survival Analysis and Reliability: https://christian-engelmann.de/publications/ostrouchov20gpu.pdf

With the Right Developer, Technological Progress Doesn’t Mean Data Center Obsolescence: https://www.streamdatacenters.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/SDC-Brief-Data-Center-Obsolescence-20250416.pdf

How Hungry is AI? Benchmarking Energy, Water, and Carbon Footprint of

LLM Inference: https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.095982024 United States Data Center Energy Usage Report: https://eta.lbl.gov/publications/2024-lbnl-data-center-energy-usage-report

ARTICLES:

Waste from Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE): https://environment.ec.europa.eu/topics/waste-and-recycling/waste-electrical-and-electronic-equipment-weee_en

Apple expands the use of recycled materials across its products: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2022/04/apple-expands-the-use-of-recycled-materials-across-its-products/

The 2025 Data Center Power Report by Bloom Energy: https://resources.bloomenergy.com/data-center-power-report

NEWS: Sanders: Yes. We Need a Moratorium On Data Center Construction.: https://www.sanders.senate.gov/press-releases/news-sanders-yes-we-need-a-moratorium-on-data-center-construction/

Ratepayer Protection Pledge: https://www.whitehouse.gov/articles/2026/03/ratepayer-protection-pledge/

BOOKS:

Connections by James Burke: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0743299558 CONNECT:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrian-dolinay-frm-96a289106/

GitHub: https://github.com/ad17171717 X: https://twitter.com/DolinayG

Odysee: https://odysee.com/@adriandolinay:0

Medium: https://medium.com/@adriandolinay

PODCAST:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-aspiring-stem-geek/id1765996824 Audible: https://www.audible.com/podcast/The-Aspiring-STEM-Geek/B0DC73S9SN

iHeart Radio: https://iheart.com/podcast/202676097/

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/60dPNJbDPaPw7ru8g5btxV

|-Video Chapters-|

0:00 – Intro

1:48 – Eric’s interesting in building things growing up

3:00 – Studying Mechanical Engineering at the University of Wisconsin Madison

4:34 – Eric’s PhD Thesis on minimizing Electronic Waste

14:55 – Defining a Data Center

18:06 – Stakeholders of a Data Center

21:59 – Central Processing Units (CPUs) vs Graphical Processing Units (GPUs)

24:30 – Lifecycles of Computer Chips

30:58 – Will the energy consumption from a GPU query become as efficient as a Google Search over time?

37:15 – Are Data Centers making electricity more expensive?

42:34 – Data Center water usage

48:39 – How Data Center builders decide where to build

57:02 – Google’s Hamina Data Centers, an example of sustainable Data Center builds?

1:01:34 – Data collection on Data Centers

1:08:36 – The United States agency that could collect data on Data Centers in the future

1:10:59 – Could an industry group collect data on Data Centers?

1:14:51 – How hardware companies can provide more data on chips

1:18:09 – Best and worst case scenarios for Data Center sustainability

1:27:01 – What happens to Data Centers if there is an AI bubble that pops?

1:31:17 – Eric’s ideal Data Center policies

1:37:29 – Being outdoors in California

1:38:56 – Book recommendation

In this episode I talk with Dr. Leigh Cash. Leigh received her doctorate in public health from Johns Hopkins University and is currently a Research Engineer at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Within the episode we discuss how Leigh became interested in science growing up, studying environmental health for her undergraduate at University of Georgia, a life changing incident at the University that solidified her interest in public health, uncertainty quantification, nanoparticles and statistics.Please note this episode is audio only. I hope you enjoy! PAPERS:Leigh's PhD Thesis: https://jscholarship.library.jhu.edu/items/09fc6bae-3c48-43bd-8f86-a094b0c0e1ebCompetency Framework: Understanding and Applying ARECC to Occupational and Environmental Health and Safety: https://www.aiha.org/education/frameworks/competency-framework-understanding-how-arecc-works-within-occupational-exposure-assessmentBOOKS:Our Children's Toxic Legacy: How Science and Law Fail to Protect Us from Pesticides by John Wargo: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0300074468The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Mystic of the Atom by Graham Farmelo: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0465022103A Cultural History of Mathematics: Volumes 1-6 (The Cultural Histories Series): https://www.amazon.com/dp/1350063126Theory of Games and Economic Behavior by John von Neumann, Oskar Morgenstern, Harold W. Kuhn and Ariel Rubinstein: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0691130612CONNECT: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrian-dolinay-frm-96a289106/ GitHub: https://github.com/ad17171717 X: https://twitter.com/DolinayG Odysee: https://odysee.com/@adriandolinay:0 Medium: https://medium.com/@adriandolinayPODCAST: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-aspiring-stem-geek/id1765996824 Audible: https://www.audible.com/podcast/The-Aspiring-STEM-Geek/B0DC73S9SN?source_code=ASSGB149080119000H&share_location=pdp iHeart Radio: https://iheart.com/podcast/202676097/ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/60dPNJbDPaPw7ru8g5btxV?si=26e034e416f446d8|-Video Chapters-|0:00 – Intro1:27 – Growing up in Kingsport, Tennessee 4:21 – Studying Environmental Health at the University of Georgia5:34 – Balancing academics and athletics at University7:22 – Pesticides12:58 – Attending graduate school at Yale18:32 – Starting a PhD and working with Los Alamos National Laboratory21:07 – Uncertainty Quantification23:44 – Nanoparticles31:24 – HEPA filters and nanoparticles33:16 – ARECC Framework35:55 – Handling sparse data sets38:09 – Probability vs Likelihood40:00 – Advice for people looking to get into Public Health and Statistics42:45 – Book recommendations46:02 – The three Chihuahuas47:28 – Conclusion