Yudame Research
Deep-dive research podcast exploring topics in health, education, technology, and decision-making. Each episode synthesizes academic and industry research into actionable insights.
Episodes (37)
Building custom LLMs in late 2026
Changing only the inference engine, with weights, decoding and hardware held fixed, moved benchmark scores by up to 16.6 points in one unreplicated preprint. This …
Who Runs the Project Now?
An AI trained on 750,000 construction projects found $30 million in hidden risk that seasoned human planners missed entirely — but a landmark MIT meta-analysis …
Algorithms for Life: Scheduling
Your brain is running dozens of "background processes" right now — every unfinished task silently draining your cognitive battery — and the scheduling algorithms you …
The Dieter Rams of Software: Who Shapes the Apps We Use Every Day
Software has no Dieter Rams — and understanding why reveals the hidden architecture shaping every app you touch. This episode traces how design authority in …
Back and Knee Longevity for the Athletic Man at 40
The 3,400-newton "safe limit" stamped on heavy lifting was designed for warehouse workers — not the 40-year-old man who's been deadlifting for fifteen years — …
Synthetic Fabrics and Your Body: Polyester, Hormones, and Microplastics
Your polyester clothing contains a heavy metal catalyst called antimony trioxide baked permanently into the fiber — and a 2021 study confirmed it migrates into …
Algorithms for Life: Sorting & Caching
The reason your Sunday night "get organized" session takes three hours instead of thirty minutes isn't a lack of willpower — it's a mathematical law: …
Algorithms for Life: Bayes & Overfitting
Your brain scores 0.85–0.92 correlation with optimal Bayesian models before you can tie your shoes — yet Harvard-trained physicians get the same class of problem …
Algorithms for Life: Game Theory
The same people cooperate 70–80% of the time or defect 80–90% of the time depending purely on the rules of the game — not their …
AI Tools for Content Marketing: A Practical Guide for Founders
Most founders using AI for content are unknowingly trading their most valuable asset — technical credibility — for generic, algorithm-penalized posts that audiences can detect …
Algorithms for Life: Letting Go
Gene Kranz didn't care what the hose was designed to do — he cared what it could do. That Apollo 13 moment launches a deep …
Algorithms for Life: When to Scout, When to Settle
A mathematician proposes to the statistically optimal woman — and gets rejected. That story launches a deep dive into the 37% rule, the explore/exploit tradeoff, …
Algorithms for Life: How to Communicate
What can computer networking protocols teach us about human communication? Discover how your brain's 10-bit-per-second bottleneck shapes every conversation, why exponential backoff is "the algorithm …
Algorithms for Life: How to Delegate
82% of hiring managers admitted they saw the warning signs during interviews—and hired anyway. Within 18 months, 46% of those new hires failed. The shocking …
Kindergarten, from First Principles: Frameworks & Environment
The final episode examines what research actually reveals about Montessori, Reggio Emilia, Waldorf, and other educational frameworks—from the Perry Preschool's $12:1 return on investment to …
Kindergarten, from First Principles: Sustaining Excellence
The intimacy paradox of early childhood education: while close relationships create developmental magic for children, they threaten the sustainability of those providing it. Research reveals …
Kindergarten, from First Principles: The Social Laboratory
The kindergarten classroom is a social laboratory where children develop competencies through peer interaction that adults cannot replicate. This episode explores the unique value of …
Kindergarten, from First Principles: Play & Pedagogy
The neuroscience of play is remarkably strong—precise mechanisms show how play shapes brain architecture through BDNF upregulation and synaptic pruning. Yet behavioral evidence reveals modest …
Kindergarten, from First Principles: Sleep, Memory & Scheduling
Missing a single nap causes irreversible memory loss in habitual nappers—overnight sleep cannot compensate. Rebecca Spencer's landmark research reveals why the hippocampal "desk" fills up …
Kindergarten, from First Principles: The Developmental Imperative
What developmental science identifies as the highest-leverage variables for children ages 4-6. Reveals the shocking Duncan study finding that early math skills—not social-emotional competence—are the …
Building a Micro School: The Soft Skills Curriculum
Children who received social-emotional learning (SEL) at age 7 were 23% more likely to complete high school and 26% more likely to attend university—not from …
Building a Micro School: Technology as Infrastructure
A 2025 meta-analysis of 10,116 children found excessive screen time associated with poorer development (OR 1.24). Yet one month of coding produced Cohen's d of …
Building a Micro School: The Self-Direction Transition
Meta-analyses show mastery learning produces effect sizes of d=0.94 at elementary level, scaffolding yields g=0.46, and cross-age tutoring benefits both tutors (g=0.39) and tutees (g=0.33). …
Building a Micro School: The 2-Hour Core Model
Alpha School promises "top 2% test scores" and "2.6x faster learning" in just two hours daily using AI tutors—yet when Pennsylvania evaluated their charter application …
Building a Micro School: The Micro-School Kindergarten
Explore the operational realities, financial constraints, and evidence base for starting and running a micro-school kindergarten. We confront the central challenge: 750,000-2M children are in …
Cardiovascular Health: Lifestyle & Beyond
Finnish men who sauna 4-7 times weekly have 63% lower sudden cardiac death risk—numbers rivaling aggressive pharmaceutical intervention. Meanwhile, social isolation increases cardiovascular mortality by …
Cardiovascular Health: Diet
When Italian researchers examined arterial plaques from 257 patients in early 2024, they found microplastics embedded in diseased tissue—patients with detectable plastics experienced cardiovascular events …
Cardiovascular Health: Supplementation
Evidence-based guide to cardiovascular supplements and medications for 40-year-old men, covering what works, what fails spectacularly, and optimal dosing protocols. Learn why high-dose omega-3 reduces …
Cardiovascular Health: Heart Rate Variability
Heart rate variability (HRV) has moved from clinical labs to consumer wearables, offering a powerful window into autonomic nervous system function, stress resilience, and training …
Cardiovascular Health: VO2 Max
Episode 2 in the Cardiovascular Health series. Deep dive into evidence-based strategies to maximize VO2 max—the strongest predictor of longevity—through polarized training (80% easy, 20% …
Cardiovascular Health: Lifestyle
Finnish men who sauna 4-7 times weekly have 63% lower sudden cardiac death risk—numbers rivaling aggressive pharmaceutical intervention. Meanwhile, social isolation increases cardiovascular mortality by …
Algorithms for Life: Strategic Selection
The same brain architecture that enables breakthrough strategic vision systematically undermines sustained execution. A 2024 meta-analysis in Nature Human Behaviour found human-AI collaboration often performs …
Algorithms for Life: Spaced Repetition
Spaced repetition produces 74% better retention than cramming (meta-analysis: 317 experiments, 839 assessments), with molecular mechanisms (CREB, MAPK) explaining exactly why spacing is biologically mandatory. …
Active Recovery: Integration
The $800 compression boots sit unused in the closet. The cryotherapy membership goes unvisited. Meanwhile, the athlete who simply sleeps eight hours and eats adequate …
Active Recovery: Emerging Modalities
Here's the uncomfortable truth about athletic recovery: interventions showing the most dramatic biomarker improvements often fail to enhance actual performance—and some may actively impair long-term …
Active Recovery: Therapies
The recovery paradox revealed: 89% of athletes use stretching for recovery, yet Cochrane reviews show only 0.52-1.04 point improvement on a 100-point scale—clinically trivial. Meanwhile, …
Active Recovery: Foundations
Discover why the active recovery "paradox" challenges gym wisdom: studies show active recovery clears lactate faster and feels easier during workouts, yet produces identical long-term …