We scrounged the archives for all things geospatial across the podcastverse. Below are seven podcasts, covering topics such as mapping, ancient navigation, and the reflections of a surveyor in far north Queensland.

1 Babbage, The Economist: Battle of the Maps

Companies are striving to control an evolving digital infrastructure that will guide everything from self-driving cars to drones. Veteran investor Bill Janeway explains the parallels between artificial intelligence and electricity. Also, a  Also, a Braille-controlled camera system offers an efficient way to guide the blind

2 This American Life: Mapping

Five ways of mapping the world. One story about people who make maps the traditional way — by drawing things we can see. And other stories about people who map the world using smell, sound, touch, and taste. The world redrawn by the five senses.

3 Outside/In: Look Toward the Dawn

Today, we take a step back to imagine a world without a web of GPS satellites telling your smartphone where you are every second of the day. While this might sound scary, come along and maybe you’ll discover you have a secret sixth sense… one that’s been inside you all along, if you just knew how to turn it on.

4 Magnificent Maps: The new mapping revolution    

The internet is fuelling dramatic and dynamic changes in the way we map our world.

5 Magnificent Maps: The map in the palace

David Starkey and  Peter Barber discuss the importance of maps in medieval and early modern palaces.

6 UrbisPro: Jemma Picco

Jemma is a Principal Surveyor at the Department of Natural Resources and Mines in Cairns, North Queensland. Working often in remote areas, Jemma shares stories from the field, from mechanical failures to magical scenery and being followed by a family of emus.

7 Conversations: Birds, bees and intelligent machines

When Professor Mandyam Srinivasan began studying bees 25 years ago, he had no idea where his studies would take him. He was interested in learning how bees landed so elegantly, and avoided colliding in mid-air. What Mandyam discovered was a complex and astounding system of vision and flight, which is now being applied to machine vision and robotics.

He and his team at the Queensland Brain Institute have built an autonomous aircraft, without GPS or radar, that flies like a bee. The technology could have widespread applications for surveillance, rescue operations, defence, and planetary exploration.