Category Archives: Science

Medical Research: Single Gene Therapy Treatment For Multiple Age-Related Diseases Seen (Harvard)

From a Harvard news online release:

Harvard Medical School“The results we saw were stunning and suggest that holistically addressing aging via gene therapy could be more effective than the piecemeal approach that currently exists,” said first author Noah Davidsohn, a former research scientist at the Wyss Institute and HMS who is now chief technology officer of Rejuvenate Bio. “Everyone wants to stay as healthy as possible for as long as possible, and this study is a first step toward reducing the suffering caused by debilitating diseases.”

New research from the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University and Harvard Medical School (HMS) suggests that it may be possible someday to tend to multiple ailments with one treatment.

The study was conducted in the lab of Wyss core faculty member George Church as part of Davidsohn’s postdoctoral research into the genetics of aging. Davidsohn, Church, and their co-authors homed in on three genes that had been shown to confer increased health and lifespan benefits in mice that were genetically engineered to overexpress them: FGF21, sTGFβR2, and αKlotho. They hypothesized that providing extra copies of those genes to nonengineered mice via gene therapy would similarly combat age-related diseases and bring health benefits.

To read more: https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2019/11/researchers-able-to-improve-reverse-age-related-diseases-in-mice/?utm_source=SilverpopMailing&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Daily%20Gazette%2020191105%20(1)

Top Science Podcasts: Measles Wipes Out Immune System Memory, Black Holes (Science Magazine)

scimag_pc_logo_120_120 (2)Measles is a dangerous infection that can kill. As many as 100,000 people die from the disease each year. For those who survive infection, the virus leaves a lasting mark—it appears to wipe out the immune system’s memory. News Intern Eva Fredrick joins host Sarah Crespi to talk about a pair of studies that looked at how this happens in children’s immune systems.

In our second segment this week, Sarah talks with Todd Thompson, of Ohio State University in Columbus, about his effort to find a small black hole in a binary pair with a red giant star. Usually black holes are detected because they are accruing matter and as the matter interacts with the black hole, x-rays are released. Without this flashy signal, black hole detection gets much harder. Astronomers must look for the gravitational influence of the black holes on nearby stars—which is easier to spot when the black hole is massive. Thompson talks with Sarah about a new approach to finding small, noninteracting black holes.

https://www.sciencemag.org/podcast/how-measles-wipes-out-immune-memory-and-detecting-small-black-holes

Top Science Podcasts: AI Beats Humans At A Video Game, Arthropods In Decline (Nature)

Nature PodcastHear the latest science news, with Benjamin Thompson and Shamini Bundell. This week, a computer beats the best human players in StarCraft II, and a huge study of insects and other arthropods.

In this episode:

00:51 Learning to play

By studying and experimenting, an AI has reached Grandmaster level at the video game Starcraft IIResearch Article: Vinyals et al.News Article: Google AI beats experienced human players at real-time strategy game StarCraft II

10:08 Research Highlights

A record-breaking lightning bolt, and identifying our grey matter’s favourite tunes. Research Highlight: Here come the lightning ‘megaflashes’Research Highlight: Why some songs delight the human brain

12:24 Arthropods in decline

Researchers have surveyed how land-use change has affected arthropod diversity. Research article: Seibold et al.

18:30 News Chat

Young Canadians file a lawsuit against their government, an Alzheimer’s drug gets a second chance, and South Korean efforts to curb a viral epidemic in pigs.

 

Science & Culture: Human’s Early Ancestors, Digital Transformation (Economist Podcasts)

The Economist BabbageScientists believe they have located the ancestral home of one of humanity’s early ancestors—in northern Botswana. Tom Siebel, a Silicon Valley veteran and the founder of C3.ai, explains how digital transformation stops companies from going extinct. And, host Kenneth Cukier takes a trip to the Natural History Museum in London to learn about bias in species collection

Technology Podcasts: What To Consider With DNA Testing (Kiplinger)

KiplingerKiplinger’s vice president of content Sarah Stevens joins our podcast hosts Sandy Block and Ryan Ermey to talk about the advantages, risks, obstacles and other things to consider when having your DNA tested.

Halloween 2019: “Galaxy Of Horrors!” Video And Posters From NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Dubbed Galaxy of Horrors, the fun but informative series resulted from a collaboration of scientists and artists and was produced by NASA’s Exoplanet Exploration Program Office, located at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. The same program is behind the popular Exoplanet Travel Bureau poster series, which imagines humans visiting some of the thousands of known worlds outside our solar system.

Rains of Terror NASA Exoplanet Posters Halloween 2019

To read more: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7527&utm_source=iContact&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nasajpl&utm_content=exoplanet20191029-1

Science Podcasts: Quest To Detect Gravitational Waves, First Hypothesised By Einstein (Nature)

Nature PodcastIn 2015, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) facilities in the US directly detected ripples in space-time known as gravitational waves. These waves were produced by the final spiral of two oribiting black holes that smashed into each other, sending ripples across the universe.

In this Podcast Extra, Benjamin Thompson speaks to Cole Miller from the University of Maryland about the quest to detect gravitational waves, which were first hypothesised by Albert Einstein back in 1916.

Top Science Podcasts: Earthworm Study, Bias In Health Algorithms & “Dr. Space Junk” (ScienceMag)

scimag_pc_logo_120_120 (1)This week in ScienceHelen Philips, a postdoctoral fellow at the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research and the Institute of Biology at Leipzig University, and colleagues published the results of their worldwide earthworm study, composed of data sets from many worm researchers around the globe. 

Sarah also talks with Ziad Obermeyer, a professor in the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley, about dissecting out bias in an algorithm used by health care systems in the United States to recommend patients for additional health services.

Finally, in the monthly books segment, books host Kiki Sanford interviews author Alice Gorman about her book Dr. Space Junk vs The Universe: Archaeology and the Future. Listen to more book segments on the Science books blog: Books, et al.

To read more: https://www.sciencemag.org/podcast/worldwide-worm-survey-and-racial-bias-health-care-algorithm

Top Science Podcasts: Quantum Computing, Speediest Ants & Altering The “Deaf” Gene (Nature)

Nature PodcastListen to the latest from the world of science, with Nick Howe and Shamini Bundell. This week, a milestone in quantum computing, and rethinking early mammals.

In this episode:

00:43 A quantum computing milestone

A quantum computer is reported to have achieved ‘quantum supremacy’ – performing an operation that’s essentially impossible for classical computers. Research Article: Arute et al.News and Views: Quantum computing takes flightEditorial: A precarious milestone for quantum computingNews: Hello quantum world! Google publishes landmark quantum supremacy claim

08:24 Research Highlights

The world’s speediest ants, and the world’s loudest birdsong. Research Highlight: A land-speed record for ants set in Saharan dunesResearch Highlight: A bird’s ear-splitting shriek smashes the record for loudest song

10:19 The mammals that lived with the dinosaurs

Paleontologists are shifting their view of Mesozoic era mammals. News Feature: How the earliest mammals thrived alongside dinosaurs

18:00 News Chat

A Russian researcher’s plans to edit human embryos, and ‘prime editing’ – a more accurate gene editing system. News: Russian ‘CRISPR-baby’ scientist has started editing genes in human eggs with goal of altering deaf geneNews: Super-precise new CRISPR tool could tackle a plethora of genetic diseases

Neuroscience Podcast: “Consciousness Theories” And “Biased Childhood Memories” (ScienceMag)

We don’t know where consciousness comes from. And we don’t know whether animals have it, or whether we can detect it in patients in comas. Do neuroscientists even know where to look? A new competition aims to narrow down the bewildering number of theories of consciousness and get closer to finding its biological signs by pitting different theories against each other in experimental settings. Freelance journalist Sara Reardon talks with host Sarah Crespi about how the competition will work.

Science Mag Podcast ConsciousnessIn our second segment, we talk about how we think about children. For thousands of years, adults have complained about their lack of respect, intelligence, and tendency to distraction, compared with previous generations. A new study out this week in Science Advances suggests our own biased childhood memories might be at fault. Sarah Crespi talks with John Protzko of the University of California, Santa Barbara, about how terrible people thought kids were in 3800 B.C.E. and whether understanding those biases might change how people view Generation Z today.

To read more: https://www.sciencemag.org/podcast/trying-find-mind-brain-and-why-adults-are-always-criticizing-kids-these-days