Why scientists are trying to make anemones act like corals, and why it’s so hard to make pharmaceuticals for brain diseases
First up on this week’s show, coaxing anemones to make rocks. Newsletter Editor Christie Wilcox joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss the difficulties of raising coral in the lab and a research group that’s instead trying to pin down the process of biomineralization by inserting coral genes into easy-to-maintain anemones.
Next on the show, a look at why therapeutics for both neurodegenerative disease and psychiatric illness are lagging behind other kinds of medicines. Steve Hyman, director of the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research at the Broad Institute, talks with Sarah about some of the stumbling blocks to developing drugs for the brain—including a lack of diverse genome sequences—and what researchers are doing to get things back on track.
Finally, in a sponsored segment from the Science/AAAS Custom Publishing Office, associate editor Jackie Oberst discusses with Thomas Fuchs, dean of artificial intelligence (AI) and human health and professor of computational pathology and computer science at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, the potential and evolving role of AI in health care. This segment is sponsored by the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.
About the Science Podcast
Authors: Christie Wilcox; Sarah Crespi
Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adm6756
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
The source of solar wind, hackers and salt halt research, and a book on how institutions decide gender
What killed off North American megafauna, and making languages less complicated
Why some trees find one another repulsive, and why we don’t know how much our hands weigh
Tracing the genetic history of African Americans using ancient DNA, and ethical questions at a famously weird medical museum
Researchers collaborate with a social media giant, ancient livestock, and sex and gender in South Africa
Adding thousands of languages to the AI lexicon, and the genes behind our bones
The AI special issue, adding empathy to robots, and scientists leaving Arecibo
Putting the man-hunter and woman-gatherer myth to the sword, and the electron's dipole moment gets closer to zero
Putting organs into the deep freeze, a scavenger hunt for robots, and a book on race and reproduction
A space-based telescope to hunt dark energy, and what we can learn from scaleless snakes
Why it’s tough to measure light pollution, and a mental health first aid course
Contraception for cats, and taking solvents out of chemistry
How we measure the world with our bodies, and hunting critical minerals
Talking tongues, detecting beer, and shifting perspectives on females
The earliest evidence for kissing, and engineering crops to clone themselves
Debating when death begins, and the fate of abandoned lands
Building big dream machines, and self-organizing landscapes
The value of new voices in science and journalism, and what makes something memorable
Mapping uncharted undersea volcanoes, and elephant seals dive deep to sleep
More precise radiocarbon dating, secrets of hibernating bear blood, and a new book series
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
DNA Today: A Genetics Podcast
Museum of the Missing
Strange by Nature Podcast
Sasquatch Chronicles
Hidden Brain