On this week’s show: How urban spaces can help conserve species, and testing a gene therapy strategy for epilepsy in mice
First up on the podcast, we explore urban ecology’s roots in Berlin. Contributing Correspondent Gabriel Popkin joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss turning wastelands and decommissioned airports into forests and grasslands inside the confines of a city.
Next, we hear about a gene therapy strategy for epilepsy. Yichen Qiu, a recently graduated Ph.D. student and researcher at University College London, talks about introducing a small set of genes into neurons in mice. These genes detect hyperactivity in the brain and respond by quieting the cell, ultimately suppressing seizures.
This week’s episode was produced with help from Podigy.
[Image: Maurice Weiss; Music: Jeffrey Cook]
[alt: dim photo of the forest of the Schöneberger Südgelände with old railroad tracks receding into the distance, with podcast overlay symbol]
Authors: Sarah Crespi; Gabriel Popkin
Episode page: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adf6190
About the Science Podcast: https://www.science.org/content/page/about-science-podcast
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Fish farming’s future, and how microbes compete for space on our face
How the human body handles extreme heat, and improvements in cooling clothes
What we can learn from a mass of black hole mergers, and ecological insights from 30 years of Arctic animal movements
Taking the politicians out of tough policy decisions; the late, great works of Charles Turner; and the science of cooking
Early approval of a COVID-19 vaccine could cause ethical problems for other vax candidates, and ‘upcycling’ plastic bags
Making sure American Indian COVID-19 cases are counted, and feeding a hungry heart
Visiting a once-watery asteroid, and how buzzing the tongue can treat tinnitus
FDA clinical trial protection failures, and an AI that can beat curling’s top players
How Neanderthals got human Y chromosomes, and the earliest human footprints in Arabia
Performing magic for animals, and why the pandemic is pushing people out of prisons
Alien hunters get a funding boost, and checking on the link between chromosome ‘caps’ and aging
Fighting Europe’s second wave of COVID-19, and making democracy work for poor people
Arctic sea ice under attack, and ancient records that can predict the future effects of climate change
Wildlife behavior during a global lockdown, and electric mud microbes
A call for quick coronavirus testing, and building bonds with sports
Why COVID-19 poses a special risk during pregnancy, and how hair can split steel
Fighting COVID-19 vaccine fears, tracking the pandemic’s origin, and a new technique for peering under paint
How Hiroshima survivors helped form radiation safety rules, and a path to stop plastic pollution
Reopening schools during the COVID-19 pandemic, and taking the heat out of crude oil separation
A fast moving megatrial for coronavirus treatments, and transferring the benefits of exercise by transferring blood
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