Biopedia

Biopedia

By Vince's PodcastsScienceLife Sciences
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Biopedia episodes

  • 28- Speciation and the Great Wall of China

    The Great Wall of China is one of the most imposing monuments humanity has ever created- after all, it's not for nothing that the claim goes around that you can see it from space. However, it's not just an effective barrier for humans. In fact, a 2003 study indicates that it's causing speciation in the region...


    Sources for this episode:

    • Campbell, N. A., Urry, L. A., Cain, M. L., Wasserman, S. A., Minorsky, P. V. and Reece, J. B. (2018), Biology: a global approach, 11th edition (Global Edition), Harlow, Pearson Education Limited.
    • The Editors, Encyclopaedia Britannica (2021), Great Wall of China (online) [Accessed 19/02/2021].
    • Oltermann, P., et al., The Guardian/Observer (2010), The Ancient World (booklet series), Day 6: China. Associated with the British Museum.
    • Su, H., Qu., L.-J., He, K., Zhang, Z., Wang, J., Chen, Z. and Gu, H. (2003), The Great Wall of China: a physical barrier to gene flow? Heredity 90: 212- 219.
      • 5 min
    • 27- Twin Types

      We're always taught that twins can either be identical or non-identical. But what is the basis for this? And is there ever a situation where twin type is not quite so binary?


      Sources for this episode:

      • Davis, N., the Guardian (2019), Scientists stunned by discovery of 'semi-identical' twins (online) [Accessed 07/02/2021].
      • Author unknown, BBC (2019), Semi-identical twins 'identified for only the second time' (online) [Accessed 07/02/2021].
      • Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Twin (online) [Accessed 08/02/2021].
        • 6 min
      • 26- The Anthropocene

        The term 'Anthropocene' (roughly translated as 'Age of Man') is a term that is sometimes thrown about on the radio or in science. But what is it exactly? As we'll see today, the concept itself is relatively simpler, but nailing down the specifics is somewhat harder than it seems...


        Sources for this episode:

        • Ashley, S., National Trust (date unknown), What is the Anthropocene? (online) [Accessed 30/01/2021].
        • Author unknown, Encyclopaedia Britannica (2020), Anthropocene Epoch (online) [Accessed 30/01/2021].
        • Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Chinese industralization (online) [Accessed 02/02/2021].
          • 6 min
        • 25- Dollo's Law

          Science has to change with the evidence if it is to be trusted. One example of this comes with Dollo's Law, named after the French Belgian biologist Louis Dollo. His original theory was that evolution would never, under any circumstances, retrace its path. However, as we're going to see on the podcast today, that isn't always the case. With new evidence came the need for a revamp of Dollo's Law...


          Sources for this episode:

          • The Editors, Encyclopaedia Britannica (2018), Peppered moth (online) [Accessed 27/01/2021].
          • Zimmer, C., National Geographic (2003), Recoil from Dollo's Law (online) [Accessed 24/01/2021].
          • Author unknown, Encyclopaedia Britannica (2018), Dollo's Law (online) [Accessed 24/01/2021].
          • Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Dollo's Law of irreversibility (online) [Accessed 24/01/2021].

            • NOTE: I think I get a bit mixed up in my speech at one point with the gastropod example. What I should have said is that shells started out coiled, uncoiled itself and then recoiled on at least two occasions.

            5 min
          • 24- Rewind: Dominant and Recessive

            In our third Rewind episode, I'm going to go back over the concept of dominant vs. recessive as a mechanism of genetic inheritance, which I've touched upon before but not really in any great detail.


            Sources for this episode:

            • Fullick A., Locke, J. and Bircher, P. (2015), A Level Biology for OCR A. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
            • Thain, M., and Hickman, M. (2014), The Penguin Dictionary of Biology, 11th edition. London: Penguin Publishing Group.
            • Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Eye color (online) [Accessed 19/01/2021].
              • 4 min
            • 23- How Many Species?

              This episode is really going to do what it says on the tin- discuss the question of how many species there are in the world. This might seem a simple question, but a simple answer has eluded the scientific community for some years now. On the show today, I'm going to go through some of the methods past research has used to answer this question and what figures they came up with.


              Sources for this episode:

              • Latty, T. and Lee, T., 'Phys.org' (2019), How many species on Earth? A simple question that's hard to answer (online) [Accessed 16/01/2021].
              • Mora, C., Tittensor, D. P., Adl, S., Simpson, A. G. B. and Worm, B. (2012), How Many Species Are There on Earth and in the Ocean? PLOS Biology 9(8): e1001127. 

                • NOTE- at one point I mention seven taxonomic levels, but I should have said six.

                6 min
              • Bonus- On the Origin of Species 1859 Introduction

                Bonus episode! I thought it would be interesting to hear the thoughts of Charles Darwin in the form of the introduction he wrote to the 1859 edition of 'On the Origin of Species'. Side note: although I'm not sure where this is, I believe I slip up at one point and pluralise something incorrectly at some point in the first half of the narration.

                Sources for this episode: 1) Darwin, C. (1859), On the Origin of Species by means of natural selection or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. London: John Murray. Available at: Internet Archive [Accessed 07/03/2021].

                13 min
              • Introducing- After Alexander
                Hi everyone, just a quick plug for my other show- After Alexander. This is a history podcast where we examine what happened between Alexander the Great's death in 323 and the destruction of the last of the Hellenistic kingdoms by the Romans and Parthians. Specifically, it focuses on the Seleucid dynasty, descended from Seleucus I Nicator and eventually rulers over most of Alexander's old empire in their glory days. If that sounds like it might be for you, feel free to head over and join us! Regular content resumes next week.
                3 min
              • 22- The Central Indo-Pacific

                The Central Indo-Pacific (or CIP if you're stuck for time) is a highly diverse region of the ocean. But how did it get to be this way? It's this question which is the topic for today's episode.


                Sources for this episode:

                • Ivany, L. C., Patterson, W. P. and Lohmann, K. C. (2000), Cooler winters as a possible cause of mass extinctions at the Eocene/Oligocene boundary. Nature 407: 887- 890.
                • Jones, K. R., Klein, C. J., Halpern, B. S., Venter, O., Grantham, H., Kuempel, C. D., Shumway, N., Friedlander, A. M., Possingham, H. P. and Watson, J. E. M. (2018), The Location and Protection Status of Earth’s Diminishing Marine Wilderness. Current Biology 28: 2506- 2512.
                • Miller, E.C., Hayashi, K. T., Song, D., Wiens, J. J., (2018) Explaining the ocean’s richest biodiversity hotspot and global patterns of fish diversity. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 285: 20181314.
                • Renema, W., Bellwood, D. R., Braga, J. C., Bromfield, K., Hall, R., Johnson, K. G., Lunt, P., Meyer, C. P., McMonagle, L. B., Morley, R. J., O'Dea, A., Todd, J. A., Wesselingh, F. P., Wilson, M. E. J. and Pandolfi, J. M. (2008), Hopping Hotspots: Global Shifts in Marine Biodiversity. Science (321): 654- 657.
                • Siqueira, A. C., Bellwood, D. R. and Cowman, P. F. (2019), Historical biogeography of herbivorous coral reef fishes: The formation of an Atlantic fauna. Journal of Biogeography.
                • Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Coral (online) [Accessed 17/01/2021].
                • Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Eocene (online) [Accessed 17/01/2021].
                  • 5 min
                • 21- The Black Queen Hypothesis

                  Building on our discussion of the Red Queen hypothesis last week, we're going to go through a theorem which is similarly chess-themed but goes against our hypothesis from episode 20. This theory holds that, rather than continual evolution being necessary for a species to survive, natural selection can sometimes allow genes to be lost from the gene pool.


                  Sources for this episode:

                  • Allen, R. C., Popat, R., Diggle, S. P. and Brown, S. P. (2014), Targeting virulence: can we make evolution-proof drugs? Nature Reviews Microbiology 12(4): 300- 308.
                  • Morris, J. J., Lenski, R. E. and Zinser, E. R. (2012), The Black Queen Hypothesis: Evolution of Dependencies through Adaptive Gene Loss. mBio 3(2): e00036-12.
                  • Willey, J. M., Sherwood, L. M. and Woolverton, C. J. (2017), Prescott's Microbiology (Tenth Edition, International Edition). New York: McGraw Hill Education.
                  • Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Black Queen hypothesis (online) [Accessed 15/01/2021].
                    • 6 min

                  About Biopedia

                  From the publisher's feed

                  Biology is a fascinating subject which is well worth exploring. Its scope stretches from individual DNA strands and viruses to blue whales, metapopulations and the biosphere. We will shine the…

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