In this end-of-the-year episode, we return from our several-month-long hiatus and talk to Dr. Karmella Haynes about chromatin and epigenetics. Then, we catch up on some news from earlier in the fall, discuss some very endangered birds, and question whether DNA can actually predict what your face looks like. Happy holidays and a happy new year, listeners!

6 - Chr-Ho Ho Ho-matin (w/ Prof. Karmella Haynes)

Official podcast of GeneMods, the Northwestern University Synthetic Biology Society. News, interviews and discussions about the bioengineering revolution!

Science

In this episode, we learn all about membranes and the Build-a-Cell project with Dr. Neha Kamat.

You can find out more about Dr. Kamat's research at her lab website, https://www.nehakamat.com/.

Here's a link to the Build-a-Cell website if you're interested in the cool stuff going on in this project: http://buildacell.io/engineering/.

Intro music by Chris Zabriskie, "Is That You or Are You You?", modified under an Attribution license, http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Chris_Zabriskie/Reappear/04_-_Is_That_You_or_Are_You_You.

11 - Build-a-Cell Workshop (w/ Dr. Neha Kamat)

New year, new GeneMods season! Join us as we discuss all the syn bio that happened in 2018, including CRISPR babies, Frances Arnold's Nobel Prize, massive leaps in protein engineering, and local Northwestern and Chicago news as well.

****Important note, the views expressed in this and all episodes belong to Isaac, Adam, me, and other guests on the show and do not reflect the Center for Synthetic Biology at Northwestern.

10 - Synthetic Biology: 2018 in Review (w/ Jordan Harrison, Isaac Larkin, and Adam Silverman)

GUESS WHO'S BACK! After some long-neglected editing, we bring you some very belated news from July 2018. The news is old but hopefully still entertaining. Isaac was out this month, so we were instead joined by Kirsten Jung, a graduate student in the Lucks Lab at Northwestern.

Here are some links to the papers and news we discuss in the episode:
Gene-edited monkeys offer hope for heart disease patients: https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/07/gene-edited-monkeys-offer-hope-heart-disease-patients
CRISPR plants now subject to tough GM laws in European Union
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05814-6
CRISPR–Cas9 genome editing induces a p53-mediated DNA damage response
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-018-0049-z
Engineering circular RNA for potent and stable translation in eukaryotic cells
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-05096-6
CRISPR gene editing produces unwanted DNA deletions
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05736-3
Last Week Tonight gene editing segment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJm8PeWkiEU

9 - Jeopardy, But For Science: July News Quiz (w/ Adam Silverman and Kirsten Jung)

Tune in as we talk to Professor David Baker from the University of Washington about the wonders of protein folding and computational protein design!

8 - Protein Folding and Design (w/ Prof. David Baker)

In this episode, we are joined again by Adam Silverman to catch up on news from November and December. Tune in for lots of CRISPR news and jokes, plant synthetic biology, DNA origami, DIY Bio, protein engineering, and more!

6 - Chr-Ho Ho Ho-matin (w/ Prof. Karmella Haynes)

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