FutureBites with Dr. Bruce McCabe

What does the future of medicine look like when microchips and nervous systems speak the same language?

I asked Dr Elisa Donati, a Senior Scientist working at the cutting edge of neuroscience and engineering at the Institute of Neuroinformatics at University of Zürich and ETH Zürich.

It starts with mimicking the way neurons work in nature. Real neurons are analog, not digital. They process information event-by-event, not in lock-step with computer clocks. They transmit and process large volumes of information in parallel, and dispatch complex tasks using astonishingly little energy.

By re-thinking medical computer chips, Elisa and her colleagues are designing prosthetic hands that let wearers to feel pressure and texture and temperature through their fingertips. They are making cochlear implants with more fidelity, and pacemakers that take cues from our respiratory system as the heart does in nature. They are creating implants that bridge severed spinal chords.

And that’s only the beginning. By improving communications with the autonomic system, they aim to create new ways to manage type 2 diabetes and other hormonal imbalances, obesity, erectile dysfunction, depression and more. Elisa hopes to one day unlock new treatment pathways for neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. The future of healthcare is an amazing place!

We recorded our conversation outdoors, at a beautiful seaside location at the 2023 NeuroEng Workshop hosted by the International Centre of Neurmorphic Systems, so you may hear the occasional walker or vehicle passing us by  :-)

Don't forget to check out all the other interviews and insights on the FutureBites page on my website, where you can also learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.

See you in the future!

Affordable age-reversal drugs. Xenotransplants to eliminate organ shortages. Revolutionizing health economics. Keeping methane sequestered under the tundra. Editing livestock and crops to be resistant to ALL viruses ... What are the genomics pathways to a better future? Which are closest? Where could we be in twenty years? I asked George Church, the greatest genomic pioneer in the world.

George is a professor of genetics at both Harvard and MIT, the developer of the first direct genomic sequencing method, an initiator of the Human Genome Project and the Personal Genome Project, inventor of molecular multiplexing and tags, homologous recombination methods, array DNA synthesizers and many many more tools that help us investigate, analyze, edit and synthetize life.

His contributions, both directly and indirectly, via the accomplishments of the students and colleagues who have passed through his lab, have improved the lives of hundreds of millions, and will soon improve the lives of billions.

Who better to clarify how genomics can create a better future for HUMANITY?

It’s a wide-ranging discussion. The opportunities to revolutionize medicine and agriculture in particular will astonish you, as will the pace of progress. Some of this is coming SOON! And if that isn't enough to inspire you, how about a sprinkling of de-extinction and interstellar exploration to consider? What a joy it was talking to him.

Enjoy the podcast!

For additional comments, and to read the interview transcript, check out the FutureBites post on the website.

Learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.
See you in the future!

The future of medicine is one where all cancers are either 100% curable or turned into manageable diseases. You’ve heard me tell the story in my keynotes for many years. Now it’s time for you to hear from one of the heroes of that story, Bruce Levine.

Bruce and his colleagues pioneered CAR T-cell therapy, one of the most important breakthroughs in the history of medicine, where your own immune cells are reprogrammed to attack and destroy your cancer. They developed it, applied it, saved the first lives, achieved the first FDA approvals, and perfected a therapy that has now been applied to tens of thousands of patients around the world and will soon be hundreds of thousands.

Now Bruce is targeting solid tumors. And he’s moving CAR T-cell production INSIDE the human body to slash the costs. And he’s not stopping at cancer …

Which makes CAR T-cell therapy not only one of the most important breakthroughs in the history of medicine, but also one of the most important platforms for the FUTURE of medicine.

Enjoy the podcast. As always, I’ll add a post to the FutureBites page soon with additional thoughts and further reading, as well as a copy of the full interview transcript.

Learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.

See you in the future!

Will AI exacerbate inequality? Can we stop that from happening? As the world grapples with guardrails to protect us from future dangers of AI, I thought it timely to talk to an ethicist who has spent a lifetime pondering these challenges. Enter, Wendell Wallach, Carnegie-Uehiro fellow at Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs, where he co-directs the Artificial Intelligence & Equality Initiative (AIEI). He is also Emeritus Chair of Technology and Ethics Studies at Yale University’s Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics, a scholar with the Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics, a fellow at the Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technology, and a senior advisor to The Hastings Center.
We recorded our discussion over cups of tea in his lounge room in Hartford CT. He was grounded and thoughtful and had a refreshingly broad perspective on the many complex forces shaping our future. Most importantly, while worried about bad corporate behaviours and all the ways A.I. can make things worse, he was also optimistic about the actions available to us to re-shape the trajectory for the better.
Enjoy the podcast!

As always, I’ll add a post to the FutureBites page soon with additional thoughts and further reading, as well as a copy of the full interview transcript.

Learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.

See you in the future!

The story of cancer medicine is multi-threaded. It’s a story of early detection, of surgical removal, of radio- and chemo-therapies, of understanding lifestyle factors, of sequencing and pinpointing genetic factors, and lately of immunotherapies, but instead of one succeeding the other, each overlaps and complements and adds more weapons to the armory, and many of these weapons can be deployed in series or in combination.

In this episode of FutureBites, I’m talking to Dr Ben Stanger about adding three more entire armories.

Dr Ben Stanger is the Hanna Wise Professor in Cancer Research at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. He’s also Director the Penn Pancreatic Cancer Research Center and a member of half a dozen other prestigious Institutes. What a guy! In addition to his many prestigious academic positions, he still practices AND makes time to write science for a popular audience. We met in his office, and in our half-hour conversation, he shared his optimism for three new frontiers in cancer medicine: the advancement from liquid to solid tumors, the development of mRNA cancer vaccines, and the latest work being undertaken in ‘cancer interception.’

As always, I’ll add a post to the FutureBites page soon with additional thoughts and further reading, as well as a copy of the full interview transcript. Enjoy!

Ben's latest book is From One Cell – a Journey Into Life’s Origins and the Future of Medicine. I've enjoyed every page and thoroughly recommend it.

Learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.
See you in the future!

Is this the most important gene therapy in the world? At the Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine, a cutting-edge facility at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr Kiran Musunuru is developing something truly extraordinary, a ‘one and done’ gene therapy to prevent heart disease, which happens to be the number one killer on our planet today.
Welcome to FutureBites with Dr. Bruce McCabe, futurist and keynote speaker, where we interview scientists and explore pathways to a better future. I visited Dr Kiran Musunuru at his office in Philadelphia (it was an exciting time, as two of his colleagues had just won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine that very morning!) We discussed his journey so far, the Stage 1 human trials currently underway, and his BIG future goals to tackle cardiovascular disease planet-wide. Then we talked about how his ‘programmable medicine’ toolkit will be repurposed to tackle all manner of genetic diseases. This might be the most important interview I've recorded. Make no mistake, Dr Musunuru is rewriting the future of medicine.

As always, I’ll add a post to the FutureBites page soon with additional thoughts and further reading, as well as a copy of the full interview transcript. Enjoy!
Learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.
See you in the future!

Insurance companies must deal with the financial realities of climate change. They must make quantitative decisions and translate risks into dollars. They must do it for today’s impacts as well as making quantified predictions about future impacts. And behind the insurance companies are the reinsurance companies, who must act as shock absorbers to the industry and do all of the above on a global scale. Who better to go to for insights on how climate change translates into real dollars?

Welcome to FutureBites with Dr. Bruce McCabe, futurist and keynote speaker, where we interview scientists and explore pathways to a better future. In this episode, I’m speaking with Trent Thomson, CEO of the Australian and New Zealand arm of the second largest reinsurer in the world, Swiss Re. We cover the changes they’ve seen over the last 30 years, future projections, the factors contributing to cost and risk, the challenges of covering climate “hot spots,” and the future role of reinsurers in providing risk data transparency to governments and communities.

Trent was amiable, honest and forthright. He offers a fascinating and different point of view that compliments the scientists I talk to. I know you’ll find him interesting, and I can’t help thinking that we’ll be revisiting this topic  – companies like Swiss Re have treasure troves of data just waiting to be tapped!

As always, I’ll add a post to the FutureBites page soon with additional thoughts and further reading, as well as a copy of the full interview transcript. Enjoy! 

Learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.

See you in the future!

I’m calling neuromorphic computing the most important computer engineering research in the world. That’s right, more important than quantum computing (you heard it here first!) 

So what is neuromorphic computing? How is it inspired by biology? Where is it taking us? Why are the opportunities so vast? How is it fundamental to future directions in artifical intelligence? And why does it matter SO much to the future of this planet? 

Welcome to FutureBites with Dr. Bruce McCabe, futurist and keynote speaker, where we interview scientists and explore pathways to a better future. In this episode, I’m talking to Dr Alexandre Marcireau at the International Centre for Neuromorphic Systems (ICNS) at the University of Western Sydney. Alex generously took me on a tour of his lab to see his inventions, including neuromorphic cameras that are currently circulating in the International Space Station. Afterwards he sat down with me to share his views on the future. He’s an extraordinary invidividual, and very much tuned-in to all the planet-scale benefits his technology has to offer. I know you’ll enjoy this one. 

And when I say most important, I mean it. Its early days and there is a LOT of hard work to be done, but if you are investing in computer engineering, or studying it, or building AI systems (who isn’t?) or you happen to be manufacturing computer chips, this IS your future.

As always, I’ll add a post to the FutureBites page soon with additional thoughts and further reading, as well as a copy of the full interview transcript. Enjoy! 

Learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.

See you in the future!

Innovation is a deeply, deeply social phenomenon that requires many people to come along for the ride. It’s not easy! So, where to start? What are the principles? How to think about it? If you want to make the world a better place by building new products or services, or simply by creating better ways of doing things inside your organization, then this episode is for you!

Welcome to FutureBites with Dr. Bruce McCabe, futurist and keynote speaker, where I interview scientists and leading thinkers to explore pathways to a better future. 

In this episode, we're talking to Dr Ken Dovey about how to make innovation happen. Ken is the deepest thinker on innovation I know. He led an elite Master of Business and Technology program and dedicated a career to researching, teaching and leading innovation.  From leading multi-racial sporting teams in apartheid South Africa to working alongside CEOs attempting to turn around megafactories, he’s made the mistakes, celebrated the wins, and learned his innovation lessons the hard way – by being there!

Ken is also a great friend, and 100% committed to helping others and contributing positively to the world, which means he always ‘tells it like it is.’  There are so many gems in this wide-ranging conversation. Get ready for a treasure-trove of honesty and wisdom. Enjoy!

You’ll find the full interview transcript, together with a list of the sub-themes we covered and links to papers for further reading on the website here.

Learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.

See you in the future!

Has Martin Green done more than any other human to safeguard our future? For fifty years – yes fifty – he’s dedicated his life to pushing the boundaries of photovoltaics so they convert more sunlight to electricity and produce more electricity for less money. He and his team have held the world record for solar cell efficiencies for 30 of the past 39 years, and his technology is now imbedded in – wait for it – no less than 91 percent of worldwide solar cell production.  

And he isn’t stopping!

So, how much more room for improvement is there? What happens if we can halve the price of solar again? Big questions for our future!

Welcome to FutureBites with Dr. Bruce McCabe, global futurist and keynote speaker, where we interview scientists and explore pathways to a better future. In this episode, I ask Professor Martin Green at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia,  who I’m now calling the God of Solar, “How far can we go?” and we spend a happy hour exploring the myriad ways we can extend the solar contribution to our future. 

Enjoy the podcast!

And for further commentary and a full transcript of our conversation, see the accompanying FutureBites post on my website.

Learn more about my work as a futurist speaker.

See you in the future!