The Science Scholars Podcast

Katie and Caleigh discuss scientific conferences - a combination of learning new science, networking, coffee and beer.

Katie and Caleigh discuss the human gut microbiome - what it is, how it affects our health, and how it affects the brain.

This week, Katie and Caleigh talk crisis - the reproducibility crisis in science and what the proposed Republican tax reform bill could mean for graduate students. We start the conversation by discussing a group that has spent many years proving why other groups couldn't produce their results in C. elegans studies. Caleigh talks about struggles reproducing both cancer biology and stem cell results (and how that affected the lives of the scientists). Katie discusses the Reproducibility Project in Psychology that started at UVA (!!!!).

Katie and Caleigh talk to friend of the pod, Mike Pokrass, about methods for studying single cell interactions (his specialty). Caleigh and Katie discuss a paper that images and models G protein and receptor interactions at "hotspots". Mike touches on a paper about the role of cell-cell interactions during zebrafish gastrulation.

This week, Katie and Caleigh discuss problems surrounding mental health in academia. They also review Chemistry - a novel by Weike Wang. Chemistry is a work of fiction narrated by a chemistry graduate student dealing with depression and anxiety.

This week, Katie and Caleigh research on cochlear implants (and hearing generally)! We try to cover our bases on all 5Ws: what, where, why, when, and who. Katie covers a paper about variability in performance outcomes over time during cochlear implant use. Caleigh discusses an important paper from 1991 about developing an improved method for processing sounds.

Caleigh interviews two friends about their experiences taking their qualifying exams this week while Katie is benched this week because her qualifying exam is Friday......... * fingers crossed * (everyone who knows her should send encouraging texts and be extra nice to her this week!)

Katie and Caleigh discuss Caleigh's *favorite* receptor - the AMPA receptor. Caleigh covers a review paper about iGluR structures, focusing on AMPA receptors specifically. This review comes on the heels of many new structures that have been able to answer some long standing questions in the field, but have also raised new ones. Katie covered a paper looking at different mutants and drugs that slow desensitization. This paper dives into the specifics of what they can tell us about how the receptor functions normally and how they are different from or similar to each other.

This week, Katie, Caleigh and friend of the pod Elise James discuss the pros and cons of the documentary What the Health. What the health is a documentary on Netflix made by Kip Andersen and Keegan Kuhn, producers of Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret. Based on some of the cons of the film, Katie and Elise also discuss how to identify questionable use of scientific studies. Elise is a nutritional health grad student at Tufts.

Katie and Caleigh discuss how recognizing someone can go wrong and why it might happen. Caleigh talks about a paper that uses brain activity collected using fMRI in humans to uncover what the face looks like. Katie's paper goes a step farther and says they've identified the code for facial identity. Each face is represented in high dimensional space based on the characteristics of the face, which allows for neurons to separate and decode what the face looks like.