Building miniature brains may sound like a page out of a science fiction novel, but fact is indeed stranger than fiction. Researchers around the world grow brain organoids—3D miniature brains—to better understand brain development, aging, injury, and other disorders, as well as to test new treatment strategies. Some scientists take brain building to the next level by launching their brain organoids into outer space.

In this episode, Iris Kulbatski from The Scientist spoke with Alysson Muotri, a University of California, San Diego professor and Stem Cell Program director to learn more about how microgravity affects the cellular and molecular biology of brain organoids and how these discoveries can improve human health. 

The Scientist Speaks is a podcast produced by The Scientist’s Creative Services Team. Our podcast is by scientists and for scientists. Once a month, we bring you the stories behind news-worthy molecular biology research. This month’s episode is sponsored by ACROBiosystems and Molecular Devices.

As a maternal-fetal immunologist at the Washington University School of Medicine, Nardhy Gómez-López investigates the immunobiological pathways that underlie pregnancy complications. Having trained and researched across the globe alongside caring and curious physicians, Gómez-López became hooked on perinatal immunology research. Motivated to help solve the prevalent problem of preterm birth, she currently looks at labor and birth, also called parturition, through a basic research lens.

In this Science Philosophy in a Flash podcast episode, The Scientist's Creative Services Team spoke with Gómez-López to learn more about her recent work investigating cellular changes in the maternal-fetal interface during parturition and what motivates her clinically collaborative research perspective.

To learn more about Gómez-López’s research, check out this article.

In the 1960s, researchers in England noticed an anomaly when investigating chromosomes from surgically removed human tumors. Distinct from the intact chromosomes visible underneath the microscope were numerous “very small double chromatin bodies,” which are today better known as extrachromosomal DNA. Thanks to modern sequencing and imaging techniques, researchers now know that these tiny bits of circular DNA play a big role in cancer outcomes.

In this episode, Niki Spahich from The Scientist spoke with Lukas Chavez, an assistant professor in the Cancer Genome and Epigenetics Program at the Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute, to learn more about his team’s multiomic exploration of extrachromosomal DNA and how it influences medulloblastoma progression and treatment.

Welcome to The Scientist Speaks, a podcast produced by The Scientist’s Creative Services Team. Our podcast is by scientists and for scientists. Once a month, we bring you the stories behind newsworthy molecular biology research.

This episode is brought to you by biomodal. 

As the Golub Family Professor of stem cell and regenerative biology at Harvard University, Paola Arlotta seeks to understand how the human brain is formed and what makes it unique. After being inspired by her high school science teacher, Antonio Vecchia, Arlotta pursued a research path that led to her current work exploring the cerebral cortex by growing human organoids in 3D cell culture and investigating their development with single cell sequencing techniques.

In this Science Philosophy in a Flash podcast episode, The Scientist’s Creative Services Team spoke with Arlotta to learn more about her path from a curious child in Italy to her current work exploring the complexities of human brain development using organoid models.

To learn more about Arlotta's research, check out this article.

Science Philosophy in a Flash is a mini podcast series produced by The Scientist’s Creative Services Team. In this series, we highlight researchers’ unique outlooks on what it means to be a scientist.

Researchers now employ artificial intelligence (AI) models based on deep learning to make functional predictions about big datasets. While the concepts behind these networks are well established, their inner workings are often invisible to the user. The emerging area of explainable AI (xAI) provides model interpretation techniques that empower life science researchers to uncover the underlying basis on which AI models make such predictions. 

In this month’s episode, Deanna MacNeil from The Scientist spoke with Jim Collins from Massachusetts Institute of Technology to learn how researchers are using explainable AI and artificial neural networks to gain mechanistic insights for large scale antibiotic discovery.

More on this topic

Artificial Neural Networks: Learning by Doing

This month's episode is sponsored by LabVantage, serving disease researchers with AI-driven scientific data management solutions that increase discovery and speed time-to-market. Learn more at LabVantage.com/analytics.

The field of psychedelics research has exploded in recent years, as scientists dig deeper into the neuroscience and pharmacology of hallucinogens and how their unique properties can be harnessed to understand and treat depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, Alzheimer’s disease, dementia, and neurodegenerative diseases. Remarkably, the human body produces its own endogenous psychedelics, the reasons for which have implications for understanding the ordinary and extraordinary states of human consciousness, from creativity and dreaming to near death experiences.

In this episode, Iris Kulbatski from The Scientist’s Creative Services Team spoke with Steven Barker, a professor emeritus at Louisiana State University to learn more about the human body’s ability to produce hallucinogenic compounds and their roles in physiological processes.

More on this topic

https://www.the-scientist.com/features/natural-high-endogenous-psychedelics-in-the-gut-and-brain-71301

https://www.the-scientist.com/infographics/infographic-what-a-trip-71303

The Scientist Speaks is a podcast produced by The Scientist’s Creative Services Team. Our podcast is by scientists and for scientists. Once a month, we bring you the stories behind news-worthy molecular biology research.

Every cell within the human body contains the same DNA, but not all cells look and act alike. The key to cellular diversity lies in which genes the cells express or shut down. Cells convey this information to the appropriate machinery through epigenetic modifications. In this episode, Charlene Lancaster from The Scientist spoke with Jonathan Weissman from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Luke Gilbert from the University of California, San Francisco to learn about making epigenetic changes in vitro and the application of these tools in research and the clinic.

The Scientist Speaks is a podcast produced by The Scientist’s Creative Services team. Our podcast is by scientists and for scientists. Once a month, we bring you the stories behind news-worthy molecular biology research. This month's episode is sponsored by Cytosurge, Molecular Devices, and Eppendorf.

Cloud-based systems enable remote science experiments, allowing researchers to accomplish experimental breakthroughs from virtually any location with computer access. Remote labs and cloud-connected instruments are revolutionizing the way researchers approach benchwork, improving scientific discovery and education by enabling accessible and automated workflows.

In this episode, Deanna MacNeil from The Scientist spoke with Mohammed Mostajo-Radji from the University of California, Santa Cruz; Brandon Sutherland from University of Toronto’s Accelerator Consortium; and Dana Cortade from Align to Innovate, to learn about connecting experiments to the cloud with remote research technologies.

The Scientist Speaks is a podcast produced by The Scientist’s Creative Services Team. Our podcast is by scientists and for scientists. We bring you the stories behind news-worthy molecular biology research.

Researchers apply the principles of synthetic biology to address some of the most pressing human health challenges. In what some consider a science and an artform, scientists use bacterial components in creative ways to create synthetic cells for cancer research.

In this episode, Iris Kulbatski from The Scientist’s Creative Services Team spoke with Kate Adamala, an assistant professor at the University of Minnesota and a synthetic biologist working on engineering synthetic cells, to learn more about the latest advances in using synthetic biology for cancer therapy applications.

The Scientist Speaks is a podcast produced by The Scientist’s Creative Services Team. Our podcast is by scientists and for scientists. Once a month, we bring you the stories behind news-worthy molecular biology research. This month's episode is sponsored by Namocell – a Bio-Techne brand.

As bioengineers incorporate smart technology into more aspects of the scientific process, these updates promise to digitize and automate laborious, repetitive research tasks while simultaneously transforming the laboratory into a more accessible and connected environment. This episode highlights cutting-edge smart technologies that allow scientists to take their research to the next level by streamlining common experimental workflows.

In this month’s episode, Deanna MacNeil from The Scientist’s Creative Services Team spoke with Sofie Salama and David Haussler, professors at the University of California, Santa Cruz, to learn more about the smart technology behind growing brain organoids.

The Scientist Speaks is a podcast produced by The Scientist’s Creative Services Team. Our podcast is by scientists and for scientists. We bring you the stories behind news-worthy molecular biology research. This month's episode is sponsored by Benchling.