Petri Dish

On this second episode about drug discovery, we discuss small molecule drug libraries and the challenges behind rational design! Don't know what that means? Tune in to find out! References: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fcell.2019.00107/full https://next.cancer.gov/discoveryresources/resources_ndl.htm https://www.molbiolcell.org/doi/10.1091/mbc.E22-08-0377 https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-approves-first-gene-therapy-treatment-certain-patients-duchenne-muscular-dystrophy https://www.goodrx.com/health-topic/gene-therapy/crispr-therapeutics-vertex-exa-cel https://www.broadinstitute.org/what-broad/areas-focus/project-spotlight/crispr-timeline

Hey everyone! Today's episode is about getting into the nitty gritty of drug discovery. We often benefit from the research and development that goes into the creation of drugs we use to treat illnesses without really understanding what goes into that process. In this first part, we will discuss how you conceptually begin the process. References: https://www.nature.com/articles/nrd2399 https://www.fda.gov/vaccines-blood-biologics/zolgensma https://cancerci.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12935-019-0806-1 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK519062/ https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B9780128191828000338 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0006291X89926788?via%3Dihub https://www.nature.com/articles/362841a0 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305737220300554

Sorry for the COVID-related break in episodes everyone! In our return, we complete our series on influenza by discussing past epidemics and pandemics to understand how influenza has repeatedly led to large scale medical events. Then we will finish by discussing the current and future state of influenza vaccines! References: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmp058281 https://www.nature.com/articles/nature08157 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16208372/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5578040/ https://www.who.int/news-room/spotlight/history-of-vaccination/history-of-influenza-vaccination https://www.scripps.edu/news-and-events/press-room/2020/20200623-wilson-universalflu.html https://www.cdc.gov/flu/season/faq-flu-season-2022-2023.htm https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7159335/ https://www.nature.com/articles/nrmicro.2017.118 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0042682278901538 https://www.cdc.gov/flu/prevent/flushot.htm https://www.science.org/content/article/innovative-universal-flu-vaccine-shows-promises-it-first-clinical-test https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aaz5143 https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/using-mrna-technology-universal-flu-vaccine

You've had the flu. You've had a cold. Maybe you've even had allergies! But how can you tell them apart? And if you even figure out that you do have influenza, are there any treatments you can take that can help? References: https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/gastroenteritis-in-adults-a-to-z https://academic.oup.com/aje/article/182/4/294/113092 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/irv.12515 https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-estimates.htm https://newsinhealth.nih.gov/2014/10/cold-flu-or-allergy https://journals.plos.org/globalpublichealth/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgph.0000221 https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7150a4.htm https://www.mobihealthnews.com/news/lucira-health-files-bankruptcy-it-receives-eua-home-covid-19-flu-test https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-authorizes-first-over-counter-home-test-detect-both-influenza-and-covid-19-viruses https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-39683-4 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3108042/ https://www.cdc.gov/flu/treatment/antiviralresistance.htm https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5404498/ https://www.mdpi.com/2076-2607/11/1/183 https://www.jbc.org/article/S0021-9258(21)00260-X/fulltext

Last episode we discussed the current H5N1 flu that is hitting birds pretty hard. But is bird flu different from swine flu? Is there just a 'human flu', or do we only catch influenza from other animals? Let's get into the evolutionary history of the flu and primary hosts! References: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7328453/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK8611/ https://journals.asm.org/doi/full/10.1128/JVI.01080-14 https://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/index.htm https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7268205/ https://www.woah.org/en/disease/avian-influenza/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3784916/ https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fevo.2018.00131/full https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1176225 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32967956/

Today's episode is the first in a four-part series on influenza! This time we are covering just enough background information to discuss the recent H5N1 pandemic in birds, which was responsible for the egg shortage and has been killing a lot of wild birds. References: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3074182/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5198887/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6520700/ https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmolb.2021.727847/full https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2801499 https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/wpro---documents/emergency/surveillance/avian-influenza/ai_20230331.pdf https://www.cdc.gov/flu/avianflu/reported-human-infections.htmhttps://www.cdc.gov/flu/avianflu/h5n1-animals.htm https://www.aphis.usda.gov/aphis/ourfocus/animalhealth/animal-disease-information/avian/avian-influenza/2022-hpai https://www.eurosurveillance.org/content/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2023.28.9.2300134?crawler=true https://journals.asm.org/doi/full/10.1128/spectrum.02867-22 https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/news-events/efsa-ecdc-eurl-ongoing-avian-influenza-outbreaks-birds-low-risk-public https://www.eurosurveillance.org/content/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2023.28.3.2300001 https://perspectivesinmedicine.cshlp.org/content/11/2/a038679.short https://journals.plos.org/Plospathogens/article?id=10.1371/journal.ppat.1011135

Sure, plants can sometimes smell good and they do cool stuff like make carbs for us to eat and oxygen for us to breathe. But they sort of look like they're just passively sitting there, right? Just chilling. If only we could hear just a slightly broader range of frequencies, we would hear a whole new world of plants -- one where they are complaining about being thirsty! Find out about the screaming clicks of dying plants, this week on Petri Dish! References: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00890-9 https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(23)00262-3.pdf https://agrivita.ub.ac.id/index.php/agrivita/article/view/2613 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/ele.13331 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6899487/

Hi everyone! This week's episode is about recent work trying to figure out a way to make a baby mouse that has two genetic dads. We also dive into why mammals don't seem to have virgin births!References: https://www.nature.com/articles/cr201115 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17034046/ https://www.nature.com/articles/nature02402 https://www.nature.com/articles/nature11435 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00717-7 https://www.science.org/doi/abs/10.1126/science.abe0237 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-3027-9

Today's episode is our second and final episode on Black Holes! We cover some exotic black hole concepts, like whether they are a source of dark energy, what a white hole is, and whether black holes are fuzzy or not! References: https://www.science.org/content/article/dark-energy-supermassive-black-holes-physicists-spar-over-radical-idea https://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/focus-areas/what-is-dark-energy https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/acac2e https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/acb704 https://physicsworld.com/a/new-theory-links-supermassive-black-holes-and-dark-energy/ https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/409/3/1022/1097516 https://esahubble.org/wordbank/quasar/https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/white-holes-exist/ https://www.space.com/white-holes.html https://astronomy.com/news/2022/02/fuzzballs-might-be-the-answer-to-a-decades-old-paradox-about-black-holes https://physics.aps.org/articles/v14/s110

Here in our first episode on our 2-parter on Black Holes, we explain what a black hole is in theory and what it probably actually is in practice. We dive into why it is still hard for us to really know what the true nature of black holes are and we discuss the different kinds of black holes.References: https://forums.space.com/threads/how-to-calculate-a-black-hole%E2%80%99s-event-horizon.27467/ https://astronomy.stackexchange.com/questions/49957/do-schwarzschild-black-holes-exist-in-reality https://www.reedbeta.com/blog/emc2-is-only-half-the-story/ https://medium.com/predict/the-black-hole-made-of-light-5494e972abab https://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/educators/lifecycles/LC_main3.html https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ab2646 https://www.wired.com/story/where-do-supermassive-black-holes-come-from/

In February, a train was partially derailed while carrying a number of chemicals. The subsequent attempt at containment resulted in the release of many thousands of gallons of these chemicals. What were those chemicals? What are the risks involved in their release? References: https://www.nytimes.com/article/ohio-train-derailment.html https://www.ntsb.gov/news/press-releases/Pages/NR20230214.aspx https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0002889718506429 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160412007001390 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304389421030533 https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/es1013664#https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/20/3/617 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0013935105001921 https://news.wosu.org/2023-03-01/could-dioxins-be-in-the-soil-after-the-east-palestine-train-derailment-experts-weigh-in

On this week's episode, we complete our series on desalination by discussing the near future technologies that are coming to either improve or attempt to supplant the current front runners that we discussed last week. We will also discuss the downsides of desalination and work that is being done to try to minimize or circumvent them! References: https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/story/five-things-know-about-desalination https://www.energy.gov/eere/articles/department-energy-invests-5-million-desalination-technology-deliver-freshwater https://e360.yale.edu/features/as-water-scarcity-increases-desalination-plants-are-on-the-rise https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-04467-3 https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/23659/chapter/14#66 https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2022200118 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1871271109002049 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1364032117307086 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41545-018-0020-z https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0043135421003523 https://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn/2011/523124/ https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9717/8/8/901 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B9780444639615000092 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001191642100254X https://www.nature.com/articles/s41545-022-00158-1

Hi Everyone! We're interrupting our series on desalination to put out a quick rerelease of one of our episodes on Fungi! We're doing this in honor of the season 1 finale of The Last of Us, which heavily features a fungus called Cordyceps, which we covered in this episode. Check it out and learn more about cordyceps, similar fungi, and much nicer fungi that improve human life rather than turning us into freaky zombies.

Climate change is happening, two billion people don't have a reliable and safe supply of fresh water, and the problem isn't likely to get a whole lot better on its own! Desalination is the process of making fresh water from salt water, but what is the current state of the technology? Find out on this episode of Petri Dish! Next time, we will discuss the near-future iterations on desalination! References: https://www.usgs.gov/special-topics/water-science-school/science/saline-water-and-salinity https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6801928/ https://www.usgs.gov/special-topics/water-science-school/science/where-earths-water https://water.ca.gov/water-basics/groundwater https://data.unicef.org/resources/progress-on-household-drinking-water-sanitation-and-hygiene-2000-2020/ https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001191642100254X https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/23659/chapter/14 https://phys.org/news/2019-08-technique-membranes-next-generation-filtration-desalination.html https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0376738821002416 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0011916420313114

While science and medicine have come a long way over the centuries, there are still illnesses that cannot be explained -- and many of them are autoinflammatory disorders. Many people all over the world have been inflicted with these disorders with no clear cause. But recently, scientists were able to find a mutation that can help explain what some of these people are going through, a mutation that led to the identification of an autoinflammatory disorder now known as VEXAS. Tune in to learn more! References: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmoa2026834 https://www.nature.com/articles/nrm.2017.83 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0962892413002274 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006497121010223 https://journals.physiology.org/doi/abs/10.1152/physrev.00004.2022 https://www.niams.nih.gov/labs/grayson-lab/vexas https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2800661 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/bjh.17893 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41375-022-01698-8 https://ashpublications.org/blood/article-abstract/140/8/927/485331/Ruxolitinib-is-more-effective-than-other-JAK https://ashpublications.org/bloodadvances/article/6/3/998/477726/Successful-allogeneic-hematopoietic-stem-cell

Occasionally we do episodes where we speak about a couple different topics that don't have a specific underlying theme -- they're just fun science papers that have cropped up recently! This time we discuss the confluence of two different hot technologies, CRISPR base editing and CAR T cells. We also do a little dive into Roman Concrete! References: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-63859184 https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/treatment/research/car-t-cells https://www.science.org/content/article/teen-s-leukemia-goes-remission-after-experimental-gene-editing-therapy https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.add1602 https://www.science.org/content/article/scientists-may-have-found-magic-ingredient-behind-ancient-romes-self-healing-concrete https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2017.22231

We return with our second episode on Death, the final frontier! What is it? Actually though, like what determines the moment when someone dies? This question has actually had a different answer through the years, and we dive into the definition and how it has changed as technology has advanced. We finish with an example of cutting-edge technology that may further muddy the line between alive and dead! References: https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20150508-what-happens-after-we-die https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167701214002127 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5570697/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6880073/ https://cpr.heart.org/en/resources/history-of-cpr https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/article/deaths-troubled-relationship-law/2020-12 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05016-1 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-02112-0 https://news.yale.edu/2022/08/03/yale-developed-technology-restores-cell-organ-function-pigs-after-death https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-02060-9

On our first episode about Death, we look into a paper published a few years that described the reanimation of a pig brain! Spooky! Let’s get into the science behind it and some of its implications for humans!

This winter season the world is dealing with not two but three respiratory illnesses at the same time. While these are familiar names at this point, they’re definitely different from one another, so let’s get into COVID, the flu, and RSV!

Hi Folks! Part 2 of our series on coffee focuses on how coffee beans can be imparted with different flavors through their picking and processing! We mentioned this in the show notes for the last episode, but we will be going on a couple month hiatus while Nathan and Stacey take a vacation in Korea! We will be re-releasing some of our older episodes in the meantime, in case people are really itching to listen to our dulcet tones. References: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13593-022-00801-8 https://perfectdailygrind.com/2018/01/coffee-defects-how-to-avoid-them-a-producers-guide/ https://perfectdailygrind.com/2017/01/why-specialty-naturals-need-strict-quality-control/ https://www.baristainstitute.com/blog/jori-korhonen/january-2020/coffee-processing-methods-drying-washing-or-honey https://www.trianoncoffee.com/blogs/news/how-is-honey-processed-coffee-different-from-washed-or-natural https://ticotimes.net/2020/12/21/what-is-anaerobic-coffee https://www.mdpi.com/2304-8158/10/6/1329/htm https://gayokopi.com/history-of-kopi-luwak/