As a kid, all Vincent Lynch wanted to do was hang out by the river near his home, fishing and crabbing and playing in the muck. School, by contrast, was a bore. Then he discovered biology—and never looked back. Today, as an evolutionary biologist at the University at Buffalo, Lynch studies the genomic history of animals both living and extinct to understand everything from why elephants don’t get cancer to why women go into labor. In this episode of Driven to Discover, Lynch talks to host Tom Dinki about what it means to run a “curiosity-driven” lab, why resurrecting extinct species is a bad idea, and how analyzing animal genes could help humans lead longer, healthier lives.

Credits: 
 
Host: Tom Dinki
Guest: Vincent Lynch
Writer/Producer: Laura Silverman
Production and editing by UB Video Production Group 

Coming on Feb. 4: Host David Hill chats with architecture professor Joyce Hwang, whose work over the past two decades incorporating wildlife habitats into the built environment challenges humans’ notions of what it means to coexist with animals, whether they’re creepy and crawly or cute and cuddly. Hwang’s work has been featured by the Museum of Modern Art and exhibited around the world.