Podcasts

In our fortnightly podcasts we aim to keep you up-to-date with the most recent and exciting biological discoveries.

Our podcasts are presented by Ceri Harrop and Greta Santagata. If you'd like to get in touch, please email: podcast@manchester.ac.uk.

Series 2

Episode 13 - Gut thoughts

Ever wondered why some people refer to guts as your "second brain"? In this podcast we're discussing the role that the enteric nervous system plays in our body and how what happens in your guts can affect the rest of your body... including your brain!

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Episode 12 - Parasite mind control

Zombie ants that have lost control of their actions, nematodes that make insects look like berries, suicidal mice that are attracted to cat wee, parasitoid wasps that inject their eggs into other animals... a short journey into the weird and grotesque world of mind controlling parasites!

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Episode 11 - Sumer Is Icumen In (sing Cuckoo)

Spring is here, finally! And we're celebrating with an episode on birds and bird migration. Our guests on the show are Richard Roe, an ecologist, and Henry McGhie, zoology curator at the Manchester Museum.

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Episode 10 - Women in science for International Women's Day

We're here to celebrate International Women's Day, on the 8th of March. In this episode, we interview three female researchers from the FLS, Cay Kielty, Sarah Woolner and Rachel Lennon, to find out what they think are the major challenges of being a woman in science, and what piece of advice they would give to a young woman starting her academic career.

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Episode 9 - Child stroke

In this episode we talk about child stroke and interview Eileen, the mother of Daisy, a little girl who survived stroke when she was 21 months old. We also talk to Professor Dame Nancy Rothwell, stroke researcher and President and Vice-Chancellor of The University of Manchester, and to Professor Stuart Allan from the Faculty of Life Sciences.

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Episode 8 - The origin of life

Inspired by the BBC2 series Wonders of Life presented by Prof Brian Cox, we've made a whole episode about the question "What is life and how did it come about on our planet?". We talk about deep sea vents, panspermia, the RNA world hypothesis and much more.

On this podcast our guests are Dr Nick Lane and Adam Rutherford. The former is a researcher and lecturer at UCL, author of the award winning book "Life Ascending" and science consultant for the TV series, Wonders of Life. The latter is a brilliant science writer and broadcaster, currently working on his latest book, "Creation", on the origin and future of life.

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In episode 7:

Prof Charles Streuli and Dr Nasreen Akhtar from the FLS and the Wellcome Trust Centre for Cell Matrix Research have discovered how cells from the breast know which way up (also known as "polarity") they need to be in order to function properly and form healthy tissues. When these cells lose their polarity, they stop aligning themselves in the correct way, forming a disorganised tissue that resembles the early stages of breast cancer. Their discovery can therefore help us to understand, prevent and fight the disease.

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In the 6th episode we talk about computers and brains and how one can affect our understanding of the other. Tom Sharp is a computer scientist working in the SpiNNaker group where he's building a massive super computer which should be able to simulate large networks of neurons. Matteo Farinella, from UCL, has a background in biology, but he's now making computer simulations of how single neurons from the cortex of the brain integrate and compute large amounts of information in just a few milliseconds.

During our chat we discuss Matteo and Tom's work and we critically talk about the future of neuroscience, what it means to investigate the nature of our own minds and if we'll ever be able to figure out once and for all how the brain works.

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In our 5th episode we talk about the Moon, the tides and how these can affect the behaviour of some animals.

• Our first guest is Tim O'Brien, associate director of the Jodrell Bank Observatory, who explains how tides are formed.
  Listen to Tim's full interview (mp3). Why? Because Tim is a brilliant speaker, funny and insightful and this whole interview is packed with science facts and curiosities.
• Following on is former marine biologist Pamela Buchan, who talks about Nereis virens (a type of ragworm that lives in the sandy beaches of Britain) and how their feeding and reproductive behaviour is synchronised with the moon cycles.
• At the very end we decided to read you the poem "The Time and the Ragworm" whilst playing the musical composition "Eight Bells", both written by artist John Kefala Kerr and inspired by the moon cycles, the tides and the science behind the ragworm's peculiar reproductive behaviour.

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In the fourth episode we talk about Autumn and how plants and animals start to get ready for the cold and long winter months.

Richard Roe, a freelance ecologist and bat expert, talks about how bats and other animals hibernate while Dr Giles Johnson explains why leaves change coloration in Autumn before falling off.

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In the third episode of the second series:

We talk about light! How light can affect us in many different ways, from our sleep patterns, to hunger and even moods. We also talk about winter depression and how the very little light that we see during this time of year might play a role in us feeling less energetic than usual.

Final year medical student Elspeth Hill will tell you about her experience using light therapy and how that improved her life, while Prof Rob Lucas and Dr Tim Brown will guide you through the mechanisms by which light acts on our brains and subconscious.

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In the second episode of the new series:

• We interviewed Professor Enrique Amaya, who has worked in the past with the Nobel laureate Sir John Gurdon and told us about his life, both as a scientist and as a man.
• We also welcomed a new faculty member, Dr Robert Sansom, and found out a bit more about his peculiar research on the decomposition of dead bodies.

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In the first episode of the new series:

• we talk to Professor Steven Reppert about the role of circadian clocks in the migration of the Monarch butterflies
• we meet a new faculty member, Dr Tucker Gilman, and find out what his research is about
• Prof Matthew Cobb and Dr Victoria Henshaw take us on a "smell" tour around campus and show us how smells can affect the perception of the urban environment we live in

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Series 1

In the final episode of series 1:

• we talk to Professor Bambos Kyriacou about biorhythms
• we hear from Dr Simone Turchetti about his new book The Pontecorvo Affair
• we say goodbye to "the rarest animal on Earth"

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Content in Episode 13:

• We speak to Professor Sir John Sulston about sustainable development
• How Synthetic Biology will change the world
• Radioactive Tuna, better than it sounds!

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Featuring in Episode 12:

• Orang-utan nest building (see movie below)
• Britain leads the fight against Dementia
• Tracing the roots of agriculture using ancient DNA

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Episode 11 is a little different from our other podcasts... It's an interview with Professor Steve Jones, a geneticist from University College London. Professor Jones talks about the relationship between science and the media, following his report commissioned by the BBC Trust.

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In episode 10 we discuss:

• the modern world of palaeontology [Link: Dinosaur Sabbatical]
• why we dream, and
• ovarian stem cells

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Topics for episode 9 of the Life Sciences Podcast are:

• can you die of a broken heart?
• what makes our knuckles crack
• the world's first stem cell burger

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In the 8th episode of the Life Sciences Podcast, we discuss:

• the discovery of our sixth taste, fat
• just why it is that your stomach rumbles in seminars
• the hot topics at this year's ScienceOnline conference 2012

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In this first episode of 2012 we find out about:

• the microbes that live in our gut
• why we humans are symmetrical
• and why spider silk is the holy grail of material science

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Previous episodes

This is an archive of last year's podcasts, click the title to expand/contract.

2011 Podcasts