A Nature Podcast

Environmental & Science Education, STEM, Science & Society, Biodiversity, Nature of Science, History of Science, Earth & Space Science, Earth Systems, Sustainability, Nature, Wildlife

Ed Hessler

A UK science journal Nature podcast to which you can listen in its entirety how you want. Because it is divided into segments you can listen to one and return or simply choose the one that interests you. The podcast is 35m 23s long.

You can listen to all of it or decide which segments you want to hear. 

What follows are the menu descriptions provided below the podcast. Each provides a link to relevant reports,  research article; research highlights, news features, and Nature news..

0:46  Borrowing tricks from cancer could help improve immunotherapy. The link, 0.46 is hot.

T-cell based immunotherapies have revolutionized the treatment of certain types of cancer. However these therapies — which involve taking someone’s own T cells and reprogramming them to kill cancer cells — have struggled to treat solid tumours, which put up multiple defences. To overcome these, a team has taken mutations found in cancer cells that help them thrive and put them into therapeutic T cells. Their results show these powered-up cells are more efficient at targeting solid tumours, but don’t turn cancerous themselves.

11:39 Research Highlights:

How researchers solved a submerged-sprinkler problem named after Richard Feynman, and what climate change is doing to high-altitude environmental records in Switzerland.

14:28 What might the car batteries of the future look like?

As electric cars become ever more popular around the world, manufacturers are looking to improve the batteries that power them. While conventional lithium-ion batteries have dominated the electric vehicle market for decades, researchers are developing alternatives that have better performance and safety — we run though some of these options and discuss their pros and cons.

25:32 Briefing Chat:

How a baby’s-eye view of the world helps an AI learn language, and how the recovery of sea otter populations in California slowed rates of coastal erosion.