The eLife Podcast
The eLife Podcast: outstanding research in life science and biomedicine.
- Update frequency
- every 44 days
- Average duration
- 31 minutes
- Episodes
- 99
- Years Active
- 2013 - 2025
Ants doing gene therapy, and tadpole microbiomes
This month, as the eLife Podcast hits its century, we hear how getting frog dads to cross-foster tadpoles has revealed the way in which some frogs come by their microbiomes, the ants that do gene the…
00:43:15 |
Mon 08 Sep 2025
Finland's giant virus, and monkeys take care of their teeth
In the eLife podcast, a university compost heap has turned up Finland's first documented "giant virus". Also, why monkeys de-sand their supper, and how learning more languages actually makes brain ti…
00:38:48 |
Thu 19 Jun 2025
Frog toxicity, and what a year's schooling does to the brain
What is the impact of an extra year at school on the brain? Also, how poison dart frogs come by their toxins, using movies to track the developing infant nervous system, the insect-spread bacterial p…
00:35:28 |
Thu 24 Apr 2025
Hollywood helps brain scientists probe thoughts
This month, how films are helping neuroscientists link brain activity patterns to specific thought processes, a breakthrough in managing opiate overdose, a technique to study animal teamwork, extract…
00:40:51 |
Wed 26 Feb 2025
Evolving flu, and the desert decomposition conundrum
Predicting how influenza viruses will evolve, how deserts decompose matter despite the dry, what worms are revealing about a gene linked to autism, and what makes mice fearful of cat smells. Dr Chris…
00:30:59 |
Fri 20 Dec 2024
Cancer mood control, and birth products blocking pain
This month, signs that cancers communicate with the brain to alter mood, why antibodies are unreliable in research, evidence that social training can cut stress and boost brain volume, and agents der…
00:33:06 |
Fri 01 Nov 2024
Vampire bacteria, "hangry" males, and ants using moonlight
This month, Chris Smith hears how blood-thirsty bacteria sniff out wounds to trigger infections, how ants navigate at night, how male and female brains respond differently to starvation, and inflamma…
00:30:50 |
Tue 10 Sep 2024
How termites build their nests, and drivers of new diseases
This month, how human encroachment and conflict on nature drives emerging diseases, the role of "stigmergy" in guiding the nest-building feats of termites, a project to track infectious abortions in …
00:34:28 |
Tue 18 Jun 2024
Hibernation, Ketamine and Aphantasia
This month, how animals hibernate and evidence that muscle myosin makes its own heat in the cold, brain scans to reveal how ketamine relieves resistant depression, the way the brain changes when anim…
00:37:53 |
Fri 19 Apr 2024
Apes reveal language origins, and being dyslexic in science
This month we hear what orangutans can tell us about the origins of human speech, we ask if science making life even harder for dyslexics, where do the scientists we train end up and do they stay in …
00:36:04 |
Fri 08 Mar 2024
Bees can't taste pesticides, and how albatrosses get aloft
In the eLife Podcast this month, signs that bees are oblivious to pesticides in nectar, sea anemone stinging strategies, a new means of cell-cell communication to share growth factors and other signa…
00:34:46 |
Thu 30 Nov 2023
Cold haemoglobin, and teaching old dogs new ethics
This month, how an extinct marine mammal made its haemoglobin work in the cold, how does learning compassion change the shape of the human brain, women publishing cautiously, how populations evolve t…
00:35:35 |
Fri 29 Sep 2023
How many friends for best brain health?
This month join host Dr Chris Smith to hear how a nuclear power station provides the opportunity to test theories of the effects of global warming on how fish grow, evidence that personalised medicin…
00:31:02 |
Mon 31 Jul 2023
Social media and febrile fish
This month we look at a method to raise the bar on the quality and trustworthiness of information shared over social media networks, how fish running a fever heal from infection faster, what miniatur…
00:36:50 |
Tue 06 Jun 2023
Ancient Genes and Trust in New Tech
This month, the genetic variants inherited from millions of years back that protect from disease but can cause illnesses; also, signs that we trust human-sourced information more than what a computer…
00:39:18 |
Tue 11 Apr 2023
Right handedness, and genes for hairiness
Why are 90% of humans right handed and where did we get this from; genes for how - and where - hair grows; the intriguing timing behind how sunflowers flower; how the microbiome of the bee weaponises…
00:36:55 |
Wed 01 Mar 2023
Rebuilding Dinosaurs and Stress from Siblings
The ability to recreate dinosaurs inside computers means the true nature of the spinosaurus can now be uncovered, what the Afro Barometer reveals about the potential to use mobile phones to deliver r…
00:30:05 |
Thu 15 Dec 2022
Babies cry in utero, and pushing preprints
This month, what ultrasound scans are revealing about how primates learn to cry before birth, the new imaging technique highlighting brain structural changes linked to speech and language impairments…
00:33:01 |
Fri 11 Nov 2022
Urban microbiomes, and crushed cancers
This month, what happens to the microbiomes of wild animals when they share cities with humans, how being crushed in a cancer makes metastatic cells more malign, a genetic tool to uncover when popula…
00:32:22 |
Fri 16 Sep 2022
Does Vaping Inflame the Brain?
Signs that some vapes inflame the brain and other organs, how a whiff of CO2 puts mosquitoes into feeding mode, how long, at present rates, it will take before science reaches gender parity, and how …
00:29:28 |
Mon 04 Jul 2022
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