ResearchPod

Omega-3 fatty acids are essential to human health, and are mainly sourced from wild caught fish. Those same fish are also an essential part of feeding farmed salmon as their own source of omega-3.  With increasing demands on the fishing industry globally, there is a pressing need for sustainably sourced omega-3 oils for human and salmon alike. Benita Boettner, global general manager for Nuseed Nut...

There have been scores of drug approvals across the globe for treating cancer in recent years, and the right combination of treatment and patient can lead to longer, better living with the disease. With all these breakthroughs on top of years of experience in care administration, how much has the patient experience changed?   Professor David Stewart , medical oncologist and professor of medicine a...

The infrastructure for transport within and between towns offers more than just a means to get from one place to another. It can shape the formation of those towns, and how people relate to traveling from a psychological, not just practical, standpoint. Ole Aasvik of Institute of Transport Economics and the University of Oslo discusses his research into transport access, attitudes and autonomy in...

A trusting society is open, inclusive, and promotes both social and personal well-being. Understanding the interpersonal trust between any members of society, be it a belief, intention or behaviour, is of crucial importance to fields ranging from psychology and neuroscience to economics. Prof Frank Krueger of George Mason University brings together economic exchange games, psychological systems an...

Our world is always changing. Some of those changes, such as climate change or depletion of natural resources, are coming fast, and could have far reaching impacts on nature and culture for generations to come. Prof Jim Perry of The University of Minnesota  describes his work in Adaptive Heritage, and discusses how citizens and governments alike can act now to ensure a future for those fast-vanish...

Depending on when and where you listen to this podcast, you may be legally allowed to possess cannabis for your own recreational enjoyment. Or it may land you in jail.  That’s not just a difference between one liberal countries laws and another conservative nation, that’s the difference between New Mexico and it’s neighbouring state of Texas.  Today i’m speaking with Dr Michael Sofis of Cannabis P...

In the face of a staff shortage among endocrinologists in the US, patient care for those with diabetes is paramount. Dr Richard Santen at the University of Virginia School of Medicine, offers a solution to improve the care of patients in rural, underserved areas through ‘re-booting’ endocrinologists and telehealth. Read the original article: http://doi.org/10.1177/1357633X221106041 Read more in Re...

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, multiple vaccines and treatments have been proposed to combat the disease. However, one limitation of these vaccines and treatments is that they are often developed for a specific form of a virus–meaning they maybe less effective against new variants of the disease. Professor Thomas Webster thinks that this could be achieved by using nanomaterials, specifi...

Forecasts project that there will be around 100 million electric vehicles on the roads in the next few decades. With that additional electricity demand, it's important to consider how we are going to be able to charge electric vehicles. Dr Yangfang (Helen) Zhou from Singapore Management University and colleagues propose an innovative business model for utility firms to meet the stress of elec...

Dr Shelley Newman of Newman Specialty VetPath, USA, has improved the diagnosis, classification, and treatment of mast cell tumours and pancreatic diseases in veterinary species and contributed to the literature by characterising many new disease processes in exotic species. Read more about their work in Research Outreach Read the original article: https://doi.org/10.2460/javma.20.12.0663

Even this early in the 21st century, there are signs of economic and cultural trends that may be its hallmarks in history - for better, for worse and in ways yet to be seen. Today i’m speaking with Dr Huiyao 'Henry' Wang of the Centre of China and Globalisation about the future of China in international commerce and diplomacy, how to connect with, and within, global superpowers, and what...

For as long as people have farmed, it has been known that planting the same crop in the same field without change over the years leads to reduced crop yield. Decaying plant material from past harvests leaves extracellular, or free-drifting, plant DNA in the soil, that prohibits the growth of new plants of the same species. This phenomenon, known as toxicity, is responsible for a plant–soil negativ...

The dream of nuclear fusion as a source of near-unlimited energy is decades old, but, with the latest advances by research teams working around the world, it may just be within reach. Dr Tamás Biró of the Wigner Research Centre for Physics is leading research on laser ignition of nanoparticles to bring that goal closer to fruition. You can read more about his research in Research Outreach. Read th...

Peter Verheyen of the Sola Society and Academy at Vienna University, Austria, explores the notion that the conscious reality we experience as human beings is drawn from the information constantly emitted from the real physical world.  He argues that the real physical world is akin to a giant quantum computer that gives rise to consciousness itself. Read the original article: https://doi.org/10.339...

The cellular waste in your blood can tell you a lot about your health -any immune activation, mineral deficits, or stress hormones circulating through you. So, what do you think it means when chunks of cells, knocked loose by the shear stress of your own blood pressure, start turning up? Dr Ramani Ramchandran at the Medical College of Wisconsin and his team are developing new tests for these cellu...

More than one in seven people in the US have chronic kidney disease (CKD), making it one of the top causes of death. Anaemia is a common, though under-treated complication. Dr Robert Provenzano of Wayne State University and his team pooled together the results of three randomised clinical trials to investigate the efficacy and safety of of new treatment, Roxadustat, in managing the blood disease r...

For members of The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), festivals are used to promote a concept known as   “the ASEAN Way”: respecting each other’s sovereignty, non-interference in the internal affairs of one another, and peaceful settlements of disputes. In his most recent paper, Dr David Ocón of Singapore Management University researches the “ulterior motives” of festivals and how the...

Biodiversity data can be analysed to predict species distribution at various scales of time and space. However, survey completeness and temporal decay in data quality introduce uncertainty into biodiversity models.  Researchers Joaquín Hortal, Juliana Stropp, Richard Ladle, and Geiziane Tessarolo, among others, are constructing the first Maps of Biogeographical Ignorance (MoBIs) that account for u...

The 'resource curse’,  or "Dutch disease“, describes when countries rich in natural resources face reduced domestic growth rates in other sectors due an influx of foreign currency or investment, mixed with market volatility.   The Tao of Finance initiative from the World Academy of Arts and Sciences examines the link between this ‘disease’ and the 17 UN-Sustainability Development Goals,...

How do we know that we can trust software? One answer is software reliability testing. Dr Mário Pereira and Dr António Ravara from the Nova School of Science and Technology in Lisbon, Portugal, and their collaborators have developed the Cameleer tool, a formal verification software tool for OCaml-written code. Read the original article: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-81688-9_31 Read more in Res...

Alchemy may be understood as the first scientific paradigm, beginning as a collection of observations, experiments, and recipes for practical processes. Woven into these primary alchemical texts were also a good deal of the symbolism, philosophy and religious beliefs of the time. Dr Julia Kasmire explores the ways in which the seemingly unrelated concepts of sustainability and alchemy can both be...

Obesity is a growing public health concern, but studies suggest that soluble fibre from certain cereal whole grains can help weight management.   Rebecca Mathews and her collaborators in the US conducted a thorough review of key studies demonstrating the efficacy and mechanisms behind oat and barley β-glucan on weight loss. These findings confirm the importance of whole grains in combating obesity...

Molecules are comprised of charged particles whose spatial distribution is or could be distorted, lending the molecules a handle by which they can be manipulated via external electromagnetic fields. Dr Burkhard Schmidt at the Freie Universität Berlin and Professor Bretislav Friedrich at the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society in Berlin, along with colleagues, have been studying the eff...

 While some bacteria are beneficial, such as probiotic bacteria in the human gastrointestinal tract, others can have serious consequences for human health. Professor Aliyar Cyrus Fouladkhah of  Tennessee State University  studies preventative measures for microbial pathogens and foodborne and waterborne infectious diseases in the context of climate change.  Read the original research: https://doi....

New generations of particle accelerators are now in development, in which beams of particles collide ever more precisely and at ever higher energies. Professor Stephen Myers, former Director of Accelerators & Technology at CERN and currently Executive Chair of ADAM SA, identifies both the positive and negative lessons which future projects can learn from previous generations of accelerators fo...