Editor’s Picks | November

[00:00 – 00:36] Hello and welcome back to Editor’s Picks! As another month rolls over and we soon open the first doors of our advent calendars, it’s time to catch up on the latest news from BioTechniques. Join me, Aisha Al-Janabi, as I round up the weird, the wonderful and the incredible research going on in the life science community. Each month I’ll be bringing you my favourite news stories and interviews in this bitesize podcast to accompany you whilst you’re waiting for your centrifuge to run or your kettle to boil.

[00:36 – 01:22] We spoke to Emma Kurz about her research investigating the link between aerobic exercise and anti-tumour activity in pancreatic cancer models. Emma has been studying mechanisms that are triggered by exercise in the hope of finding a way to mimic these effects and develop adjuvant therapies for pancreatic cancer patients. Kurz and the research team studied the impact of gentle running on mice with pancreatic tumors and found a significant increase in CD8 effector T cells. This suggests that aerobic exercise promotes mobilization and accumulation of anti-tumor cells. The research group has started collaborating with the MD Anderson Cancer Center to obtain tumor samples from patients who had carried out an exercise training plan prior to their surgery to see if these mechanisms also occur in humans.

[01:22 -01:54] If you’re an early career researcher using proteomics, definitely check out our latest LEARN guide. This guide is all about quantitative proteomics and was written by David Kotol, who published a paper in the BioTechniques journal outlining a method of targeted proteomics analysis of plasma proteins. In this guide, David explains what proteomics is and talks through a workflow using stable isotope standard protein epitope signature tags.

What other technique guides would you like to see? Let us know by Tweeting us @MyBioTechniques or sending us an email.

[01:54 – 02:26] The clitoris is the only organ we know of that has the sole purpose of providing pleasure, but it has been largely ignored by science. The human clitoris has more than 10,000 nerve fibers, which is nearly four times as many as in a fingertip. However, finding the region of the brain that responds to clitoral stimulation has been difficult. Researchers of a recent study used functional MRI to map the regions of the brain that respond to clitoral stimulation. They found that the precise location in the brain differs from person to person and that the structural thickness of the somatosensory cortex is correlated with the frequency of sex.

[02:26 – 03:05] Scientists have found a link between the distribution of black wolves across North America and the frequency of Canine Distemper Virus outbreaks. The further south you are, towards the Rocky Mountains, the more black wolves you are likely to see. An international collaboration led by Tim Coulsen at the University of Oxford wanted to find out why this was the case. They found that the gene variant responsible for the black-colored coat helps protect the wolves from Canine Distemper Virus. They looked back at 20 years of data from the wolf population in Yellowstone National Park and found that the black wolves had higher instances of Canine Distemper Virus antibodies and were more common in areas that had experienced outbreaks.

[03:05 – 03:56] Mars has a temperature of around -63 degrees Celsius, but temperatures can drop as low as -128 degrees! Its atmosphere contains more than 95% carbon dioxide and less than 1% oxygen. Researchers have tentatively suggested that microbial cross-contamination between Earth and Mars might be possible as some terrestrial bacteria species could survive these conditions. These researchers put six forms of bacteria and fungi that are found on Earth into conditions that simulate the frozen and dry Martian environment. They found that some of these microorganisms could in fact survive the Martian climate for hundreds of millions of years! This includes the Deinococcus radiodurans, a bacterium that the researchers suggest could survive for 280 million years when buried just 10 meters below Mars’ surface!

[03:56 – 04:28] Researchers from the University of Copenhagen have used lactic acid bacteria strains to make a sustainable alternative to heavy whipping cream. This was a proof-of-concept study for bacteria-based food. Using two strains of lactic acid bacteria, the researchers were able to create two types of whipped cream with different peak stiffnesses. Interestingly, this cream is not vegan, despite only having four ingredients, which are: water, bacteria, milk protein and a thickener. So, when you’re cozying up with a whipped cream-covered hot chocolate this winter, consider that in the future it might be made of bacteria!

[04:28 – 04:53] Those are some of the articles from BioTechniques that I enjoyed reading or writing over the past month, but there are plenty more on our website. Let us know what your favorite articles were this month by tweeting us @MyBioTechniques and use the #BTNEditorsPicks. If you’d like to find out more about any of these articles check out the show notes.

[04:53 – 05:42] This brings us to the last episode of 2022. I hope you take what you need from this festive period, be that feasting with your chosen families or spending some time with yourself to rest and recover. We’ll be back in 2023 with more life science news and in the meantime, you can keep up to date with our content by subscribing to our newsletter or following us on Twitter and LinkedIn!

Thank you for listening and see you in 2023!