Genes

Nobel prize-winning geneticist Sir Paul Nurse's latest book, What Is Life?, explores the question of what we as humans share with all other living things on this planet.  Audio

Geneticist Neil Gemmell has won the 2020 Hutton Medal for using DNA & new genomic technologies to better understant plants & animals. Audio

The next major pandemic could be inflicted by terrorists unleashing a bio-engineered virus on to the world, according to distinguished fellow at Harvard Law School, Vivek Wadwha. He joins the show to… Audio

In his new book, The Origins of You: How Childhood Shapes Later Life, University of Otago professor Richie Poulton and his co-authors set out to determine to what extent our origins shape our later… Audio

Following recent photos of the dramatic weight-loss transformation by pop star Adele the Sirtfood Diet has become a hot topic. But what's the catch? Sarah Hanrahan from the NZ Nutrition Foundation… Audio

If we talked to other people the way we talk to yourself we'd probably have zero friends, no job and warrants out for our arrest, says psychologist Nick Wignall. From a young age, many of us… Audio

Kiwi Gary McLean is a Professor of Immunology at the London Metropolitan University. He says the news on the Covid-19 front continues to be hugely concerning. In fact, he says this outbreak is… Audio

In 1978, a seemingly straightforward experiment involving New Zealand rabbits discovered that kindness made the difference between a heart attack and a healthy heart. It's called the 'rabbit effect'… Audio

Dartmouth College Professor David Blanchflower has studied data across 132 countries to measure the relationship between wellbeing and age and come up with a U-shaped happiness curve, which reaches… Audio

What if plants are smarter than we think - a lot smarter? That's the central premise for an essay, published in The Paris Review by New York-based writer and editor Cody Delistraty.  Audio

 Dr Justin O'Sullivan from the Liggins Institute explains the break through they've made in understanding why people with type 1 diabetes often contract seemingly unrelated diseases by using 3D gene… Audio

Early bird or night owl? Professor Timothy Grayling of the University of Exeter Medical School explains the health implications of our sleep patterns. Audio

Warren Tate has jointly won the 2018 Marsden Medal for a lifetime of molecular discoveries about proteins and the genes that code them. Audio

Anna Pilbrow says that a complex interaction of genetic factors underpin our risk of getting heart disease - and leading a healhy lifestyle lowers the risk. Audio

Kiwi canine DNA has been collected as part of a global project, called Darwin's Dogs, investigating the genes behind the personalities of dogs. Audio