Beyond Lab Walls | Salk Institute

Latest Episodes:

Lara Labarta-Bajo explains how infections affect your brain Sep 10, 2024

Show notes

How can an infection in your lungs have such a lasting effect on your brain? Lara Labarta-Bajo, a postdoctoral researcher in Associate Professor Nicola Allen's lab, studies how the immune system and the brain communicate with each other. Her latest findings reveal a surprising relationship between infections, brain aging, and mobility.

Jesse Dixon talks DNA loops and six-toed cats Aug 10, 2024

Show notes

Did you know each of your cells contains a six-foot-long strand of DNA? In a miraculous feat of molecular origami, your genome can fold itself into a tightly packed structure that fits into the tiny space of a cell's nucleus. Hear how Assistant Professor Jesse Dixon combines his scientific and medical training to unravel the rules of DNA folding and explain how a single misplaced bend or loop can lead to diseases like cancer.

Jake Minich looks to the sea to solve food scarcity on land May 30, 2024

Show notes

Jake Minich is a postdoctoral researcher in the lab of Research Professor Todd Michael. Minich had a long and winding journey to Salk, crossing continents and oceans to land in sunny San Diego studying microbial ecology. Combining his childhood joy of fishing and a passion for community, Minich is working to alleviate or prevent the burden of undernutrition in low- and middle-income countries.

Laura Mainz on stopping cancer before it starts Apr 17, 2024

Show notes

Laura Mainz is a postdoctoral researcher in the lab of Professor Jan Karlseder. Always curious about the human body, her father's cancer diagnosis inspired a career in cancer biology. In this episode, we learn about Mainz's journey from Germany to California, the science of stopping cancer before it starts, and how researchers cope with such emotionally draining lab work.

Pamela Maher lets us in on plants' medicinal secrets Mar 15, 2024

Show notes

In the first year of her new life attending university in Montréal, Research Professor Pamela Maher made a fateful switch from political science to the biological sciences. On this episode of Beyond Lab Walls, Maher recounts how the science major girl-next-dorm inspired her flourishing career studying age-related neurodegeneration and diseases like Alzheimer's—and how we could potentially treat them with plant derivatives.

Talmo Pereira is using AI to understand movement Feb 26, 2024

Show notes

Salk Fellow Talmo Pereira first learned to code in his hometown in Brazil as a way to improve his video gaming. His lab now uses artificial intelligence (AI) to track complex motion in video data. Hear how he's using these tools to study how the brain coordinates body movements to produce complex behaviors, how plant root systems sequester carbon, and how humans and animals behave during health and disease.

Natanella Illouz-Eliaz explores how plants survive droughts Jan 30, 2024

Show notes

Natanella Illouz-Eliaz is a postdoctoral researcher in the lab of Professor Joseph Ecker. A plant biologist by training, she studies how plants recover from drought conditions. On this episode of Beyond Lab Walls, Illouz-Eliaz recounts how her life plan went from business to biology—all because of a tomato field.

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