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Biology-related podcasts as part of the KYTOS Enrichment Programme. Visit: www.kytosbiology.org.uk for full details Visit: www.youtube.com/mriexplains for Science video tutorials 'KYTOS Biology' podcasts and the 'mr i explains' YouTube channel are proudly sponsored by Curriculum Press - producers of global education resources for over 25 years. Visit https://curriculum-press.co.uk/ for details.
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The Jack the Ripper case remains one of the most studied and debated criminal mysteries in history. Biological evidence, from blood patterns and autopsy reports to modern DNA analysis, has played a crucial role in shaping the investigation and the various theories about the killer’s identity. Despite the significant advances in forensic science, th…
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The O.J. Simpson case remains a landmark in the history of forensic science and criminal justice. The biological evidence, particularly the DNA analysis, was a cornerstone of the prosecution's case. However, the handling of this evidence, the cross-examination of experts, and the broader social context all played crucial roles in the trial's outcom…
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Migraines are a debilitating neurological condition characterised by severe, recurring headaches, often accompanied by symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, and sensitivity to light and sound. Despite the availability of various pharmacological treatments, the search for effective, well-tolerated, and safe preventive measures remains a priority. Among…
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This episode explores anthropomorphism, the attribution of human characteristics to non-human entities, such as animals. Written and researched by my sixth form student Phoebe L, the discussion delves into how anthropomorphism can enhance animal welfare by fostering empathy and compassion. However, it also uncovers the hidden, potentially catastrop…
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The Harry Potter series, while rooted in fantasy, offers a rich tapestry of biological concepts that enhance its magical narrative. By exploring the evolutionary adaptations of magical creatures, the botanical wonders of magical plants, and the biological foundations of spells and potions, we gain a deeper appreciation for the intricate world J.K. …
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Circadian rhythms are one of three biological rhythms that tell the body when to eat, sleep, wake up - the biological and psychological processes that oscillate in predictable patterns each day. This internal clock is influenced by external cues, like sunlight and temperature, which help determine whether one feels energised or exhausted at differe…
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In the realm of human appearance, few features carry as much symbolic weight as the beard. It's more than just a cluster of facial hair; it's a statement, a symbol of masculinity, wisdom, and even status in many cultures throughout history. But what lies beneath this seemingly simple facial adornment? Beyond its aesthetic appeal, the biology of bea…
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Medical ethics is essential for maintaining the integrity of healthcare practice, promoting patient well-being, and upholding the trust and confidence of both patients and the broader community in the medical profession. In this podcast, I'll explore the key ethical principles in relation to several controversial topics; genetic testing, genetic sc…
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There is no doubt that some individuals are much more risk averse than others, but how do we explain individual differences in risk-taking behaviour? Perhaps the answers lie in our biological differences; these can include differences in brain structure or function, as well as those caused by the process of evolution. Understanding the biological b…
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Endometriosis is a disorder that affects a staggering 190 million women worldwide, often associated with severe pelvic pain, period cramps and even infertility. In this podcast, Sixth Form Biology student Amelie D explores the potential causes of the condition, one that is both misunderstood and all too often misdiagnosed in the medical community, …
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Cosmetic dentistry has gained unprecedented popularity. Whether your teeth exhibit chips, stains, wear, breakage, gaps, or misalignment, a variety of dental procedures are available to enhance the aesthetic appeal of your teeth, providing a significant confidence boost to your smile. In this podcast, Sixth Form Biology student Yasmin J explores the…
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Consumption, or pulmonary tuberculosis, killed around 25% of the adult population in the 19th century. So why was this deadly disease seen as fundamentally romantic, intellectual and aesthetic? In this podcast, Year 13 biologist Felicity P will explore causes of the romanticisation of consumption, from Victorian fashion and styles, to its role as a…
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In this podcast, I reveal the shameful practices taking place in the greyhound racing industry, and the devastating truth as to why most rescues are classed as 'unrehomable' and so are euthanised. The story of my own rescue greyhound, Luca, is explored to provide some real life context.
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The glymphatic system works as a waste-carrying drainage system which removes unwanted materials from the brain. It was identified as a system in 2013 by Danish neuroscientist Maiken Nedergaard. He used the term glymphatic because the system works in a similar way to the lymphatic system but it is managed by the glial cells of the brain. There are …
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Arthritis is a family of diseases that cause pain and swelling in the joints. Osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis are two common forms of arthritis. Worldwide, gout is currently the most common form of inflammatory arthritis. Gout happens when uric acid, a normal body waste, gets too high in the blood. Uric acid comes from the breakdown of puri…
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It wasn’t until Sperry’s split-brain research that it was possible to test the idea of hemispheric lateralisation. His studies used a unique group of participants, all of whom had undergone the same treatment for their severe epilepsy which involved cutting the corpus callosum in order to control severe epileptic seizures. While the surgery was suc…
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In this podcast, I’m joined by Poppy GT who discusses the various treatments available for those suffering with depression. Should someone opt to have psychotherapy as opposed to being prescribed antidepressants, or could a combination of both be the most effective form of treatment?
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In this second podcast of the series, I describe the initial three-month journey from embryo to foetus, in a period known as the first trimester. I'll examine the significant developments that occur, not only in terms of overall length, but in the physical structures and features that begin to take shape.…
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Human embryonic development is the development and formation of the human embryo. It is characterised by the processes of cell division and cellular differentiation of the embryo that occurs during the early stages of development. In biological terms, the development of the body entails growth from a single-celled zygote to an adult human being. Th…
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Any person, at any stage of their life, can experience an eating disorder. Of people with eating disorders in the UK, around 10% have Anorexia nervosa compared to 40% with Bulimia nervosa; binge eating disorder along with several other conditions make up the remaining 50%. Anorexia is a serious mental health condition which significantly impacts a …
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Head lice, or Pediculosis capitis, is a common condition caused by infestation of the scalp with head lice. While some people can have lice infestations with no symptoms, for most, the tell-tale sign is itching. Itching can affect the scalp, neck, and ears, and is caused by an allergic reaction to the louse saliva, which is injected under the skin …
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Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is recognised to be an autoimmune disease that causes preclinical systemic abnormalities and eventually leads to synovial inflammation and destruction of the joint architecture. Our understanding of this chronic inflammatory disease has evolved considerably during the past decade. Introduction of novel therapeutic strategi…
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Vasectomy is a safe, effective, and permanent method of birth control for men. It is also the most cost-effective form of birth control, costing half as much as a tubal ligation (having a woman's "tubes tied"). A successful vasectomy will last for life, but if circumstances change, the procedure can be reversed. In this podcast, I'll discuss how th…
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Acne is a common skin condition where the pores of your skin become blocked by hair, sebum (an oily substance), bacteria and dead skin cells. Those blockages produce blackheads, whiteheads, nodules and other types of pimples. Acne is the most common skin condition that people experience; it's estimated that 80% of people between the ages of 11 to 3…
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Would we be wise to pay more attention to the role of our microbiome with regard to our health?
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Microbial genes have been found to perform a variety of functions including coding for enzymes to hydrolyse food we can't digest, coding for proteins that form essential nutrients, making vitamins we can’t produce and even helping to release energy from our diet. In addition to playing a vital role in metabolism, our microbiome stimulates the immun…
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2020 proved to us all that health is unpredictable. The pandemic, not only catalysed a global crisis as services were strained and lives were lost, but also forever altered the way we practice medicine. We saw a 50% drop in A&E visits, whilst more importantly a great proportion of appointments were moved online. This shows the great adaptability an…
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Autism is lifelong developmental disorder with no known cures. A significant amount of research has been conducted into the causes of autism and research is increasing into the treatment of autism. Given that research has indicated there appears to be functional and structural differences in the brains of individuals with autism as well as the fact…
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Culling is defined as the killing of animals in order to reduce population numbers. Culls can happen for various reasons, including health and disease control and prevention, or to protect other species. However, the ethics make the subject a strongly polarising one, and while culling in some cases may be necessary, it can be unclear when culling s…
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There's no doubt that Gregor Mendel is one of the great biologists of our time. His findings on inheritance led to multiple new fields of research, most notably genetics, in which breakthroughs have revolutionised biology and medicine. His work helped to create the modern understanding of how evolution and selection works, and his mathematical meth…
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Sometimes, scientists can take advantage of real-world incidents to help us understand the function of particular parts of the brain. Psychologists can carry out case studies on people who have experienced bran injuries. They are not interested so much in the actual injury, but what that injury can tell us about the normal functions of the brain. (…
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There will always be elements of near death experiences (NDE's) that are difficult to explain scientifically. This is partly because researchers are entirely dependent on the reports people provide of their individual experience, which means the data is received second-hand and there is no way of verifying that the report given is accurate. Some re…
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Are ‘ordinary’ people capable of carrying out wicked and immoral acts against other individuals, if the context suggests that is what is expected of them? These are the questions that Philip Zimbardo was trying to answer in his infamous study, 50 years ago. (With thanks to our sponsor 'Curriculum Press' for providing content for this podcast)…
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Just one week before I recorded this podcast, the FDA, the Food and Drug Administration authorised e-cigarette products for use in the US for the first time ever, claiming that...'the benefit to adults trying to quit smoking outweighs the risk to young'. Vaping is often seen as the 'safer' alternative but research suggests that this is simply not t…
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How keen is your sense of smell? Well, according to new research published in Frontiers in Psychology, people who witnessed a crime are able to identify criminals by their smell. Police line-ups normally rely on sight, but nose-witnesses can be just as reliable as eye-witnesses. It's not quite time to replace the sniffer dogs, however; the 2010 Ame…
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Forensics labs are frequently asked to examine documents to determine if they have been altered or forged. An altered document is an original, valid document that has been changed in some way. For example, one common type of altered document is a cheque in which the numbers have been changed to increase the amount drawn. A forged document is one th…
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COPD or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is the term given to a group of diseases which affect the lungs. These include emphysema and chronic bronchitis. They are inflammatory diseases and will obstruct air flow to and from the lungs. There is no cure for COPD as it causes permanent lung damage. Treatment can slow down the progression of the c…
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Obesity is rising dramatically across the world. Since 1975 it is estimated that the number of obese people has almost tripled. One of the chronic diseases that is linked to obesity is type 2 diabetes. The dramatic rise in individuals suffering from this disease is causing a global medical emergency. In a world where our knowledge of the importance…
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By not being exposed to agents that stimulate our immune system in infancy, we are at greater risk of developing inflammatory responses and autoimmune diseases in later life. Some scientists vigorously reject the hypothesis, arguing that the term hygiene hypothesis was potentially dangerous. This is because it might lead people to believe that they…
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Sepsis is a condition which results from an uncontrolled and disorganised reaction of the body to an infection. If it is caught at an early stage, a combination of treatments can help to cure it. However, sepsis has the power to kill if left either undiagnosed or untreated. (With thanks to our sponsor 'Curriculum Press' for providing content for th…
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How did people in the past treat illness, injury and disease? What medicines or 'magic' did they use? In this first of a series of short podcasts, I explore the concept of natural illness vs the supernatural in prehistoric times, the healers and priests of Ancient Egypt and their meticulous medical records on papyri, and how the Ancient Greeks move…
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'Death Of A Naturalist' - The Biology of Inevitable Change in Heaney's Seminal Poem (with Felicia Isaacs)
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English teacher Felicia Isaacs joins KYTOS once again, to discuss the Biology behind one of her favourite poems, 'Death of a Naturalist', by renowned Irish poet Seamus Heaney. In this seminal piece of work, small tadpoles undergo metamorphosis into frogs, and this inevitable change causes a young Seamus to question his love for nature, and the dest…
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Hormones are chemical messengers that have a specific physiological effect in the body. Research suggests that hormones also have considerable influence on behaviour and emotion in both human and non-human animals. This supports the notion that behaviour and emotion have physiological origins. It is not appropriate, however, to say that hormones ca…
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In the hope that it might provide a solution to the growing problem of antibiotic resistance, a new treatment is currently receiving a lot of attention. Based on a naturally occurring phenomenon this potential solution lies with a group of viruses called bacteriophages. When most people think of viruses, they usually imagine the ones that infect hu…
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There is evidence that, when the solar system was young, conditions on Mars and Venus may have been suitable for life. The surface of Mars has clearly been altered by water in the past and it may still exist deep underground. Venus is the nearest planet to Earth and is almost identical to Earth in both size and geological composition. Recent resear…
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Coral reefs are widely regarded as some of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet. They provide habitat for approximately 25% of all marine species but surprisingly account for a microscopic 0.1% of the world’s ocean surface. Coral reefs are continually under threat from both natural and anthropogenic (human) factors. In this podcast, I will exp…
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In this podcast, I discuss the characteristics of Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), also known as Multiple Personality Disorder and review the evidence presented in Thigpen and Cleckley’s’ (1954) case study of a person with three distinctly different personalities. It is called a dissociative disorder because there is a division , or dissociati…
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The prostate gland grows in men at puberty and secretes the fluid that carries the sperm. It remains a constant size until about the age of forty, then it begins to grow again. About 50% of men aged 60 have some enlargement of the prostate gland and this rises to 90% at the age of 80. This enlargement may be benign – effectively harmless. However, …
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The biology behind Shelley's Frankenstein in an unquestionably fascinating subject. Since the bicentenary of the novel, Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus, the field of Medicine has progressed beyond recognition. Yet the overwhelming message that comes across to the reader, and indeed the world, is that we can never allow our egos to presume tha…
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Many biologists consider the microbes in our bodies to be, effectively, another body organ. The bacteria in our intestines help to release nutrients from the food we ingest, manufacture crucial vitamins, protect against infection by out-competing other, harmful bacteria and interact genetically with the immune system reducing inflammation, to name …
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Actions taken at the outset of an investigation at a fire and arson scene can play a pivotal role in the resolution of a case. Careful, thorough investigation is key to ensuring that potential physical evidence is not tainted or destroyed, or potential witnesses overlooked. Arthur Conan Doyle’s literary detective Sherlock Holmes is quoted as saying…
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