FULL PODCAST: The Journal of Life Sciences
On this edition, The Journal’s editor-in-chief William Patrick is joined by journalist Sally Lehrman, author Catherine Brady and The Journal’s Web Editor Daniel S. Levine. They discuss the emergence of consumer genetic tests, the career of groundbreaking scientist Elizabeth Blackburn and the challenges of making personalized medicine a reality.

 

The Journal's Editor-In-Chief William Patrick offers some thoughts on Gary Taubes Good Calories, Bad Calories and the trouble that ensues when scientists yield to pressures from political, financial and other considerations.

 

The notion of personalized medicine is seductive. Proponents say it will increase the efficiency of drug development, cut wasteful spending on therapies that don’t work for certain patients, and deliver more effective treatments. But as Daniel S. Levine reports in the November issue of The Journal of Life Sciences, the adoption of personalized medicine on a large scale faces significant barriers. The science of identifying appropriate biomarkers for diagnostics can be evasive. The business models to align pharmaceutical and diagnostic companies’ interests remain undefined. And the regulatory and reimbursement models are not yet in place to allow companies to recoup their sizable R&D investment in products designed to reach smaller and smaller populations within a subset of a disease.

 

Empowerment through genetics is now at everyone’s finger tips – or so we’re told. A quick trip online will direct you to tests that claim to identify your genetic propensity for diabetes, breast cancer, cystic fibrosis, or iron overload disease. You can secretly check your baby’s paternity and learn its gender in as few as six weeks from conception. You can go to Target.com and buy a genetic home collection kit for the whole family, with results that tell you how your DNA makes you unique. But as Sally Lehrman reports in the November issue of The Journal of Life Sciences, some question whether the trend toward making genetics testing as easy as fixing a TV dinner is putting the market ahead of the science.

 

Reserved, introspective, uncomfortable with head-to-head competition, Elizabeth Blackburn might seem an unlikely role model and mentor for young scientists. But her predilection for exploring unconventional explanations and her aversion to jostling for position in a crowded race led her to a seemingly obscure byway that became a thriving research field with significant implications for human health. The functions of telomeres and telomerase in the aging of cells influences human aging, and telomerase also plays a role in the growth and metastasis of cancer. Catherine Brady, author of the newly released Elizabeth Blackburn and the Story of Telomeres: Deciphering the Ends of DNA joins Bill to discuss the career of this pioneering scientist.

 

The Journal's Managing Editor Eric Wahlgren offers some thoughts on the zymergy experts of biotechnology who apply their professional skills in the science of fermentation to the art of brewing beer.