This Week in Virology

TWiV 278: Flushing HIV down the zinc

March 30, 2014

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Dickson Despommier, Alan Dove, and Kathy Spindler

Vincent, Dickson, Alan, and Kathy discuss disruption of the ccr5 gene in lymphocytes of patients infected with HIV-1.

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Links for this episode

Gene editing of ccr5 in AIDS patients (NEJM)
HIV gets the zinc finger (TWiV 144)
Genome engineering with zinc finger nucleases (Genetics)
Photo credit: Watty’s Wall Stuff
Mice lie, monkeys exaggerate t-shirt design (thanks, Christophe)
Letters read on TWiV 278

Weekly Science Picks

Alan – Digital scale model of solar system
Dickson – Font of knowledge
Vincent – Measles outbreaks trends, and NYC measles (one, two)
Kathy – Winner, funding basic science to revolutionize medicine

Listener Pick of the Week

Stephen & Jon – Watty’s Wall Stuff
Johyne – Macro views of snowflakes
Ricardo & Stephen – Vaccine exemptions
Bill – Books by John Janovy
Marshall – Animation of DNA replication
Steve – Debunking influenza vaccine myths

Send your virology questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twiv@microbe.tv

TWiV 277: My podcast Vinny

March 23, 2014

Hosts: Glenn Rall, Ann Skalka, and Vincent Racaniello

Glenn and Ann meet up with Vincent to talk about his career in science and science communication.

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Video of this episode – view above or at YouTube

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TWiV 277

TWiV 276: Ramblers go viral

March 16, 2014

Host: Vincent Racaniello

Guests: Susan Baker and Thomas Gallagher

Vincent meets up with Susan Baker and Tom Gallagher at Loyola University to talk about their work on coronaviruses.

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Download TWiV 276 (51 MB .mp3, 70 min)
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Links for this episode

Papain-like viral proteases (Virus Res)
MERS-CoV papain-like protease (Virology)
Mouse model for MERS-CoV (PNAS)
Receptor and MERS-CoV infection (J Virol)
Letters read on TWiV 276
Video of this episode – view above or at YouTube

Weekly Science Picks

Vincent – First demonstration of Macintosh, 1984

Listener Pick of the Week

Lance – The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver

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TWiV 276

TWiV 275: Virocentricity with Eugene Koonin

March 9, 2014

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Rich Condit

Guest: Eugene Koonin

Vincent and Rich meet up with Eugene Koonin to talk about the central role of viruses in the evolution of all life.

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Download TWiV 275 (94 MB .mp3, 130 min)
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Links for this episode

Virocentric view of evolution (Curr Op Virol)
Proposed order Megavirales (Arch Virol)
Pithovirus (PNAS)
Selfish virus-like elements (Virol J)
Pandoraviruses are derived Phycodnaviruses (Biol Direct)
Video of this episode – view above or at YouTube

Send your virology questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twiv@microbe.tv

TWiV 274: Data dump

March 2, 2014

Adina rubella Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Dickson Despommier, Alan Dove, Rich Condit, and Kathy Spindler

The TWiV team discusses recent cases of polio-like paralysis in California, and the virome of 14th century paleofeces.

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Weekly Science Picks

Alan – The science of science communication
Rich – Command and Control by Eric Schlosser
Dickson – Top 10 plant viruses
Vincent – Is the Nobel Prize good for science?
Kathy – Time to rethink graduate and postdoc education (YouTube)

Listener Pick of the Week

Jon – Lessons from a Kansas graveyard
Mike – Cross a fashion designer with a microbiologist

Send your virology questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twiv@microbe.tv

Below is a video depicting laser capture microdissection from Tim Sheahan:

TWiV special: MERS-coronavirus in dromedary camels

February 25, 2014

Dromedary camels Host: Vincent Racaniello

Guests: W. Ian Lipkin and Thomas Briese

Vincent meets up with Ian and Thomas to discuss their finding that MERS-coronavirus has been circulating in dromedary camels in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia since at least 1992.

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Download TWiV Special MERS (28 MB .mp3, 38 min)
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Links for this episode

Send your virology questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twiv@microbe.tv

TWiV 273: Lambda is not just a phage

February 23, 2014

IFN lambda Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Dickson Despommier, Rich Condit, and Kathy Spindler

The TWiVome dissect the finding that interferon lambda alleles predict the outcome of hepatitis C virus infection.

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Download TWiV 273 (75 MB .mp3, 103 min)
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Weekly Science Picks

Rich – Think like a scientist (one, two); Science controversies
Dickson – Visualization challenge 2013
Vincent – Orphan Black
Kathy – Alberta worm invasion project

Listener Pick of the Week

Timothy – How do vaccines cause autism?
Anne – Luke Jerram’s glass viruses
Jim – NLM Communications Engineering Branch
Steve – Synapse by synapse
Jacob – Tiny technology creates a buzz

Send your virology questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twiv@microbe.tv

TWiV 272: Give peas a chance

February 16, 2014

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Dickson Despommier, Alan Dove, Rich Condit, and Kathy Spindler

The TWiV team describes aphid control by using a viral capsid protein to deliver a spider toxin to plants, and a human endogenous retrovirus that enhances expression of a neuronal gene.

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Links for this episode

Toxin delivery to plants by viral capsid protein (Nat Biotech)
Pea enation mosaic virus (ViralZone)
Image credit: Aphid membrane feeding chamber (Sci Rep)
Aphid feeding chamber (YouTube)
Parafilm (Wikipedia)
Human endogenous retrovirus enhances neural gene (PNAS)
Flu, common cold, alternative medicine (NCCAM)
Cold vs flu (CDC)
Phage hunters
Bed bugs and infectious disease (PLoS Path)
Letters read on TWiV 272

Weekly Science Picks

Alan – Statistical error (Nature)
Rich – 12 oldest animal species
Dickson – When liquids collide
Vincent – HIV denial and just asking questions
Kathy – Sun’s canyon of fire

Listener Pick of the Week

Sandra – Women physicists keep female students psyched
Judi – HHMI’s Biointeractive
Jacob – Influenza virus HA

Send your virology questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twiv@microbe.tv

TWiV 271: To bee, or not to bee, that is the infection

February 9, 2014

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Dickson Despommier, Alan Dove, Rich Condit, and Ashlee Bennett

The TWiV crew discusses two reports on viruses that might have crossed kingdoms, from plants to honeybees and from plants to vertebrates.

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Download TWiV 271 (69 MB .mp3, 96 min)
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Links for this episode

Tobacco ringspot virus in honeybees (mBio)
Plant virus that switched to vertebrates (PNAS)
CDC influenza activity and surveillance
With Esmeralda at ASM Biodefense (jpg)
Are viruses alive? (poll at virology blog)
Image credit: Virginia Tech Learning Resources Center
Letters read on TWiV 271

Weekly Science Picks

Alan – Nagasaki bombing (YouTube)
Rich – GoPro Red Bull Stratos (YouTube)
Dickson – Solar orbs
Vincent – Socrative

Listener Pick of the Week

Basel – Pathology course online
Russell – Sochi 2014: Encyclopedia of spending
Yegor – Visual Science

Send your virology questions and comments (email or mp3 file) to twiv@microbe.tv

TWiV 270: Homeland virology

February 2, 2014

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Rich Condit

Guests: Dennis Hruby and Yoshihiro Kawaoka

Vincent and Rich discuss avian influenza virus and an antiviral drug against smallpox with Dennis and Yoshi at the ASM Biodefense and Emerging Diseases Research Meeting in Washington, DC.