Biology Podcasts

How do you tell the age of a rockfish? In Moby Rockfish // The Hypothesis Generator [26], the people working through a genome paper on The Lemma Journal Club reach that question and admit they cannot answer it. "I don't know if that was like common knowledge," one says, before returning to what the paper actually measured. That small honesty is a good test for biology audio. The shows worth your time let you hear where an answer came from, and they say plainly where their knowledge runs out.

Immune runs a gentler club. In Living longer without B cells, the panel weighs a mouse study linking B cells to the ageing of CD4 T cells. It also turns to a paper pairing a vaccine with a harmless competitor bacterium against Salmonella. The verdict is keen but hedged ("A lot more work to do"), and one panelist adds, "this is why we make you take ecology." For vaccines and disease, Immune Booster 25: Out of the anti-vax woods with Ellen Woods leads naturally to the Medical Science page.

Authentic Biochemistry is the uncompromising alternative. Daniel J. Guerra lectures through papers on microglia, lipid droplets and neurons. In Immuno Diaeventontological Framing CNS VI Authentic Biochemistry Podcast Dr Daniel J Guerra 11April26, he objects that one study tracked RNA levels without measuring enzyme activity: "they're not demonstrating what they say they're finding, because they're not measuring anything." That is his judgment, argued at length. Brain biology continues on the Neuroscience page.

Interview shows trade argument for the arc of a career. On Epigenetics Podcast, from Active Motif, host Stefan Dillinger asks guests early on how they came to biology. In From Placeholder Nucleosomes to Zygotic Genome Activation (Patrick Murphy), Murphy explains how specialised nucleosomes on the father's genome in sperm mark sites that later become active or poised gene promoters in the embryo. He then offers a handle: "I think of H2AZ like vanilla ice cream."

Speaking of Mol Bio, a Thermo Fisher Scientific series, sits nearer the bench and the market. In DNA-encoded library use in living cells for drug discovery, Leif Larsson describes a compound library stored in one small PCR tube. He also explains why his team has its own sequencer: "We needed it actually yesterday."

StemCells@Lunch Digested comes from King's College London, and its newest listed episode dates from November 2022. In Episode 150: Prof Shalev Itzkovitz "We can infer the design principles of organs", Itzkovitz notes that human gut stem cells divide less often than mouse ones. He proposes that this "might be a very important design principle" for a long-lived animal, while conceding the work has only begun to "scratch the surface." More researcher-led listening leads naturally to the Life Sciences page.

The Nutrition Scholar is designed for graduate-level nutrition study, and these episodes use stubbornly concrete metaphors. In 12.1 The Methyl Master: Methionine, the THF Cycle, and the One-Carbon Relay, a methyl group is a parcel on a delivery truck. The enzyme that strips the empty truck becomes a "chop shop" that leaves homocysteine behind. A separate episode on tyramine and MAO inhibitors explains the biochemistry.

Branch Out offers the best single image, in Solving the waratah's genetic puzzle. Assembling a genome without a reference is a jigsaw where "you don't have the picture on the front of the puzzle box."

Mushroom Revival Podcast moves from crops to clinics. In Double-stranded RNA Mind Controls Rust Fungi with Rebecca Degnan, Degnan describes a species-specific RNA spray against myrtle rust. Its gene silencing is temporary, so it needs repeat spraying like a fungicide. In Healing with Mushrooms: Psilocybin's Promise Against Heroin Addiction, a Temple University researcher reports results from her rat model. Psilocybin did not change heroin taking, but it blunted heroin seeking during relapse. This is preclinical animal work, and the "promise" in the title should be heard that way.

On Planet Philadelphia, in Mycology without apology-Toby Kiers 3/20/2026, Kiers cites her group's finding that mycorrhizal networks draw about 13 billion tons of carbon into soil each year. The Environmental Science page picks up from there.

The American Birding Podcast, hosted by Nate Swick for the American Birding Association, ties research to the habit of watching. In 10-14: How to be Hawky with Janet Ng, Ng describes the hawks she studies in Alberta and Saskatchewan seeking out a mix of native grassland and cropland. She also describes maps that flag windy ground with few hawks, which she hopes developers will use. 010-15: Saving Birds to Save the Planet with Scott Weidensaul does not flinch from the costs of conservation: restoring puffins to Eastern Egg Rock first meant poisoning its gulls.

Mooney Goes Wild, Derek Mooney's programme on RTÉ Radio 1, does natural history by question and answer. In Dublin’s Rare Surviving Elms Offer New Hope Against Dutch Elm Disease, arborist Joe McConville explains that the killer was a fungus carried by the beetle, which blocks the tree's water-carrying vessels. In Keeping Track Of Ireland’s Squirrels And Pine Martens... And You Can Help!, Colin reports work showing that grey squirrels fail to treat the pine marten as a predator, while red squirrels keep their distance.

Gorilla Radio Show is the rowdy one, and Episode 96 - Run Your Pockets, Warhol is heavy on profane banter. In Episode 98 - Chimpanzees with Bill Wallauer of the Jane Goodall Institute, Wallauer admits that filming in the old days was "way too close," given the respiratory infections humans introduced. Water Colors Aquarium Gallery brings biology into the fish room. In "Switch Hitter" Spawning Killifish, the hosts describe killifish eggs that wait out dry spells and hatch within hours of flooding.