Dara O'Briain's Science club

[Northerner]

Did anyone see this the other night? If not, it's being repeated on BBC2 tonight at 11:20pm. The bit that I found particularly interesting was the piece about Epigenetics, and how environmental factors can affect/suppress the expression of certain genes and which may explain why some people with certain genetic propensity for things like Type 2 develop it and others don't - certainly gave me a new insight into the complexity of human beings - up a whole new level even though it was pretty complicated beforehand! Which, of course makes such a nonsense about the often repeated treatment of chronic diseases like ours as though they all have one cause and can be treated via a few simplistic pathways 🙄

Must read more! 🙂

 

[Robster65]

Sky+'ed it tonight. Will watch over the weekend if I can.

Shows that the old nature vs nurture argument can be nature+nurture.🙂

Rob

 

[cazscot]

I really enjoyed it even though genetics is my weakest subject at Uni I find it fascinating...

 

[Copepod]

Except in a very few single gene diseases such as sickle cell anaemia and cystic fibrosis, causes of most diseases / conditions have always been a case of interaction between several genes and environment / behaviour (things done to you and things you do to yourself).

Well done programme, I thought - experts, such as Prof Steve Jones (the man who tries to make sex boring and knows more than most about how snails reproduce 🙂) brought in, as Dara studied mathematics / physics, not biology / genetics.