Works in Progress

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Kanal • 2 serier

Teknologi

Teknologi

5 dage siden
Videnskab

Videnskab

3 dage siden

5 DAGE SIDEN

Why Europe has stagnated

Europe is now much poorer than America. Is it because Europe doesn’t have a big tech giant? Can we blame the bureaucrats in Brussels? What happened to make Germany ban combustion cars? Should we turn Europe into a playground for American and Asian elites? Are the far right going to solve Europe’s energy problems by burning coal to own the libs? Pieter, Sam and Aria discuss why Europe hasn’t grown very much and what we can do to save it.

5 dage siden

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1 t. 30 min.
22.12.2025

The first cancer vaccine

Hepatitis B is a tiny virus that causes hundreds of thousands of deaths from liver disease and cancer each year. The vaccine against it became the first of many milestones: it was the first viral protein subunit vaccine, the first recombinant vaccine, and the first vaccine to prevent a type of cancer. In this episode, Jacob and Saloni follow the trail of strange jaundice outbreaks that scientists traced to a stealthy liver virus, how scientists turned one viral surface protein into a lifesaving shot for newborns, and how it was all built upon breakthroughs in immunology. Hard Drugs is a new podcast from Works in Progress and Coefficient Giving about medical innovation presented by Saloni Dattani and Jacob Trefethen. You can watch or listen on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts. Chapters:0:00:00 Introducing the hepatitis B vaccine0:15:46 The mysterious trail of jaundice outbreaks0:28:03 How a tiny virus causes cirrhosis and liver cancer0:53:19 Maurice Hilleman's purified hep B vaccine1:17:36 Turning the hep B vaccine recombinant1:29:14 The impact of hep B vaccination1:39:27 The 19th century battle for immunology2:01:34 How the body makes an almost infinite number of antibodies2:30:57 How subunit vaccines took over2:45:33 Conclusion Saloni’s substack newsletter: https://www.scientificdiscovery.dev/ Jacob’s blog: https://blog.jacobtrefethen.com/ Books: Paul Offit (2007) Vaccinated: One Man's Quest to Defeat the World's Deadliest DiseasesArthur M Silverstein (2009) A history of immunologyRonald W Ellis (1993) Hepatitis B Vaccines in Clinical PracticeSally Smith Hughes (2011) Genentech: The beginnings of biotechArticles: Timothy M. Block et al. (2016) A historical perspective on the discovery and elucidation of the hepatitis B virus https://doi.org/10.1016/j.antiviral.2016.04.012 Naijuan Yao et al. (2022) Incidence of mother-to-child transmission of hepatitis B in relation to maternal peripartum antiviral prophylaxis: A systematic review and meta-analysis https://doi.org/10.1111/aogs.14448Jill Koshiol et al. (2019) Beasley’s 1981 paper: The power of a well-designed cohort study to drive liver cancer research and prevention https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5866222/ William J. McAleer et al. (1984) Human hepatitis B vaccine from recombinant yeast https://doi.org/10.1038/307178a0 Chunfeng Qu et al. (2014) Efficacy of Neonatal HBV Vaccination on Liver Cancer and Other Liver Diseases over 30-Year Follow-up of the Qidong Hepatitis B Intervention Study: A Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1001774 Anthony R Rees (2020) Understanding the human antibody repertoire https://doi.org/10.1080/19420862.2020.1729683 Correction: Urea was mentioned as a protein, but is actually the product of a protein breakdown process, not a protein itself. Acknowledgements: Aria Babu, editor at Works in ProgressGraham Bessellieu, video editorAbhishaike Mahajan, cover artAtalanta Arden-Miller, art directionDavid Hackett, composerWorks in Progress & Coefficient Giving

22.12.2025

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2 t. 59 min.
26.11.2025

The history of vaccines

Before vaccines became routine, they were risky experiments. In this episode, Jacob and Saloni travel back to the world of smallpox, cowpox, and cow-based “vaccine farms” to see how scientists stumbled toward the first vaccines against infectious diseases: smallpox, rabies, TB, polio, and more. Through the stories of milkmaids and aristocrats, secret lab notebooks, microscopes and cell culture, they explore how trial and error turned gruesome folk practices into the science of immunization, and how it all began with a single pustule. Hard Drugs is a new podcast from Works in Progress and Coefficient Giving about medical innovation presented by Saloni Dattani and Jacob Trefethen. You can watch or listen on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts. Saloni’s substack newsletter: https://www.scientificdiscovery.dev/ Jacob’s blog: https://blog.jacobtrefethen.com/ Books: Gerald Geison (1995) The private science of Louis PasteurThomas D. Brock (1998) Robert Koch: a life in medicine and bacteriologyMervyn Susser and Zena Stein (2009) Eras in epidemiology : the evolution of ideasAngela Leung (2011) Chapter: “Variolation” and vaccination in late Imperial China, ca. 1570–1911. History of vaccine development by Stanley PlotkinFlorian Horaud (2011) Chapter: Viral vaccines and cell substrate. History of vaccine development by Stanley PlotkinSamuel Katz (2011) Chapter: The role of tissue culture in vaccine development. History of vaccine development by Stanley PlotkinHervé Bazin (2011) Chapter: Pasteur and the birth of vaccines made in the laboratory. History of vaccine development by Stanley Plotkin Articles: Andrew Shattock et al. (2024) Contribution of vaccination to improved survival and health: modelling 50 years of the Expanded Programme on Immunization https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(24)00850-X/fulltext Saloni Dattani (2020) The story of Viktor Zhdanov https://worksinprogress.co/issue/the-story-of-viktor-zhdanov/José Esparza et al. (2020) Early smallpox vaccine manufacturing in the United States https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2020.05.037 Paula Gottdenker (1979) Francesco Redi and the fly experiments https://www.jstor.org/stable/44450950 Donald Angus Gillies (2016) Establishing causality in medicine and Koch’s postulatesBurt A Folkart (1993) Dr. Albert Sabin, Developer of Oral Polio Vaccine, Dies https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-03-04-mn-283-story.html Saloni Dattani (2025) Measles leaves children vulnerable to other diseases for years https://ourworldindata.org/measles-increases-disease-risk Acknowledgements: Aria Babu, editor at Works in ProgressGraham Bessellieu, video editorAbhishaike Mahajan, cover artAtalanta Arden-Miller, art directionDavid Hackett, composerWorks in Progress & Coefficient Giving

26.11.2025

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2 t. 6 min.
16.09.2025

100 years of insulin in 15 minutes

A hundred years ago, insulin was scraped from pig pancreases. Today, it’s made by bacteria in giant tanks. In the second part of a mini series on proteins, drug development and AI, Saloni tells the story of how insulin went from a crude animal extract to the first genetically-engineered drug, kickstarting the biotech industry along the way. Hard Drugs is a new podcast from Works in Progress and Open Philanthropy about medical innovation presented by Saloni Dattani and Jacob Trefethen. Saloni’s substack newsletter: https://www.scientificdiscovery.dev/ Jacob’s blog: https://blog.jacobtrefethen.com/ Books: Genentech: The beginnings of biotech by Sally Smith Hughes Articles: FDA (2007). Celebrating a Milestone: FDA's Approval of First Genetically-Engineered Product https://fda.report/media/110447/Celebrating-a-Milestone--FDA%27s-Approval-of-the-First-Genetircally-Engineered-Product.pdf Genentech (2016). Cloning Insulin https://www.gene.com/stories/cloning-insulin Arthur Riggs (2020). Making, Cloning, and the Expression of Human Insulin Genes in Bacteria: The Path to Humulin https://academic.oup.com/edrv/article/42/3/374/6042201 Podcasts: Novo Nordisk (Ozempic) by the Acquired podcast https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/novo-nordisk-ozempic Acknowledgements: Aria Babu, editor at Works in ProgressAdrian Bradley, on-site producerAnna Magpie, fact-checkingAbhishaike Mahajan, cover artAtalanta Arden-Miller, art directionDavid Hackett, composerWorks in Progress & Open Philanthropy

16.09.2025

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18 min.
03.09.2025

Proteins: Weird blobs that do important things

This episode kicks off a mini-series on proteins, drug development and AI. Saloni and Jacob explore the world of proteins, including how proteins fold into complex shapes, why that complexity matters and how crowded and dynamic the inside of a cell really is; and they exchange surprising statistics about proteins. Hard Drugs is a new podcast from Works in Progress and Open Philanthropy about medical innovation presented by Saloni Dattani and Jacob Trefethen. You can watch or listen on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts. Saloni’s substack newsletter: https://www.scientificdiscovery.dev/ Jacob’s blog: https://blog.jacobtrefethen.com/ Books: Ron Milo and Rob Phillips. Biology by the numbers https://book.bionumbers.org/ Carl Ivar Branden and John Tooze (1999) Introduction to protein structure https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.1201/9781136969898/introduction-protein-structure-john-tooze-carl-ivar-branden Articles: Niko McCarty (2023). Biology is a burrito. https://www.asimov.press/p/burrito-biology Rhiannon Morris, Katrina Black, and Elliott Stollar (2022) Uncovering protein function: from classification to complexes. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9400073/ Victor Muñoz and Michele Cerminara (2016) When fast is better: protein folding fundamentals and mechanisms from ultrafast approaches https://portlandpress.com/biochemj/article/473/17/2545/49248/When-fast-is-better-protein-folding-fundamentals Image credits: Chang et al. (2012) Egg white in organic electronics. https://spie.org/news/4149-egg-white-in-organic-electronics [diagram of egg white denaturing and cross-linking]John Kendrew’s model of myoglobin’s structure; via Carl Ivar Branden and John Tooze (1999) Introduction to protein structure.Carl Ivar Branden and John Tooze (1999) Introduction to protein structure. [diagram of amino acids and protein structure]Ron Milo and Rob Phillips. Which is bigger, mRNA or the protein it codes for? https://book.bionumbers.org/which-is-bigger-mrna-or-the-protein-it-codes-for/ [diagram of myoglobin mRNA vs protein]Scitable (2014). Microtubules and Filaments. https://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/microtubules-and-filaments-14052932/ [diagram of microtubules]

03.09.2025

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20 min.
15.10.2025

The art of protein design with AI

What if you could design a protein never seen in nature? In this episode, Jacob and Saloni explore how researchers are using new tools like RFDiffusion, AlphaFold, and ProteinMPNN to ‘hallucinate’ entirely novel proteins: designing them from scratch to solve problems evolution hasn’t tackled. They talk about how these technologies could transform medicine, agriculture, and materials science. Along the way, they reflect on the surprising ways AI is changing the process of science itself. Hard Drugs is a new podcast from Works in Progress and Open Philanthropy about medical innovation presented by Saloni Dattani and Jacob Trefethen. Saloni’s substack newsletter: https://www.scientificdiscovery.dev/ Jacob’s blog: https://blog.jacobtrefethen.com/ Courses: EMBL-EBI. AlphaFold: A practical guide https://www.ebi.ac.uk/training/online/courses/alphafold/ Articles: Tanja Kortemme (2024) De novo protein design—From new structures to programmable functions https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(23)01402-2 Jie Zhu et al. (2021) Protein Assembly by Design https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.chemrev.1c00308 Lectures: Rosetta Commons (2024) Diffusion models for protein structure generation (and design) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEnY2yA3jy8 Rosetta Commons (2024) AlphaFold – ML for protein structure prediction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVrn8_8aKO8 Rosetta Commons (2024) MPNN – ML for protein sequence design https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6z4XmUAwdNA Acknowledgements: Aria Babu, editor at Works in ProgressGraham Bessellieu, video editorRachel Shu, on-site editorAnna Magpie, fact-checkingAbhishaike Mahajan, cover artAtalanta Arden-Miller, art directionDavid Hackett, composer Works in Progress & Open Philanthropy

15.10.2025

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1 t.
22.12.2025

The first cancer vaccine

Hepatitis B is a tiny virus that causes hundreds of thousands of deaths from liver disease and cancer each year. The vaccine against it became the first of many milestones: it was the first viral protein subunit vaccine, the first recombinant vaccine, and the first vaccine to prevent a type of cancer. In this episode, Jacob and Saloni follow the trail of strange jaundice outbreaks that scientists traced to a stealthy liver virus, how scientists turned one viral surface protein into a lifesaving shot for newborns, and how it was all built upon breakthroughs in immunology. Hard Drugs is a new podcast from Works in Progress and Coefficient Giving about medical innovation presented by Saloni Dattani and Jacob Trefethen. You can watch or listen on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts. Saloni’s substack newsletter: https://www.scientificdiscovery.dev/ Jacob’s blog: https://blog.jacobtrefethen.com/ Books: Paul Offit (2007) Vaccinated: One Man's Quest to Defeat the World's Deadliest DiseasesArthur M Silverstein (2009) A history of immunologyRonald W Ellis (1993) Hepatitis B Vaccines in Clinical PracticeSally Smith Hughes (2011) Genentech: The beginnings of biotech Articles: Timothy M. Block et al. (2016) A historical perspective on the discovery and elucidation of the hepatitis B virus https://doi.org/10.1016/j.antiviral.2016.04.012 Naijuan Yao et al. (2022) Incidence of mother-to-child transmission of hepatitis B in relation to maternal peripartum antiviral prophylaxis: A systematic review and meta-analysis https://doi.org/10.1111/aogs.14448Jill Koshiol et al. (2019) Beasley’s 1981 paper: The power of a well-designed cohort study to drive liver cancer research and prevention https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5866222/ William J. McAleer et al. (1984) Human hepatitis B vaccine from recombinant yeast https://doi.org/10.1038/307178a0 Chunfeng Qu et al. (2014) Efficacy of Neonatal HBV Vaccination on Liver Cancer and Other Liver Diseases over 30-Year Follow-up of the Qidong Hepatitis B Intervention Study: A Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1001774 Anthony R Rees (2020) Understanding the human antibody repertoire https://doi.org/10.1080/19420862.2020.1729683 Correction: Urea was mentioned as a protein, but is actually the product of a protein breakdown process, not a protein itself. Acknowledgements: Aria Babu, editor at Works in ProgressGraham Bessellieu, video editorAbhishaike Mahajan, cover artAtalanta Arden-Miller, art directionDavid Hackett, composerWorks in Progress & Coefficient Giving

22.12.2025

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2 t. 59 min.
01.10.2025

Hacking proteins with AI

Nature didn’t evolve all the proteins we need, but maybe artificial intelligence can help. Jacob and Saloni explore how tools like AlphaFold and ProteinMPNN are helping researchers re-engineer proteins, to make them safer, more stable, and more effective. They talk about how new technologies could help make a long-sought vaccine against Strep A, which causes scarlet fever and rheumatic heart disease, and how similar tools have already led to breakthroughs against COVID and RSV. Hard Drugs is a new podcast from Works in Progress and Open Philanthropy about medical innovation presented by Saloni Dattani and Jacob Trefethen. Saloni’s substack newsletter: https://www.scientificdiscovery.dev/ Jacob’s blog: https://blog.jacobtrefethen.com/ Courses: EMBL-EBI. AlphaFold: A practical guide https://www.ebi.ac.uk/training/online/courses/alphafold/ Articles: Monica Jain et al. (2022) Exosite binding modulates the specificity of the immunomodulatory enzyme ScpA, a C5a inactivating bacterial protease. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9464890/ Jakki Cooney et al. (2008) Crystal structure of C5a peptidase https://www.rcsb.org/structure/3EIF Hui Li et al. (2017) Mutagenesis and immunological evaluation of group A streptococcal C5a peptidase as an antigen for vaccine development and as a carrier protein for glycoconjugate vaccine design https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2017/ra/c7ra07923k Lectures: Rosetta Commons (2024) AlphaFold – ML for protein structure prediction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVrn8_8aKO8 Rosetta Commons (2024) MPNN – ML for protein sequence design https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6z4XmUAwdNA Acknowledgements: Aria Babu, editor at Works in ProgressGraham Bessellieu, video editorRachel Shu, on-site editorAnna Magpie, fact-checkingAbhishaike Mahajan, cover artAtalanta Arden-Miller, art directionDavid Hackett, composer Works in Progress & Open Philanthropy [Correction: The structure of RSV's prefusion F protein was initially determined by X-ray crystallography by Jason McLellan and colleagues, rather than cryo-electron microscopy, although the latter was used to visualize antibody binding and confirm its structure.]

01.10.2025

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55 min.
15.08.2025

The underrated economics of land with Mike Bird

Why is Chinese housing so expensive despite being oversupplied? How did land reforms in Russia lead to the Bolshevik revolution? What killed Georgism? The Economist’s Wall Street Editor, Mike Bird, discusses the underrated economics of land. You can preorder Mike's book here and read more about land readjustment in Works in Progress Issue 19.

15.08.2025

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1 t. 16 min.
30. JAN.

The nuclear renaissance

In the mid twentieth century, nuclear power was meant to be the cheap and clean energy of the future. Now, nuclear power is expensive, maligned and unpopular. Ben, Sam and Alex discuss what went wrong in most of the world and, surprisingly, what went right in France. Ben delivers a radioactive hot take that meltdowns aren't so bad after all. You can read more about the French nuclear success here: https://www.worksinprogress.news/p/liberte-egalite-radioactivite

30. jan.

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1 t. 21 min.

Works in Progress is an online magazine devoted to new and underrated ideas about economic growth, scientific progress, and technology. Subscribe to listen to Hard Drugs by Saloni Dattani and Jacob Trefethen and the Works in Progress podcast by the whole team.

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Works in Progress

Mest populære serier

Why Europe has stagnated

The first cancer vaccine

The history of vaccines

100 years of insulin in 15 minutes

Proteins: Weird blobs that do important things

The art of protein design with AI

The first cancer vaccine

Hacking proteins with AI

The underrated economics of land with Mike Bird

The nuclear renaissance

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