For Whom the Cell Tolls: Biology, Cancer, and Other Stories About Life

Hello! I'm recently returned from my annual ASH meeting where I see all of the latest advances in blood cancers. This specific facet was my favorite: small, insurgent populations of healthy B-cells portend better survival because they prime your T-cells to keep fighting. Super cool! I also have some mother grey stories from the meeting to share that I'm hopeful to get out on another episode. Thank you as always for listening!

Welcome back! It's been a while. I'm excited to get going again with an episode on the emerging science of "ecotyping" the cells around tumors - the microenvironment. Ecology and Evolution of lymphoma tumors is only half the story. We needed to know more about the state of cells around the tumor. How do they affect the surrounding immune cells? Do they support the tumor? We examine the worst possible scenario: when very little remains except for tumor and support cells. What are the consequences for immune-specific therapies like CAR-T cells? Hopefully this episode provides a good intro to our new tools to measure the TME and how it can further advance precision cancer medicine. I hope that you enjoy! Steen: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34597589/ Katlov: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33541860/ --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

What do you think? Would the immensely powerful amount of data be a game-changer for medicine? Or does DNA sequencing miss too much of the picture to be worth the cost? This question is an example why we need leaders that understand Biology as genomics becomes hyper-accessible. I do my best to discuss the primary Pros and Cons of each side, along with possible modifications to the proposal. I hope you enjoy it! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Can your genome match you with a soulmate? Sort of, but we'd need more than just mammal genomes to know... I hope you enjoy, and collect your thoughts on the proposal at the end of the episode if you're interested! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

The Netflix series The One is based on a book with a similar premise: via genome sequencing, we can match you with your best possible partner. The show is a great watch, and the science is not too far outside the possible. In fact, it's far closer than the Sci-fi elements suggest, although this comes with some caveat changes. This is Part I of a set of episodes related to mass sequencing and how this could relate to medicine, cancer, the inner workings of the genome, and where the human mind falls within that. I hope you enjoy! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

*Instagram page now live!* This episode covers how gene therapy may emerge as a critical tool for medicine as we seek to treat the previously untreatable. Can we ADD genes to specific cells to help humans overcome fated genetic ailments? Why has this process challenged us in the past? And lastly, who is going to pay for all these expensive viral delivery systems? Join to take a first look at how medicine and genetics can change the future. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

BONUS EPISODE - I collected the top 20 insights from my personal and professional colleagues that completed or are currently undertaking medical school or another healthcare program to share with my students. This episode is a recorded conversation with several of my students over video. I share what I can from my experiences, those of colleagues, and also address student questions. I hope it offers something new for those of you considering a career in healthcare! NOTE - the recording ends at the 60 minute limit sadly. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Join me and Gustavus Adolphus College colleague Katie Peterson to discuss our research, how we teach, our paths to becoming professors, and student questions! In this episode we address interdisciplinary connections between evolution, environmental change, and cellular biology. We hope you enjoy! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

This episode covers the basics of how a cancer begins. Genetic mutations can often knock out genes responsible for keeping an eye on how many cell divisions are allowed. Once these are out of the way, aggressive growth genes can overcome them and cause initial tumor populations to form. After further successive survival advantages are gained, tumors eventually break free from their original organ/tissue and wreak havoc. Learning how to address the initial and final stages of cancer are key towards better clinical outcomes for all patients --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Chimeric Antigen Receptor T-cells (CAR-T) represent one of the most profound and exciting advances in modern medicine and science. Many lymphoma patients fail therapy after therapy with little recourse. CAR-T aimed to stop that. Taking immune T-cells from the patient, engineering them to target cancer cells, and re-releasing them into the patient would've sounded crazy 20 years ago. Thanks to modern technology, science, and clinical practice we've created something powerful. The CAR-T enter patients and attack the tumor, but a massive immune reaction results in massive side effects. This episode explores some of the exciting news, future possibilities, and ethical challenges of CAR-T use for lymphoma treatments. I hope you enjoy! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

We live in an age where social media provides a platform for everything - good and bad. I wanted to summarize how ideas can be spread, weaponized, and distorted, much like a disease. We also briefly go over the differences between ideas and beliefs. The episode takes a look at how stem cell clinics offer hope through social media without a solid foundation of biology with which to apply their therapies (that nobody knows how to control or stop from hurting people). Cancer can be an unfortunate consequence of visiting one of these clinics. We can reflect on how easy it would be for trusted health professionals to turn to social media to market "Miracle Cancer Cures", taking advantage of anyone looking for hope. The same hope that cancer patients need to fight their disease is poisoned by willfully ignorant endeavors like these. Learning how to harness science, logic, ideas, and human emotion is a key to overcoming the aggressive advance of non-well-meaning products. Emotion trumps logic in the courts of social media, and health professionals need to be ready to confront these challenges from the same perspective (or a dual one) instead of relying on scientific findings alone. Facts can convince you, but emotion can make you believe. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Today's episode details my research area: B-cells and the resulting lymphomas. The journey of a B-cell is violent and chaotic. To produce the best possible antibody protein against pathogen, the body employs an all-or-nothing tool: DNA modification. Nowhere else in the body is the DNA in cells actively manipulated and changed, except in B-cells. It's no wonder they result in so many lymphoma cases. Tune in to learn more about this tumultuous process! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

This is an exciting and quick episode that mainly covers the findings of a recent Daniel D. Carvalho paper in Nature Reviews called “Epigenetic therapy in immune oncology” where the authors elaborate on new mechanisms of cancer treatments. Essentially, the epigenetic Cancer therapies that cause genes to reprogram the “on/off” state also awaken ancient relic viruses that lie dormant in our DNA, which subsequently leads to a massive immune response against the tumor. These mechanisms may play a role in treating aggressive forms of the disease that usually evade the immune system. Enjoy! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Welcome back to season 2! Domestication is a very interesting process and was first performed millions of years ago. The relationships between humans and dogs is of particular interest, as are the genetic and developmental changes that make them possible. We also delve into controversy and how the process of tameness selection brings along more than what's expected. Enjoy, and go hug your dog or cat! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Everything you've heard about CRISPR is likely closer to the truth than not. The possibilities are exiting, and the possibilities are terrifying. This episode dives into the logic and ethics behind CRISPR-Cas9's DNA-changing capabilities and what it means for science, healthcare, and war. Now is a good time to start learning about this next step in technology and to form your thoughts, because since we've opened this box it will be impossible to close. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Today's episode is the first one that is primarily driven by literature and philosophy, namely borrowing themes explored in Frankenstein and Paradise Lost. Victor Frankenstein's fraught relationship with his creature is a devastatingly emotional purview into what life is. The influence from Paradise Lost and our subsequent relationship with a creator initiates a powerful dialogue worth exploring. General aspects of being creative are also introduced, and human control of life and healthcare conclude the episode. Either way you look at it, advances are mounting without as much central appreciation or critique. It's a discussion I'd encourage you examine more closely in your own life! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Today's episode covers the basics of evolution so that we can address a case of extreme survival in some of the smallest organisms to exist: yeast! Cancer evolution makes a token appearances as well, alongside new mechanisms of tumor evasion that can develop when we treat cancer with different therapies. Stories of how organisms put everything on the line to defy their environment and survive are what Biology so fascinating. Plus, who doesn't love using the word hypermutation repeatedly? Also, feel free to add any content you want to see covered or questions you want to explore. Engaging new ideas is always exciting. I hope you enjoy! Note: The yeast hypermutation strategy is latch ditch for a reason: it's a one in a million shot to work. Luckily, yeast exist in colonies of tens of millions, so when faced with species survival or death they are engineered to make the gamble. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

The days of chemo-only cancer treatment ended years ago. This episode introduces 20 diverse therapies that scientists and clinicians are turning to in the face of ever-evolving tumors. This is an especially exiting episode, as I believe there is so much hope on the horizon for treating these diseases, and it's exciting to share that hope with others. Enjoy! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

The power of immune system is on full display every day of our lives and has been throughout our history. As pathogens try to enter our bodies and hurt us, the immune system rises up to fight and counter new disease mechanisms that it encounters. This episode will touch on the debate over remaining smallpox samples, innate and adaptive immunity, and autoimmunity. I hope you enjoy, and please let me know if I need to clarify anything! As a B-Cell scientist I'm always a bit over-excited by these concepts. My students often had to slow me down. I hope you enjoy! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Internal human ecosystems? Transmissible personality traits? Tune in for the best episode yet where we get you up to speed on the human microbiome, a collection of thousands of partner bacterial species that live inside and on us. Our microbiome species have co-evolved to keep our gut, immune system, and even mind healthy. The emerging consequences of disrupting this ecosystem will also come up, along with ways to keep things good. Enjoy! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

This episode goes over why DNA and the information it encodes could be what defines life. Organisms are finite things, but the information coded by successful genes persists through generations, possibly indefinitely. We'll also touch on instincts surrounding survival, family, and altruism. Enjoy! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Cancer is more than cells that proliferate and survive like mad. They also rely on parasitizing resources and evading immune system predators. Cancer evolution represents the greatest challenge for scientists and clinicians, as tumors can do almost anything to survive. Listen to this episode for a glimpse inside the tumor microenvironment and how we have to combat it. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

This episode addresses further definitions of life, the end of the dinosaurs, and the emergence of the mammal, along with the partnership that they made with fungi to do it. This story is inspired by a seminar by Dr. Arturo Casadevall from John's Hopkins. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message

Hello! My name is Keenan, and I'm a cancer scientist. I also love going over the amazing stories that Biology has to share, and hopefully these casts make it enjoyable to hear some of them on a time budget. Today's episode is introductory, covering what I do, cancer, the definition of life, and how philosophy plays a huge role in science. Cancer and the definition of life can be heavy topics, but I hope that you enjoy it! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/keenan-t/message