AlphaGenome & the RNA world hypothesis | The chemical breakdown podcast
2/11/202627 min
Welcome to our latest podcast series, The chemical breakdown. Each week, we dive deeper into two stories we've covered here at Chemistry World, providing insight into the facts, why you should care, and what it means for the chemistry community. We also give you that week's headlines to keep you up to date with what's happening in the chemistry community. And finally, we'll end each episode with a brief section on what was happening this week in chemistry history.
This week, we discuss the new deep learning model AlphaGenome and visit the very beginning of life on E...
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First 90 secondsMarianna Kneppers· Host0:00
[gentle music] Google DeepMind has released a new deep-learning model that can predict the effect of small changes to DNA sequences up to one million base pairs in length. What does this new tech mean for our understanding of the human genome? And how did life start on Earth before the first cell came to be? We discuss the long-debated RNA world hypothesis and break down the chemistry it's built on. I'm Marianna Kneppers, Chemistry World's science media producer, and this is The Chemical Breakdown. We'll be diving deeper into these stories shortly, but first, let's take a look at this week's news from the Chemistry World website. [gentle music] India and the EU have reached a new trade agreement aimed at significantly cutting tariffs and opening up smoother pathways for economic migration. The deal is expected to boost trade flows between the regions while making it easier for skilled workers to move and work across borders. A new UK government report describes the threat posed by PFAS as one of the most pressing chemical challenges of our time. The report lays out a plan for responding to the risks, including annual freshwater testing, tighter restrictions, and monitoring PFAS exposure and its risks to human health. But researchers are worried the new plan is not strong enough. A new class of super strong porous materials has been developed