Tech and Science Daily speak to the lead author, Dr. Cornelia De Moor.
Dr De Moor says the fungus has the presence of a potent chemical that stop cancer cell growth, and could lead to a ‘gamechanging’ cancer drug.
- The UK pledges £79 million to accelerate the energy transition in developing countries.
- The Royal Observatory tells us how to spot the final supermoon of 2024.
- Satirical website The Onion has bought the highly controversial ‘conspiracy site’ Infowars.
- The Royal Zoological Society of Scotland has called for tighter restrictions on fireworks following the death of Roxie, a baby red panda.
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Here’s a fully automated transcript of this episode:
Hey, I’m Rachelle Abbott, and you’re listening to The Standard’s Tech and Science Daily podcast.
Remember the zombie disease-inflicting fungus from The Last of Us?
Well, University of Nottingham scientists say a compound in the actual fungus could save lives.
The fungus that we are using a compound from is Cordyceps militaris, which is a fungus that normally lives in the soil, but if it has the opportunity, it will infect caterpillars, and that will help it then to form a fruiting body, so the mushroom, that then spreads the spores so that the fungus can migrate somewhere else.
That’s Dr Cornelia De Moor from the School of Biosciences at the University of Nottingham and lead author of the study.
Dr De Moor says the fungus has the presence of a potent chemical that stops cancer cell growth and could lead to a game-changing cancer drug.
Basically, this type of fungus, the caterpillar fungi, so these fungi that infect caterpillars, are quite famous in Chinese traditional medicine.
And cordycepin is produced at quite high levels by this particular species, Cordyceps militaris.
What we found was that the initial assumption had been that this would be a very toxic compound that would kill cells very quickly, all cells, because it interferes with a fundamental process in gene regulation.
So, what we did was we looked at five different cell lines that were differently treated, and also from both mice and humans.
We looked at what is the general effect that happens on gene expression, and compare what happens to them under different conditions.
The team have been researching cordycepin on a range of diseases for a number of years, and with each step they get closer to understanding how it could be used as an effective treatment.
We’ve been looking at it for a number of different diseases, in part because we saw from the literature that other people found different diseases.
We have done also a literature review, and there are many, many different diseases that seem to benefit from cordycepin when you test it in animals.
So there’s not that much clinical data.
We found it worked in the animal model of osteoarthritis, and also in an animal model of breast cancer.
But that’s just a small range of the potential diseases that this drug might work for.
Now the things that we have found, these effects that we have now published, are consistent with the diseases that it is reputed to work for.
And these are all age-related diseases.
So the mechanism of action is consistent with it being an age-related, something that helps with an age-related disease.
So we are quite excited about it because it makes sense.
The study is published in the journal FEBS Letters.
Next, the government’s announced that projects which aim to speed up the energy transition in developing countries will receive a share of £79 million in UK climate finance.
The money will support clean power innovation in countries on the front line of the climate crisis such as African nations and comes under the UK’s existing pledge to spend £11.6 billion in climate finance over five years.
Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said this will support the world’s most vulnerable and unlock the global growth benefits of decarbonised economies.
But what does the spend go towards?
Low carbon technologies, energy storage, zero emission generators and clean transport, as well as innovations to decarbonise the steel, chemicals, cement and concrete industries.
Next, satirical website The Onion has bought the highly controversial conspiracy site Infowars.
The purchase took place at a court-ordered auction and confirmed on Thursday 14th November.
Infowars is run by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and in a video shared on X, he said that due to bankruptcy, they were being shut down, even without a court order, and that the Connecticut Democrats with The Onion newspaper bought us.
Onion boss Ben Collins said in a post on Blue Sky, “We are planning on making it a very funny, very stupid website.”
Coming up in part 2, how to spot the final supermoon of 2024.
See you back here in just a minute.
We’ve been speaking to The Royal Observatory, Greenwich, as Friday the 15th of November marks the end of four consecutive super moons.
The Beaver Moon, titled Beaver, has a couple of interpretations.
Some believe the moon is called this because beavers are usually pretty busy at this time of year, preparing for the winter months ahead, or because Native American tribes would set up beaver traps before the swamps froze and were able to retrieve a supply of furs.
The moon’s orbit around the earth is not perfectly circular, it’s slightly squashed, a sort of ellipse.
And that means that at some points, the moon is slightly closer to the earth than others.
If a full moon happens when the moon is at its closest point or close to its closest point, then it will be referred to as a super moon.
That’s Dr. Greg Brown, Senior Public Astronomy Officer at The Royal Observatory, Greenwich.
Dr. Greg explains how the beaver moon compares to previous super moons.
The beaver moon is fairly standard compared to other super moons.
It’s slightly further away than some of the other super moons that we’ve had in this season.
It will appear very, very slightly smaller than some of the previous super moons we’ve had over the course of this year.
To the point that some people don’t even consider it to be a super moon.
There are disagreements on what the definition of a super moon is, but if you do, it’s a slightly smaller one than some of the others.
You won’t be able to see another super moon until October 2025, so if you can try to catch a glimpse, it’s worth a try.
The good thing about a super moon is that the full moon is extraordinary bright, very, very easy to see, visible throughout the entirety of the night, rising around about sunset and setting around about sunrise.
So as long as you’re willing to head outside at some point in the evening, then as long as it’s clear and you’re looking in the right direction, there’s a very, very good chance you’ll see it.
And finally, the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland has called for tighter restrictions on fireworks following the death of a baby red panda at Edinburgh Zoo on bonfire night.
It’s believed by veterinary experts that the three-month-old named Roxie died due to stress caused by fireworks being let off across the city centre.
The Wildlife Conservation Charity is calling on people to contact their local MP and MSP to support the petition delivered to the UK government earlier this month.
You’re up to date, come back at 4pm for The Standard podcast.
Tech and Science Daily returns tomorrow at 1pm.
For all the latest news, head to standard.co.uk.
