Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Alan Dove, Rich Condit, and Kirsten Sanford On episode #83 of the podcast This Week in Virology, Vincent, Alan, Rich, and special guest Dr. Kirsten Sanford talk about her career in science media, then consider whether smallpox eradication led to the AIDS pandemic, high fidelity RNA synthesis, ...

In the final lecture of my virology course, Professor Dickson Despommier weaves a story about the arrival of West Nile virus to the United States in the summer of 1999. This is a special treat that you won't want to miss, as Prof. Despommier is a wonderful storyteller. Download: .wmv ...

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier On episode 10 of the podcast "This Week in Parasitism", Vincent and Dickson trace the life cycle of Plasmodium in a mosquito and in a human host. [powerpress url="http://traffic.libsyn.com/twip/TWiP010.mp3"] Click the arrow above to play, or right-click to download TWiP is brought to you by the ...

An important question about the retrovirus XMRV, which has been implicated in prostate cancer and chronic fatigue syndrome, is where the virus replicates in humans. Such information would provide clues about how infection might be transmitted. To date the virus has been detected in malignant prostate cells and in the ...

Google Flu Trends uses analysis of large numbers of search queries to track influenza-like illness in a population. The idea is that the frequency of certain queries correlates with the percentage of physician visits in which a patient presents with influenza-like symptoms. Google claims that it can accurately estimate the ...