Why proteins matter
Jul 01, 2025•30 min•Ep. 1166
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Summary
Dr. Marushka Subban leads a journey into the world of proteins, explaining their crucial role as biological workhorses and how their precise 3D shape is essential for function, with misfolding leading to serious diseases like cancer and neurodegeneration. The episode highlights historical breakthroughs like insulin sequencing and hemoglobin's structure, then explores how modern synthetic biology is engineering new proteins for treating illness, cleaning pollution, and combating climate change. Finally, it discusses the transformative impact of AI, particularly AlphaFold, on predicting protein structures and accelerating drug discovery, opening doors to designing new solutions for humanity's biggest problems and even pondering the future of designing life itself.Episode description
This episode was produced and presented by Dr Marushka Soobben, a scientist from South Africa who's been taking part in an internship here at the Naked Scientists. And this week, a journey into the world of proteins. What are they? why do they matter? And why did predicting their shapes win a recent Nobel prize? Like this podcast? Please help us by supporting the Naked Scientists
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