RTE1, Thursdays 23.05 from November 8th

Ireland has one of the highest incidences of cancer in the Western World. Each year approximately over 20,000 new cases are diagnosed (this figure is likely to rise to 40,000 by 2020). Every year 11,000 people die from the disease. Dr. John Kennedy (St. James Hospital) leads a voluntary co-ordinated research group (ICORG) with consultants, clinicians and researchers who organise clinical drug trials in Ireland.

The ‘take up’ of these trials is higher per capita in Ireland than even the USA and drug companies are taking note. It’s quite clear that advances in cancer research could not happen without the patients who volunteer for clinical trials, and we tell the story of one such patient, Marie Loughney.

Two Irish scientists working at the forefront of cancer research are Professor Tom Cotter of UCC and Dr. Rob O’Connor of DCU. Professor Cotter’s research into the body’s biochemical pathways led to the development of a drug which is 95% successful in the treatment of a rare form of leukaemia. While Dr. Rob O’Connor’s pioneering research into combining pre-existing drugs to devise new treatments for melanoma are brought to trial stage via ICORG.

Featuring: John Kennedy, Professor Tom Cotter, Dr. Rob O’Connor Interviews: Professor John Crowne, Dr. Brian Moulton, Denis Slaman UCLA,

Ireland has a strong history of Climate Change research dating back to the 1860s when John Tyndall famously discovered how the Earth’s temperature is warmed by water vapour. Though the famous term ‘The Greenhouse Effect’ was coined later, there is no doubt that his work was pioneering in the field. Since the 1950s, the Mace Head Research Station in Galway has been at the forefront of international atmospheric monitoring and is a world class science station. Professor Gerard Jennings illustrates how data from Mace Head is used to predict global climate trends and used by Climatologists around the world in their climate models.

But how will climate change affect Ireland specifically? At NUI Maynooth, Dr. John Sweeney’s climate modelling system is designed to answer that question. From flooding, to droughts, and coastal erosion, water management will represent our most serious challenge. And what can be done to lessen Ireland’s contribution to Climate Change? Dr. Padraig O’Kiely of Teagasc is investigating ways to decrease our considerable agricultural methane emissions by devising alternative diets for cattle designed to cut our output significantly.

Featuring; Professor Gerard Jennings, EPA, SFI, HEA. John Sweeney and Rowan Fealy, EPA, SFI, HEA, Teagasc, Dr. Padraig O’Kiely, Teagasc. Interview: Dr. R. K Pachauri, Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

For centuries the human brain has fascinated and mystified scientists almost in equal measure. Neuro-psychologist Prof. Ian Robertson (TCD) gives us a high tech tour of the human brain. He explains how his work into brain function through detailed tests and imaging techniques can help us to better understand exactly how the brain and specifically the frontal lobes work.

Often the physical effects of a damaged brain which Ian studies can be very similar to those displayed by people whose brains actually look normal but are in fact suffering from poor connections or bad ‘wiring’ such as ADHD and also schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s. Michael Gill a clinical psychiatrist has been working on the links between genetics and these disorders and has made some significant advances in this area. Now in a new approach, Prof. Roberston and Prof Michael Gill have joined forces and are collaborating on an exciting link between brain function and genetics. By combining their methods, their research could change the way we diagnose and treat brain injury in the future.

Featuring: Professor Ian Robertson, Professor Michael Gill Interviewees: Professor Philip Asherson, King’s College London. Dr. James Watson, Nobel Prize Winner, Physiology/Medicine.

For centuries the human brain has fascinated and mystified scientists almost in equal measure. Neuro-psychologist Prof. Ian Robertson (TCD) gives us a high tech tour of the human brain. He explains how his work into brain function through detailed tests and imaging techniques can help us to better understand exactly how the brain and specifically the frontal lobes work.

Often the physical effects of a damaged brain which Ian studies can be very similar to those displayed by people whose brains actually look normal but are in fact suffering from poor connections or bad ‘wiring’ such as ADHD and also schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s. Michael Gill a clinical psychiatrist has been working on the links between genetics and these disorders and has made some significant advances in this area. Now in a new approach, Prof. Roberston and Prof Michael Gill have joined forces and are collaborating on an exciting link between brain function and genetics. By combining their methods, their research could change the way we diagnose and treat brain injury in the future.

Featuring: Professor Ian Robertson, Professor Michael Gill Interviewees: Professor Philip Asherson, King’s College London. Dr. James Watson, Nobel Prize Winner, Physiology/Medicine.

Could the discovery of one protein possibly save millions of lives? Professor Luke O’Neill’s discovery of MAL has the potential to do just that. It offers a new horizon of hope to the 3 million children who die of Malaria in the developing world every year, to the 146,000 who die of Sepsis in the EU and to sufferers of the painful and debilitating disease Rheumatoid Arthritis. At the very least it is a vital new key to understanding the human immune system.

We will feature interviews with Professor Adrian Hill in Oxford who has recently collaborated with Luke in the race to find a malaria vaccine. Their efforts funded by the Gates Foundation have yielded extraordinary results and were published to great acclaim in ‘Nature’ magazine 2007. Meanwhile in Imperial College London and Sheffield University Professors Brian Foxwell and Gerry Wilson are each applying research into MAL to the development of future treatments for arthritis. In the Netherlands we meet Dr. Mihai Netea who is working both against Arthritis with which he has had some very promising results in animal models and to try and eliminate sepsis, the biggest killer in the Western world.

Featuring: Luke O’Neill, Interviews: Dr. Peter Doherty, Winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine, Professor Cliona O’Farrelly, President of the Irish Society for Immunology, Dr. Siobhan O’Sullivan, Irish Bio Ethics Council, Adrian Hill, Oxford, Brian Foxwell, Kennedy Institute, Mihai Netea, Holland.

Functional food is a phrase that is much mentioned but often misunderstood and even misused. Liam Donnelly of Teagasc outlines what the term really means and some of the projects which Irish researchers are involved in. We profile the work of Dr. Catherine Stanton of Teagasc and her research into Conjugated Linoleic Acid enriched cheese (from cow’s milk) and the health benefits shown to be associated with CLAs such as anti IBS, anti cancer and reduced heart disease properties. Her original trials showed excellent results but she is pleased now to discover that we may have the ability to produce these CLAs in the human gut.

We are familiar with the concepts of good and bad bacteria in the human gut but research is increasingly showing just how powerful those good bacteria can be when isolated and grown in large numbers. Scientists like Catherine are working hard in what is essentially uncharted territory to search for health promoting bacteria which could help to counter many extremely painful and debilitating diseases.

Professor Eamonn Quigley of UCC explains his research into gut bacteria and how he identified a bifido-bacterium which exerts beneficial IBS sufferers. Professor Colin Hill discovered a bacteria in the human gut, ‘UCC118’, capable of killing listeria which can be fatal to unborn children. His cover story in the highly regarded PNAS journal demonstrates how internationally significant this finding has been.

Featuring:, Dr. Catherine Stanton, Teagasc, SFI, Professor Eamonn Quigley, Professor Colin Hill, SFI, HEA. Interview: Liam Donnelly, Teagasc, Prof. Mike Pariza (University of Wisconsin), Professor Fergus Shanahan, UCC.

Where will Ireland be making a real impact in 10 years time? What are the ‘hot spots’ of Irish scientific research and…. who are the investigators of the future?

Without doubt one of the key areas will be in genetics. Since the discovery of the structure of DNA revolutionised the field in the 1960s the search for further information on our genome began apace. In 2001 they finally succeeded in one of the greatest achievements of modern science – The human genome project. The only Irish Scientist asked to participate was Professor Ken Wolfe of TCD.

By analysing the evolution of genes across different species over billions of years, Wolfe aims to understand how new genes begin and why. A major breakthrough came initially in 1997 when he proved beyond doubt that there was a duplication of the entire genome in yeast and more significantly in 2001 when he showed that this duplication had occurred twice in the evolution of human genes. Gaining deeper insights into the formation of genes will help us gauge the consequences of future manipulation or intervention within genetics. Now scientists like Peter Humphreys are concentrating on the identification of genes and their links to function in the body and more importantly to disease and disability– in this case blindness. We will examine the ethical issues surrounding the possession of knowledge which might indicate likelihood of life expectancy etc and the concept of ‘blacklisted genes’ like that which indicates clearly if someone will develop the fatal ‘Huntington’s Disease’.

Featuring: Ken Wolfe, SFI, Peter Humphreys, Tim O’Brien Interviews: Dr Ewan Birney, European Bio Informatics Institute, Cambridge University, Dr. Siobhan O’Sullivan, The Irish Bio Ethics Council