NICHD Research Perspectives is a monthly podcast series hosted by NICHD Director Alan E. Guttmacher. The series features informal interviews with NICHD researchers who go beyond the descriptions provided in the institute’s news releases. In the series, NICHD staffers take the time to discuss the implications of the research, what the findings may mean for patients and members of the public, as well as what direction future studies might take. Because the podcasts are recorded live they are sometimes subject to factors beyond our control. For example, in our inaugural NICHD Research Perspectives (May 2012), you can hear the lawnmower that was operating outside the window during our recording session. Our audio engineer was able to minimize the distraction, but, unfortunately, couldn’t eliminate it completely.
May 2013 NICHD Research Perspectives
In the May NICHD Research Perspectives, Dr. Michael Weinrich, Director of NICHD’s National Center for Medical Rehabilitation Research interviewed NICHD program officials and grantees on reducing the risk for stroke, current stroke treatments, and research on how best to rehabilitate stroke patients.
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Transcript: May NICHD Research Perspectives
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April 2013 NICHD Research Perspectives
Guests at the April 2013 NICHD Research Perspectives discussed ‘Shaken Baby Syndrome,’ and it’s health effects, ways to recognize signs of impending child abuse, and how to prevent such abuse from occurring.
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Transcript: April NICHD Research Perspectives
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March 2013 NICHD Research Perspectives
The March 2013 NICHD Research Perspectives featured research from the NICHD’s Obstetric and Pediatric Pharmacology Branch, which supports numerous projects to ensure the safety and efficacy of pharmaceuticals used for infants, children, and pregnant women.
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Transcript: March NICHD Research Perspectives
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February 2013 NICHD Research Perspectives
The February 2013 NICHD Research Perspectives featured research from the NICHD’s Molecular Medicine Program, which focuses on understanding the role of trace minerals-- minerals needed in very small amounts-- on human health. February’s podcast guests were Dr. Tracey Rouault and Dr. Stephen Kaler who described their efforts to better understanding disorders of iron and copper metabolism.
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Transcript: February NICHD Research Perspectives
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January 2013 NICHD Research Perspectives
The January 2013 NICHD Research Perspectives featured adolescent health research undertaken by scientists in the institute’s Prevention Research Branch. Branch Chief Bruce Simons-Morton described his studies of teen driving behavior, Tonja Nansel spoke about her work on bullying and diabetes management among adolescents, and Ronald Iannotti outlined his ongoing investigations of behaviors associated with adolescent obesity.
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Transcript: January NICHD Research Perspectives
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December 2012 NICHD Research Perspectives
The December podcast focused on the research of NICHD’s Laboratory of Comparative Ethology. Ethology is the study of human and animal behaviors and ethologists tend to study animals in their natural settings. Much of lab’s research is conducted at the NIH Animal Center located on a 509-acre expanse of farmland in rural Montgomery County, about 30 miles from the main NIH campus in Bethesda, Maryland. Lab researchers study rhesus macaques and a few other non-human primates. An important component of the lab is an open-air enclosure that houses a free-ranging troop of rhesus macaques. The December guests were the lab chief, Stephen Suomi, Ph.D, whose research involves the interaction between genetics, environment and behavior, postdoctoral fellow Annika Paukner, whose studies involve rhesus monkeys and the role that imitation plays in social development and bonding, and Amanda Detmer Erard, the postdoctoral fellow who manages the open air enclosure.
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Transcript: December NICHD Research Perspectives
Accompanying the December podcast are two videos of the primates at the NIH Animal Care Facility.
The first shows footage of the free ranging rhesus macaque troop (Macaca mulatta) at a pond inside their five acre enclosure. This video shows the animals interacting with each other, on the shore of the pond, and in the water.
The second video shows research on a 2009 study which found that capuchin monkeys (Cebus apaella) preferred to interact with human beings who imitated them, rather than with human beings who did not.
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November 2012 NICHD Research Perspectives
The November 2012 NICHD Director’s podcast featured presenters from a recent NICHD Exchange program, “Sleep: the ABC’s of Zs.” The NICHD Exchange is a series of quarterly meetings in which NICHD administrators and scientists present relevant findings designed to spur thought provoking conversations to inform the NICHD research effort. For this month’s podcast, four guests discussed aspects of sleep research pertaining to the NICHD mission. Recapitulating their talks from the recent Exchange were: David Klein of the Division of Intramural Research, who described the genetic factors governing sleep, Caroline Signore of the Pregnancy and Perinatology Branch, who reviewed the literature on sleep and pregnancy, Lynne Haverkos, of the Child Development and Behavior Branch, who reviewed the research literature on how sleep influences child and adolescent development, and Paul Albert, of the Division of Epidemiology, Statistics, and Prevention Research: who described the statistical methods used to inform an ongoing NICHD study involving adolescent sleep patterns and other aspects of adolescent health.
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Transcript: November NICHD Research Perspectives
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October 2012 NICHD Research Perspectives
The October 2012 podcast features discussions of a study on a treatment to reduce the risk of preterm birth and the new Safe to Sleep campaign.
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Transcript: October NICHD Research Perspectives
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September 2012 NICHD Research Perspectives
In the September 2012 podcast, NICHD researchers discussed how a gene found in a rare cancer increases red blood cell production, the involvement of “dark matter” DNA in the body’s response to day and night cycles, and on cesarean delivery versus labor for preterm infants.
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Transcript: September NICHD Research Perspectives
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August 2012 NICHD Research Perspectives
The August 2012 podcast featured research on how the stresses of poverty may affect learning in young children, the effects of fetal alcohol exposure, and how the ability to estimate quantities changes across the lifespan.
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Transcript: August NICHD Research Perspectives
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July 2012 NICHD Research Perspectives
The July podcast featured research sponsored by the NICHD’s Pediatric, Adolescent and Maternal AIDS Branch: reducing the occurrence of mother-to-child transmission of HIV, the safety of one of the new anti HIV drugs, tenofovir, during pregnancy, and the risk of bone loss among young men newly diagnosed with HIV.
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Transcript: July NICHD Research Perspectives
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June 2012 NICHD Research Perspectives
Researcher discuss a therapy to treat oxygen deprivation at birth with whole body cooling, report on how a therapy to treat infertility associated with polycystic ovary syndrome appears not to work as well as it was thought to, and a study showing how an intervention to engage the attention of young children with autism results in increased language development.
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Transcript: June NICHD Research Perspectives
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May 2012 NICHD Research Perspectives
Researchers discuss the cognitive advantages of bilingualism, why American women take longer in labor now than women did 50 years ago, and a discovery that viewing images of infant faces evokes specific patterns of brain activity in adults.
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Transcript: May NICHD Research Perspectives
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