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The Conversation

A show for curious minds, from The Conversation. Each week, host Gemma Ware speaks to an academic expert about a topic in the news to understand how we got here.

The Conversation Weekly

Back in the 1980s, when Shimon Sakaguchi was a young researcher in immunology, he found it difficult to get his research funded. Now, his pioneering work which explains how our immune system knows when and what to attack, has won him a Nobel prize.

Sakaguchi, along with American researchers Mary Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell, were jointly awarded the 2025 Nobel prize in physiology or medicine for the work on regulatory T-cells, known as T-regs for short, a special class of immune cells which prevent our immune system from attacking our own body.

In this episode Sakaguchi tells The Conversation about his journey of discovery and the potential treatments it could unlock.

This episode was produced by Mend Mariwany, Katie Flood and Gemma Ware. Sound design and mixing by Michelle Macklem and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Metal-organic frameworks: Nobel-winning tiny ‘sponge crystals’ with an astonishing amount of inner spaceNobel physics prize awarded for pioneering experiments that paved the way for quantum computersHow does your immune system stay balanced? A Nobel Prize-winning answerNobel medicine prize: how a hidden army in your body keeps you alive – and could help treat cancer

Nobel laureate Shimon Sakaguchi on his immune system breakthrough

As Donald Trump gives oxygen to unproven theories about what might be behind a recent rise in autism cases, experts repeatedly point to the changing nature of how autism is diagnosed and viewed.

A key moment in the history of autism diagnosis was the publication in 1994 of a new version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. It's a reference book of psychiatric conditions and how to diagnose them, used by psychiatrists and psychologists around the world. 

In this episode, Andrew Whitehouse, a professor of autism research at the University of Western Australia, explains why this shift in autism diagnosis happened in the 1990s, what impact it had, and what it's meant for the support autistic people get. 

This episode was produced by Katie Flood, Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware. Sound design and mixing by Michelle Macklem and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

The diagnosis dimension to the rise in autism

Donald Trump is not letting up pressure on the US Federal Reserve. He's taken efforts to fire one of its governors, all the way up to the US Supreme Court. 

Trump's clash with the Fed echoes pressure that Richard Nixon put on the central bank in the 1970s to lower interest rates. In this episode, Cristina Bodea, professor of political science at Michigan State University, why that moment – and the inflation spike that followed – became a cautionary tale about what can happen if politicians threaten the independence of central banks. 

This episode was written and produced by Katie Flood and Gemma Ware with assistance from Mend Mariwany. Sound design and mixing by Eloise Stevens and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Pressuring the Fed doesn't end well

With France, the UK, Australia and Canada expected to recognise an independent Palestinian state at UN General Assembly in New York, what are the origins of the state they plan to recognise? 

In this episode, Palestinian-American historian Maha Nassar from the University of Arizona describes the events leading up to the original declaration of Palestinian independence in 1988, including the compromises made within the Palestinian liberation movement. Nassar then traces how we've got to the point where more than 150 countries will recognise an independent Palestinian state – a move that she believes is more of a symbolic gesture than a meaningful route to Palestinian sovereignty.

This episode was written and produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware with assistance from Katie Flood. Sound design and mixing by Eloise Stevens and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Palestinian statehood: the route to recognition

Police in Australia are continuing a huge manhunt in the mountains for Dezi Freeman, a man accused of killing two police officers and injuring a third in late August. 

Freeman identifies as a sovereign citizen, someone who believes they aren't subject to the law.

In this episode we speak to criminologist Keiran Hardy from Griffith University about the origins of the sovereign citizen movement in the US, how it spread to Australia and was taken up by the self-styled Prince Leonard in the 1970s, and why the movement grew during Covid-19. 

This episode was written and produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware with assistance from Katie Flood and editing help from Ashlynee McGhee. Sound design and mixing by Eloise Stevens and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

The sovereign citizen movement's spread around the world

As China invited world leaders to a vast military parade marking the end of the second world war on September 3, President Xi Jinping said China is "never intimidated by bullies" and would "stand by the right side of history". In a coded message about China's territorial ambitions over Taiwan, Xi added that "the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation was unstoppable".

China and Taiwan both claim their forces bore the true burden of Chinese resistance against Japan during the second world war, and use this contested history to lay claim to power and territory. Now China is weaponising this history, pushing for a "correct" perspective of the war as it seeks to reshape the world order. 

In this episode, historian Meredith Oyen from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, explains how disagreements between China and Taiwan over who fought the Japanese more than 80 years ago are still raging and why China's military parade raised tensions with Taiwan up another notch. 

This episode was written and produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware with assistance from Katie Flood. Sound design and mixing by Eloise Stevens and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

How China is weaponising the history of WWII

If you’ve ever experienced a state of creative flow, perhaps when writing, playing music, or even gardening, you’ll know that it feels like everything just clicks into place. But what is actually happening inside the brain?

This week, we're re-running an episode first published in June 2024 featuring neuroscientist John Kounios at Drexel University in the US. He scanned the brains of jazz musicians as they were improvising, and revealed the secret ingredients need to achieve a state of creative flow.

This episode was written and produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware. Sound design and mixing by Eloise Stevens and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

The secret ingredients for creative flow

AI is transforming the world around us, offering increased productivity and promising to tackle difficult problems like global warming. But behind the scenes, its environmental costs are mounting. From massive energy use to vast quantities of water required to cool data centres, AI’s footprint is growing fast. So, in an age of water scarcity and climate crisis, can we justify this technological boom?

As The Conversation Weekly team takes a production break in August, we're delighted to bring you an episode of LSE IQ, an award-winning, monthly social science podcast produced by a team from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Each episode they ask leading social scientists and other experts to answer one intelligent question and speak to people affected by the issues explored. Like artificial intelligence. 

In this episode of LSE IQ which aired in early May, producer Anna Bevan sets out to find out the environmental costs of AI. 

This episode was produced and edited by Anna Bevan, with script development from Sophie Mallet and on location sound recording from Oliver Johnson. Mixing help for this episode for The Conversation from Eloise Stevens. Subscribe to LSE IQ here.

LSE IQ: is AI destroying the planet?

Scientists can get animals to do the strangest things. They’ve taught goldfish to drive cars, primates to perform calculations with Arabic numerals and giraffes to do statistical reasoning. But what’s the point?

In this episode, biologist Scarlett Howard from Monash University in Australia – who has taught bees to tell the difference between odd and even numbers – defends the importance of these seemingly ecologically irrelevant experiments.

She argues that they can help us understand the secrets of animal cognition, and even potentially unlock future technological developments for humanity too.

This episode was written and produced by Katie Flood. The host and executive producer is Gemma Ware. Sound design and mixing by Eloise Stevens and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Teaching animals irrelevant skills can reveal the secrets of cognition

Countries around the world are meeting in Geneva in August to negotiate a global plastics treaty aimed at curbing plastic pollution. The last round of negotiations failed last November after oil-producing countries refused to sign up to a clause calling for the world to reduce its production of plastics. 

But how did the world become hooked on plastic in the first place? This week, we're re-running an episode we first aired in January 2025 featuring an interview with Mark Miodownik, professor of materials and society, at UCL in the UK. He explains the history of plastic, how it’s shaped our lives, and what can be done to make sure more plastic is recycled and less ends up polluting the planet.

This episode was written and produced by Katie Flood and Gemma Ware with assistance from Mend Mariwany. Sound design and mixing by Michelle Macklem and Eloise Stevens and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

How the world got hooked on plastic

Can makeup really kill you? That’s the myth attached to Maria Gunning, the Countess of Coventry, an 18th century socialite who reportedly died from her lead-based makeup in 1760, aged just 27. In this episode, we speak to Fiona McNeill, a professor of physics at McMaster University in Canada, who has recreated some centuries-old recipes for white lead makeup to test how dangerous these cosmetics really were. 

Plus, an extract from a special episode of The Conversation's Don't Call Me Resilient podcast, about Will Smith's Oscar slap.

The Conversation Weekly is produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware, with reporting from the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra by Ellen Duffy. Sound design is by Eloise Stevens and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Full credits for this episode available here.

Further reading

Dying for makeup: Lead cosmetics poisoned 18th-century European socialites in search of whiter skinThere’s a complex history of skin lighteners in Africa and beyond

Could lead makeup really have killed an 18th century socialite? A scientist investigated

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