Heredity Archive
Podcast team
Heredity cover

For scientists, by scientists: This archive maintains the first years of Heredity podcast content.
For the latest podcasts visit the Nature.com Heredity podcast page



Listen to the May 2012 episode

Population structure in the house sparrow. Are we still mis-measuring man? Male production in an asexual snail.

Listen to the March 2012 episode

The genetics of domestication; developmental timing and butterfly wing pattern; Biological clocks long & short - links between daily and seasonal rhythmns.


Listen to the January 2012 episode

Convergent molecular evolution and echolocation; The genetic basis of Drosophila song; The genetic signature of violence against women; Elevated heritability estimates under population subdivision; The genetics of bacterial resistance in Daphnia


Listen to the November 2011 episode

Evolution of phenotyopic traits without positive Darwinian selection; Genome-wide comparisons identify chromosomal rearrangements in bird genomes; Using Y-chromosomes to reconstruct dog domestication; Centromere repositioning in primates.

Listen to the September 2011 episode
Bighorn sheep genomics- the genetics of being large and horny; Does hybridisation trigger speciation- the case of the Oxford ragwort; Injecting Genetics into conservation policy and practice- the 'ConGRESS' European FP7 project

Listen to the July 2011 episode

Basic mathematical errors in molecular clock calculations, using multiple genetic markers to nail down the origin of Irish pygmy shrews, evolution of SINES, first lessons from the Arabidopsis lyrata genome (read the papers here)

Listen to the May 2011 episode

Learning about evolution from dog genetics, successful sperm competition and its heritability, evolution of malarial resistance, measuring inbreeding, the evolution of genetic modularity, long distance gene flow in trees

March 2011

Agressive Soviet rats (and friendly ones), a new model for the evolution of altruism, environmental influences on the differentiation of dolphins, salmonid genetics

January 2011
Rampant Eastern European Y chromosomes, wolf conservation genetics, measuring genetic differentiation (Fst)

December 2009

Heritability of ageing, implications of genetic linkage and the genetics of sex determination in dragon lizards

November 2009 Kleptogenesis, scrapie genetics, global warming & Drosophila and a return to the strange meiotic system of dogroses.

August 09 Understanding genetic diversity in the wild: characterizing it, understanding how plants may exploit it, and how human management may diminish it.

June 2009 Family drama in some of Mendel and Darwin's favourite species plus Bayesian statistics and the nature of the genetic code

Winter 2008/9 : The new Heredity Archive is free online, containing many classic genetics papers from 1947 onwards.  In this podcast, we ask geneticists to choose some gems from the archive and explain their importance. We also hear from Tracy Chapman about seminal fluid mediated fitness traits.

April 2008 : Social parasites and the evolution of virulence, new methods for studying polyploids and evolution: just how predictable is it?

New Year 2008 : Times are a-changin' for the molecular clock, and the extraordinary epigenetics of a transposon trap

October 2007: The chicken and egg problem of inversions, and not everybody's equal when it comes to mutations

July 2007: Bumblebee bottlenecks and dinosaur genomes

April 2007: Evolution takes on climate change, the lek paradox revisited, and short sperm in stalkies

February/March 2007: Ark populations, (a)symetrical deer and the inner workings of coevolution

January 2007: Sex in small doses, Dynamic DNA and is inbreeding depressing?

Final 2006: Not all cities are genetic melting pots, sexual selection and evolvability and sexual dimorphism

October 2006: Spanish flu resurrected, a bright outlook for the human Y-chromosome, and radishes gone wild

September 2006: The enigmatic world of EvoDevo

August 2006: DNA barcodes and how a friendly fungus became a perilous pathogen

July 2006: Garden genetics, shiny statistics and migrating molluscs

June 2006: Skeletons in the closet for fine wines, evolution in human body tissues, and genetic clues about the ancestors of modern Europeans

May 2006: Our new sisters, the sea squirts, picky tree frogs, and big lessons from small genomes

April 2006 (pilot): Who won the GM debate, dog rose reproduction, worms and elephantiasis, and why teeth are giving biologists something to chew on