Podcast and video

The podcast Step Inside the Danish National Biobank was created in 2019, and aimed at life science researchers interested in - or just curious about - biobank research. The idea was to increase understanding of biobank research and perhaps inspire more great work in the future.

The podcast invited listeners inside the biobank, as a research institution. In each episode, we visited one of our collaborators working either directly with the samples doing fundamental health research, or working as a part of the research infrastructure of the biobank.

In addition, each episode has a short promo video that gives a quick overview of the story.

Episode 7 | Future of Biobanking

In this year’s last episode we take a look in the mirror. Having so far focused on the great work of our collaborators, we now turn the attention on biobanking itself. Inspired by our recent co-hosted PhD course and symposium: “The Future of Biobanking”, and with the help of biobanking expert Eva Ortega-Paino, we explore the past, present and future of biobanking.

Episode 6 | Roots of Infertility

This time we go searching for some of the root causes of male infertility with the world’s largest male offspring cohort, as we visit Bispebjerg Hospital, Copenhagen and the FEPOS-project. Though we are far from dystopian scenarios where humanity’s actual existence is threatened by infertility, it is one of the most common among major health issues facing young people. Infertility can be devastating, and half the time a couple faces infertility, semen quality is part of the problem. We sat down for a talk with Sandra Søgaard Tøttenborg, a reproductive and environmental epidemiologist, and Principal Investigator on the FEPOS-project. FEPOS investigates the possible causes of male infertility in what is passed on to the next generation at the fetal stage.

Episode 5 | Mental Disorders: As Human as Anything

In this episode, we visit the psychiatric centre, Sankt Hans in Roskilde, to speak with Professor of Biological Psychiatry, Thomas Werge about the comprehensive research initiative, iPsych that he and five other Principal Investigators lead, - about how mental disorders can be understood better and treated diversely for different groups and individuals in the future, - and about what normal is.

Episode 4 | Word Along the Wire

New research by genetic epidemiologist, Bjarke Feenstra of Statens Serum Institute, will help solve the puzzle of birth. In this episode Bjarke tells us about the new piece of the puzzle that he and his team have discovered. As a world first, they’ve been able to pinpoint a certain location in the genome of the unborn child that affects when the child is born. Here cytokine proteins seem to work as a sort of telegraph sending word along the wire, from child to mother. Signaling that the child is ready to come into the world.

Episode 3 | Giving Software Its Due

We sat down with three research software engineers that are trying to put focus on quality and sustainability in research software, as well as the increasingly important role of software engineers in modern life science research. The three: Nikolaus Sonnenschein, a Senior Researcher at DTU Biosustain, Kai Blin, also Researcher at DTU Biosustain, as well as our own Head of IT at the Danish National Biobank, Bartlomiej Wilkowski together hosted an unconference on these topics supported by the Novo Nordisk Foundation.

Episode 2 | Power over Cancer

In the second episode we visit the Danish Cancer Society, and speak with Professor Anne Tjønneland about the studies Diet, Cancer and Health and it's recent extension Next Generations. And about the power we all have over cancer as individuals, through the lifestyle choices we make.

Episode 1 | Mitochondrial DNA in a population of immigrants

The first episode looks at Mitochondrial DNA research into mental disorders, and how it has helped scientists understand the origin and biological ancestry of the Danish population. Principal Investigator, and Cheif Physician at SSI, Michael Christiansen tells the story.