HDBI Podcast

Podcast transcript: Made the Same Way

Episode 5: A repetitive process of branching

Oneda

You're listening to made the same way the podcast for those who were curious about how we humans are made. My name is Oneda. I'm a rapper, producer and songwriter from Manchester, and in this series we're discovering how we get from a fertilised egg to a fully functioning human being. To answer this, I've teamed up with HDBI. That's the Human Developmental Biology Initiative to explore science in a brand new way. Each episode we bring together one emerging artist and one knowledgeable researcher to discuss science, life and music, and at the end of each episode, the pair will have a limited amount of time to collaborate on an original piece, inspired by their conversation.

Beth

But it's amazing as well how there are them options if you - if someone is born premature, there are ways to recover.

Lucia

Exactly

Oneda

Yeah, in this episode, we bring together Beth, a singer and performer from Manchester, and Lucia, a specialist in lung development who was particularly excited to be in the studio.

Lucia

Do you mind like, I don't know, like taking a picture or something for people in the lab?

Beth

Of course!

Oneda

The pair were chatting about how our heart and lungs developed before we were born and just how life changing this research could be, a subject that's very personal to Beth and her family.

Beth

Hi, lovely to meet you. I'm Beth.

Lucia

Hi, Beth. Lovely to meet you too. I am Lucia. So do you have any particular expectation about like this conversation?

Beth

So personally my sister, she was born with a heart condition. I was too young to really understand what was going on. This was in 2013, so I must have been 12 years old. But she was born with an open valve in her heart. And it all escalated pretty quickly. She was in hospital for quite a while, so I just remember her being in hospital for months in Birmingham, but she was she was under surgery. It was, I think it was the open valve surgery where they had to do that. ‘Cause I remember when I saw her in hospital, she was like blue. So that's the first sign. And then they had to rush her from Sheffield to Birmingham. Thank goodness, like she was saved. So… and now she's crazy!

Lucia

Yeah, I'm very happy that she's full of life and yeah, and she’s recovered.

Beth

I mean, I've had conversations with my dad about this project, and even he wants to know a lot more about why that might have happened.. so…

Lucia

Yeah, I think that's also like for like from a scientific perspective, like we want that like the type of research that we do to like remain relevant for society. And of course like we would like to come up with an understanding on how this process occur, like how the lung and the heart for example like develop properly and if something goes wrong, like trying to identify it on the on the right moment. And of course, if we cannot like prevent it to happen, at least be able to offer in the future like some better ways of treating it. So yeah, hopefully we can at least give you a bit of insight on that.

Beth

Yeah, definitely. That's what we need. I was going to bring my dad today, but I thought I can't bring my dad!

Lucia

And I would like to ask you like from your music career, could you describe like your job or like your - what you do like in one sentence?

Beth

So I make soul and jazz and R&B music and it's all through- all the writing that I do do, it's mainly - I don't speak to people. I just write down how I'm feeling or my life experiences and then that can inspire me to then put it into some form of art... Describe your job to me as well in in one sentence.

Lucia

Well, I am a multidisciplinary scientist with a background in physics, engineering and biology, and I'm trying to combine all of that to better understand how lungs develop. And what about you? Did you study science? At some point you were you interested in science?

Beth

I did, I studied science at school, but I feel like whilst I was at school, I was probably a little bit immature to listen. And as ignorant as that sounds… and but now I'm at an age where I love watching documentaries about science and there's a lot more to it, I feel like, than what you learned at school… is that, is that right, do you think?

Lucia

No, totally.

Beth

Yeah, and now I'm a little bit more mature, I'm a lot more open to finding out about it. It's like I think about this might be completely random, but like how certain I suppose it is scientific in a way but, how certain plants have like features of animal patterns and how that is all connected. I just find it crazy. Like that's interesting to me. Yeah. How everything is connected in a way.

Lucia

It's actually it's very interesting that you mention it because like one of like the main characteristics of the lung, the, the developing lung, is a process, is a patterning process that we scientists call the branching morphogenesis. And if you think about it, it's something that we can see in many other organisms like in, in trees, in plants, even in rivers, like this idea of like you have, tubular structures that they continue branching to form like a tree like architecture and that's like essential to like for our airways to form.

Just to give you a little bit more information about that, we know that the lung starts developing like around the 5th post-conception week when the fetus is very small. And then this tissue, they form the primary bronchi that are the ones that are connected to the trachea. And then they continue as they go away from that primary branch - they continue to like undergo this repetitive process of branching and continue branching until they become like the branches that are very away. They are very small and tiny and the next step - it's also very crucial for the lung development is in this very tip regions of these tubes, they are located what we call the stem cells, and these are cells that they have the potential to form or specify all the epithelial cells that are relevant for the adult lung to function. And especially in these steep regions, they will start expanding to form the alveoli. And the alveoli is the unit where the gas exchange - when we exchange the oxygen and the CO2 - which is essential to sustain life.

Beth

So this is all during the nine months that a baby is developed… So what’s the time frame between the like?

Lucia

Yeah, this this like first budding - what we call like this first budding- starts around the 5th post-conception week. And for example, what for the time that we have this more complex airway architecture is around the 16th post-conception week and then the specification or like the formation of the alveoli, it will start at that age. And it needs to continue until the end of the pregnancy and something that we know is that, for example, when the baby is born too soon, then the lungs, they haven't reached that that moment where they are essentially -

Beth

Right - they're not fully developed yet, yeah.

Lucia

Exactly. They are not fully developed yet. And then the babies, when they are born too soon, they might have problems like breathing normally, and it's essentially because they are - they all like - they haven't been like fully developed and they cannot function. So then from our perspective of, if you ask me why I am trying to understand better how this process works - is to be able in one hand to offer like better treatments to, like premature babies, for example. And in other case, also something that we know, is like when our lungs are exposed in adults, our lungs are exposed to many like molecules from the ambient - like we breathe a lot of chemicals and a lot of things that could also affect – and our lungs, they can be injured. So from the developmental biology perspective, we would like to understand when an injury it's occurring in our lungs - can we revert back to more developmental stages where the cells they can in a way try to start this programme again and regenerate itself again?

Beth

So if a baby is born premature and the heart, the lungs aren't fully developed... Will that - will they never develop afterwards? Or is - I don't know if that sounds like a silly question but…

Lucia

No, it's not. It's not silly at all. It's actually a very important question. And we know that there is there certain drugs that are even used now. For example, there is a molecule that is called dexamethasone, that it's given to the mothers when they know that the baby is in risk of like premature birth. And that's like trying to help to mature as much as possible the lungs before they are, they are born. But also we know that the our lungs they are - they are developed until the point where we can sustain the first breath after birth. But the full maturity of the lungs or the alveoli, that is still happening after birth.

Beth

After birth, yeah. But it's amazing as well how there are them options that if you – if someone is born premature, there are ways to recover, yeah.

Lucia

Exactly, yeah. And and we want to like maybe come up with better ideas for that.

Beth

And you brought these… experiments in as well. Can you tell me a little bit more about these and how they work?

Lucia

Yeah. I brought - it's a microfluidic device. And as I said, like, I'm trying to understand particularly, what kind of, like, mechanical stimuli affect lung development. And maybe before explaining the experiment, I should like give like what are what we know that are like the mechanical stimuli that are present in in lung development... it's easy to think that in adults the lungs, they are like constantly undergoing or they're experiencing this mechanical expansion, when we breathe in and then when we exhale the air, then the lungs, they need to relax and go back to like a relaxed shape. And these, like, the rate of our breathing can change depending if we are at rest or if we are like doing exercise. So, then this like the frequency of how often the lungs expand and then relax it can be like affected. But what we know and for me, it's like very fascinating - is that throughout pregnancy the lungs are completely filled with the amniotic fluid. So these tubes that I mentioned, the airway tubes, are entirely filled with the amniotic fluid. And also they experience random contractions that we as scientists, we call them breathing-like movements. In certain mouse models, we can see these random contractions in the microscope. And one hypothesis from our area of research is that this mechanical stimuli is essential to patterning the lung. I don't know if there's like some… Like, I think I mentioned a lot of things, so if you have -

Beth

Yes! Just going back to when you said, depending on what you're doing, like exercise-wise, it can change in pace… So is that connected to the heart as well? I actually, I've got an ectopic heartbeat. It's where your heart beats irregularly. I only found out this year, really. But you can feel it within your pulse and you can feel it at night like beating through your chest. So I was wondering, is that to do with your lungs as well?

Lucia

Yeah, well, definitely the lungs and heart - they need to work together to take the oxygen throughout the body and actually during the development, heart and lung, they need to develop simultaneously and at least from the developing perspective like the heart needs to be like developing like fully. Yeah, and and properly like undergoing this like programme and all the processes like normally. So then the long also like receive like this the signals to fully develop.

Beth

And I notice it more when I am doing exercise and I'm breathing heavier and that's when the heartbeat increases. So that's why it I think it is yeah to do with like my breathing and like being out of breath sometimes so..

Lucia

Yes, I mentioned like it's a very coordinated process like our cells, they need oxygen to function. So then for example when we are like doing exercise and probably when you're like singing - then your cells and your muscles they are like they need the oxygen to perform. And then they require more oxygen when you are like in higher activitiy. So like of course the heart rate needs to adjust to that - our breathing - like how deep we breathe or how often we breathe it will change. And it's also something that we normally do without even thinking like it's just something that our body knows how to do it -

Beth

Yeah, yeah.

Lucia

- which is like very fascinating.

Beth

And I think it's interesting you said that about when you're performing as well, like that's why I suppose why people do have vocal training as well in order to take the right breaths when you're when you're singing. Yeah, because you do need that and you need the breaths in order to hit like a good, good note.

Lucia

And also I would like to mention something that I really like about like the work that I do - it's a very collaborative process. I'm part of a group that I said that is a specialist in lung development. But we also collaborate with a group, actually two groups, that they are experts in heart development. They are really wanting to understand better how specifically the heart develops during gestation and for us like of course it's like relevant to collaborate closely because these two organs, they need to work like collaboratively as well.

Beth

Talking about lung development, what can go wrong along the way as the lungs and heart develop?

Lucia

Yeah, there's there is different things. I think I already mentioned like one that is like obvious is for example when a baby is born too soon…

Beth

Yeah, prematurely.

Lucia

- then of course the lung, it doesn't have the time to finish that process. However, there's some other aspects that, for example, as I also mentioned briefly, that the lungs throughout like gestation, they are completely filled with the amniotic fluid. And actually the lungs are also responsible for the production of that, that fluid. And we know that if there's like less amniotic fluid than normal or that is required, than the lungs also they don't fully develop... Yeah, based on our conversation, would you say that what you do with your music and your job is like similar to what I do as a scientist?

Beth

I think definitely in the ways that we're both so passionate about our jobs. I'm sure like you, some days can be frustrating when you're facing challenges in the lab. Like sometimes music doesn't just flow out of me or lyrics and stuff like that. So there's some days that are great, some days that are not.

Lucia

I agree, like being passionate about what you do is, yeah, definitely something that we have in common. But I also think that science has, like this need of making like very complex theories or hypotheses - you need to be able to kind of like narrow it down to something that you can communicate as well to the rest of your peers and colleagues. So I think that could also be a similarity. For example, for you, transmitting like maybe complex emotions into like a more understandable message for listeners and stuff.

Beth

Yeah, definitely. So, shall we move on to the creative part? We'll make something together…

Lucia

Yeah, that sounds great! Do you normally like follow a usual process for making your music or?

Beth

So usually, it's what I have in my head. I mean I could be - it sounds really silly - but I could be in the shower and some lyrics will just come to me and I can write it down in my notes, pop out for a second. And then when it comes to actually sitting in the studio, I'll either find a beat or create a beat myself, and it takes a while sometimes you just, sometimes I will record and just mumble throughout the whole song and lyrics can appear out of that.

Lucia

OK, so would you prefer to choose like the tune? You know, like the sound first?

Beth [20:23]

Yeah, probably I think it would be. We'll work together, find which beat we like the most. And then I can kind of workout a melody in my head and maybe sing a little bit and it wouldn't be lyrics. I'll be rambling. So I yeah, I got - because I knew as well that you were from Mexico - I decided to pick out some Latin beats just in case you liked them. And yeah, I know it's Brazilian, like Bossa Nova, but.

Lucia

Oh, I love, I also love Bossa Nova..

Beth

It's just very chilled vibes. It’s like that all the way through, but it makes you want to move, right? See I hear this in a jazz bar.

Lucia

This is really nice. It also makes me want to move.

Beth

So we've got them. Yeah. So it's a, it's a, it's a challenge, but we'll get there ‘cause I'm used to writing heartbreak, love songs or experiences… to write about science I'm like hahaha

Lucia

I'm just thinking that it's also - we can make it related to our personal experience a little bit like we come like from different backgrounds and but then we put like the passion into what we're doing - like there's some similarities.

Beth

Mm-hmm. When you was coming here, what did you expect from from it? Was there any concerns? Was there any…?

Lucia

Hmmm, yeah I mean, I was very excited to start with. And I really wanted to just kind of like engage in a conversation with you and learning from your experience and your interest. And one of my concerns was being able to like transmit first, like why lungng development is fascinating and interesting, but at the same time, trying to be fair, which is - it's a huge research field and there's so many things that people, they have learned, and done about that and here I'm just like talking about a small aspect of it and sorry, I'm just like getting carried away with that reflection!

Beth

No, it's - I really I needed all this so it's…

Lucia

But I was thinking like, uh, like the idea of the podcast is to also transmit like the interest of science, where people that they might think that science is not for them, and in that sense I also sometimes I feel that I'm not the expert in lung development for example and it's umm…

Beth

That you're trying to make it more accessible for people as well to listen and to to engage them.

Lucia

Yeah. And also that the idea of like you don't need to be like the expert of something as long as you like are curious of learning a bit more about it and you like work and collaborate with people, then you can like find your way and contribute equally to…

Beth

You know, when you did move to Cambridge from Mexico, how did you feel when you first, when you first moved? Was it excitement? Were you anxious?

Lucia

Both … and I also move in the pandemic in 2020, so there was a lot of uncertainty and yeah, anxiety about that. But it was also a great opportunity. And I was like. Very excited about going away.

Beth

Yeah. So if I think about, I could do verses… one verse could be from your perspective on your journey in science. One could be my journey with music, and then it could all be incorporated at a chorus… So I feel like sometimes singers - I'm not saying I'll be good at imitating - but singing singers sometimes can be good at imitating a language, so it would be really, really cool to maybe - if you had a lyric that you could translate into Spanish that now I could sing. Because then it's it's from your culture as well. So we're adding that into it.

Lucia

And and actually it's being kind of like my…. It's a bit funny that you mentioned it, but I - all my scientific like studies I did them in Mexico, yeah, which is like in Spanish. So then it was like a huge challenge to like move to the UK and not only like -

Beth

Your English is amazing as well. I'm trying to learn Spanish now.

Lucia

Oh thank you so much! But like there's like all the world of like actually translating science to a new language, it's been like an interesting process…

Beth

I'm going to pop that down as well.

Lucia

I can say random words in Spanish and see… like the airway we in Spanish it we say very different, it’s las vias aéreas.

Beth

Las vias a…

Lucia

…áereas.

Beth

…a áreas?

Lucia

…áereas.

Beth

…áereas. That’s beautiful…. And how would you say breathing in Spanish?

Lucia

Respirar

Beth

Oh, I can't roll my tongue like that.

Lucia

That's a tricky one, I'm sorry! Respirar.

Beth

Respirar.

Lucia

Yeah, sounds good. Yeah.

Beth

We can try…

Lucia and Beth

Hahaha!

Musical piece (Beth)

Repirar…

Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando

Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando

Todos estamos conectados

The way that my mind runs it’s like a dance

Maybe it’s only the circumstance

So give me another chance

Las vias aéreas

Las vias aéreas

Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando

Durante siete segundos

Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando

Durante siete segundos

Respirar

Reducir mi estrés

Count the beats in my chest

Todos los Días soy bendecita

Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando

Durante siete segundos

Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando, Inhalando y exhalando

Respirar

Respirar

Oneda

Thank you for listening to Made the Same Way. Now next time we're bringing together another scientist and artist to look at how our brains develop. What do they look like whilst they're growing? Did they all develop in the same way and does music actually have an effect on them? Join us next time to find out. Made the Same Way is a Reform Radio production for HDBI, which is funded by welcome. It was produced by Olivia Swift with help from Jamie Green.

Download the transcript here