Hello listener. How's things?

You'll be relieved to know that this episode is much shorter than the last one and really delivers on the science. Yes, that's right; back by popular demand, this is the second episode of Lab Rat Jazz Club and, this time, we hear about the work of the brilliant Professor Smith (he's the best, Paul loves him).

The main paper; Smith, M.L., 2014. Xxxxx xxx xxxxx xxxx index by xxxx location. PeerJ, 2, p.e338. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.338

Find Professor Smith's other work here; https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?view_op=list_works&hl=en&hl=en&user=lREVIHgAAAAJ

The Berkley paper on pain thresholds; women (not girls) vs men (cited 1,673 times!). This could be behind a paywall, but there's at least an abstract. Berkley, K.J., 1997. Sex differences in pain. Behavioral and brain sciences, 20(3), pp.371-380. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X97221485

The career of our other hero; Justin Schmidt. Starr, C.K., Jacobson, R.S. and Overal, W.L., 2024. Justin Schmidt's originality. Journal of Hymenoptera Research, 97, pp.297-306. https://jhr.pensoft.net/article/121387/

Edith Piaf - Non, Je ne regrette rien

Where to begin listener? Well, you could begin about 45 minutes into this unfeasibly long episode, because that's how long it takes to get to this fascinating research paper and it's 45 minutes of your life you will never get back.

Salomon, M.J., Demarmels, R., Watts-Williams, S.J., McLaughlin, M.J., Kafle, A., Ketelsen, C., Soupir, A., Bücking, H., Cavagnaro, T.R. and van der Heijden, M.G., 2022. Global evaluation of commercial arbuscular mycorrhizal inoculants under greenhouse and field conditions. Applied Soil Ecology, 169, p.104225. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0929139321003486

Apologies listener, you will only find the abstract and some section snippets, because the full paper is behind a paywall. Michael just tried to make me feel better by saying, "Surely no-one actually reads them, do they?"

This is the review paper that sets off all the nonsense in the first 45 minutes; the one with the peloton. It's got an abstract.

Genre, A., Lanfranco, L., Perotto, S. and Bonfante, P., 2020. Unique and common traits in mycorrhizal symbioses. Nature Reviews Microbiology, 18(11), pp.649-660. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41579-020-0402-3 Another bloody paywall, but you can read the abstract and here is the peloton picture. https://share.google/images/droIULxU1yL85Lrgl

We promise that we will definitely do more science next time with data, graphs, tables and statistics. Well, not exactly next time. Next time (Ep. 6.) is Ep. 2. of Lab Rat Jazz Club. But, definitely the one after that. Episode 7. will be just science with no funny business. Promise.

Three punch lines; in one joke; brilliant.

Do you like your agricultural scientific research sumarised in easily digestible form or described at length in mind numbing detail? Oh, OK, nevermind; how about this then? Have you ever asked yourself what happens to arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal mediated phosphate supply when stressed plants stop supplying sugar-like carbon molecules to the fungi? No? Seriously? Nevertheless, buckle up and welcome to the School of Biology at Leeds University, West Yorkshire. Eee by gum, ey up, etc.

Michael makes a couragous attempt at humour, based on the marvelous premise that AMF (the phosphate supplying fungi) sounds a bit like EMF (the 90s band), but Paul doesn't understand what's happening and it falls a bit flat. We alienate another potential sponsor and the cats continue to carry the show.

Links

The main paper; Charters, M.D., Sait, S.M. and Field, K.J., 2020. Aphid herbivory drives asymmetry in carbon for nutrient exchange between plants and an arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus. Current Biology, 30(10), pp.1801-1808. https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(20)30294-3

Great judge of character, Professor Katie Field on The Infinite Monkey Cage, with Professor Brian Cox and popular fungus botherer Dr Merlin Sheldrake (not kidding). https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0fwww6q

EMF doing their thing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfCLt0kTd5E&list=RDsfCLt0kTd5E&start_radio=1

The Swiss work on how AMF protects maize against pathogenic fungi. Lutz, S., Bodenhausen, N., Hess, J., Valzano-Held, A., Waelchli, J., Deslandes-Hérold, G., Schlaeppi, K. and van der Heijden, M.G., 2023. Soil microbiome indicators can predict crop growth response to large-scale inoculation with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. Nature Microbiology, 8(12), pp.2277-2289. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41564-023-01520-w

The British Society of Soil Science webinar with Dr Anne Bhogal and Professor Richard Bardgett; see proper scientists putting themselves out there and talking to normal people. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RggdJPe6nio Don't tell Professor Bardgett (eminent respected academic, titan in his field, behemoth, etc), but Paul thinks that the evidence that biodiversity (species richness) causes agroecosystem productivity is weak, because he's been thinking about it for almost a year now.

The paper about soil and bacteria and fungi and that sort of thing. Howe, J.A., McDonald, M.D., Burke, J., Robertson, I., Coker, H., Gentry, T.J. and Lewis, K.L., 2024. Influence of fertilizer and manure inputs on soil health: A review. Soil Security, 16, p.100155. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667006224000297

The it's-a-network paper that shows unstressed plants transfering extra Carbon to AMF, which makes up for neighbouring stressed plants being a bit crap. Durant, E., Hoysted, G.A., Howard, N., Sait, S.M., Childs, D.Z., Johnson, D. and Field, K.J., 2023. Herbivore-driven disruption of arbuscular mycorrhizal carbon-for-nutrient exchange is ameliorated by neighboring plants. Current Biology, 33(12), pp.2566-2573. https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(20)30294-3