Advertise on podcast: Beyond Lab Walls | Salk Institute

In this special Beyond Lab Walls video podcast episode—part of the Salk Institute's 2026 Year of Brain Health—Salk President Gerald Joyce, MD, PhD, sits down with Janelle Ayres, PhD, an expert on how the immune system helps the body maintain balance, recover from stress, and stay resilient across a lifetime.

We've all heard that staying social is good for your health. But what's actually happening in the brain when you feel connected, or when you don't? In this special Beyond Lab Walls video podcast episode—part of the Salk Institute's 2026 Year of Brain Health—Salk President Gerald Joyce, MD, PhD, sits down with neuroscientist Kay Tye, PhD, whose lab studies the brain circuits that drive social behavior, emotion, and the deep human need for connection.

When we think about brain health, we tend to think about neurons. But some of the most important work of protecting the brain may depend on immune and other cell types, which make up a surprising 50% of the human brain. In this special Beyond Lab Walls video podcast episode—part of the Salk Institute's 2026 Year of Brain Health—Salk President Gerald Joyce, MD, PhD, speaks with Nicola Allen, PhD, a leading neuroscientist whose lab studies how non-neuronal brain cells shape brain function in health, aging, and disease.

In this special Beyond Lab Walls video podcast episode—part of the Salk Institute's 2026 Year of Brain Health—Salk President Gerald Joyce, MD, PhD, speaks with Christian Metallo, PhD, a leading expert in how nutrients power cells and tissues, and how subtle shifts in metabolism can shape long-term wellbeing. Together, they explore why the brain's energy demands make it especially sensitive to metabolic changes across the lifespan.

What does it actually mean, biologically, when we say "exercise is good for your brain"? In this special Beyond Lab Walls video podcast episode—part of Salk's 2026 Year of Brain Health—Salk President Gerald Joyce sits down with renowned neuroscientist Rusty Gage to explore how movement shapes cognitive brain health across a lifetime. Together, they discuss: • What changes in the brain with exercise, and why it matters over time • Adult neurogenesis: how Gage's research helped overturn the belief that the adult brain can't generate new neurons • What the evidence suggests about exercise and the survival and integration of new neurons • The key biological signals that carry benefits from an active body to the brain • How exercise intersects with other pillars of brain health, including immune function, metabolism, and sleep • The biggest unanswered questions—and what it will take to solve them This conversation is a window into how foundational science turns familiar advice into real, evidence-based understanding.

At Salk, we encourage our scientists to ask, what if? And when they do, our Innovation and Collaboration Grants program provides the seed funding they need to pursue their high-risk, high-reward questions. Hear how our Innovation and Collaboration Grant program got started, what discoveries it has enabled, and the what if questions Salk scientists Dannielle Engle and Axel Nimmerjahn are asking.

Emily Manoogian, PhD, has made a career out of asking when. Manoogian is a chronobiologist—a fancy word for someone who studies circadian rhythms. As we go about our daily lives, sleeping, eating, exercising, and more, our bodies respond by tuning internal biological clocks. Our habits can make or break these clocks, and Manoogian is finding out exactly what and when those habits are so we can optimize our circadian rhythms for long-term health.

Terrence Sejnowski, PhD, is a professor, head of the Computational Neurobiology Laboratory, and holder of the Francis Crick Chair at Salk, and he's played a hand in two entirely new scientific fields emerging—first computational neuroscience, then NeuroAI. Hear what it was like creating the first text-to-speech program, best practices for using modern chatbots, and how computer models are helping neuroscientists understand the human brain.

Salk scientist Christian Metallo, PhD, weighs in on the pros and cons of GLP-1 drugs and gives us a sneak peek into how metabolism research at Salk could inspire the next generation of obesity and weight management treatments.

While you might not appreciate a shipment of live, wriggling lamprey, Joseph Herdy, PhD, will tell you the parasitic fish can actually teach us quite a bit about our own genomes. Studying lamprey set Herdy off on a genomic journey, as he continued over the years to study the organization, flexibility, and instability of genomes. Today, he's a postdoctoral researcher in the lab of Rusty Gage, PhD, where he researches how genomic plasticity influences Alzheimer's disease progression.

On October 30, 2025, at 9:00 a.m. PT/12:00 p.m. ET, the Salk Institute holds a special live, video edition of our Beyond Lab Walls podcast as we explore why science can't wait. Salk's Vice President of Advancement Michelle Chamberlain will host an in-depth conversation with Chief Science Officer Jan Karlseder and Chief Financial Officer Marie Carter-Dubois about the urgent importance of foundational research—and how it depends on the vital partnership between federal funding and private philanthropy. Discover how current funding challenges are impacting scientific progress and why continued support is essential for breakthroughs that can change the world.

Tony Hunter, PhD, is a cancer biologist, professor, and holder of the Renato Dulbecco Chair at Salk. 2025 marks Hunter's 50th year at the Institute—a milestone that's apparent the second you walk into his office. Floor-to-ceiling archives reflect the many discoveries he's made, papers he's reviewed, people he's met, and knowledge he's gained along the way. His persistent curiosity has fueled incredible science and lifesaving medications, and continues to shape the future of cancer research.

Aksinya Derevyanko is a postdoctoral researcher in Professor Nicola Allen's lab at Salk. For Derevyanko, recounting her journey from Russia to Spain to San Diego isn't just a practice in storytelling—it's an exercise in what she studies: memory. She watches the connections between our brain cells, called synapses, form, mature, and fail throughout our lifetimes and in diseases like Alzheimer's. Outside the lab? She tests her own synaptic strength by memorizing steps as a semiprofessional dancer.

What is my place in the universe? This question began Professor John Reynolds' introspective and philosophical journey into the world of neuroscience, where he now studies nebulous human feats like perception and consciousness. Reynolds constructs models and tools that allow him to lean into these intangible abilities and, in turn, make scientific sense of how our brains process the world around us.   See the transcript for further reading as you listen.

Joseph Swift is a postdoctoral researcher in Professor Joseph Ecker's lab at Salk, but has recently launched his own start-up called CropDiagnostix. Inspired by his parents, Swift has always embraced "crazy" choices—leading him to leave Australia to study plant genomics in New York City then San Diego. In this episode, you'll hear about everything from the microscopic similarities between plants and humans, to what it's like road-tripping with a car full of potatoes.