The science behind molecular biology is advancing fast and scientists are eager to create and share new content. But the more content is being created, the harder it is to reach the desired audience. Therefore, the scientific community has had to come up with new attractive formats to help spread valuable scientific content.

One format that is currently popular is explainer videos, which combine both, audio and visual elements to untangle a topic. It has been proved that when one sense is activated we keep part of the information, but with the activation of multiple senses we can process and store far more.

We have therefore created explainer videos as part of our e-learning series.

“It was a great experience working on this project for our virtual courses. We are very fortunate to have Daniel Krüger, a former PhD student creating the graphics for these videos. This immensely improved the communication between the scientific advisers and the graphic designer because they speak the same language,” said EMBL Training Lab Manager Yvonne Yeboah, who came up with the idea of creating the explainer videos and led their production.

The first explainer video we are introducing deals with metagenomics, the genomic analysis of microbes by direct extraction and cloning of DNA, that allows studying communities of organisms directly in their natural environment.

“Our metagenomics course encompasses many different in silico and experimental approaches to understand and gain insights into microbial communities. Therefore, we thought that the visualisation of a video would provide students with an attractive overview that helps to connect and integrate all the aspects covered in the course,” explained José Eduardo González-Pastor, who organised the EMBO Practical Course: Microbial Metagenomics: A 360° Approach and acted as scientific advisor for the videos.

The second explainer video deals with the topic of ribosome profiling, a method that allows researchers to quantitatively analyse translation genome-wide and with high resolution. The video gives a comprehensive overview on how this technique works, what ribosome protected fragments (RPFs) are and what information we can obtain from them.

“Ribosome profiling is still an emerging technology. Therefore, it is great to have a concise summary that explains the method to students. I will certainly use the video for lectures and on my website,” said Sebastian Leidel and Jan Medenbach, both organisers of the EMBO Practical Course: Measuring Translational Dynamics by Ribosome Profiling and scientific advisors for the video.

Visit EMBL’s YouTube channel to find more exciting scientific content.