The Life Scientific

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Julia Higgins on polymers Nov 29, 2016

Show notes

Plastic Bags and the DNA in our cells are both polymers, very long molecules ubiquitous in nature and in their synthetic form, in materials like polythene, perspex and polystyrene. Professor Dame Julia Higgins has spent a lifetime researching the structure and movement of polymeric material. Trained as a physicist, Dame Julia was one of the early researchers in polymer science and throughout her career worked alongside chemists and engineers. No surprise then that she was the first woman to become both a Fellow of the Royal Society and of the Royal Academy of Engineering. In the 1960s with other young researchers she worked at the Harwell Atomic Energy Research Centre in Oxfordshire, one of the first people to use neutron scattering as a technique to investigate how polymer molecules move. Emeritus Professor of Polymer Science and former Principal at the Faculty of Engineering at Imperial College, London, Professor Higgins tells Jim Al-Khalili how she used her influence as a leading academic to improve representation of women in top posts in science and medicine.

Roger Penrose on black holes Nov 22, 2016

Show notes

In a career of over fifty years Sir Roger Penrose has changed the way we see the Universe. He carried out seminal research on black holes and the big bang, and he's questioned the current received wisdom on some of the most important ideas in science, such as quantum mechanics, artificial intelligence and where consciousness comes from. His ideas in geometry directly influenced the work of the Dutch artist M.C. Escher.

Now Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford, Roger Penrose is one of the world's most lauded mathematical physicists. He's written a number of popular science books in which he certainly doesn't shy away from the mathematics.

Jim al-Khalili talks to Roger Penrose about his continuing fascination with the biggest questions in science.

Lynne Boddy on Fungi Nov 15, 2016

Show notes

Fungi are responsible for rotting fruit, crumbling brickwork and athlete's foot. They have a mouldy reputation; but it's their ability to destroy things that enables new life to grow. 90% of all plants depend on fungi to extract vital nutrients from the soil. And it's probably thanks to fungi that the first plants were able to colonize land 450 million years ago. Professor Lynne Boddy shares her passion for fungi with Jim Al-Khalili and describes some of the vicious strategies they use to defend their territory. Direct strangulation and chemical weapons; it's all happening underground.

Producer: Anna Buckley.

Ian Wilmut on Dolly the sheep Oct 11, 2016

Show notes

Dolly the sheep was born near Edinburgh, twenty years ago this summer. She was the first mammal to be cloned from an adult animal, (named after Dolly Parton because she was created from a breast cell). And became a global media star, inspiring both amazement that an animal be created with three mothers but no father,and fear. Many worried about where such a development might lead. The papers reported: 'dreaded possibilities are raised'; 'cloned sheep in Nazi storm'. Professor Ian Wilmut,the man who created Dolly, was compared to Frankenstein. Jim talked to Ian in front of an audience at the Edinburgh Festival and asked him why he decided to try and clone a sheep; how he and the team did it; and whether cloning humans is now a real possibility.

Producer: Anna Buckley.

Frans de Waal on chimpanzees Oct 04, 2016

Show notes

We share 99% of our DNA with the chimpanzee and the bonobo. And yet we're often surprised to learn that apes, like us, can be both kind and clever. Behavioural biologist and best-selling author, Frans de Waal has spent many years observing our closest living animal relatives. He pioneered studies of kindness and peace-making in primates, when other scientists were focussing on violence, greed and aggression. Empathy, he argues, has a long evolutionary history; and he is determined to undermine our arrogant assumptions of human superiority. Frans talks to Jim Al-Khalili about growing up on the Dutch polders, chimpanzee politics, and the extraordinary sex lives of the bonobos.

Producer: Anna Buckley.

Trevor Cox on sound Jul 19, 2016

Show notes

Inside a Victorian sewer, with fat deposits sliding off the ceiling and disappearing down the back of his shirt, Trevor Cox had an epiphany. Listening to the strange sound of his voice reverberating inside the sewer, he wondered where else in the world he could experience unusual and surprising noises.

As an acoustic engineer, Trevor started his career tackling unwanted noises, from clamour in the classroom to poor acoustics in concert halls. But his jaunt inside a sewer sparked a new quest to find and celebrate the 'sonic wonders of the world'.

In this episode he shares these sounds with Jim Al-Khalili and discusses the science behind them.

Producer: Michelle Martin.

Georgina Mace on threatened species Jul 12, 2016

Show notes

Despite decades of conservation work, in zoos and in the field, the rate at which species are going extinct is speeding up. Georgina Mace has devoted her Life Scientific to trying to limit the damage to our planet's bio-diversity from this alarming loss. For ten years she worked on the Red List of Threatened Species, developing a robust set of scientific criteria for assessing the threat of extinction facing every species on the planet. When the list was first published, she expected resistance from big business; but not the vicious negative reaction she received from many wildlife NGOS. Her careful quantitative analysis revealed that charismatic animals, like the panda and the polar bear, are not necessarily the most at risk.

Producer: Anna Buckley.

Faraneh Vargha-Khadem on memory Jul 05, 2016

Show notes

Self-taught Professor of Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, Faraneh Vargha-Khadem has spent decades studying children with developmental amnesia. Her mission: to understand how we form memories of the events in our past, from things we've experienced to places we've visited and people we've met. She talks to Jim about the memories we lay down during our lives and the autobiographies stored in our brains that define us as individuals. Faraneh was also part of the team that identified the FoxP2 gene, the so called 'speech gene', that may explain why humans talk and chimps don't. Plus Faraneh discusses how her Baha'i faith informs her scientific thinking.

Hazel Rymer on volcanoes Jun 27, 2016

Show notes

Hazel Rymer has journeyed closer to the centre of the earth than most, regularly peering into the turbulent, fiery world than makes up the earth's core. By taking measurements of micro-gravity on, and inside, volcanoes all over the world, she hopes to better understand why they erupt and what happens when they do. Having lost a close colleague to a random volcanic eruption, she appreciates the risks involved and, at the same time, insists that they are no greater than driving on the M25. She talks to Jim Al-Khalili about learning to think like a geologist after studying physics; the joys and frustrations of doing fieldwork on volcanoes; and why she loves gravity meter, G513.

Producer: Anna Buckley.

Nick Davies on cuckoos Jun 21, 2016

Show notes

Nick Davies has been teasing apart the dark relationship between the cuckoo and the birds it tricks into bringing up its young, for more than three decades. The Professor of Behavioural Ecology at the University of Cambridge has spent more than 30 springs and summers on nearby fenland of watching, recording and crucially experimenting. Nick's studies have deployed simple yet ingenious experiments, among the reed beds where the birds nest. They have involved mock eggs, stuffed birds and miniature loudspeakers, to piece together the cuckoo's dark story. He has even swopped cuckoo chicks with blackbird nestlings in the nests of the feathered parasite's victims. No birds are harmed in his revealing tests.

Prof Davies also talks to Jim al-Khalili about the origins of his life with birds, and the revolution in animal behaviour science beginning as he began his scientific career. Ideas about the selfish gene and game theory, along with DNA fingerprint in the 1980's, transformed the research of zoologists asking 'why' questions about what animals do.

Producer: Andrew Luck-Baker.

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