Naked Scientists Special Editions, iTunesU: Recent Episodes
Dr Chris Smith
Mobile phone companies could be set to erect bigger and taller phone masts as part of government plans to roll out 5G networks and improve coverage in rural areas. How might taller masts help with connectivity - and what is 5G anyway? Tech-xpert and Angel Investor Peter Cowley explains to Chris Smith and Katie Haylor...
Bacteria are becoming increasingly resistant to many of the agents we use to deal with them, including antiseptics. The bacterium Acinetobacter baumannii is one example and causes hard to treat skin, chest, and urine infections in hospitals. Now, a team at the University of Newcastle, Australia have discovered a gene that renders Acinetobacter resistant to the chemical chlorhexidine that's used in hand disinfectants. But the gene evolved long before the antiseptic was invented, so what was it doing previously? As well as finding out, Adam Murphy also heard from lead author Karl Hassan how the discovery could help us to make more environmentally-friendly forms of plastic.
A research team from Virginia Tech, led by Ryan Pollyea, has found that earthquakes 8 kilometres below the earth's surface are increasing in intensity. Published in the journal Nature Communications, the team's work has found that a super-dense liquid called oilfield wastewater is seeping deep into the sheets of the earth, causing massive pressure changes that could be increasing earthquake intensity. Matthew Hall got into contact with Ryan Pollyea and Martin Chapman from Virginia Tech to see what all the rumble is about...
A heatwave has been sweeping across Europe recently, causing record temperatures across the continent and creating a lot of consternation in the Naked Scientist office. But where do heatwaves come from. And what's going to happen in the future. Adam Murphy spoke to Manoj Joshi, professor of climate dynamics from the University of East Anglia, starting with what a heatwave even is...
Your genome contains all of your genetic information, and it's pretty long - the Human Genome Project estimated that humans have between 20,000 and 25,000 genes. But according to synthetic biology, you can survive on only 473! At least a very simple bacterium can. Of this "minimal genome", scientists previously didn't know what nearly a third actually did. But now Mark Wass has been telling Heather Jameson how his team at the University of Kent may have cracked 66 of the mystery genes...
The world's largest patch of seaweed appears every summer in the mid-Atlantic. Since 2011, the Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt has been growing to monstrous sizes - thousands of kilometres long - and it's been clogging up beaches along the Americas with metres of stinking brown sludge. Now, scientists in Florida and George have used satellite tracking to figure out what's going on - as Phil Sansom explains...
The nervous system is a complicated network of specialized cells, called neurons, that allow the transfer of information from one part of our body to another. To help our understanding of the nervous system in humans, scientists have been mapping the connections between neurons in a type of round worm, called C Elegans. C Elegans are so small that they are barely visible by the naked eye. So to obtain images of the worm, a special microscope, called an electron microscope is used. They take images along the worm, using an electron microscope and each image is analysed, and the neurons are marked. These marks are then put together to form a map of the neurons through the body of the worm. A map, known as a connectome. Connectomes give us more information on how signals transfer through our bodies, and which neurons are used for which actions. For example, how does the signal that tells my brain that it is hungry compare to a signal of pain from stubbing my toe? Due to the complicated nature of the nervous system, a lot of previous studies have focused on one area of the worm. For example, the brain. For the first time, a connectivity map has been drawn for the entire nervous system of a C- elegans, a type of round worm. I asked Professor Scott Emmons to describe what the work tells us.
You might remember from a year or so ago stories of an alien fly-by. The unidentified object was famously referred to as Oumuamua, which means "scout" in Hawaiian. Now a paper just out in the journal Nature Astronomy has revisited the story to probe whether Oumuamua really is alien technology, or just a cigar-shaped hunk of rock hurtling through the solar system. Matthew Hall got in touch with co-author Dr. Alan Fitzsimmons from Queens University Belfast...
In June, Izzie Clarke explored the extremely fast science of speed and headed to the race tracks with McLaren in their 600LT Spider supercar. But whilst Formula 1 and petrol racing have a huge fan base, we're also seeing the rise of electric racing, Formula E. In this bonus interview, Izzie spoke with Rodi Basso, Motorsport Director of Mclaren Applied Technologies, about the future of the sport.
With a rising global population, and the impending impacts of climate change, we need more food, and reliable food sources safeguarded for the future. But varying light levels mean that plant growing conditions aren't always consistent, as Katie Haylor has been finding out...
In March 2016 the public voted to name a new polar research vessel "Boaty McBoatface", ultimately though, it was decided that "RRS Sir David Attenborough" was a more fitting choice. But the name "Boaty McBoatface" lived on and was instead given to one of the ship's autonomous submarine vehicles. Now, data from Boaty's first research mission in Antarctica has revealed a worrying new mechanism related to rising sea levels. Boaty has discovered that winds above the southern ocean, which have been strengthening in recent years, due in part to increased concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, are driving warmer surface water down into the depths of the ocean and warming the water right at the bottom of our oceans. Warmer oceans mean melting ice caps, so this new discovery is vital to help us accurately predict the rate that global sea levels will rise and plan for the consequences. Heather Jameson spoke to Southampton University's Alberto Naveira Garabato who led the project.
Robots are increasingly used to take over repetitive tasks in industry and agriculture, but they are still limited in what they can do. This also means that humans still need to work alongside them and often things can go badly wrong. 13000 injuries and 60 deaths were caused by accidents due to contact with machinery between 2014-18 in the UK alone. Engineers are working on ways to make robots safer, cheaper and more efficient. Ankita Anirban speaks to Matthias Althoff from the Technische Universitt Mnchen, in Germany, about his recent work on modular robots.
The world is facing a global fish issue - a fissue, if you will. One third of all fish stocks are being overfished, and most of the efforts to prevent this involve exclusive zones in the ocean managed by individual countries. But a study released this week shows how the world's fisheries are all closely connected in a "small-world" network, and how overfishing in one zone can affect all of its neighbours. Izzie Clarke spoke with James Rising from the London School of Economics to find out how.
The chest disease asthma is becoming more common. It can lead to life-threatening breathing difficulties when the airways constrict and the lung tissue overproduces mucus; this is usually an allergic reaction that can be worsened by air pollution. But our understanding of what's going on in an asthmatic lung is still quite limited. But now for the first time, scientists at the Sanger Institute near Cambridge have used a new technique to document and examine every cell in lung samples from both healthy and asthmatic patients, to discover what's changing when a person develops asthma. Chris Smith spoke to researcher Felipe Vieira Braga.
Holes in the Antarctic sea ice have been forming for decades, and are a mystery to science
When it comes to understanding how the brain functions, scientists have done a great deal of work on studying macaque monkeys, our evolutionary relative. We share 93% of our DNA and in a lot of ways, our brains are very similar. Even for high level operations such as learning, memory and decision-making, our brains work in comparable ways.. However, when it comes to sound, scientists have discovered that humans seem to have a unique edge in how we perceive pitch. Ankita Anirban spoke to Bevil Conway, from the National Institute of Health in Maryland, on his recent work comparing how humans and monkeys respond to sound.
At the end of 2018, Walkers launched their own recycling scheme for crisp packets after more than 300,000 people signed an online petition demanding that they change to a fully recyclable material for their packaging. Crisp packets are made from plastic and coated with a thin layer of metal. The metal layer is essential to prolong the shelf life of the food by providing a barrier to oxygen and water, but it makes the packets very difficult to recycle. Aiming to tackle this problem is Dermot O'Hare and his team at the University of Oxford, who have developed a new coating using nano-technology which, they say, could produce fully recyclable crisp packets and other plastic food packaging. Heather Jameson spoke to Dermot to learn more
CRISPR stands for clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats. Long name, but easy to picture: the sequence is synonymous to a word processor for a book, the book being DNA, which allows scientists to not only read the book, but to also edit a specific 'passage' of the book. Using CRISPR technology, DNA edits were performed on female twin embryos by Chinese scientist Jiankui He, who has since lost his standing in the scientific community. Xinzhu Wei Rasmus Nielsen, from the University of California Berkeley, followed up with the birth of the twins in an article published in the journal Nature Medicine and found a 21% increase in early mortality for the mutated genes. Matthew Hall visited Florian Merkle, a Senior Research Associate at the Institute of Metabolic Science right here in the University of Cambridge, to discuss the goal of He's experiment.
Around 1.4 million people alive in the UK today have survived a heart attack, but survivors can suffer from debilitating heart failure, because the heart is damaged during the attack. Ten years ago The Naked Scientists spoke to Sian Harding from Imperial College London about some promising new "heart patches" that could be grown in the lab. Ten years on, production is more reliable and plentiful, and it's hoped that safety trials on humans could begin within the next couple of years. Heather Jameson spoke to Sian to learn more...
Antibiotic resistance occurs when bacteria evolve to sidestep the drugs we use to kill them. With resistance rising, we could be facing an "antibiotic apocalypse", where even trivial infections become untreatable. What's worse, almost no new antibiotics are being developed by the major pharmaceutical companies. Now, though, Kirsty Smitten has uncovered a new option based on the heavy metal ruthenium. It can destroy antibiotic resistant bacteria, including those known as gram negatives, traditionally regarded as much harder to treat...
To better understand how personal exposure to air pollution can impact an individual's health, Katie Haylor met up with Cambridge University chemist Lia Chatzidiakou for a walk around central Cambridge. And to find out how air pollution can be monitored across a whole city, Katie climbed up to the roof of Cambridge University's chemistry department with Cambridge University chemist Lekan Popoola....
Researchers have gained new insights into how bacteria move in complex environments. Bacteria move using a system called "swim-and-tumble": they swim in a straight line for a bit, then tumble in a circle, which gives them a chance to correct their course. They can't see where they're going - they can't see at all - but they can sense and follow gradients of increasing concentration of food, like following a delicious smell into the kitchen. This type of movement is called chemotaxis, with the chemical that's attracting them being called a chemoattractant. Chemotaxis has been well studied in bacteria moving in a clear area. But in the real world, such as inside the human body, bacteria often have to get past a lot of obstacles. So how do obstacles affect bacterial movement? Ruby Osborn spoke to Dr Sabrina Rashid, from Carnegie Mellon University, about how bacteria fare in special obstacle courses built into tiny chambers.
Geologists from the University of California, Berkeley, found something unexpected in sand samples from Japan. Rather than natural particles, from rocks or plants, these tiny blobs of glass seem to have been formed in an atomic blast, and they might mean that the destroyed buildings of Hiroshima have been hiding in plain sight ever since. Ruby Osborn spoke to Mario Wannier about his research, which has been published in the journal Anthropocene.
Harassment in online communities is not a new phenomenon, but it is a growing one, with 40-46% of people reportedly having experienced it. Communities like reddit, one of the internet's, and the world's largest discussion forums, often have moderation teams responsible for applying self-imposed rules which govern acceptable behaviour. These rules are not always well presented, or well adhered to. Researchers from Princeton University have collaborated with the moderation team at the reddit science discussion community "r/science", to determine how the clear presentation of the expected standards, or social norms within online groups can influence user behaviour. Ben McAllister spoke to J. Nathan Matias...
Everyone's heard of T-Rexes, the twenty-foot-tall monsters that roamed the Earth back in the Late Cretaceous Period. But you may not have heard of their miniature cousin. It's a six foot tall dinosaur called Suskityrannus hazelae, and it gives us a clue about when and how T-Rexes got as big as they did. Sterling Nesbitt is the paleontologist who found the second and most complete fossil of this new dinosaur, but it took him twenty years to put this paper together. Phil Sansom asked him how.
Caster Semenya, a South African athlete with unusually high testosterone for a woman, has lost her appeal against new regulations from the International Association of Athletics Federations. The regulations set an upper limit on how much testosterone a female athlete is allowed to have compete in middle distance running, and require any woman over this limit to artificially lower her testosterone if she wants to continue competing. Ruby Osborn discusses the story.
Our society uses - and then throws away - a vast amount of plastic, which then accumulates in the environment. To combat this, in recent years, new types of plastic bags have become available, labelled as "compostable" or "biodegradable." Both of these terms indicate the bag can break down and so avoid pollution, although biodegradable bags take longer than compostable bags. There's also a third type, oxo-biodegradable, which have an additive that should make them decompose a bit faster than standard biodegradable bags. So when you see a plastic bag labelled "biodegradable," how long do you think it takes to break down? Three months? Six months? Well, new research from the University of Plymouth shows that's not quite the case. Ruby Osborn spoke to Imogen Napper, lead author of the study, about how she put plastic bags through their paces.
Before Britain was a nation of shopkeepers we were a nation of farmers; before that, the population were a bunch of hunter gatherers. But farming didn't catch on here until 1000 years after it had in Europe. Why was always a mystery, but now DNA technology is shedding new light on how this could have happened. Ben McAllister has been looking into the story...
Human babies grow inside their mothers for 40 weeks enclosed in a watery bag that expands as they do. And as the clock ticks during pregnancy, various processes kick in to thin the membrane material that surrounds the baby so that the bag ruptures at the right time to promote labour. But in some cases this happens far too early and can trigger a pre-term birth, and now scientists at Queen Mary University of London have discovered why. And if we know how it works, we might be in a position to discover how to stop it, as Tina Chowdhury explains...
Batteries are in almost everything we use. Our phones, computers, energy storage, even in transport. Typically, to see how well a battery performs, scientists have to charge and discharge them over and over until, ultimately, the battery stops working. This can take years of development and testing, plus it's an expensive process. Now researchers from MIT and Stanford University in America have turned to AI to help. Izzie Clarke spoke to William Chueh who explained how AI has stepped in
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (or IPCC) has recently issued a series of so-called "energy transition pathways". These are essentially routes that we as a society need to follow, in order to prevent global warming from exceeding the limit at which society cannot continue to function. All of these pathways rely on a technology known as "carbon capture", which would capture carbon dioxide from fossil fuel energy plants to prevent it from impacting the atmosphere. As a result, there has been a massive investment of money and resources in this technology. But, some new research from Lancaster University is attempting to figure out if that is actually the right path for society. Ben McAllister spoke to Denes Csala...
The multinational team behind the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT), which spans the Earth by linking dishes in 8 different countries, have revealed the first images of the supermassive black hole - that has a mass 6 billion times that of our Sun - sitting at the centre of galaxy Messier 87, fifty-five million light years from Earth. For the first time we can see what a black hole - or rather the space around a black hole - looks like. Speaking with Chris Smith to discuss how this was done and what it means, and to answer questions from the Naked Scientists audience, is Cambridge University astronomer Carolin Crawford... (image credit - EHT Collaboration)
Astronomers have used a new camera called the HiPERCAM to analyse a type of small, dim star that has proved elusive to standard cameras. The camera has allowed them to make detailed measurements of this cool subdwarf star 1500 light years away, and it's the first time they've been able to confirm the predicted model of this type of star. Ruby Osborn spoke to Dr Steven Parsons from the University of Sheffield about what makes this star so interesting, and how the HiPERCAM has helped them to study it.
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is widely regarded as one of humanity's greatest scientific achievements. The 17 km long accelerator smashes particles together at high speeds, and looks at the products to search for new physics. So far we've learned a tonne about the smallest things in nature, such as quarks - which are tiny particles that make up the atoms that compose people, planets, stars, and everything else we can see. A few years ago, physicists discovered strange new particles known as pentaquarks. We knew they were made up of five quarks bound together, but their properties and structure were a mystery. Now, brand new results from the LHC provide significant insight into the nature of these puzzling particles. Tomasz Skwarnicki, from Syracuse University (in New York) told Ben McAlister all about it, starting with the initial discovery of pentaquarks...
Ever wondered how to get the best wifi reception in your house, given all those floors and walls which can interrupt the signal? Where to position the router and signal boosters, then where people should use their devices to get the best reception? There are so many combinations, making it labour-intensive to move things around and try all the different positions! But complex scenarios like this can be modelled by mathematical equations. Not the six minus what equals four type of equation, really complex ones. Additionally, metamaterials are materials that have a structure that take their properties beyond what is possible from the material alone, often meaning they behave in unexpected ways. Jack Tavener spoke to Nader Engheta from the University of Pennsylvania about how his metamaterials can be used to find fast solutions to many tricky maths problems...
Having an injection is an experience common to us all, and whether you are unfussed by them or they make you feel faint, the actual needle used is the same for everyone and highly standardised. But given different parts of the body are more difficult to inject than others, this is not ideal. Scientists at Harvard Medical School realised this problem and have set about creating a more adaptive solution that could lead to big changes in healthcare. Jack Tavener spoke to Jeff Karp, who co-authored the study, about the challenges his team faced...
US scientists have engineered into yeast the genes needed to make the key chemicals in cannabis. To find out why and what's involved, Chris Smith looked at the paper with York University's Ian Graham, who wasn't involved in the project but has expertise in this area. We last spoke with him in 2015 when he uncovered the genes needed to perform a similar feat so yeast could make morphine.
The agriculture sector is responsible for about 25% of global warming according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, so rearing livestock for meat is a significant problem. When ruminant animals such as cows and sheep digest food they burp large amounts of methane, a greenhouse gas that causes climate change. And growing the crops they are fed adds even more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. It is now possible to cultivate edible meat in a lab, rather than rearing livestock. And because of this, the new technique is often promoted as more environmentally friendly than having herds of cattle. But a new study from the University of Oxford has looked closely at the data, and the situation is not as simple as first though. Jack Tavener spoke to John Lynch who co-authored the study about the impact of meat's potentially promising alternative...
Antibiotic resistance is a growing problem that kills hundreds of thousands of people each year, from what should be preventable diseases. Up to date, scientists have been trying to figure out the reasons in each individual case, until now A group from McMaster University in Canada has published a paper which shows for the first time the two common physical characteristics of bacterial resistance to antibiotics. Mariana Campos has been talking to Maikel Rheinstadter, who explained what they did and how this could help in the development of new and improved medications.
Scientists have discovered that some grass species have information in their genes that's not come from their parents, and instead think they're stealing genetic information from neighbouring plants. By genetically enhancing themselves, they gain a competitive edge, which helps them thrive in more challenging environments. The species Alloteropsis semialata, a type of tropical grass found in Africa, Asia and Australia, has changed the way it produces energy, a process known as photosynthesis. Jenny Gracie spoke with Luke Dunning from the University of Sheffield, to find out how these plants are changing...
About a quarter of a billion people around the world are affected by asthma, when the lungs' airways constrict, making breathing difficult. For decades we've treated the condition with drugs that relax the muscles in the airways and damp down the immune response that makes the airways tighten in the first place. But, recently, researchers have discovered that asthmatic airways also contain bulkier muscles than they should do. This is caused, they think, by the same inflammatory signals that trigger the airways to constrict. And now they've gone on to show that an experimental drug, called "fevipiprant", that blocks these signals, can prevent - and even reverse - the muscle changes, potentially ushering in a new way to manage asthma. Chris Smith spoke with Chris Brightling from the University of Leicester to find out how the new drug could be used to treat asthma.
Scientists have found a spot in the brain that, when stimulated, triggers laughter and is followed by a sense of calm and happiness that lasts 30 minutes.This discovery has direct implication for tens of thousands of people who undergo open brain surgery, and could be used in the future to treat anxiety, depression, and pain.
Archaeologists working in the UK and in Germany have come across rare examples of what look like ancient wooden spears that would have been used by our ancestors 400,000 years ago. But scientists were pointedly stuck on whether these weapons were just for poking, or if they could have been thrown, like javelins. To find out, Annemieke Milks built replicas of the original spears and asked six experienced, sharp-eyed javelin throwers to see if they could throw them. She told Adam Murphy how they got on
Scientists have given a dieting drug made for humans to mosquitoes in order to curb their appetite. Researchers at the Rockefeller University in New York have worked through hundreds of thousands of molecule-receptor combinations to find the right one able to suppress the mosquito's hunger. As a result, mosquitoes were not interested in seeking a human blood meal and so this method could be used to help stop the spread of deadly diseases. Jenny Gracie spoke with Laura Duvall, lead author of a paper recently published in Cell, to find out why mosquitoes bite us in the first place...
If you are a night owl, getting up in the morning is something that you absolutely dread. On the other hand, morning people jump out of bed ready and chatty. Is this something hardwired? The answer's probably got a lot to do with the genes that influence your body clock. Chris Smith speaks to Samuel Jones from the University of Exeter to find out what the connection is.
Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy is a genetic disease which causes the muscle of the heart to thicken. Left untreated, it can lead to heart failure, and it's quite common. But the therapies we have available at the moment treat only the symptoms and don't alter underlying disease course. Now new research from Harvard University, published in Science Translational Medicine, has identified the molecular clockwork that actually causes the condition, and they're testing a new drug that may help to stop it. Adam Murphy spoke to Chris Toepher to hear how...
A new way to capture CO2 from factories or the atmosphere has been developed by researchers in the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, located in the United States of America. The new technology uses a different molecule to 'soak up' the CO2 and it is 24% more energy-efficient than the existing technologies. On top of it, the molecules can be reused up to a hundred times, meaning even more savings. This improvement on technology may prove a big step towards large-scale adoption of carbon capture, which could help slow down the effects of climate change. Dr David Fairen-Jimenez from the University of Cambridge comments on the new research from the Oak Ridge lab.
There is a mountain located in the middle of a giant crater on Mars, but how it formed is still a bit of a puzzle for scientists. Investigations of the rocks below the surface of the crater have been helping piece together an answer. The Curiosity Rover currently on Mars has an advanced suite of scientific instruments able to carry out experiments on the Martian surface. Kevin Lewis is a planetary scientist from Johns Hopkins University, who along with help from colleagues, has been able to adapt some of the instruments to work in new ways. Jenny Gracie spoke with him to find out the rover's latest adventure
Lack of sleep or poor sleep is a problem that affects 1 in 3 people in the UK and America. Insufficient sleep is not only a health issue, contributing to heart disease, diabetes and obesity, but also an economic one. There's the direct costs of treating sleep disorders and their numerous side effects, plus the costs associated with reduced productivity, time off work and injuries resulting from fatigue. With such a big problem at hand, we need to think of a solution outside the box. Mariana Campos spoke with Dr Aurore Perrault, formerly from the University of Geneva, now at the Sleep, Cognition and Neuroimaging Laboratory at Concordia University in Montreal. Aurore and her coauthors have just published a study that could rock this problem to its core.
Nearly every cell in the body contains a part called the nucleus which houses the genetic information needed to function. Muscle cells are the largest cells in the body, so they often need multiple nuclei to meet high power demands. New research from the University Massachusetts at Amherst, supports the contradiction of a widely believed theory linking large cells and nuclei numbers. Jenny Gracie spoke with Professor Larry Schwartz to find out why the relationship may no longer be true...
It's common knowledge that smoking cigarettes is addictive, and this is because of the nicotine they contain. E-cigarettes are devices that heat up a liquid and produce an aerosol or spray which is then inhaled. If there's nicotine in the e-cigarette liquid then this gives a nicotine hit. In Australia, nicotine is classified as a poison, so it's illegal to sell e-cigarette liquids containing it, they have to instead be "nicotine free". But while studying the potential health impacts of e-cigarettes, scientists have found that, surprisingly, out of 10 "nicotine-free" e-cigarette liquids, or e-juices, from Australian suppliers, only 4 didn't actually contain any nicotine. So what does this mean for people using these products? Katie Haylor spoke with the study author, Alex Larcombe from the Telethon Kids institute in Perth.
Brushing our teeth keeps them clean and free from debris, but back in medieval times, dental hygiene wasn't part of your daily routine. This means that scientists can look at the teeth of skeletons to reconstruct what food they might have munched on back then and find out more about their lifestyle. But recently a team of international scientists, lead from the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Jena, Germany, found something a little more peculiar fossilised in the teeth of a 1000 year old skeleton. Jenny Gracie spoke with Christina Warinner to unearth the mysterious finding...
Every day hundreds of people die when they accidentally overdose on opiate drugs, like heroin or morphine. These agents depress breathing, causing respiratory failure. But, if an opioid antidote is administered sufficiently quickly, then the situation can be reversed. And a team at the University of Washington have developed a system that turns a mobile phone into a sonar device that can monitor a person's breathing and then sound the alarm if something goes wrong. Chris Smith spoke with Jacob Sunshine, an anaesthesiologist and assistant professor at the University of Washington, to discuss the new life saving app.
One terrifying prediction is that, by mid-Century, up to 30% of adults will be affected by a form of dementia, chiefly Alzheimer's Disease. This happens when proteins called beta-amyloid, and tau, build up in the brain and damage nerve cells. But scientists think this begins to happen decades before a person develops Alzheimer's symptoms, meaning we might have an opportunity to intervene and change the course of the condition if we can tell who's affected sufficiently early. Now, researchers at Washington University in St Louis have discovered subtle changes in the patterns of brain waves we produce when we sleep in people with early Alzheimer's. Katie Haylor heard about the work from the study's author, Brendan Lucey...
Back in 2001, Dr Chris Smith launched a new show, The Naked Scientists, in the hope of making science accessible. It was one of the first radio programmes to be made into a podcast and is now one of the world's most popular science shows. In the past five years, the programme has been downloaded more than 50 million times. Dr Chris has travelled the world in search of the latest science topics and trends, through which he has won numerous national and international accolades. He joins Lawrence Jones MBE to discuss bringing science to life through podcasts, how the team are engaging more people with STEM subjects and, if you can stomach it, find out how many organs you can donate and still remain alive! This episode is from Lawrence Jones' podcast, Mind Your Own Business...
Biological systems are able to create complex shapes and patterns, like the stripes of a zebra, the shape of your hand or the dynamic displays of a flock of birds. These shapes develop in an emergent and self-organised way, relying on just local interactions between individuals. In contrast, human designed technology is usually created by an external builder. But now, a team of roboticists and biologists have come together to design robot swarms that can self-organise into complex shapes. Hannah Laeverenz Schologelhofer spoke with Sabine Hauert from the Bristol Robotics Lab.
The Ancient Greeks understood that the liver was one of the most incredible organs humans possess when they wrote the cautionary tale of Zeus' punishment of Prometheus, in which poor Prometheus was tied to a rock where an eagle would eat his liver every day, but overnight it would regenerate and grow back, allowing his punishment to continue day after day. Now, in real life, the liver doesn't regenerate quite that quickly, but it is true that it has the ability to grow back and heal itself remarkably well. Georgia Mills spoke to liver scientist Auinash Kalsotra from the University of Illinois, about how and why the liver has this incredible skill.
Cervical cancer is one of the most common cancers affecting young women, and it's caused by a virus called Human Papilloma Virus, or HPV, which is spread through sexual contact. The virus causes the cells of the cervix to keeping growing excessively, which eventually damages their DNA, causing cancer. Testing for this cancer can be challenging: these days it involves using DNA tests to look for traces of the virus in a sample. But the viruses are very common, and only a small proportion of people carrying them will actually get cancer; so there are lots of false positives. Now researchers at Queen Mary University of London have found a way to tell who really is at risk, by pinpointing changes to a pattern of chemical markers, called epigenetic marks, that are present on our DNA. A person at risk of cancer develops characteristic changes to these marks, which study author Attila Lorincz can pick out, as he explained to Georgia Mills...
Christmas is a wonderful time of year, but all of the additional transport and consumption adds up, and we are left with plenty of seasonal rubbish and greenhouse gases. So how can you cut down this Christmas? Georgia Mills is here to spoil all of the festive fun...
Clean water is something that we often take for granted, but making it can be a major technological and energy-intensive process. Now, thanks to a system developed by scientists at York University, Toronto, and MIT, there might be a way to do this much more cheaply in future. Hannah Laeverenz Schlogelhofer spoke with York researcher Thomas Cooper, about this new way of using sunlight to clean up water and produce superheated steam.
How can seemingly similar cells behave differently? This is a particularly important question when a small change means that a cell does not function properly and several diseases might be the result of these small changes at the single cell level. But a cell is a complex system, and some of the important molecules inside a cell exist in very small quantities that can be difficult to detect. To address this challenge, a new tool has been developed called 'nano-tweezers'. These tiny devices can extract individual molecules from inside cells. Hannah Laeverenz Schlogelhofer spoke with Joshua Edel from Imperial College London about these 'nano-tweezers'.
Language is all around us, and good language skills are important for getting on in life. But does being good in one language domain, like spelling, mean you'll be good in another, like grammar? And if your child is doing well with language as a toddler, will they still be doing well as a teenager? Recently, results have come out from a study 15 years in the making and Katie Haylor spoke to one of the authors, Rebecca Pearson from the University of Bristol.
When we think of robots we might think of the Terminator, West World, or even something completely different like Big Hero Six - a story about a young boy and his soft medical robot companion Baymax. Doughy and malleable, a robot like Baymax is kind of the holy grail for scientists who are working on making Soft Robots - robots which aren't made of metal or plastic but instead of stretchable, supple materials like rubber, gels, or fabric. Eva Higginbotham spoke to Ilse Van Meerbeek, a PhD student at Cornell University who recently published a paper in Science Robotics about new progress in this field.
Antibiotic resistance is one of the greatest threats facing mankind today. A new group in the University of Washington in Seattle, have been working to fight this threat. In their study published September 2018, they looked to poison bacteria using the heavy metal gallium, to improve the lives of those with cystic fibrosis. In October 2018, Adam Murphy spoke to two authors of the study. First, Christopher Goss and then colleague, Pradeep Singh
Every year, hundreds of millions of people contract malaria; this is a parasitic infection spread by mosquitoes. The parasite does two things when it grows in the body: either it clones itself to make millions more malaria parasites in that infected individual, and makes them sicker in the process; or, it produces a different form of the parasite that's sexually active and specialised to infect mosquitoes so it can spread to another human. And this week scientists in Edinburgh have discovered that malaria bases the decision on whether to boost its numbers in an infected person, or to try to spread to other individuals, by counting its own population. Understanding how this works, they think, might provide us with new ways to tackle the problem. Petra Schneider told Chris Smith what she's found...
When we think of our immune system, most of us will be familiar with the white blood cells that circulate around our body to target and kill the bacteria and viruses that make us sick. But, we actually also have a special type of immune cell sitting in some of our body surfaces, like our skin and our gut, and new research suggests that these cells might hold the key to future cancer and allergy treatments. Eva Higginbotham spoke to Professor Adrian Hayday from the Francis Crick Institute and King's College London, about his new paper describing the unique way these cells actually work, and why they might be an important player in the fight against certain diseases.
Do you like to lie out on the beach in the summer, or are you more likely to be found hiding in the shade? Well, how you answer might depend on how quickly you seem to get sunburnt. We all know that we should wear sunscreen when out and about in the summer to protect our skin and so reduce our risk of skin cancer, but new research from the Weill Medical College of Cornell might allow us to ditch the sunscreen at some point in the future. Eva Higginbotham spoke to Dr Jonathan Zippin, a dermatologist and skin researcher, about his lab's key discovery in the science of skin.
We get so many good questions sent to us here at The Naked Scientists, that sadly we can't fit them all into our monthly question and answer shows. So here's an extra slice of science for you from our November 2018 QnA. Roger got in touch to ask whether artificial intelligence will be making medicines in the future, and we also heard from Sean about some rather intelligent ravens...
Today marks 100 years since the end of World War 1. This conflict caused the deaths of around 16 million people, and the new developments in artillery meant that new and nasty injuries were defying our ability to treat them. Ironically, this meant WW1 actually lead to huge advances in medicine, and neuroscience. But, thanks to a charity, Headway, it's also helping people with brain injuries today. Georgia Mills has been finding out how
Glioblastoma is an aggressive and often deadly cancer of the brain. Understanding it is vital to improving patient outcomes. In a new study published in Nature Genetics, a group in Cornell University has been sequencing genes to understand which ones are switched on by the tumours. To learn more, Adam Murphy spoke to Charles Danko, of the Baker Institute for Animal Health and the Cornell College of Veterinary Medicine...
Good dental hygiene is crucial in the fight against gum disease, which can lead to a common condition called periodontitis. It comes about when changes to the bacteria in the mouth cause a reaction called inflammation in areas around the teeth, potentially destroying tissue and bone and causing tooth loss. But quite why an altered microbiome causes this inflammation isn't known, so there are no targeted treatments, and surgery is the main option for severe cases. But now scientists have spotted that periodontitis patients have higher numbers of immune cells called TH17 cells in their mouths, and by targeting these cells, they managed to slow down the progression of the disease in mice. Katie Haylor spoke with Niki Moutsopoulos from the National Institute of Dental and Crano-facial Research at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland.
Astronomers at the University of Hertfordshire have come up with an explanation for the wobble seen in jets of matter being blasted from regions surrounding some supermassive black holes: Another nearby supermassive black hole! Dr Martin Krause tells us how we can see them at all...
Nowadays, tuberculosis takes more lives than any other infectious disease. Cases are on the decline but emerging antibiotic resistance threatens to interrupt that pattern. Tamsin Bell spoke with Professor Francois Balloux from University College London to learn about how this infectious disease evolved...
We all know that drinking alcohol is bad for us but in the UK we still pay a huge 3.5 billion annually for the National Health Service (NHS) to treat over 60 alcohol induced medical conditions including liver disease, pancreatitis, diabetes, heart disease and numerous forms of cancer. Fortunately, it seems that the message to put down the booze has trickled down to the younger generation as a recent study of 16 to 24 year olds shows that over the past ten years, they are drinking less. Tamsin Bell spoke to Linda Ng Fat from University College London to find out why more teens are laying off the drinks...
From right here on earth to the furthest visible parts of the universe, NASA has its eye on pretty much everything in between. Professor Andrew Coates from University College London was lead co-investigator in the joint ESA-NASA Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn, and is involved in several further NASA missions of space exploration. With NASA turning 60 this month, Sam Brown spoke to Professor Coates about the fascinating missions that NASA is involved with, and what they have planned for the future...
Mosquitoes spread diseases like malaria, and they are rapidly becoming resistant to the insecticides used to control them. So scientists are looking at the potential of using a genetic technique, called a gene drive, to solve the problem. This involves engineering a gene-editing system into the insects that targets and inactivates a gene called dbx - or doublesex - that is needed for the insects to develop normally. Critically though, only female mosquitoes, which are also the ones that bite, are affected by the change. This means that males are left unaffected and can spread the genetic modification through the population; but affected female mosquitoes are unable to reproduce, and within 8 generations, the population crashes to zero. Chris Smith heard how it works from Imperial College's Andrea Crisanti...
Imagine going into space. You've got your kit, you're blasted into darkness, you're ready to discover the unknown but then your equipment doesn't quite fit the task required. How can you prepare for that? This is a reality that space engineers and robotic experts are trying to facing every day. Now, researchers from Yale think they've got an answer. They've developed something called "Omniskin" - a sheet of material that can animate everyday objects and turn them into robots. Izzie Clarke spoke to study author Joran Booth.
You may have heard of graphene, the so called wonder material set to revolutionise electronics but the difficulty to consistently add extra properties and scale up cheaply limits industrial use! Scientists have been looking for easy to make alternatives, such as a new class of materials called metal organic frameworks or MOFs. As the name suggests, they're made by combining two components: a metal and something called an "organic chain" which contains carbon with some other elements. These can be used to create new materials with exciting properties.The big problem is that scientists have not been able to introduce magnetic properties and electrical conductivity to metal organic frameworks, limiting their application in electronics. Until now. Tamsin Bell spoke with Kasper Pederson from the Technical University of Denmark to find out what they have been doing
We've all been there at some point - you raise your hand in class, answer the question, and get it utterly, utterly wrong. These school-day humiliations may stay with us many years later, in fact - I'd love to hear yours, but as our kids are all headed back to school this week, we're trying to find out if perhaps these mistakes are good for us! Georgia Mills is on the case, but only after finding out some of our listeners biggest dunce moments!
Do you share food or do you bite the hand off anyone who tries? Chimpanzees, one of our closest relatives are in the latter category: they'll gladly share tools, but food's a no no. New research published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B has been looking into our other close relatives: bonobo apes. Bizarrely, while they'll gladly share food, woe betide anyone who touches someone else's tools or toys! So what does this say about us? Adam Murphy spoke to Christopher Krupenye, from the University of St. Andrews to learn more.
These days, many of us are heavily dependent on our trusty sat navs to get where we want to go, but looking at these devices whilst driving is incredibly dangerous and can lead to car accidents. Psychologists from Anglia Ruskin University are hoping to minimise the dangers of using this technology by incorporating audio cues with in-car GPS to forewarn the driver of the lay of the land. Tamsin Bell met with Helen Keyes to hear what's driving their work...
Goats can tell apart human facial expressions and - what's more - prefer to interact with happy people, according to a new study from scientists at Queen Mary University of London. We knew work animals like dogs and horses could do this, but no-one knew if animals domesticated for food products would be able to. Georgia Mills spoke to lead researcher Alan McElligott to find out how they did it
Most of the people who develop cancer are adults, although a significant number of children succumb too. The signs are though that childhood cancers could have a different origin than the adult disease, which might also mean they can be treated in a different way. Cambridge University's Sam Behjati suspects that tumours in children form from foetal tissue that has failed to mature properly. And by comparing the genetic instructions operating in normal and cancerous kidney cells from children and adults, he's tracked down evidence to support his theory and found a host of new avenues to explore to treat the disease. Chris Smith heard how...
From artificial photosynthesis to the art of statistics, the Naked Scientists take Jenny Zhang and Richard Samworth, two of St John's College's leading scientists, for a trip down the river to hear all about their work.
Doctors think that one third of the world's population have been exposed to the bacterial infection TB, or tuberculosis. It can damage any tissue in the body, infect the skeleton and joints, and even cause meningitis, but most people develop chest disease and a cough, which is how it chiefly spreads. A major problem with controlling the infection is that the Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria can be very hard to culture in a laboratory, and they grow extremely slowly, which holds up diagnosis and also makes it tricky to tell quickly whether someone is actually responding to the treatment they're receiving. Now microbiologists at St Andrews University, working with the charity Life Arc, have come up with a genetic test that looks for a very short-lived form of genetic material called ribosomal RNA that is specific to the TB bacteria. Their aim is to turn what's currently a lab research tool into a very quick and cheap test for use in remote and poor settings. Stephen Gillespie
Since Darwin's time scientists have been studying the skeleton of a type of fish that lived 400 million years ago called Heterostracans. These fish were covered in a tough exoskeleton, but scientists couldn't decide exactly where it came from. Was it a precursor to bone? To teeth? New research is suggesting all those old theories may be as dead and buried as the fish fossils, and this exoskeleton is just another way of making bone. Adam Murphy spoke to Joseph Keating of the University of Manchester to learn more...
Mixing chemicals together causes reactions and produces new molecules. With so many different chemicals in existence, there are infinite combinations that can be made, and millions of chemical reactions yet to be tried. But doing these tests is very time consuming, laborious and has a low success rate; it's also very susceptible to human failings, like bias and fatigue. To surmount this, University of Glasgow chemist Lee Cronin has invented a robot to test his chemical combinations for him. What's more impressive is that this robot can actually learn. By testing random chemical combinations from an initial set of 18 chemicals, the robot gathered data about chemical reactivity and could predict what other chemical combinations would cause reactions. This helped the robot decide which chemical combinations to test next. Marika Ottman spoke with Lee Cronin to hear how his "Chemputer" came about
HIV is a global pandemic. Worldwide, about 37 million people are living with the virus, and there are between 3 and 5 thousand AIDS deaths every day. More worrying is that, despite intensive public health and safe sex campaigns, there are a further 3 to 5 thousand new HIV infections occurring every day, and despite decades of effort, scientists still have not yet managed to develop an effective vaccine. But one very powerful way to prevent infection is for men to be circumcised, which reduces their risk of picking up the virus by up to 80%. So is this a cost effective strategy to halt HIV spread? Marika Ottman spoke with John Stover who's been studying the impact of a circumcision programme in Zimbabwe...
Vitiligo is an autoimmune condition, in which the immune system attacks the pigment-producing cells of the skin, leaving behind pale white patches. Although not dangerous in itself, vitiligo can be disfiguring, causing a great deal of distress to people suffering from it. There are treatments available for vitiligo - these include topical creams that suppress the immune attack on skin cells, and phototherapy, which uses UV light. However, these treatments are time- and effort-consuming, particularly if large areas of the skin are affected. Another problem is that they only work temporarily - in many patients, the disease returns when the treatment is stopped. Crucially, the disease tends to return in the same patches of skin where it first appeared - prompting a team of researchers to wonder whether this property may lead to an explanation as to how the disease occurs, and even a potential cure. To find out more, I, Isabelle Cochrane spoke to Prof John Harris...
Heart attacks come about when blood vessels in the heart are blocked, and without a supply of oxygen-rich blood, the heart muscle can die. This is called ischemic injury, and can also occur in other places in the body, potentially leading to tissue death and even limb amputation. But what if it was possible to re-build the blood vessels in the heart or in other areas of the body, to kick-start the circulation and prevent tissues from being starved of oxygen, and dying? This is what Jo Mountford is trying to do at the Scottish National Blood Transfusion service, as she explains to Katie Haylor...
People all around the world are living the high life. That's to say, living their whole lives at high altitude. This lifestyle has an impact on their bodies, including upon how their bones grow. And one adaptation, Cambridge University's Stephanie Payne has found, is to alter the relative lengths of the arms. Katie Haylor and Chris Smith found out more...
Scientists want to raise awareness to protect the Earth from dangerous asteroids. June 30th has now become Asteroid Day where people from around the world come together to learn about asteroids, the impact hazard they may pose, and what we can do to protect our planet, families, communities, and future generations from future asteroid impacts. Izzie Clarke spoke to Matt Bothwell and Adrian Currie at the University of Cambridge to learn more...
4 billion years ago, life on earth looked nothing like it does today. In fact, the oceans contained only single-celled microbes. At some point, these single-celled organisms began to work together, forming complex, multi-celled creatures, which then suddenly became much larger. The question is, why? Emily Mitchell studies one of the earliest animals believed to exist, and explained to Marika Ottman why she thinks these creatures got bigger when they did
In recent years, we've woken up to the massive problem that is dementia. This is where people progressively lose their cognitive faculties and Alzheimer's Disease is one well-known example. But scientists are increasingly realising that injury done to the brain by damaged blood vessels is probably the leading cause of dementia, but it's also the one that we know much less about. It happens when the very small blood vessels deep within the brain become narrowed, stiffened and leaky, which leads to progressive damage to the adjacent brain tissue, although we don't understand how this happens, or whether we can block or reverse it.
Cambridge scientist Alessandra Granata is working on a way to recreate in a dish what goes on in a patient's brain by turning a skin biopsy into stem cells and then converting those into new blood vessels that recapitulate the features of the disease. She spoke to Chris Smith.
Osteoarthritis, a condition which damages the cartilage in joints, is a painful, debilitating condition. Millions suffer every year, and with an ageing population, that number will only increase. Therefore, improving diagnosis is an important goal. Adam Murphy spoke with Tom Turmezei from Cambridge University, to learn more about osteoarthritis and his Wellcome Trust funded project which aims to improve diagnosis...
If robots really are the future, then said future is certainly one step closer as of this week. For the first time ever, a robot has been used in surgery on the human eye. To find out more about this incredible feat of engineering, Isabelle Cochrane spoke to Dr Tom Edwards, the lead author of the study...
CRISPR makes it possible to snip out undesired bits of DNA from our cells. This process holds the potential to cure genetic conditions such as cystic fibrosis. However, it seems that doing this isn't without risk. Marika Ottman went to the University of Cambridge and spoke with biochemist Jussi Taipale to learn more...
Researchers have found a way to regenerate the enamel - or apatite - that's damaged by tooth decay. Katie Haylor spoke to Alvaro Mata from Queen Mary University of London...
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We know more about the surface of mars than we do about the depths of our own ocean, but scientists from the California Academy of Science created an invention that allows researchers to bring never-before seen species from coral reefs in the deep sea to the ocean's surface. In the spirit of World Ocean's day tomorrow, Marika Ottman spoke with lead author Bart Shepherd to learn more...
Millions suffer from osteoarthritis, a condition that causes joints, especially knee and hip joints, to become stiff and painful. Luckily these joints can be replaced by an implant with usually good results. However, scientists are going one step further, bringing robots into the operating theatre to improve precision, and patient outcomes. The Nuffield Hospital in Cambridge recently brought in one of these robot helpers, and Chris Smith spoke with the director of the hospital, Adrian Connolly...
Any activity on your daily commute, like walking to the bus instead of just hopping in the car, might reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease, says a new study from the University of Cambridge, published in the journal Heart...
We all love a good hug, whatever our age! Babies are no different. There's growing evidence that skin-to-skin contact is beneficial for babies, so Katie Haylor spoke with Laura Baird and Kelly Spike from Addenbrookes Hospital in Cambridge to find out what it's all about...
Hawaii's Big Island has been experiencing a series of volcanic eruptions. What's causing them, and how is it likely to change in the future? To find out, Chris Smith talked to Jessica Johnson, a volcanologist at the University of East Anglia...
Exercise is good for us, it's one of the best things you can do to keep your mind and body healthy for a long age. But perhaps not all exercise is equal. A new analysis out in the British Journal of Sports Medecine reports that exercise at work is associated with an increased risk of early death in men. So what's going on? Georgia Mills spoke to study author Pieter Coenen, of VU University in Amsterdam.
Knowing where Earth's freshwater is accumulating, or perhaps more critically, disappearing is of paramount importance. A new study in Nature has analysed changes in freshwater across the entire planet. To learn more Adam Murphy spoke with Matthew Rodell, from the NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre in Greenbelt, Maryland...
Neurodegeneration is a process involved in several serious and debilitating diseases, for which there is often no cure. One of the first steps on the journey towards a treatment to stop neurons dying is understanding how and why they do so. Now, scientists from Cambridge University and the University of Toronto have announced a mechanism that explains how neurons die in two diseases, motor neurone disease and a type of dementia called fronto-temporal dementia. Georgia Mills spoke to Cambridge University chemist Michele Vendruscolo. First, Georgia asked, what actually are neurons?
Are you struggling to know what to wear for the weather at the moment? One day in the UK it's freezing, the next rain, the next a veritable heat wave. Apart from playing havoc with BBQ plans, this extreme variation in weather is also affecting local wildlife. Georgia Mills went for a stroll along the river Cam with the RSPB's Richard Bradbury to find out more.
Tasmanian devils are black, carnivorous, scavenger marsupials that live - perhaps unsurprisingly, on the island of Tasmania. In recent years an intriguing type of cancer has been decimating their numbers, pushing the animals to the brink of extinction. Known as "Devil Facial Tumour Disease" - or DFTD - the cancer is spread when an affected animal bites - and literally implants - some of the tumour from its own mouth into the face of another devil. The tumours avoid detection by the immune system by switching off key markers that would normally label the tissue as foreign. Now, by studying the genetics of the tumour tissue, and its response to drug treatments, scientists are beginning to spot drugs that might be capable of blocking the disease. Katie Haylor spoke to Max Stammnitz, who's been studying DFTD at Cambridge University...
Every year millions of people contract malaria, which is a blood parasite infection spread by mosquitoes. And part of the reason why the infection spreads so successfully, scientists now know, is because the parasite makes an infected human over-produce certain skin odours that are irresistible to a mosquito. Chris Smith spoke to Ailie Robinson, researcher at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the lead author on the new study that's uncovered how this happens
Motor neurone disease (MND) is a degenerative disease affecting around 5,000 people in the UK. It attacks people's ability to move, speak and breath, and usually is fatal within two years. At the moment there is no cure, but scientists are trying to find out more about what causes MND and how we might one day treat it. This week, a paper out in Nature Neuroscience describes a new model for MND, which has revealed some unexpected clues about how the disease operates, and may even lead to a target for treatments. Chris Smith spoke to one of the authors Jemeen Sreedheren, from Cambridge University's Babraham Institute Kings College London.
When people take wildlife products over a border that is under the control of CITES. Some of it is illegal, and this is when Border Force step in, confiscating the items in question and when possible, returning them to the wild. But what do people bring through? Georgia Mills was shown the Dead Shed, by senior Border Force officer Grant Miller, a horrific stash of animal and plant products that had been confiscated at Heathrow Airport. This content may be upsetting to some people.
Multiple Sclerosis, or MS, affects hundreds of thousands of people. It's a condition where the body's own immune system attacks a protective layer around nerve fibres called myelin. This prevents messages being conveyed quickly and faithfully through the brain producing symptoms that can include difficulty with vision, movement, speech, balance and sensation. In recent years scientists have begun to explore the use of stem cells to combat the progression of the disease. As author Stefano Pluchino, from Cambridge University, explained to Chris Smith.
Scientists in the US have uncovered a surprising potential treatment for strokes: short-term sensory deprivation. Strokes occur when the blood supply to the brain is interrupted; this destroys the affected nerve cells, and robs the victim of the function of the affected brain area. But it is possible to achieve some degree of recovery by encouraging other, adjacent healthy parts of the brain to rewire themselves and take over from the damaged area. Working with mice, Washington University neurologist Jin-Moo Lee has found that this can be promoted by temporarily depriving a patch of brain tissue near to the stroke-affected region of its normal sensory inputs. This encourages the re-wiring process and results in faster and better recovery...
Was exercising more one of your new year's resolutions? Has it ended up a broken promise at the bottom of your to-do list? Georgia Mills spoke to Catherine Meads from Anglia Ruskin University, who may be able to help.
Up to a third of women experience debilitatingly heavy periods. This can cause significant disruption. It can also lead to depression; time off work; and, in severe cases, even lead to a low blood count or anaemia. Currently, heavy periods are treated hormonally or surgically, but these options have side effects and can affect fertility. So is there a better treatment? Edinburgh University's Jackie Maybin thinks so.
Scientists have shown that a toothpaste ingredient could be used as an anti-malarial drug. Spread by mosquitoes, malaria is caused by Plasmodium parasites, and kills over half a million people every year, 70% of them children. In recent years the parasite has also become resistant to most of the existing anti-malarial compounds. This new discovery, by researchers at the University of Cambridge, was aided by Eve, an artificially-intelligent 'robot scientist'. Chris Smith was joined by Steve Oliver who was part of the investigation.
It's winter time again in the northern hemisphere and the influenza virus - the 'flu - is making its seasonal rounds. The virus infects millions of people every year, and vulnerable individuals with underlying health complaints including heart disease, kidney problems and diabetes, as well as pregnant women, the very young and the over 65s are at higher risk of developing a severe infection. To find out how flu spreads and causes disease, and how you can protect yourself, Naked Scientists Connie Orbach and Khalil Thirlaway have been investigating this microbial assailant...
Around one in ten people have to live with tinnitus, this is a persistent noise ringing in the head when there's nothing external causing it. The severity of tinnitus can range from irritating to completely life-changing, by making it nearly impossible to work or sleep, and there is no cure. But now, scientists have come up with a way to reduce the severity of symptoms, by stimulating parts of the brain responsible for causing the phantom sounds. Georgia Mills spoke to Susan Shore, from the University of Michigan.
The question of where life began is a difficult one to answer. While many scientists believe that life began on earth, others believe that life, or at least its building blocks, first formed in space. A recent study from the University of Sherbrooke, in Canada, has shown how complex organic molecules could form on icy comets - from nothing more than simple molecules and radiation. And it's possible that this could explain how complex molecules like amino acids - which are the building blocks of proteins - could have originally formed billions of years ago and led to the beginning of life on Earth. Michael Huels, who led the study, told us more.
In the run up to Christmas, shops are bursting at the seams with delicious treats, appealing platters and indulgent morsals, which can make sticking to a healthy diet rather unlikely. And food consumption has consequences for our "waist" in more ways than one! According to the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the UN, over a third of all the food made globally each year goes un-used, that's around 1.3 billion tonnes. But could adhering to a healthier diet in the food we do eat make a difference to the environment? Paul Behrens and colleagues from Lieden University in the Netherlands have set out to answer this question, and Katie Haylor's been finding out how.