Discovery

The City that Fell into the Earth

07 Nov 2016

Contributed by Lukas

How do you move a city? Lesley Riddoch travels to Arctic Sweden to find out. Kiruna is gradually sliding into Europe's biggest iron ore mine. The city...

The Sun King of China

31 Oct 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Meet Huang Ming, the Chinese inventor who describes himself as, 'the number one crazy solar guy in the world'. One of the prize exhibits of his museum...

The Mars of the Mid-Atlantic

24 Oct 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Ascension Island is a tiny scrap of British territory, marooned in the tropical mid-Atlantic roughly halfway between Brazil and Africa. It is the tip ...

Creating the Crick

17 Oct 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The Francis Crick Institute, in the centre of London, is the UK’s brand new, game-changing centre for biology and medical research. Roland Pease joi...

Black Holes: A Tale of Cosmic Death and Rebirth

10 Oct 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The discovery of gravitational waves by the LIGO observatory opens up a new form of astronomy, which will allow scientists explore the ultimate fate o...

The Whale Menopause

03 Oct 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Killer whales and humans are almost unique in the animal kingdom. The females of both species go through the menopause in their 40s or 50s, and then l...

Reversing Parkinson's

26 Sep 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Parkinson’s Disease is one of the major neurodegenerative conditions. Cells die, for reasons not fully understood, causing a reduction in the produc...

Could we send our litter into space?

19 Sep 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Two spacey cases today for doctors Rutherford and Fry to investigate, both sent in to BBC Future via Facebook.The Stellar Dustbin 'Can we shoot garbag...

Why do we faint?

13 Sep 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Swooning maidens and clever horses feature in today's Curious Cases, sent in by listeners to [email protected] Squeamish Swoon Science sleuth...

Why do people shout on their cellphones?

05 Sep 2016

Contributed by Lukas

How does traffic jam? And, why do some people shout into their cellphones in public places? Two subjects guaranteed to annoy even the most patient lis...

How do you make the perfect cup of tea?

29 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

A story of sorrow and comfort today, as Doctors Adam Rutherford and Hannah Fry investigate two mysteries sent in by listeners.The Psychic Tear Edith C...

What makes gingers ginger?

22 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Doctors Adam Rutherford and Hannah Fry set out to solve the following perplexing cases sent in by listeners:The Scarlet Mark Sheena Cruickshank in Man...

China Science Rising

15 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

China is super-sizing science. From building the biggest experiments the world has ever seen to rolling out the latest medical advances on a massive s...

The Power of Cute

08 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Zoologist and broadcaster Lucy Cooke explores the science behind our seeming obsession with all things adorable. There has been an explosion in intere...

Failing Gracefully

01 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Dr Kevin Fong concludes his exploration of the boundaries between the medical profession and other industries for valuable lessons that might be of us...

Going Lean: Health and the Toyota Way

25 Jul 2016

Contributed by Lukas

In the third programme in the series, Dr Kevin Fong explores the concept of ‘lean’ in healthcare. He visits Toyota’s largest car assembly plant ...

“Faster, Better, Cheaper”

18 Jul 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Kevin Fong explores the success and failure of NASA’s missions to Mars

The Business of Failure

12 Jul 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Dr Kevin Fong flies with a US air ambulance crew and discovers why it’s seen as one of the most dangerous occupations in America.

Cleaning Up the Oceans

04 Jul 2016

Contributed by Lukas

More than five million tonnes of plastic waste ends up in the oceans every year. The abandoned fishing gear and bags and bottles left on beaches can s...

Life on the East Asian Flyway - Part 4: The Arctic

27 Jun 2016

Contributed by Lukas

After flying thousands of kilometres from faraway Bangladesh and New Zealand via the Yellow Sea, the shorebirds of the East Asian Flyway complete thei...

Life on the East Asian Flyway - Part Three: Yellow Sea North

20 Jun 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Can China’s new generation of birdwatchers and North Korea’s weak economy save migratory birds from extinction? Habitat loss for shorebirds in th...

Life on the East Asian Flyway – Part Two: Yellow Sea South

13 Jun 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Ann Jones flies north to Shanghai as shorebirds from as far away as Australia, Indonesia, Thailand, Myanmar and Bangladesh arrive on the coast of the ...

Life on the East Asian Flyway

06 Jun 2016

Contributed by Lukas

One of the great wonders of the natural world is in deep trouble.Millions of shorebirds fly from Australia and Southeast Asia to the Arctic every year...

The Neglected Sense

30 May 2016

Contributed by Lukas

We may fear going blind, deaf or dumb, but few of us worry about losing our olfactory senses. And yet more than 200,000 people in the UK are anosmic -...

After Ebola

23 May 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Last November Sierra Leone was declared Ebola free. By then, the epidemic had killed over 11,000 people in West Africa. The speed at which it took off...

Benefits of Bilingualism - Part Two

16 May 2016

Contributed by Lukas

More than half the world speaks more than one language. New research is showing that being multilingual has some surprising advantages – it can help...

Benefits of Bilingualism - Part One

09 May 2016

Contributed by Lukas

More than half of the world's people speak more than one language. Some people may have been forced to learn a language at school or had to pick up o...

Our Unnatural Selection

02 May 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Humans have been altering animals for millennia. We select the most docile livestock, the most loyal dogs, to breed the animals we need. This 'artific...

Science Stories: Series 2 - Margaret Cavendish

25 Apr 2016

Contributed by Lukas

In the spring of 1667 Samuel Pepys queued repeatedly with crowds of Londoners and waited for hours just to catch a glimpse of aristocrat writer and th...

Science Stories: Series 2 - Orgueil Meteorite

18 Apr 2016

Contributed by Lukas

In 1864 a strange type of rock fell from the sky above Orgueil in rural France. Shocked and frightened locals collected pieces of the peculiar, peaty ...

The Horn Dilemma

11 Apr 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The majority of white and black rhinoceros are found in South Africa. This stronghold for these magnificent creatures is now being threatened by poach...

African Einsteins

01 Apr 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Will Einstein’s successors be African? It’s very likely - and some of them will be women.Back in 2008 South African physicist Neil Turok gave a s...

Feeding the World - Part Two

28 Mar 2016

Contributed by Lukas

As the world’s population grows and the climate challenges our ability to grow crops, how can agriculture provide enough food? Can we get more from ...

Feeding the World - Part One

21 Mar 2016

Contributed by Lukas

As the world’s population grows and the climate challenges our ability to grow crops, how can agriculture provide enough food? Can we get more from ...

Editing the Genome - Part Two

14 Mar 2016

Contributed by Lukas

There is a new genetic technology which promises to revolutionise agriculture and transform our influence over the natural world. Research is well und...

Editing the Genome

07 Mar 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Over the last four years, scientists have discovered a simple and powerful method for altering genes. This will have massive implications for all of ...

Science Stories: Series 1 - Einstein’s Ice Box

29 Feb 2016

Contributed by Lukas

In the late 1920s Einstein was working on a grand unified theory of the universe, having given us E=mc2, space-time and the fourth dimension. He was a...

Science Stories: Series 1 - Eels and Human Electricity

22 Feb 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Naomi Alderman presents an alternate history of electricity. This is not a story of power stations, motors and wires. It is a story of how the electri...

Science Stories: Series 1 - Cornelis Drebbel

15 Feb 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Philip Ball dives into the magical world of Cornelis Drebbel , inventor of the world's first submarine in 1621. How did the crew of this remarkable ve...

El Nino

08 Feb 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Floods in South America, fires in Indonesia, famine threatened in Ethiopia, yet more drought in Southern Africa and central America. Plus, a stunning ...

An Infinite Monkey's Guide to General Relativity

01 Feb 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Brian Cox and Robin Ince explore the legacy of Einstein's great theory, and how a mathematical equation written 100 years ago seems to have predicted ...

An Infinite Monkey's Guide to General Relativity

25 Jan 2016

Contributed by Lukas

It is 100 years since the publication of Einstein's great theory, and arguably one of the greatest scientific theories of all time. To mark the occasi...

Scotland’s Dolphins

18 Jan 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The chilly waters of north-east Scotland are home to the world’s most northerly group of bottlenose dolphins. They are protected by EU conservation ...

Nature's Numbers

11 Jan 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Mathematics is one of the most extraordinary things humans can do with their brains but where do our numerical abilities come from? Maths writer Alex...

Nature's Numbers

04 Jan 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Lemurs and parrots accompany maths writer Alex Bellos as he explores the foundations of our ability to understand numbers. What are the fundamental nu...

Future of Energy

28 Dec 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Professor Jim Skea, from the Faculty of Natural Sciences, Centre for Environmental Policy at Imperial College London, joins Jack Stewart in the studio...

The Power of Equations

21 Dec 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Jim al-Khalili was sitting in a physics lecture at the University of Surrey when he suddenly understood the power of equations to describe and predict...

Enceladus: A second genesis of life at Saturn?

14 Dec 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Discovery invites you on a mission to the most intriguing body in the solar system – Saturn’s moon Enceladus. It’s a small icy world with giga...

Humboldt - the Inventor of Nature

07 Dec 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Alexander Von Humboldt - the forgotten father of environmentalism - warned of harmful human induced climate change over 200 years ago. Explorer, natur...

Unbreathable: The Modern Problem of Air Pollution

30 Nov 2015

Contributed by Lukas

The shock news three months ago, that Volkswagen had used defeat devices to circumvent emissions tests in the United States, has brought back into the...

Future of Biodiversity

23 Nov 2015

Contributed by Lukas

"I'm determined to prove botany is not the 'Cinderella of science'". That is what Professor Kathy Willis, director of Science at the Royal Botanic Gar...

Problems of Developing Drugs

16 Nov 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Patrick Vallance is something of a rare breed - a game-keeper turned poacher; an academic who has moved over into industry. And not just any industry,...

The Genetics of Intelligence

09 Nov 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Professor Robert Plomin talks to Jim al-Khalili about what makes some people smarter than others and why he is fed up with the genetics of intelligenc...

How to Make an Awesome Surf Wave

02 Nov 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Can we make better surfing waves than the wild ocean, asks marine biologist and writer Helen Scales.Helen loves surfing but she describes it as an ext...

Lion Hunting in Africa

26 Oct 2015

Contributed by Lukas

In June 2015 the death of Cecil the lion was international news and a social media sensation. Yet trophy hunting of lions and other species is common ...

The Infinite Monkey Cage USA Tour: San Francisco

19 Oct 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Brian Cox and Robin Ince take to the stage in San Francisco for the last of their USA specials. They talk alien visitations, UFOs and other close enco...

The Infinite Monkey Cage USA Tour: Chicago

12 Oct 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Brian Cox and Robin Ince take to the stage in Chicago, Illinois, to discuss fossil records and evolution. They are joined on stage by host of NPR's "W...

The Infinite Monkey Cage USA Tour: Los Angeles

05 Oct 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Brian Cox and Robin Ince continue their tour of the USA, as they take to the stage in LA, as they ask what happens when science meets Hollywood. They ...

The Infinite Monkey Cage USA Tour: New York

26 Sep 2015

Contributed by Lukas

The BBC’s award-winning radio science/comedy show The Infinite Monkey Cage has transported itself to the USA bringing its unique brand of witty, irr...

Life Changers - Didier Queloz

21 Sep 2015

Contributed by Lukas

One night in 1995, PhD student Didier Queloz was running a routine test on a new detector they had just built at the Observatoire de Haute Provence in...

Life Changers - Anita Sengupta

14 Sep 2015

Contributed by Lukas

When Anita Sengupta was a little girl, she dreamed of time travel aboard the TARDIS, along with Tom Baker, her favourite incarnation of Dr Who. It was...

Life Changers - Venki Ramakrishnan

07 Sep 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Kevin Fong talks to Venki Ramakrishnan, Professor of structural biology in Cambridge and joint-winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2009. Celebra...

Life Changers - Kathryn Maitland

31 Aug 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Kathryn Maitland is a doctor with a burning passion to transform clinical research across Africa, where she has spent most of her career. Determined ...

Women on the ‘Problem with Science’

24 Aug 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Earlier in the year, the reported remarks about 'the problem with girls' by British biologist and Nobel Laureate Professor Tim Hunt' brought the issue...

Truth about the Body Mass Index

17 Aug 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Dr Mark Porter is a family doctor in the UK and in his 50s. He’s tall and slim and thinks he’s fit and healthy – after all he goes to the gym se...

The Great Telescopes and Evolution

10 Aug 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Today, astronomers believe the universe is a violent, constantly changing place. But it was not always the case. At the beginning of the 19th century,...

The Colour Purple

27 Jul 2015

Contributed by Lukas

In 1856, a teenager experimenting at home accidentally made a colour that was more gaudy and garish than anything that had gone before. William Perkin...

Maurice Wilkins

20 Jul 2015

Contributed by Lukas

What does it take to be remembered well? The discovery of the structure of DNA is often attributed to James Watson and Francis Crick. But a third man ...

James Watt and Steam Power

13 Jul 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Naomi Alderman tells the story of James Watt and the steam engine that nearly never got made. A breath of steam hits cold metal. It cools suddenly and...

Sounds Of Space: Deep Space

06 Jul 2015

Contributed by Lukas

A sonic tour of the universe, with solar scientist, Dr Lucie Green. In the previous episode, we listened in to the sounds of the Solar System. This we...

Sounds of Space: The Solar System

29 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

The previously silent world of outer space is getting noisier. In this audio tour of the Solar System, Dr Lucie Green listens in to the Sounds of Spac...

Future of European Science

22 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

A debate about the state of scientific research in Europe, recorded in Brussels on the day when the European Research Council was celebrating its 5000...

The Bone Wars

15 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Tracey Logan takes us back to the wild west of America, and looks at the extraordinary feud that came to be known as the Bone Wars. This is a tale of ...

Stephanie Shirley: Software Pioneer

08 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

As a young woman, Stephanie Shirley worked at the Dollis Hill Research Station building computers from scratch but she told young admirers that she wo...

Origins of War

01 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Is our desire to wage war something uniquely human or can its origins be traced much further back in our evolutionary past? To suggest that warfare is...

What the Songbird Said

25 May 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Could birdsong tell us something about the evolution of human language? Language is arguably the single thing that most defines what it is to be human...

Shedding Light on the Brain

18 May 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Biologists are using light to explore the brain - and to alter it. Roland Pease meets some of the leading players in optogenetics, who use light-sens...

Future of Solar Energy

11 May 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Roland Pease looks into perovskites - the materials enthusiasts say could transform solar power. Solar power is the fastest growing form of renewable ...

Scotland's Forgotten Einstein, James Clerk Maxwell

04 May 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Dr Susie Mitchell hears the story of the 19th Century Scottish scientist James Clerk Maxwell. Maxwell's lifelong curiosity about the world and his gif...

Science of Stammering

27 Apr 2015

Contributed by Lukas

In this edition of Discovery, Erika Wright explores the science of Stammering, a widely misunderstood condition that occurs at the same level in all c...

Jane Francis

20 Apr 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Just twenty years ago, the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) would not allow women to camp in Antarctica. In 2013, it appointed Jane Francis as its Direc...

The Teenage Brain: Sarah-Jayne Blakemore

13 Apr 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Until recently, it was thought that human brain development was all over by early childhood but research in the last decade has shown that the adolesc...

Matt Taylor

06 Apr 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Matt Taylor talks to Jim Al-Khalili about being in charge of the Rosetta space mission to the distant comet, 67P. It is, he says, 'the sexiest thing a...

John O'Keefe

30 Mar 2015

Contributed by Lukas

John O'Keefe tells Jim al-Khalili how winning the Nobel Prize was a bit of a double-edged sword, especially as he liked his life in the lab, before be...

Does Money Make you Mean?

23 Mar 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Can money really make a person mean? In this second and final programme, Jack heads to Hong Kong to explore whether our preoccupation with money is af...

Does Money Make you Mean?

16 Mar 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Jack Stewart heads to Los Angeles, home to many of America's rich and famous, to explore what impact wealth has on our moral behaviour. Hollywood ofte...

Finding Your Voice

09 Mar 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Comedy performer and broadcaster Helen Keen, explores a rare condition that she herself once suffered from - selective mutism or SM. It is an anxiety...

Placebo Problem

02 Mar 2015

Contributed by Lukas

In recent years the term 'placebo effect' - the beneficial effects on health of positive expectations about a drug or some other treatment - has becom...

Throwaway Society 2/2

23 Feb 2015

Contributed by Lukas

How can manufacturers of the world supply the growing demand for consumer products without breaking the planet’s bank of natural resources? By the ...

Throwaway Society

16 Feb 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Hundreds of millions of computers, mobile phones and televisions are thrown away every year around the world. In this week’s Discovery Gaia Vince w...

The Science of Smell

09 Feb 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Pamela Rutherford explores our neglected sense of smell. How is the brain able to detect and tell apart the countless number of smells it comes acros...

The Life Scientific: Richard Fortey

02 Feb 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Richard Fortey found his first trilobite fossil when he was 14 years old and he spent the rest of his career discovering hundreds more, previously unk...

The Life Scientific: Margaret Boden on Artificial Intelligence

26 Jan 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Maggie Boden is a world authority in the field of artificial intelligence – she even has a robot named in her honour. As research professor of Cogni...

Hot Gossip - Part Two

19 Jan 2015

Contributed by Lukas

In the second of two programmes, Geoff Watts continues to explore the science, history and cultural implications of gossip. Gossip has a bad reputatio...

Hot Gossip - Part One

12 Jan 2015

Contributed by Lukas

If language elevates us above other animals, why does human society seem to spend so much time gossiping? Perhaps it's because without gossip there wo...

Virtual Therapy

05 Jan 2015

Contributed by Lukas

E-Therapy has come a long way since the (slightly tongue in cheek) days of Eliza, a very early attempt at computer based psychotherapy. Eliza was litt...

Animal Personality

29 Dec 2014

Contributed by Lukas

Professor Adam Hart explores the newest area in the science of animal behaviour – the study of personality within species as diverse as chimpanzees,...

Can Maths Combat Terrorism?

22 Dec 2014

Contributed by Lukas

Dr Hannah Fry investigates the hidden patterns behind terrorism and asks whether mathematics could be used to predict the next 9/11. When computer sci...

New Space to Fly

15 Dec 2014

Contributed by Lukas

As our skies become more crowded Jack Stewart examines the long awaited modernisation of air traffic control. With traffic predicted to reach 17 milli...

Vagus Nerve

08 Dec 2014

Contributed by Lukas

Many people are living with chronic diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and inflammatory bowel conditions in which the body attacks itself. Although...