Our Changing World
Episodes
A Taste for Science
27 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The food you see on the supermarket shelves doesn't end up there by accident. It's often been rigorously tested for likeability. This week on Our Cha...
Keeping the South Island Psa-V free
20 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
In 2010 the Psa-V bacterial disease was found in a Bay of Plenty kiwifruit orchard. This was the beginning of a terrible ordeal for many kiwifruit gro...
The unexpected potential of ketamine
13 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Ketamine was first developed as an anaesthetic, and today is taken by some as a party drug. But since 2000, research has emerged showing it is also he...
Building an army to stop a stink bug invasion
06 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
In the Auckland suburb of Mt Albert there's a particular brand of doomsday prepping going on. Our Changing World visits the Bioeconomy Science Institu...
Monitoring plastic pollution in Northland, and the elusive bittern
30 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Our Changing Word heads to Whangārei to speak to a Northland Regional Council scientist whose been using stormwater drains to estimate the scale of o...
The tree keepers
23 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
In Dunedin the local tree crop association has been looking after a heritage apple orchard, but some mixed up labels meant they weren’t quite sure w...
How to grow a kiwi
16 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Take a (very) large egg, some insects (plus specially developed food), and a safe place to put on weight for a while. This is how you grow a kiwi, and...
Iwi-led conservation in the Kaimai Mamuku ranges
09 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
In the Kaimai Mamuku ranges iwi-led conservation projects are tackling pests, removing weeds and planting natives to restore their whenua. Ngāti Hi...
The thorny issue of the long-spined urchin
02 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
A native species is taking over a jewel-in-the crown marine reserve. But what can be done? Centrostephanus, the long-spined urchin, is munching it’...
The Democratisation of Space?
23 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
New Zealand is third in the world for the number of orbital rocket launches from our shores, sitting just behind the US and China. Phil Vine discovers...
Science for future fashion
16 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
We know there are issues with sustainability within the fashion industry - can science help create a better future? Claire Concannon visits the Bioeco...
Going for eradication - Predator free South Westland
09 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Since 2018 there's been a massive effort underway to clear over 110,000 hectares of South Westland of possums, rats and stoats. As the pest numbers ha...
Insect vibes
02 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Some insects communicate using a secret language that we can’t sense – a language of vibrations. Now researchers at the Bioeconomy Science Institu...
Sight in the womb
26 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
When do humans begin to interact with the world, and develop our sense of self? When we are born? Or might it start even earlier than that? Our visua...
Summer science: Methane-busting seaweed
19 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
A Southland company is growing red seaweed as a supplement that’s been shown to significantly reduce methane emissions in beef and dairy cattle. In ...
Summer science: Why we spend
13 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Why do we spend more than we need to? Is it mood, FOMO, the desire to impress? Or maybe some tricky behavioural triggers we're not even aware of? Our ...
Summer science: The science of ageing
05 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
We’d all like to know how to live long healthy lives, and Kim Hill is no different. In this episode of Kim Hill Wants To Know, she talks to genetici...
Summer science: Keeping it crisp
29 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
We all love a good crunchy apple – but how do they stay like that for months after being picked? The Our Changing World summer science series contin...
Summer science: Dollars for nature
22 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week on the summer science series we play an episode of Country Life called Dollars for Nature. Can biodiversity credits fix New Zealand's conser...
Tackling feral cats
17 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Nobody knows how many feral cats roam New Zealand, but estimates are in the millions and they’re a major threat to our native species. They've infil...
The kākāpō files returns and the year in science
15 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
On three small predator-free islands off the coasts of Fiordland and Southland, preparations are underway for what many hope will be the biggest breed...
Restoring Te Awarua o Porirua
08 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The wetlands and surrounding forests of Te Awarua o Porirua, or Porirua Harbour, were once rich food baskets for Ngāti Toa Rangatira. But decades of ...
The best use of your time
01 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What does a ‘good day’ look like for you? Researchers are using wearable sensors and wellbeing surveys to understand how lifestyle patterns impact...
Return of the kākāpō files!
26 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This upcoming summer is likely to be the biggest ever kākāpō breeding season, and RNZ will be following the twists and turns as they happen. The kā...
Restoring freshwater forests
24 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Our freshwater ecosystems are facing numerous challenges. Many of New Zealand’s lakes have lost much of their native underwater plant life. At the R...
Mixing oil and water, the greener way
17 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Oil and water don’t mix — unless surfactants step in. At Auckland University of Technology, a team of chemists has created a new kind of surfactan...
Resurrecting Wellington's Flowers of the Underworld
10 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Until late 2024, nobody had seen te pua o Te Rēinga “the flower of the underworld” in the Wellington region for more than a hundred years. A chan...
The rise of the gold clam
03 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
An invasive species has taken hold in the Waikato River, and it’s multiplying fast. Gold clams, tiny but relentless, are now found along a large str...
SAR4SaR - The folding, floating search and rescue device
27 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
New Zealand’s marine search and rescue region stretches from Antarctica to north of Samoa. If someone goes missing without any means of communicatio...
What makes Ruapehu tick, and boom
20 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
It’s been 30 years since a dramatic series of eruptions at Mount Ruapehu. In that time, there have been great advances in monitoring and modelling v...
When the fame fades
13 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Two years ago, the Australasian crested grebe, the pūteketeke, took out the title of New Zealand’s Bird of the Century. But when the Paris billboar...
Putting AI to use in Aotearoa
06 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
From the public service sector to businesses to individuals, AI’s uptake across New Zealand has been rapid. And it’s not just large language model...
The Lough Hyne sponge mystery
29 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This week, an underwater mystery connecting New Zealand and Ireland - the puzzle of the disappearing sponges of Lough Hyne. In the late 1990s/early 20...
Now on Wild Sounds: Voices from Antarctica
25 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Need a nature fix? RNZ now has a podcast feed dedicated to our beautifully produced series telling stories from te taiao nature. Check out the Wild So...
Detecting cow burps from space
22 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In March 2024, a satellite built to detect the potent greenhouse gas methane launched into orbit – backed by New Zealand to a final total of $32 mil...
New Zealand science in space
15 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In March 2024, a rocket launched from Florida carrying New Zealand’s first science payload to the International Space Station. The small cube, named...
The I-spy carbon mobile
08 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
An elaborate game of carbon ‘I spy’ is happening on the streets of Wellington. With their brand-new mobile carbon lab, Earth Sciences New Zealand ...
The comeback bird
01 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Takahē were believed to be extinct not once, but twice. Today their population is just over 500 – still not a huge number, but big enough that new ...
Powering New Zealand
25 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Gas shortages, a reversal of the ban of offshore oil and gas exploration, and a government plan to double geothermal energy in the next 15 years… Th...
New Zealand’s youth vaping rates
18 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
New Zealand’s youth vaping rates are among the highest in the world. How did we get here and what will this mean for the future of our rangatahi? A ...
The science of non-alcoholic beer
11 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
More and more of us are reaching for low or no-alcohol beers. As the market grows, the options are also expanding – but brewing beer without alcohol...
Turning Taupō green
04 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Project Tongariro was established as a living memorial for five people who died in a tragic helicopter accident. Last November, the project turned 40 ...
The willows and the wetland
28 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The battle on the frontlines of conservation continues around the motu. This week we head to the central North Island to join some of the staff and vo...
The dance of the lanternfish
21 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
During World War II, sonar operators discovered a ‘false seabed’ that appeared to move upwards during the nighttime. In fact, the sound waves were...
A New Zealand approach to nuclear fusion
14 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
For a long time, nuclear fusion was viewed as a powerful, but unachievable, energy source, because the technological challenges were just too great. B...
Tauranga's living sea wall
07 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In May 2024, 100 strange rocky structures were installed along Tauranga's harbour shoreline. These flower-shaped artificial rockpools, nicknamed 'sea ...
Protecting ‘Jaws’ – Aotearoa’s rarest freshwater fish
30 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Speckled, pencil-thin and sporting an underbite: the lowland longjaw galaxias is New Zealand’s rarest freshwater fish species. With just seven known...
New insights from an old vaccine
23 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Since the 1800s, tuberculosis (TB) has been responsible for an estimated 1 billion deaths. In New Zealand today, we don’t get many cases of TB, but ...
Getting ready for H5N1 bird flu
16 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
2020 saw the start of two global pandemics. Covid-19, of course, but also H5N1 bird flu. The latter has swept around the world leaving millions of dea...
Wild Sounds: The new podcast feed for nature
11 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
If you like Our Changing World, you should find and follow Wild Sounds: RNZ's new podcast feed dedicated to incredible natural science stories from Ne...
Tracking turtles
09 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In late 2024 a cluster of sick green sea turtles washed up around the Rangaunu Harbour on the east coast of the Far North. It was just another mystery...
The Chatham Island tūī translocation
02 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
One from the archives! By the 1990s Chatham Island tūī had all but disappeared from the main island. Slightly different to their mainland counterpar...
Wildfire science heats up
28 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Smoke explosions. Fire tornadoes. Burning couches. It all happens in the fire lab: a purpose-built facility where researchers can safely set stuff on ...
Dissecting the world's rarest whale
21 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
How do you go about dissecting the world’s rarest whale? In December 2024, images from a concrete room in Mosgiel, just south of Dunedin, spread aro...
The missing black petrels of Great Barrier Island
14 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
For nearly 30 years, researchers have been banding black petrel fledglings before they make their maiden migration to Ecuador. Only a handful of birds...
The 2024 Prime Minister’s Science Prize winners
06 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Each year, five Prime Minister’s Science Prizes are awarded in the most prestigious New Zealand science awards. We explore the AgResearch science th...
Fiordland's underwater world
30 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
With its steep sides, forested slopes and heavy rainfall, Fiordland has interesting ecosystems both above and below the water. Below the surface of th...
Helping New Zealand’s understated orchids
23 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Cooper’s orchid is New Zealand’s rarest and most elusive, with fewer than 250 plants left in the wild. It belongs to the group of potato orchids, ...
Keeping up with the kākahi
16 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Kākahi are a keystone species in lake and river ecosystems, keeping the water clean by filtering one litre of water every hour. These native mussels ...
Bonus: RNZ climate correspondent Eloise Gibson
15 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Claire Concannon spoke to RNZ's climate correspondent Eloise Gibson for the last episode of the Voice of the Sea Ice series. Listen to the full interv...
Voice of the Sea Ice 06 | Where to?
09 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Human-induced climate change is impacting Earth’s global systems, including ice melt in Antarctica. What is the world doing to combat it? Signed in ...
Voice of the Sea Ice 05 | Changing times
02 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In February 2025, the world hit a new low for global sea ice extent. Arctic sea ice has been declining for several decades now, but Antarctic sea ice ...
Voice of the Sea Ice 04 | More life!
26 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Penguins that return to the ice in the middle of winter to lay their eggs. Seals that use cracks in the ice to keep their pups safe. And fish that hav...
Voice of the Sea Ice 03 | Life!
19 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What’s it like to live and work on the frozen ocean? A team of researchers is camping out on the sea ice to investigate the small critters that live...
Voice of the Sea Ice 02 | Antarctica's heartbeat
12 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Step out on the sea ice just outside New Zealand’s Scott Base with researchers studying the physics of its annual cycle. Each year a massive patch o...
Voice of the Sea Ice 01 | A land of ice and ambition
05 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to Antarctica - a land of ice, extremes, and ambition. From historic expeditions to modern day science projects, Antarctic exploration is a un...
Keeping tabs on Fiordland’s sharks and researching our deep-sea realm
26 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Using acoustic tags and a network of receivers attached to the seafloor, researchers are tracking the movements of sevengill sharks in Fiordland. They...
Recruiting the birds to help reforestation, and investigating ADHD and fidgeting
19 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
People with ADHD often fidget more than those without. Why might this be? Does it help them focus? Or distract them further? An Auckland Bioengineerin...
Trapping to help whio and searching for extreme life
12 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Eastern Whio Link project has been working to restore the whio or blue duck population in the rivers of the Waioeka Gorge. Sam Gibson, aka Sam the...
Your friendly local environment centre
05 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
All around New Zealand, people are trying to make things just a little bit better for their communities. The 22 Environment Centres, or Hubs, found th...
Trapping smarter not harder
29 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Trapping is hard mahi, especially on rugged terrain thick with vegetation. If you need to check a trap frequently to clear it and refresh the lure, th...
Summer science: 'Nature's itching to put the bush back'
22 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The summer science series continues with an episode from RNZ podcast Country Life. From a block of gorse-infected scrubland on Banks Peninsula, renown...
Summer science: Bird bandit
15 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The summer science series continues with an episode from RNZ podcast Black Sheep. Freddie Angell was New Zealand's most notorious wildlife smuggler. H...
Summer science: The underdogs under the ledge
08 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The summer science series continues with an episode from Tune into Nature, a podcast about New Zealand wildlife and wild places, and the people who lo...
Summer science: Plants don't know borders
01 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The summer science series continues with an episode from RNZ podcast Here Now. A love for tropical plants united Canterbury-based botanists Dr Julie B...
Summer science: Mice in Predator Free 2050, and kaimoana for communities
25 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to the summer science series! We're kicking off with two stories made by local podcast producers. First, on New Zealand's quest to become pred...
New Antarctic methane seeps and what they might mean
18 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
New methane seeps are being discovered in Antarctica, some now appearing in areas that researchers have been monitoring for years. These are areas on ...
The bacterial world inside New Zealand's 'living fossil'
11 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
New Zealand’s tuatara are the last remaining species of an order of reptile that was alive alongside the dinosaurs 240 million years ago. The rest d...
Diving into the world of Antarctic glass sponges
04 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Dive under the Antarctic sea ice near Scott Base into the weird world of cold-water life. Pink sea angels, worms that look like intestines, ocean cree...
Pacific Scientific: Samoa's scientists unlocking the power of plants
27 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
For centuries Samoa's traditional healers have harnessed the power of the country's native plants as remedies for village ailments. Now scientists at ...
Bringing ngutukākā back from the brink
20 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Ngutukākā, or kākābeak, is a popular garden plant in Aotearoa. But in the wild, it is now rarer than kākāpō, with only about 100 individual pla...
A tricky trap for redback spiders
13 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Invasive redback spiders are highly venomous, threatening both people and New Zealand’s native species. A team of scientists is developing a cunning...
The advances in MRI coming out of Gisborne
06 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The MRI technique advances coming out of the Mātai Medical Research Institute in Gisborne have been described as ‘pioneering’, ‘groundbreaking’...
The fight for the forest and the fernbird
30 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
About two hours south of Dunedin, in the Catlins, the Tautuku and Fleming rivers flow into the sea at Tautuku beach. Covered in native bush from headw...
Lead bullets - a health risk for humans and kea
23 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Every year in New Zealand, recreational hunters shoot more than half a million wild game. Most are shot with lead-based ammunition. Now, researchers a...
Can birds adapt their nest building for a warming world?
16 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
To keep their eggs safe, some birds build simple cup-shaped nests. Others craft elaborate fully enclosed domes, with porches, fake entrances and ledge...
Why we are still monitoring the ozone hole
09 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Almost 40 years on from the first reports of the Antarctic ozone hole, and 35 years since the Montreal Protocol to ban CFCs came into effect, what’s...
Looking after our four-legged friends
02 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We love our four-legged friends. It’s estimated about a third of New Zealand households share their home with at least one dog, and two thirds of do...
Anxiety and the brain-body connection
25 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We all experience anxiety – when our brains look into the future and imagine bad things happening. It’s normal and has helped keep us alive as a s...
The teamwork that solved a life-and-death puzzle
18 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
It’s been almost 30 years since a team joined forces to investigate a particularly aggressive form of stomach cancer that was afflicting one Taurang...
Some of the light we cannot see
11 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This week, we’re hanging out in the terahertz area of the light spectrum. Sandwiched between infrared light and microwaves, terahertz has been the l...
The 'science shed' across the ditch
04 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Electrons! High speeds! Intense beams of light! Claire Concannon takes a tour of our nearest particle accelerator – the Australian Synchrotron in Me...
Genomics and the future of gene technology in Aotearoa
28 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Advances in the field of genomics (the study of DNA and genomes) have meant big leaps in our ability to sequence, understand and manipulate the genome...
What else can we learn from wastewater
21 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Wastewater testing became part of our daily lives during the Covid-19 pandemic, but what else can it tell us about what’s happening in our communiti...
Imagining the next generation of robofish
14 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
They will look like fish, swim like fish and even sense like fish. Liz Garton meets a research team designing robofish and smart wetsuits to monitor t...
Our musical minds
07 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Making and processing music is something unique to human brains, says Dr Sam Mehr. But why are we so attuned to rhythms, melodies and matching tones? ...
Bonus: Kākāpō update with Dr Andrew Digby
31 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Claire Concannon and Dr Andrew Digby talk about all things kākāpō: that habitat trial and where the birds are now, the next breeding season, and An...
A year of mainland kākāpō
31 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In July 2023 four male kākāpō were released into the fenced Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari - part of a new habitat trial to investigate suitable ...
A voyage of deep-sea discoveries
24 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
An expedition to the Bounty Trough off the Otago Coast uncovers a treasure trove of deep-sea creatures - including some species new to science. Veroni...
Turning food waste into wealth
17 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Avocado seed powder to make snacks, fish waste skin for wound healing, and bioactive compounds made from brewer's spent grain - Claire Concannon visit...