
BBC Inside Science
BBC Radio 4
Categories: Science & Medicine
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On Thursday, The UN Environmental Programme published a report called Making Peace With Nature. It attempts to synthesise vast amounts of scientific knowledge and communicate “how climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution can be tackled jointly within the framework of the Sustainable Development Goals”. But it also offers clear and digestible messages that governments, institutions, businesses and individuals can act upon. Concluding BBC Inside Science’s month-long look at some of the challenges ahead of COP26 in Glasgow later this year, and its sister biodiversity meeting in China, Vic speaks with the report’s co-lead Prof Sir Robert Watson FRS and the Tyndall Centre’s Prof Rachel Warren, also a contributing author. Can all the ills of the natural world really be tackled at once? Game-shooting, for sport and food, has traditionally used the toxic metal lead for ammunition. In other parts of the world its use has been banned for the dangers to the human food chain and to the pollution in natural environments, and even deaths of wildfowl from poisoning. But not so in the UK. A year ago, as reported on Inside Science at the time, the shooting community announced a voluntary five year transition period to alternative shot materials. But researchers including profs Rhys Green and Debbie Pain from Cambridge University have discovered that a year on, little seems to have changed. Gathering game sold for food across the UK, they found that all but one bird in their sample of 180 contained lead shot. Meanwhile, up in the Himalayas, Smithsonian scientist Dr Sahas Barva was enjoying the scenery on a cold day off in 2014 when he saw and heard a tiny Goldcrest, thriving in temperatures of -10C. Wondering how such a tiny thing could keep its body insulated, he decided to investigate feathers, and utilizing the huge numbers of specimens in the Smithsonian’s collection he found some striking commonalities in the thermal properties and adaptations of birds everywhere. The higher up they live, the fluffier their coats. Presented by Victoria Gill Produced by Alex Mansfield Made in association with The Open University.
Previous episodes
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398 - Good COP Bad COP, Shotgun Lead Persistence, and Featherdown Adaptation Thu, 25 Feb 2021
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397 - Nasa's Perseverance - will it pay off? And spotting likely hosts for future pandemics. Thu, 18 Feb 2021
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396 - Meeting Mars, Melting Ice, Ozone on the Mend Again, and A Sea Cacophany Thu, 11 Feb 2021
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395 - Putting a number on biodiversity Thu, 04 Feb 2021
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394 - 28/01/2021 Thu, 28 Jan 2021
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393 - Vaccine Hesitancy and Ethnicity; The Joy of catnip; Lake Heatwaves Thu, 21 Jan 2021
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392 - UK Science post Brexit; GMOs vs Gene Editing regulation; Identical Twins That Aren't Indentical Thu, 14 Jan 2021
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391 - Vaccine Dosing and Biodiversity Soundscape Monitoring Thu, 07 Jan 2021
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390 - Brian Cox and Alice Roberts on a decade of extraordinary science Thu, 31 Dec 2020
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389 - Space Rocks, Aquatic Dinosaurs and Global Temperatures; 2020 science reviewed Thu, 24 Dec 2020
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388 - Covid mutation; On the facial expression of emotions; A mystery object Thu, 17 Dec 2020
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387 - Future risk planning; Millennium Seed Bank; Urban trees Thu, 10 Dec 2020
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386 - Protein folding; Hyabusa sample return; Holiday Covid testing Thu, 03 Dec 2020
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385 - 26/11/2020 Thu, 26 Nov 2020
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384 - COVID Operation Moonshot; Big Compost Experiment; Gulf of Mexico meteorite and new life Thu, 19 Nov 2020
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383 - mRNA vaccinations; bacterial space miners; Artemis accords Thu, 12 Nov 2020
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382 - COVID in families; earthquake under Aegean Sea; Camilla Pang wins science book prize Thu, 05 Nov 2020
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381 - A new saliva gland, Bill Bryson on the Human Body, and the return of the Dust Bowl Thu, 29 Oct 2020
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380 - COVID reinfections, Susannah Cahalan questions psychiatry and sense of smell and COVID Thu, 22 Oct 2020
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379 - Test and trace - how the UK compares to the rest of the world; Linda Scott's book The Double X Economy Thu, 15 Oct 2020
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378 - 08/10/2020 Thu, 08 Oct 2020
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377 - Brian May's Cosmic Clouds 3-D; How fish move between waterbodies and Jim Al-Khalili's take on physics Thu, 01 Oct 2020
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376 - Royal Society Science Book Prize - Gaia Vince; Biodiversity loss and Science Museum mystery object Thu, 24 Sep 2020
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375 - COVID-19 in Winter, Acoustics of Stonehenge and Dog years Thu, 17 Sep 2020
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374 - Coronavirus: The types of vaccine; How the UK is scaling up vaccine production Thu, 10 Sep 2020
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373 - Bird and dinosaur skull evolution; the wonders of yeast and Science Museum mystery object Thu, 03 Sep 2020
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372 - What does the science say about the COVID risks of schools reopening? Dolphin ear autopsy Thu, 27 Aug 2020
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371 - Smart bricks, The Royal Academy of Engineering awards for pandemic engineering solutions and detecting SARS-Cov-2 in sewage Thu, 20 Aug 2020
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370 - Land use and zoonoses, California's earthquake risk and the Tuatara genome Thu, 13 Aug 2020
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369 - How sperm swim, the theory of soil & the Big Compost Experiment update Thu, 06 Aug 2020
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368 - Science Museum mystery objects; home security camera security and Rosalind Franklin at 100 Thu, 30 Jul 2020
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367 - Pre-prints over peer review during the COVID pandemic and roads and birds Thu, 23 Jul 2020
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366 - Science Fraud & Bias, Immunity to COVID-19 Thu, 16 Jul 2020
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365 - Satellite navigation in the UK; the science of the World Wide Web and Neolithic genomics Thu, 09 Jul 2020
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364 - Preventing pandemics, invading alien species, blood types & COVID-19. Thu, 02 Jul 2020
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363 - The Human Genome Project's 20th Anniversary Thu, 25 Jun 2020
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362 - Coronavirus conspiracy, Listeners' mask questions, Solar Orbiter gets close to the Sun Thu, 18 Jun 2020
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361 - Engineering out of lockdown and should we castrate male dogs? Thu, 11 Jun 2020
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360 - Back to School and Covid-19 and Ordnance Survey and the pandemic Thu, 04 Jun 2020
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359 - Testing & Tracing the coronavirus, and the traces our movements leave behind Thu, 28 May 2020
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358 - Coronavirus-free science, the impact of lockdown on climate change and the odds of both life and intelligent life existing. Thu, 21 May 2020
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357 - Coronavirus R number, genome study of Covid-19 survivors and using aircraft messages to assess aviation Thu, 14 May 2020
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356 - Should the public wear face masks? Did SARS-Cov-2 escape from a laboratory in Wuhan? Thu, 07 May 2020
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355 - Testing for immunity to COVID-19 and Citizen science on BBC Radio past and present Thu, 30 Apr 2020
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354 - Understanding Covid-19 death rates; Contact tracing apps; Whale sharks and atomic bombs Thu, 23 Apr 2020
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353 - Lockdown lessons for climate change and the carbon neutral Cumbrian coal mine Thu, 16 Apr 2020
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352 - Testing for asymptomatic coronavirus carriers, Human Cell Atlas, and invasive parakeets Thu, 09 Apr 2020
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351 - Coronavirus: Models & being ‘led by the science’; Mars500 isolation tips; Kids’ science - singing glasses Thu, 02 Apr 2020
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350 - Coronavirus - Lockdown efficacy; viral testing; surface survival; dog walking safety Thu, 26 Mar 2020
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349 - TB vaccination to replace culling in badgers; Neil Shubin on the wonders of evolution Thu, 19 Mar 2020