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The World, the Universe and Us

From the evolution of intelligent life, to the mysteries of consciousness; from the threat of the climate crisis to the search for dark matter,The world, the universe and usis your essential weekly dose of science and wonder in an uncertain world. Hosted by journalists Dr Rowan Hooper and Dr Penny Sarchet and joined each week by expert scientists in the field, the show draws onNew Scientist’s unparalleled depth of reporting to put the stories that matter into context. Feed your curiosity with the

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All Episodes

25:17

Weekly: Do sperm whales have an alphabet?; Why dark...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/05/10

#249Do whales have their own alphabet? We’ve long thought the clicking sounds that sperm whales make is their way of chatting to each other, but those clicks may be even more sophisticated than we realised. After analysing whale recordings, researchers suggest the different click patterns are complex enough to form an alphabet – the closest thing to human communication we’ve yet seen in animals.We know very little about dark energy – and it turns out we may know even less than we thought. This

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32:48

CultureLab: Elizabeth Kolbert on what we’re missing...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/05/07

How do we understand the stakes of climate change, and communicate them? As we’re facing the consequences of climate change and our historical inaction as a species, how do we come to terms with the reality and uncertainty of our situation?In H is for Hope: Climate Change from A to Z, Journalist and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Elizabeth Kolbert breaks things down for us, alphabetically. She dissects the narratives around climate change, from sobering facts about our warming planet, to innovations

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29:48

Weekly: Is climate change accelerating?; Anger vs...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/05/03

#248Last year marked the hottest on record, shattering previous temperature benchmarks across both land and sea. The rapid escalation – seemingly at odds with the expected cooling after coming out of a La Niña cycle – has prompted scientists to question if climate change is accelerating beyond our models' predictionsJust eight minutes of anger can significantly impair blood vessel function and potentially increase the risk of a heart attack. A study has looked into the physiological mechanisms of

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23:33

Dead Planets Society: A Neverending Solar Eclipse

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/04/29

Did you miss out on the recent total eclipse? Don’t fear, we’ve got the solution. We bring you the constant solar eclipse.Chelsea Whyte and Leah Crane have decided not to destroy the Sun this time. Instead, they just want to block it from view at all times. But it’s all in the name of good – so everyone gets to experience the same “primal fear” Leah did when she first saw an eclipse.What starts with a modest-sized sunshade in low-Earth orbit creating 5 second eclipses, quickly turns into moving

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33:10

Weekly: What India elections mean for climate change;...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/04/26

#247What does India’s election season mean for climate change? Last year India overtook the European Union as the third largest annual emitter of greenhouse gases. And as voters head to the polls in the middle of an intense heat wave, it’s critical whichever party wins continues to push towards the goal of net zero emissions by 2070. But as the country continues to invest in expanding coal power, is that target achievable?Animals of all kinds communicate in so many different ways, but what are they

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28:27

CultureLab: Meredith Broussard on trusting artificial...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/04/22

How much faith should we be putting in artificial intelligence? As large language models and generative AI have become increasingly powerful in recent years, their makers are pushing the narrative that AI is a solution to many of the world’s problems.But Meredith Broussard says we’re not there yet, if we even get there at all. Broussard is the author of More than a Glitch: Confronting Race, Gender, and Ability Bias in Tech. She coined the term “technochauvinism,” which speaks to a pro-technology

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33:01

Weekly: Carbon storage targets ‘wildly unrealistic’;...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/04/19

#246Our best climate models for helping limit global warming to 1.5oC may have wildly overestimated our chances. To reach this goal, models are relying heavily on geological carbon storage, a technology that removes carbon from the atmosphere and places it underground. But it may not be nearly as effective as models have suggested, making the task of decarbonising much more difficult. Do we need to rethink our approach?Intel has announced it has constructed the world’s biggest computer modelled on

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24:59

Dead Planets Society: How to Destroy A Black Hole

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/04/15

How do you destroy a black hole? Turns out they're pretty tough cookies.Kicking off a brand new series of Dead Planets Society, Chelsea Whyte and Leah Crane take on the universe's most powerful adversaries. With the help of their cosmic toolbelt and black hole astronomer Allison Kirkpatrick at the University of Kansas, they test all the destructive ideas they can think of.Whether it’s throwing masses of TNT at it, blasting it with a t-shirt gun full of white holes, loading it up with a multiverse

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29:29

Weekly: The multiverse just got bigger; saving the...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/04/12

#245The multiverse may be bigger than we thought. The idea that we exist in just one of a massive collection of alternate universes has really captured the public imagination in the last decade. But now Hugh Everett’s 60-year-old “many worlds interpretation”, based on quantum mechanics, has been upgraded.The northern white rhino is on the brink of extinction but we may be able to save it. Scientists plan to use frozen genes from 12 now dead rhinos to rebuild the entire subspecies. But how do you

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39:17

CultureLab: Jen Gunter on the taboo science of...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/04/08

Half of the human population undergoes the menstrual cycle for a significant proportion of their lifetimes, yet periods remain a taboo topic in public and private life. And that makes it harder both to prioritise necessary scientific research into conditions like endometriosis and for people to understand the basics of how their bodies work.Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation is gynaecologist Jen Gunter’s latest book. In this practical guide, she dispels social, historical

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30:58

Weekly: Miniature livers made from lymph nodes in...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/04/05

#244Researchers have successfully turned lymph nodes into miniature livers that help filter the blood of mice, pigs and other animals – and now, trials are beginning in humans. If successful, the groundbreaking medical procedure could prove life-saving for thousands of people waiting for liver transplants around the world. So far, no complications have been seen from the procedure, but it will be several months before we know if the treatment is working as hoped in the first of 12 trial participants

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18:48

Escape Pod: #8 Escape from predators and escape from...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/04/01

This is a re-airing of a podcast originally released in March 2021.From beetle explosions to the deep dark depths of the ocean, this episode is all about escape.The team discusses the amazing (and sometimes disgusting) way bombardier beetles escape predators.They explain what it takes for an object to reach escape velocity, celebrating the mathematical mind of Katherine Johnson while they’re at it.And they explore the daunting realms of free-diving, and the lengths people will go to for a bit of

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26:10

Weekly: Immune system treatment makes old mice seem...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/03/29

#243As we age our immune systems do too, making us less able to fight infections and more prone to chronic inflammation. But a team of scientists has been able to reverse these effects in mice, rejuvenating their immune systems by targeting their stem cells. But there’s a long road to trying the same thing in humans.Have you seen the incredible new black hole image? Just a couple of years since the Event Horizon Telescope’s first, fuzzy image of Sagittarius A* – the black hole at the centre of our

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33:01

CultureLab: Stranded on a fantastical planet: The...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/03/26

Fish you wear like a gas mask, moss that turns a robot sentient and critters that will eat your rash – all these oddities and more cohabit on the planet Vesta, the setting for the animated miniseries Scavengers Reign, where a group of human space travellers must innovate with what they find in the landscape to survive. While all this sounds fantastical, there are many parallels with Earth’s ecosystem and the way we regularly borrow technology from the natural world.New Scientist physics reporter

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27:17

Weekly: How declining birth rates could shake up...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/03/22

#242Human population growth is coming to an end. The global population is expected to peak between 2060 and 2080, then start falling. Many countries will have much lower birth rates than would be needed to support ageing populations. These demographic projections have major implications for the way our societies function, including immigration and transportation, and what kinds of policies and systems we need.Remember Rosie the Robot from The Jetsons? Humanoid robots capable of many different tasks

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16:28

#7 Speed: From the quickest animal in the world to...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/03/19

This is a re-airing of a podcast originally released in February 2021.From the quickest animal in the world to the fastest supercomputer, this episode is all about speed.Opening with the cries of the peregrine falcon, the team finds out how the bird has evolved to endure flying at more than 200mph.Then they explain how scientists, starting from Galileo, attempted to measure the speed limit of the universe, the speed of light, and how Einstein understood what it meant.And they explore the

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26:16

Weekly: Gaza’s impending long-term health crisis

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/03/15

#241More than 2 million Palestinians in Gaza face widespread hunger, disease and injury as the war quickly becomes the worst humanitarian crisis in modern memory. Even once the war ends, the devastating physical and emotional health consequences will be felt for many years to come, especially by children. And aid groups like UNICEF and the World Health Organization have no long-term plans to meet the post-war health needs of the population.Gravity on Mars may occasionally be strong enough to stir up

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35:05

CultureLab: Rebecca Boyle on how the moon transformed...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/03/12

There’s no moon like our moon. A celestial body twinned with Earth, the moon guides the tides, stabilises our climate, leads the rhythms of animal behaviour and has long been a source of wonder and awe.Our Moon: How Earth's Celestial Companion Transformed the Planet, Guided Evolution, and Made Us Who We Are, is a new book from science journalist Rebecca Boyle. In it she takes an intimate look at our satellite and how it’s influenced everything from our species’ understanding of long cycles of time

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27:39

Weekly: Woolly mammoth breakthrough?; The...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/03/08

#240A major step has been made toward bringing woolly mammoths back from extinction – sort of. The company Colossal has the ambitious goal of bringing its first baby mammoth into the world by 2028. And its newest advance, announced this week, is in turning adult Asian elephant cells into stem cells. But it’s still a long way from here to the company’s vision of cold-adapted elephants fighting climate change in the Arctic – or even that 2028 baby mammoth.When did humans begin to affect the Earth’s

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16:32

Escape Pod: #6 All About Warmth: Emotional,...

The World, the Universe and Us ·

2024/03/05

This is a re-airing of a podcast originally released in February 2021.Keeping you cosy this week is an episode all about warmth - emotional, physiological and geological.We have an unexpected start to the show, with bees taking the spotlight, but it turns out these cold-blooded little insects can generate immense warmth when necessary.The team then takes a much bigger view of warmth, discussing the heat of the planet, and of the many uses of geothermal energy.Finally they wrap up by finding out what

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