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PODCAST

CrowdScience

BBC World Service

We take your questions about life, Earth and the universe to researchers hunting for answers at the frontiers of knowledge.

science

All Episodes

32:52

Is beer better without alcohol?

CrowdScience ·

2025/01/10

In the past stout beer has been touted for its supposed health benefits. Is there any truth to those claims - and what happens if you take the alcohol out?CrowdScience listener Aengus pondered these questions down at the pub, after noticing most of his friends were drinking non-alcoholic beers. He wondered how the non-alcoholic stuff is made – what’s taken out and what’s added in – and whether the final product is better for you than the alcoholic version.It’s a question that takes us to Belgium,

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26:29

Why am I embarrassed when I fall?

CrowdScience ·

2025/01/03

When listener Diana fell on a run on her birthday, her first instinct was not to check her bruised hand, but instead to get up as quickly as possible and act as if nothing had happened. She felt embarrassed. Meanwhile, her son Marley loves to watch fail videos that, mostly, show people falling over. So why does falling – something that can cause serious injury – elicit both embarrassment and laughter? In the name of CrowdScience, presenter Caroline Steel trips, stumbles and falls. She spends a

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26:28

I didn’t know that!

CrowdScience ·

2024/12/27

Did you know that flies fly in rectangles, fish hide by lighting themselves up and the moon is lifting the ground underneath your feet? Anand Jagatia quizzes members of the CrowdScience team on the moments from the past year that had them scratching their heads in amazement. We hear Dr Erica McAlister’s attempts to calculate how many flies have ever existed, and about flies’ mating choreography, courtesy of Prof Jochen Zeil. We learn how to tell a mosquito’s sex thanks to Eggrey Aisha Kambewa and Dr

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26:28

Will the Earth ever lose its Moon?

CrowdScience ·

2024/12/20

The Moon has always sparked human curiosity. It governs the tides and biological rhythms. It’s inspired myths and stories. It’s inspired us to reach out and explore it. And it's certainly inspired CrowdScience listeners, who have sent us a host of questions about it. And in a special lunar-themed episode we’ve brought together a panel of astronomers and planetary scientists to help answer them. What would life be like if there was no Moon? Would there even be life? Or what if we had two moons? Are

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29:19

Why does pain sometimes feel good?

CrowdScience ·

2024/12/13

It seems bizarre to seek out experiences that are uncomfortable or downright painful. Yet examples abound: it’s common to eat painfully hot chillies, drink bitter coffee, or ‘feel the burn' when exercising - and enjoy it.CrowdScience listener Sandy is baffled by this seemingly counterintuitive phenomenon, and has asked us to investigate. Presenter Anand Jagatia turns guinea pig as he tests a variety of unpleasant sensations, and unpicks the reasons we’re sometimes attracted to them. He meets

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32:13

Why am I good at jigsaw puzzles?

CrowdScience ·

2024/12/07

For their fans, jigsaw puzzles are a satisfying challenge, a focus, a chance to put everything else aside for a moment and be creative. But for other people they’re a frustrating jumble of random shapes and colours, a pointless task which is best left in the box.CrowdScience listener Heather is definitely a fan. She loves doing jigsaw puzzles and she wants to know why some people are so good at them. What skills do you need to find a pattern amongst all those shapes and colours? How do our

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29:57

Can I improve my sense of direction

CrowdScience ·

2024/11/29

Do you find your bearings quickly or are you easily disorientated? Do your friends trust you with the directions in a new city? Finding our way in the physical world, whether that is around a building or a city, is an important everyday capability, one that has been integral to human survival. This week CrowdScience listener David wants to know whether some people are ‘naturally’ better at navigating, so presenter Marnie Chesterton sets her compass and journeys into the human brain. Accompanied by

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28:44

Why can't my dog live as long as me?

CrowdScience ·

2024/11/22

As we enter our teenage years, many of us feel like life is just getting started. But for dogs, celebrating a ‘teen’ birthday is a sign of old age, entering a phase when things start slowing down. Listener Susan was besotted with her beloved corgi Copper John and wants to know why our furry companions rarely live as long as us.We investigate what accounts for the huge differences in lifespans across animal species. From fish that live a few weeks, to sharks who can survive for 500 years, what are

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31:42

What does my voice say about me?

CrowdScience ·

2024/11/15

Maybe you have a deep, booming voice. Or perhaps it’s light and mellifluous. Some people’s voices are honey-smooth while others are as rough as gravel. But why does your voice sound the way it does?CrowdScience listener Hannah in Berlin is training as a teacher and will be using her voice a lot in the classroom in future. She wants to understand more about it: how can she improve the quality of her voice and protect it? And what factors - physical, genetic and environmental - determine the sound

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30:19

Why is my house getting sunnier?

CrowdScience ·

2024/11/08

CrowdScience listeners David and Tatiana have long been captivated by an unusual dinner table discussion: the peculiar change they’ve noticed over the past 16 years in the sunlight streaming through their bedroom window in Ostend, Belgium. They’re convinced that the room has not only become sunnier but that the actual angle of sunlight has shifted.Intrigued by their observations, we head to Ostend. Our mission: to investigate three of their theories, enlisting expert help along the way.Theory 1 – A

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29:29

Why do some mushrooms glow?

CrowdScience ·

2024/11/01

Fungi are a mysterious and understudied life form. And to add to the intrigue, some of them actually glow in the dark. This phenomenon has sparked CrowdScience listener Derek's curiosity, and he's asked us to investigate.Presenter Caroline Steel gets on the case. This is just one example of the natural wonder that is bioluminescence – living organisms that glow. How do they produce their light, and is there any reason for it? Caroline visits a bioluminescent bay in Puerto Rico, and Dr Brenda

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26:54

Why do languages fade from us?

CrowdScience ·

2024/10/25

Can learning new languages make us forget our mother tongue? CrowdScience listener Nakombe in Cameroon is concerned that his first language, Balue, is slipping from his grasp. He has learned multiple languages through his life, but Balue is the language of his family and home. It’s central to his identity and sense of belonging. So why does it seem to be fading from him, and what can he do to get it back?We search for answers, investigating what happens in our brains when we struggle to recall

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26:28

Why do my armpits smell?

CrowdScience ·

2024/10/18

While there is a myriad of deodorants, shower gels and perfumes helping us stay fresh and fragrant today, that hasn’t always been the case. How did humans stay clean in the past, or did they not care so much? And is there an evolutionary reason for human body odour in the first place? These are questions that CrowdScience listener Sarah has pondered on trips in her camper van, when she wants to keep clean, but washing isn’t always convenient. In search of answers, presenter Anand Jagatia delves

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32:25

What's the best voting system?

CrowdScience ·

2024/10/11

2024 is the biggest election year in history. From Taiwan to India, the USA to Ghana, by the end of the year almost half of the world’s population will have had the chance to choose who governs them.But there are a huge number of possible voting systems – and listener James wants CrowdScience to find out which is the fairest. To do so, we create a fictional country called CrowdLand to try out different electoral systems. Presenter Caroline Steel consults mathematician David McCune and political

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26:28

Why don’t sunflowers fall over?

CrowdScience ·

2024/10/04

With huge heads on top of spindly stalks, how do sunflowers defy gravity to stay standing? That was a question sent to CrowdScience by listener Frank, whose curiosity was piqued by the towering sunflowers on his neighbour’s deck. They stay up not only when the weather is fine, but, even more impressively, during strong winds. Could this feat of strength, flexibility and balance inspire the construction of tall buildings? It's a question that takes presenter Anand Jagatia to a sunflower festival in

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30:31

How did the Moon affect the dinosaurs?

CrowdScience ·

2024/09/27

The Moon and Earth are drifting gradually further apart. Every year the gap between them increases by a few centimetres. We know that the Moon’s gravity has an important effect on Earth - from controlling the tides to affecting the planet’s rotation - but slowly, imperceptibly, over billions of years, that influence will diminish as the Moon moves away.For CrowdScience listener Tony in the UK that idea poses another question. What if we were to look back in time? What effects did the Moon have

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29:37

Are we mature by 18?

CrowdScience ·

2024/09/20

18 is the age of majority, or maturity, in most countries around the world. Depending where you live, it might be when you can vote, buy alcohol, or get married. But what's so special about 18 that makes it the beginning of adulthood? CrowdScience listener Lynda didn't feel very mature back then. She recalls a difficult decision that made her wonder what science has to say about when we’re truly grown up. How developed are we, physically, mentally and emotionally, by the age of 18? And how much

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39:49

Is the car an apex predator?

CrowdScience ·

2024/09/13

An apex predator is a killer. Usually large and terrifying, they enjoy the privilege of life at the top of a food chain. Nothing will eat them, leaving them free to wreak carnage on more vulnerable creatures. In biology, it’s a term normally reserved for animals like polar bears, tigers and wolves. But CrowdScience listener Eoin wonders whether there’s a non-animal candidate for apex predator: the car. After all, worldwide, more than 1.5 million humans die on the roads each year, while pollution

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28:24

What is the voice inside my head?

CrowdScience ·

2024/09/06

Many of us experience an inner voice: we silently talk to ourselves as we go about our daily lives. CrowdScience listener Fredrick has been wondering about the science behind this interior dialogue.We hear from psychologists researching our inner voice and discover that it’s something that begins in early childhood. Presenter Caroline Steel meets Russell Hurlburt, a pioneering scientist who devised a method of researching this - and volunteers to monitor her own inner speech to figure out what’s

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31:33

Can my body regenerate?

CrowdScience ·

2024/08/30

It would be quite a superpower to regrow entire body parts. CrowdScience listener Kelly started pondering this after a discussion with her friend on whether human tongues could regrow. Finding out that they couldn't, she asked us to investigate the extent of human regenerative abilities. Presenter Alex Lathbridge travels to Vienna, a hotbed of research in this area. He meets an animal with much better powers of regeneration than humans - the axolotl. In Elly Tanaka’s lab he finds out how she studies

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482 results

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