BBC Inside Science Folgen

A NASA spacecraft the size of a sofa is currently orbiting the Moon, gathering information about the toxic perils of moon dust. Dirt from the moon is sharp, spiky and sticky and it caused enormous problems for early astronauts as Professor Sara Russell from the Natural History Museum tells Dr Lucie Green. Joining Lucie from NASA HQ in Washington DC, Sarah Noble, programme scientist on the LADEE Mission, tells her that understanding the make-up and movement of lunar dust is vital to ensure humans can work on the Moon in the future.Electroceuticals is the new research area for medicine, tapping into the electricity transmitted through the vast network of nerves that run throughout our bodies. Kerri Smith reports on how the body's natural wiring could become a valuable tool for treating organs affected by disease. Glaxo Smith Kline has just invested £30 million into electroceuticals and researchers in labs around the world are working on devices that could "plug" into troubled organs and correct the electrical signals that have gone awry.The impact of man-made climate change tends to focus on the things we can see, like shrinking glaciers or the weather. But a study published in Nature this week by a team in Spain, focuses on the impact underground, on the make up of the soil in a sizeable part of the earth's land, the drylands. The impact of increasing aridity is dramatic, affecting the delicate balance between nitrogen, carbon and phosphorus, with serious implications for soil fertility. David Wardle, Professor of Soil and Plant Ecology at the Swedish Institute of Agriculture, tells Lucie Green that this important new study spells out the risks when delicate chemical balances are upset.Oceanographer, Helen Czerski, revealed her instrument, a giant buoy, on Inside Science's Show Us Your Instrument slot in the summer. This week, Helen is launching the buoy into the stormy seas South of Greenland, and Inside Science listeners are being called on to come up with a name ! Bob anyone ? Or Lucie's suggestion, Buoyonce ?Dogs wag their tails more to the right when they're happy and relaxed; more to the left when they're anxious. Georgio Vallortigara, Professor of Neuroscience at the University of Trento in Italy has now shown that asymmetrical tail wagging actually means something to other dogs.Producer: Fiona Hill.

Britain's legacy of nuclear waste dates back 60 plus years and a long term solution to deal with it hasn't yet been found. After this week's announcement that the UK will have a new nuclear power station, Hinkley C in Somerset, Dr Adam Rutherford asks Professor Sue Ion, former Director of Technology at British Nuclear Fuels and Chair of the European Commission's Science and Technology Committee, Euratom, how much extra waste this new plant will add to the radioactive stockpile.Eighteen years ago the first planet outside of our solar system was discovered, "51 Pegasi b". This week the tally of exoplanets passed one thousand, and as astronomer Dr Stuart Clark tells Adam, an earth twin isn't part of the planetary list.....yet.Show Us Your Instrument: Public Astronomer Dr Marek Kukula introduces the original Six Pip Masterclock at the Greenwich Observatory. This clock was used in the 1920s to send the time signals down a telephone line to the BBC, for transmission to the whole country over the radio. That's not the case now, and Adam goes down into the basement of Broadcasting House in London in search of the atomic clock that's now used to generate the Greenwich Time Signal and the famous BBC pips.iGEM is a global biology competition that allows students to build their own organisms. The UK has two teams going to the grand final next week. Adam goes to meet the team from Imperial College London, who have made a bacterium which produces plastic.Producer: Fiona Hill.

The link between genetics and a child's academic performance hit the headlines this week when Education Secretary, Michael Gove's outgoing special advisor, Dominic Cummings, called for education policy to incorporate the science behind genes and cognitive development. Mr Cummings cited the Professor of Behavioural Genetics, Robert Plomin, as a major source, and Professor Plomin tells Dr Adam Rutherford what he thinks about the way his research has been interpreted. Steve Jones, Emeritus Professor of Genetics from University College London says why he believes genetics and education is such a controversial subject.Fifty years ago, researchers tried, and failed, to teach chimpanzees English. They concluded that chimp noises were merely basic expressions of fear or pleasure. Dr Katie Slocombe from York University has shown that chimp language is far more tactical, machiavellian even, than that.The inventor of Golden Rice, the genetically modified crop, tells Adam Rutherford that he agrees with Environment Secretary, Owen Paterson, that those who attack GM crops are "wicked". Professor Ingo Potrykus from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich developed Golden Rice enriched with Vitamin A in 1999 and believes that opposition to GM foods has prevented the crop being grown and widely planted. But, nearly 80 years old, Professor Potrykus tells Inside Science that he still believes Golden Rice will be grown and eaten throughout the world during his lifetime. Rhys Phillips makes lightning at a Cardiff laboratory for this week's Show Us Your Instrument. It's used to test aeroplane parts. Less metal in an aircraft makes it lighter but too little and the lightning may damage the plane. The safest way to test is to make your own lightning, at ground level.Producer: Fiona Hill.