Science In Action
271 episodes - English - Latest episode: 3 days ago - ★★★★★ - 299 ratingsThe BBC brings you all the week's science news.
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Episodes
Brightest supernova in a decade
May 25, 2023 20:00 - 27 minutes - 12.7 MBA star in the nearby Pinwheel Galaxy has exploded spectacularly into a supernova, dubbed SN 2023ixf. It is the brightest in a decade and it has got astronomers around the world into a frenzy. Science in Action hears from both amateur and professional astronomers alike as they scramble to collect exciting new images and data. Back on the ground, we hear from the Professor of Climate Change and Earth System Science at the University of Exeter, Tim Lenton about his new paper highlighting how ...
Return of the Wildfires
May 18, 2023 20:00 - 29 minutes - 13.6 MBOver the past few weeks, wildfires have scorched over 1,800 square miles of land across North West America and are still going strong. Dr Mike Flannigan, professor at the Department of Renewable Resources at the University of Alberta, talks to Roland about the weather patterns and record-breaking heat causing the devastating flames. On the other side of the world, in Zambia, Dr Edgar Simulundu has been finding out why some humans attract mosquitoes more than others, and how we can use thi...
Human genome goes global
May 11, 2023 20:00 - 27 minutes - 12.7 MBIn 2003, an incredible scientific milestone was achieved as the first human genome completed sequencing. For 20 years, this genome has been used as a reference by researchers for comparison to all other DNA sequences. Now, the Human Pangenome Reference Consortium is addressing the lack of genetic diversity starting with 47 new reference genomes. Members of the consortium, Dr Karen Miga, assistant professor, UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute and Dr Benedict Paten, associate professor, UC Santa...
Darwin dumped from Indian classrooms
May 04, 2023 20:00 - 30 minutes - 14 MBIndia is at the centre of much of the discussion on this week’s episode of Science In Action. We hear about how a proposal to scrap Darwinian evolution from Indian secondary schools has led to signatures from thousands of scientists. Dr Vineeta Bal, Researcher at the National University of Immunology, is one of the signatories on a petition against the proposed changes. We spoke to her about why she is against them. Also in India, a new Sars-Cov-2 variant, named XBBX.16 is being studied b...
The truth about the Sudan biolab
April 27, 2023 20:00 - 32 minutes - 14.7 MBKhartoum’s National Public Health Laboratory has been caught up in the ongoing conflict in Sudan. Dr Maysoon Dahab and Dr Ayman Ahmed explain the situation and why health labs are often targeted in conflicts. Virus hunters have used artificial intelligence to discover more than 180,000 new viruses. Professor Eddie Holmes and Dr Mang Shi tell Roland how AI is completely transforming the field of viral discovery. Experts have forecasted a return to El Niño conditions later this year, which c...
Africa moves towards creating and manufacturing its own vaccines
April 20, 2023 20:00 - 28 minutes - 13 MBThe pandemic showed Africa at the back of the global queue when it came to vaccines. That should never happen again if plans being debated in Cape Town this week go ahead. Roland talks to Seanette Wilson of South Africa's Biovac. Also in the programme: life finds a way on plastic floating in the ocean; Greenland rock dust as a global fertiliser; and designing proteins from scratch. Image Credit: Robert Bonet/NurPhoto via Getty Images Presenter: Roland Pease Producer: Roland Pease Assistan...
Bird flu: The global threat
April 13, 2023 20:00 - 31 minutes - 14.5 MBH5N1, a highly pathogenic avian flu is racing across the world, and has infected multiple species, including wild and farmed birds, and mammals from cats to sea lions. What can be done to control it? Roland Pease talks to global experts about the dangers to animal and human health, and about the measures to bring the outbreak under control. Producer: Roland Pease Assistant producer: Sophie Ormiston (Photo: A government worker examines chicks for signs of bird flu infection at a poultry far...
Chasing tornados in the American mid-West
April 06, 2023 20:00 - 30 minutes - 13.9 MBChasing tornados in the American mid-West – scientists are trying to learn the maximum from the tornado outbreaks currently in America. Professor Karen Kosiba calls us from a radar truck studying the storms, and Professor John Allen explains the energy powering them. From the weather of today to the skies of 800 years ago... Dr Sébastien Guillet reveals how lunar observations by medieval monks are helping untangle the connection between historic eruptions and climate. Finally, we go ba...
Gene editing breakthrough
March 30, 2023 20:00 - 33 minutes - 15.2 MBWe look at a gene editing breakthrough, a new technique to correct genetic errors in sick patients. Roland speaks to Professor David Liu to learn about the base editing technology. Also, we look into the complex causes of last year's post-pandemic spike in child hepatitis. Professor Judy Breuer and her colleagues may have found an explanation behind the unexpected outbreak. And the James Webb Space Telescope continues to seek out the secrets of our universe. Professor Beth Biller and Dr El...
Animals at the Wuhan Market
March 24, 2023 12:41 - 31 minutes - 14.3 MBDNA has revealed potential animal COVID carriers at the Wuhan market, but what does that tell us about the start of the pandemic? Roland talks to two of the experts behind the new analysis: Dr Florence Débarre and Professor Eddie Holmes. Also, we look into Europe’s grand new space ambitions. ESA director general Josef Aschbacher gives Roland the details of the space agency’s out-of-this-world plans. And Beethoven's last DNA: a hairy story of his family and genetic afflictions. Dr Tristan B...
Return of Cyclone Freddy
March 16, 2023 21:00 - 32 minutes - 14.9 MB34 days after it first formed at the far end of the Indian Ocean, record-breaking Cyclone Freddy made a repeat landfall on Mozambique as well as passing over Malawi, causing extensive damage and loss of life. Climate scientists Liz Stephens and Izidine Pinto join Roland to give an update on the destruction and explain how Cyclone Freddy kept going for an exceptionally long time. At the Third International Human Genome Summit in London last week, Professor Katsuhiko Hayashi announced he had ...
Human Genome Editing - Promise and Peril
March 09, 2023 21:00 - 34 minutes - 16 MBHuman Genome Editing: The team meet experts at the Human Genome Editing Summit in London, seeking to cure genetic disease and ensure that it's safe and available to all. Roland Pease hears from Victoria Gray, the first person to be cured of the debilitating and life-shortening disease sickle cell anaemia by gene editing, and from the scientists making it possible. Also, the prospect of work to attempt gene rescue in fetuses before they are born. But the technology is expensive and complex ...
Drought worsens in East Africa
March 02, 2023 21:00 - 32 minutes - 15 MBThe long rains of East Africa are forecast to fail again, for the third year running, precipitating a food crisis affecting millions. Science In Action explores the science of the drought, hears about new methods improving forecasts, and what is unusual about the region that makes it so vulnerable. When we think of helium, for many of us balloons and squeaky voices come to mind. But the noble gas is critical for many aspects of modern life – and we’re facing a global shortage. Dr Annie Chen...
Cyclone Freddy batters Madagascar
February 23, 2023 21:00 - 32 minutes - 14.7 MBCyclone Freddy has made landfall on Madagascar, leaving destruction in its wake. At the time this edition of Science In Action is going to air, Freddy is on course to reach Mozambique and South Africa. Freddy, which has been gaining strength since it originally formed on the 30th of January, is the most powerful southern hemisphere cyclone on record. Professor Francois Engelbrecht provides the science behind the storm system. In the centre of our galaxy, an enormous cloud is heading towards...
CRISPR & bioethics
February 16, 2023 21:00 - 31 minutes - 14.5 MBIn the decade since the genome editing capabilities of CRISPR-Cas9 emerged, research into novel medicines has boomed – but alongside progress comes new ethical considerations. Controversy erupted in 2018, when Chinese scientist He Jiankui created the first babies with edited genomes. After leaving prison last year, he’s now back in the lab trying to raise support for new research but refuses to discuss the ethical implications of his work. Dr Joy Zhang recently arranged a bioethics seminar a...
Turkey-Syria earthquake
February 09, 2023 21:00 - 32 minutes - 14.8 MBIn the early hours of Monday, a powerful earthquake hit Kahramanmaras in Turkey. Nine hours later another struck. When this edition of Science in Action first aired, 19,000 people were reported to have died, but that number was expected to rise. Back in 2016, Professor Asli Garagon and her colleagues accurately predicted that an earthquake of this size was coming. Using GPS, they were monitoring the East Anatolian fault to calculate energy building between the plates. With such accurate in...
Science on ice
February 02, 2023 21:00 - 33 minutes - 15.3 MBPull on an extra layer and stay toasty whilst Science in Action braces for a deep freeze. Whilst we know plenty about the ice on the Earth’s poles, Roland is on a chilling journey to see what can be found in deep space. Professor Christoph Salzmann and Professor Andrea Sella at University College London have produced a new phase of ice. Roland heads to the laboratory to see how the usual crystalline ice, found in ice cubes and icebergs, can be broken down and arranged into a new structure...
Bird flu (H5N1) outbreak in mink
January 26, 2023 21:00 - 28 minutes - 12.8 MBAn outbreak of pathogenic bird flu, H5N1, in a Spanish mink farm could be a cause for concern. Some experts fear the virus may now spill over to other mammals without strict surveillance. Marion Koopmans, professor of virology at Erasmus Medical Centre, talks Roland through the potential risks. India’s caste system affects all aspects of society, but how does the hierarchy influence representation of marginalised groups in academia? Science journalist Ankur Paliwal believes that, despite ...
Climate science activism
January 19, 2023 21:00 - 29 minutes - 13.5 MBClimate researcher, Rose Abramoff took to the stage at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) fall meetings, not as a guest speaker but in protest. Whilst her demonstration only lasted 15 seconds, she found her employment terminated from Oak Ridge National Laboratory and research stripped from the AGU programme. She was attempting to persuade other climate scientists to ‘get out of the lab and into the street’. Whilst Rose’s protest hit the headlines in the media, potentially less attention wa...
Atmospheric rivers
January 12, 2023 21:00 - 34 minutes - 15.8 MBFlood warnings in parts of California have seen some of the state’s best known celebrities flee their homes. The current weather conditions are in part the result of ‘Atmospheric rivers’ – literally fast flowing rivers of water vapor in the atmosphere. Marty Ralph from the Scripps Institute has been studying this phenomenon for years, he explains what atmospheric rivers are, and tells us how a greater understanding of the phenomenon is now informing weather forecasting and evacuation plans....
One year on from the Tonga eruption
January 05, 2023 21:00 - 28 minutes - 13.2 MBWe’re taking a look back at the January 2022 eruption of Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai, which literally sent shockwaves around the world. One year on, and we’re still uncovering what made the volcano so powerful, as well as unpacking its long lasting impacts. Roland is joined by Professor Shane Cronin from the University of Auckland and Dr Marta Ribó from the Auckland University of Technology to share their findings from their latest trip to survey the volcano. The impacts of the eruption were...
The James Webb Space Telescope: The first six months
December 29, 2022 21:00 - 32 minutes - 15.1 MBNasa's James Webb Space Telescope has produced amazing images, and amazing science, in its first five months. Roland Pease hears from one of the leading astronomers on the JWST programme, Dr Heidi Hammel, as well as other experts on what they are already learning about the first galaxies in the Universe, the birthplaces of stars, the strange behaviour of some other stars, and the first view of Neptune's rings in over 30 years. Producer: Roland Pease Assistant producer: Sophie Ormiston Ima...
Mosquito pesticide failing
December 22, 2022 21:00 - 27 minutes - 12.7 MBMosquito pesticide failing - prevention of dengue fever and other diseases at risk. Dangerous bird flu evolving fast - researchers are learning why bird flu is persisting and spreading fast round the world, and assess the threat to humans. Drilling for ancient ice in the Antarctic - Roland talks to one of the team drilling kilometres into an ancient, frozen record of past climate, Martian rock store opens - NASA's Mars Perseverance rover is stashing rock samples future missions could bring b...
Fusion milestone
December 15, 2022 21:00 - 33 minutes - 15.2 MBFusion milestone - the science behind the headlines. Laser fusion expert Kate Lancaster walks us through the technology that produced energy gain at the US's National Ignition Facility NIF Whirlwinds on Mars What the sounds of a dust devil passing over NASA's Mars Perseverance Rover tells us about the Martian atmosphere 75 years of the transistor electronics revolution - where next for Moore's Law? December 16th 1947 was the day the first ever transistor device passed an electrical curren...
Ancient warmth in Greenland
December 08, 2022 21:00 - 31 minutes - 14.3 MBTwo-million-year-old molecular fossils reveal flourishing woodlands and widespread animals in Greenland's pre-Ice-Age past, and give hints to the Arctic’s future under global warming. We hear from a molecular palaeontologist and a climate modeller. DNA also reveals the enduring genetic influence of our extinct Denisovan cousins on disease immunity in modern island South East Asians. And the art and science of 3D-printing violins Producer: Roland Pease Assistant producer: Sophie Ormiston ...
COVID spreads in China
December 01, 2022 21:00 - 34 minutes - 16 MBHong Kong health expert Professor Malik Peiris relates the lessons from the devastation there earlier this year. UK virologist Dr Tom Peacock reveals the unusual origins and evolution of omicron, and explains the risks of dangerous new variants. New studies from China are revealing further SARS-like viruses in the wild; Professor Eddie Holmes says they underline the risk of further pandemics. (Photo: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images)
A distant planet’s atmosphere
November 24, 2022 21:00 - 28 minutes - 12.8 MBNasa's JWST space telescope has unpicked the chemical contents and state of the atmosphere of planet WASP-39b 700 light years away. Astronomer Hannah Wakeford explains. Meteorologist Laura Wilcox warns that atmospheric haze over China and South Asia is masking some of the effects of global warming. Loss of memory and other mental changes during pregnancy have been traced to structural changes in the brain, possibly due to hormone effects. Neuroscientist Elseline Hoekszema speculates. Imp...
Online harassment of Covid scientists
November 17, 2022 21:00 - 27 minutes - 12.5 MBSince the Covid-19 pandemic began, scientists studying the virus have become targets of online harassment, and more recently, death threats. Roland speaks to Dr Angela Rasmussen, virologist at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization at the University of Saskatchewan, about her experiences. Spyros Lytras, PhD candidate at the University of Glasgow, talks Roland through the evolutionary history of the virus that causes Covid-19 and how there isn’t just one ancestor, but several. Ant...
Neurons that restore walking in paralysed patients
November 10, 2022 21:00 - 30 minutes - 14 MBResearchers have identified which neurons, when electrically stimulated, can restore the ability to walk in paralysed patients. Professor Jocelyne Bloch, Associate Professor at the Université de Lausanne, tells Roland how the technology works. Astronomers have discovered the closest black hole to Earth. Researchers led by Kareem El-Badry, astrophysicist at Harvard University, identified the celestial body when they spotted a Sun-like star orbiting a dark, dense object. The origins of eels ...
What peat can tell us about our future
November 03, 2022 21:02 - 26 minutes - 12.1 MBThe Congo Basin is home to the world’s largest peatland. Simon Lewis, Professor of Global Change Science at UCL and the University of Leeds, tells Roland how this peatland acts as a huge carbon sink and how climate change could result in these carbon stores being released. He is joined by Dr Ifo Averti, Associate Professor in Forest Ecology at Universite Marien Ngouabi in the Congo who helps us understand what this landscape is like. We explore how peatlands all around the world are showin...
Seismic events on Mars
October 27, 2022 20:00 - 26 minutes - 12.1 MBThe latest observations from Nasa’s InSight Mars Lander and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) have revealed new information on Mars’ interior structure. Dr Anna Horleston, Senior Research Associate in Planetary Seismology at the University of Bristol, talks us through the mars-quakes that provided this data. On the 30th of October, Brazilians will head to the polls to elect their next president. Jeff Tollefson, Senior Reporter at Nature, tells Roland what approach the two candidates – Jair...
The most powerful explosion ever recorded
October 20, 2022 20:00 - 27 minutes - 12.4 MBIt’s been an unusual week for astronomers, with telescopes swivelled off course to observe GRB221009A, the brightest gamma ray burst ever recorded. Gamma ray bursts aren’t unusual, the by-product of some supernovae are recorded weekly. Whilst the afterglow of these bursts usually lasts hours or days, the aftermath of, what has been dubbed ‘BOAT’, brightest of all time, is expected to linger for years to come. Harvard University’s Edo Berger and Yvette Cendas believe there’s lots to be learnt...
Inserting human neurons into the brains of rats
October 13, 2022 20:00 - 31 minutes - 14.5 MBSergiu Pasca, Professor of Psychiatry at Stanford University has left the petri dish in the drawer and grown human neurons inside the brains of juvenile rats. Successful connectivity and brain function may allow for more rigorous testing and understanding of neurological conditions, that have until now remained difficult to localise and treat. It’s been a few weeks since NASA’s DART mission smashed into an asteroid in an attempt to budge it off course, kickstarting Earth’s first planetary d...
Nobel Prize 2022: The science behind the winners
October 06, 2022 20:00 - 30 minutes - 13.9 MBFor the scientific community, the Nobel Prize announcements are an important part of the yearly science calendar. The award is one of the most widely celebrated and gives us a moment to reflect on some of the leading scientific work taking place around the world. This year’s winners include Alain Aspect, John F. Clauser, and Anton Zeilinger for their work on quantum entanglement. Carolyn R. Bertozzi, Morten Meldal, and K. Barry Sharpless for their work on click chemistry. And Svante Pääbo...
The final moments of DART
September 29, 2022 19:32 - 26 minutes - 12.1 MBNASA’s latest mission, DART hit the headlines this week after the space agency’s satellite successfully collided with a far off asteroid. The mission acts as a demonstration of Earth’s first planetary defence system. Jon Amos, one of BBC’s Science correspondents, talks Roland through the final moments of the DART satellite. Although the collision was a success, we may have to wait a little longer before we know if the asteroid’s trajectory has been altered… Simone Pirrotta, project manager ...
Should we mine the deep sea?
September 22, 2022 20:00 - 26 minutes - 12.2 MBThe first license of its kind has been granted for deep-sea mining. It will be used to run early tests to see whether the seabed could be good place to harvest rare earth materials in the future. These earth minerals are what powers much of our modern technology, and the demand is growing year on year. The license raises ethical questions about whether anyone has ownership over the seabed, and whether we could be disrupting ecosystems under the sea in doing so. We have two experts joining u...
Science and the causes behind Pakistan’s floods
September 15, 2022 20:00 - 29 minutes - 13.6 MBA new report by the World Weather Attribution consortium demonstrates the impact of global warming on flooding in Pakistan. The consortium is helping to assess the link between humanitarian disasters and global change, faster than ever before. The work, conducted by a team of statisticians, climate experts, and local weather experts, is part of an emerging field in science called Extreme Event Attribution, and can reliably provide assessments in the immediate aftermath of an extreme weather...
The genetics of human intelligence
September 08, 2022 19:32 - 31 minutes - 14.2 MBEarly humans and Neanderthals had similar-sized brains but around 6 million years ago something happened that gave us the intellectual edge. The answer may lie in a tiny mutation in a single gene that meant more neurons could develop in a crucial part of the brain. Post-doctoral research scientist at the Max Plank Institute of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Anneline Pinson, did the heavy lifting on the research under the supervision of Wieland Huttner. They discuss with Roland how this find...
The China heatwave and the new normal
September 01, 2022 20:00 - 28 minutes - 12.9 MBHot on the tail of China’s heatwave comes the other side of the extreme coin – tragic flooding. Also, a coming global shortage of sulfur, while scientists produce useful oxygen on Mars in the MOXIE experiment. Prof Chunzai Wang is the Director of the State Key Laboratory of Tropical Oceanography in Guangzhou, China. He tells Roland about the surprising nature of the extreme temperatures and droughts much of China has been experiencing, and how they are connected to so many of the record-bre...
Surprises from a Martian Lake Bed
August 25, 2022 20:00 - 26 minutes - 12.1 MBThe Jezero Crater on Mars was targeted by Nasa’s Perseverence rover because from orbit, there was strong evidence it had at some point contained a lake. When the Mars 2020 mission landed, it didn’t take long to spot rocks protruding from the bottom that looked for all the world like sedimentary rocks – implying they were laid down from the liquid water and maybe perhaps even contain signs of past life. This week, the science team have published some of their analysis from the first 9 months ...
Deadly drought
August 18, 2022 19:32 - 28 minutes - 12.9 MBEast Africa has endured more than two years on continuous drought. The latest predictions suggest the drought is not likely to end any time soon. We look at why climate change and weather patterns in the Pacific and Indian oceans are largely to blame. Andrea Taschetto, chief investigator at the Centre on Climate Extremes at the University of New South Wales discusses the latest predictions Drought has also been an issue in Europe, comparable with events nearly 500 years ago. Chantal Camenis...
Icelandic volcano erupts again
August 11, 2022 20:00 - 28 minutes - 13.3 MBWe talk to volcano scientist Ed Marshall in Iceland about working at the volcano which has burst into life spectacularly again after a year of quiet. Also in the programme, we'll be following migrating moths across Europe in light aircraft to discover the remarkable secrets of their powers of navigation, and hearing how synthetic biology promises to create smarter and more adaptable genetically engineered crops. (Image: Lava spews from the volcano in Fagradalsfjall. Credit: Getty Imag...
Synthetic mouse embryos with brains and hearts
August 04, 2022 20:00 - 29 minutes - 13.6 MBThis week two research groups announced that they have made synthetic mouse embryos that developed brains and beating hearts in the test tube, starting only with embryonic stem cells. No sperm and eggs were involved. Previously, embryos created this way have never got beyond the stage of being a tiny ball of cells. These embryos grew and developed organs through 8 days – more than a third of the way through the gestation period for a mouse. Roland Pease talks to the leader of one of t...
The first galaxies at the universe's dawn
July 28, 2022 20:00 - 27 minutes - 12.7 MBIn the last week, teams of astronomers have rushed to report ever deeper views of the universe thanks to the James Webb Space Telescope. These are galaxies of stars more than 13.5 billion light years from us and we see them as they were when the universe was in its infancy, less than 300 million years after the Big Bang. As University of Texas astronomer Steve Finkelstein tell us, there are some real surprises in these glimpses of the cosmic dawn. The super-distant galaxy that Steve's gr...
The First Galaxies at the Universe's Dawn
July 28, 2022 20:00 - 27 minutes - 12.7 MBIn the last week, teams of astronomers have rushed to report ever deeper views of the universe thanks to the James Webb Space Telescope. These are galaxies of stars more than 13.5 billion light years from us and we see them as they were when the universe was in its infancy, less than 300 million years after the Big Bang. As University of Texas astronomer Steve Finkelstein tell us, there are some real surprises in these glimpses of the cosmic dawn. The super-distant galaxy that Steve's gro...
Heat waves in the Northern Hemisphere
July 21, 2022 20:00 - 29 minutes - 13.5 MBThe extreme heat wave in western Europe over the last couple of weeks is just one of many in the Northern Hemisphere in 2022. How is global warming changing the atmosphere to make heat waves more frequent and more intense? We talk to climatologists Hannah Cloke, Friederike Otto and Efi Rousi. If we want to stabilise global warming to two degrees by the end of the century, how are we going to do that? One novel idea is to harness the world's vast railway infrastructure and equip freigh...
First images from the James Webb Space Telescope
July 14, 2022 20:00 - 31 minutes - 14.6 MBRoland Pease talks to two astronomers who began working on the James Webb Space Telescope more than two decades ago and have now seen the first spectacular results of their labours. Marcia Rieke of the University of Arizona and JWST's senior project scientist John Mather discuss the highlights of the first four images. Also in the programme, geologists discover precisely where on the Red Planet the most ancient Martian meteorite came from - we speak to Anthony Lagain whose detective wor...
Long Covid ‘brain fog’
July 07, 2022 20:00 - 30 minutes - 13.9 MBFollowing a bout of Covid-19, a significant number of people suffer with weeks or months of 'brain fog' - poor concentration, forgetfulness, and confusion. This is one of the manifestations of Long Covid. A team of scientists in the United States has now discovered that infection in the lung can trigger an inflammatory response which then causes patterns of abnormal brain cell activity. It’s the kind of brain cell dysregulation also seen in people who experience cognitive problems follow...
Extreme heat death risk in Latin America
June 30, 2022 20:00 - 32 minutes - 14.7 MBA new analysis of deaths in cities across Latin America suggests rising global temperatures could lead to large numbers of deaths in the region and elsewhere in the world. Even a 1-degree rise in extreme heat can add 6% to the risk of dying. Lead researcher Josiah Kephart at Drexel University tells Roland Pease the lessons from Latin America should apply to cities across the global south. Brazilian ecologist Andreas Meyer talks about the troubling prospects for the health of ecosystems, par...
Monster microbe
June 23, 2022 20:00 - 34 minutes - 15.6 MBResearchers have discovered a species of bacteria which dwarfs all others by thousands of times. Normally you need a microscope to see single-celled bacteria, but Thiomargarita magnifica is the length and width of an eyelash. It's been found growing in mangrove swamps in the Caribbean. Roland Pease talks to Jean Marie Volland about what makes this Godzilla of the microbial world extra-special. Also in the programme, a new study published in the journal Nature has discovered that women sc...