The Evidence: Mental health and Covid 19

How is our mental health during the pandemic?

• 49 mins

Ignaz Semmelweiss: The hand washer

Lindsey Fitzharris tells the story of Ignaz Semmelweiss, the hand washer

• 26 mins

Science of Dad

Dr Oscar Duke discovers how pregnancy, birth and childcare affect the father

• 26 mins

The Evidence: Covid 19: ending lockdowns

When and how to end lockdowns?

• 50 mins

The Evidence: Covid 19: Sub-Saharan Africa and Testing

How sub-Saharan Africa is handling the pandemic and the different kinds of tests

• 49 mins

In Their Element

Mercury - Chemistry's Jekyll and Hyde

The most beautiful and shimmering of the elements, the weirdest, and yet the most reviled

• 26 mins

In Their Element

Oxygen: The breath of Life

Trevor Cox takes a deep breath and tells the story of oxygen on earth and in space

• 26 mins

In Their Element

And then there was Li

The element that links the formation of the universe with the functioning of our brains

• 26 mins

In Their Element

Carbon - the backbone of life

Why is all known life built on carbon?

• 26 mins

In Their Element

Silicon - The World's Building Block

The key component of rocks, sand and materials from glass and concrete to microelectronics

• 26 mins

In Their Element

Lead

The impact of the use and abuse of lead on humanity.

• 26 mins

In Their Element

Phosphorus

How a discovery in boiled urine led to the trade union movement and chemical weapons.

• 26 mins

In Their Element

Iodine

Why iodine is essential for our health?

• 26 mins

In Their Element

Gold and silver

Science and art of gold and silver

• 26 mins

In Their Element

Aluminium and strontium

Science and art of aluminium and strontium

• 26 mins

In Their Element

Helium

Science and art of helium

• 26 mins

The Evidence: Covid 19: Transmission and South America

How South America is handling the pandemic and a look at disease transmission.

• 49 mins

The Evidence: Covid 19: vaccines and after lockdown

The latest on vaccines and how people are behaving after lockdown

• 48 mins

Covid-19: Recovery

The latest on how people are recovering from Covid-19

• 50 mins

The Origin of Stuff

Toothbrush

Katy Brand investigates the toothbrush from its humble start, as a stick, to the present.

• 26 mins

The Origin of Stuff

High heel

Katy Brand tracks the extraordinary life of the high heel, from past to the present.

• 26 mins

The Origin of Stuff

Fork

Katy Brand explores the life of the unsung hero of the cutlery world – the fork.

• 26 mins

The Origin of Stuff

Wine glass

Katy Brand toasts the wine glass, learning why it became the gargantuan glass it is today

• 26 mins

The Origin of Stuff

Toilet

Katy Brand reveals how attitudes to the toilet have shaped it's place in history.

• 26 mins

The Origin of Stuff

Bed

Katy Brand reveals how our attitudes to sleep, sex and status are played out in the bed.

• 26 mins

Jane Goodall

Jane Goodall describes her life with the wild chimpanzees of Gombe.

• 26 mins

Brian Greene

Brian Greene studies the universe at the largest and smallest scales imaginable.

• 26 mins

Human Genome Project's 20th Anniversary

Twenty years of the Human Genome Project

• 26 mins

On the menu

Adam Hart explores our relationship with some of the animal kingdom's deadliest predators

• 26 mins

Frank Kelly

What difference has lockdown made to our air? Frank Kelly talks to Jim Al-Khalili.

• 26 mins

Professor Emma Bunce

Emma Bunce tells Jim Al-Khalili why she is intrigued by the gas giants Jupiter and Neptune

• 26 mins

Liz Seward

Jim Al-Khalili talks to Liz Seward, Senior Space Strategist for Airbus Defence and Space.

• 26 mins

Return to Mars

How will NASA’s latest robot rover search for life on Mars?

• 26 mins

The Evidence: Covid lessons for safe school reopening

Will schools and colleges reopening fuel Covid-19 spread?

• 50 mins

Megadrought in Chile

Why Chile has a megadrought

• 26 mins

The Evidence: Are national lockdowns evidence of policy failure?

Locked in the lockdown cycle – evidence for a more targeted response

• 51 mins

Anatomy Of Touch

Touch hunger

Why we’re starved of touch

• 26 mins

Anatomy Of Touch

Unwanted touch

How can we stop unwanted touch?

• 26 mins

Anatomy Of Touch

Affectionate touch

How we experience gentle touch

• 26 mins

Anatomy Of Touch

Digital touch

Can touch be replicated digitally?

• 26 mins

Birds: singing for survival

Birds are changing their tunes

• 26 mins

Broad spectrum

Helen Keen had a diagnosis of autism as an adult. She explores how it appears in women

• 26 mins

The Evidence: Pandemic rules: follower or flouter?

Why a sense of “we” rather than “I” makes us more likely to follow pandemic rules

• 51 mins

Steve Haake

Steve Haake talks to Jim al-Khalili about how technology improves sporting ability

• 26 mins

Evolutionary biologist Alice Roberts

What can we learn from human remains? Alice Roberts talks bones with Jim Al Khalili

• 27 mins

Hopes and fears for Covid-19 vaccines

Vaccines and virus mutations

• 50 mins

Climate meltdown

Wildfires, floods, hurricanes made 2020 record breaking. What it says about climate change

• 37 mins

Marine conservationist Heather Koldewey

Saving seahorses and turning old fishing nets into luxury carpets.

• 27 mins

Astrophysicist Andy Fabian

Professor Andy Fabian on supermassive black holes and their dramatic hold over galaxies

• 27 mins

Plant scientist Dale Sanders

Why the world needs more plant scientists. Prof Dale Sanders talks to Jim Al-Khalili.

• 27 mins

Science Trumped

Let science speak, health expert Tony Fauci pleaded last week. So how was it sidelined?

• 33 mins

The Evidence: The Shapeshifting Virus

Will new vaccines work against the more infectious versions of the coronavirus?

• 50 mins

The power of celibacy

Lucy Cooke discovers why some species reproduce without sex or the need for males

• 27 mins

The power of one

Lucy Cooke explores why some species shirk company in favour of a solitary life

• 27 mins

The power of night

Lucy Cooke examines why it pays to stir when the sun goes down

• 27 mins

The Life Scientific: Giles Yeo

Professor Jim Al-Khalili talks to leading scientists about their life and work.

• 27 mins

The Evidence: Keeping out Covid-19

The virus knows no borders, so do international travel restrictions work for Covid-19?

• 50 mins

The Life Scientific: Cath Noakes

How good ventilation dramatically reduces the risk of inhaling tiny airborne pathogens.

• 27 mins

The Life Scientific: Jane Hurst

Jane Hurst reveals how mice are ruled by their noses.

• 27 mins

The Evidence: Mental health and the pandemic

Mental health distress has risen around the world. How can people's suffering be eased?

• 49 mins

Lithium: Chile’s white gold

Why lithium makes such good batteries

• 27 mins

The equal rights stuff

When women and minorities first went into space

• 26 mins

Patient zero: Back from the brink

When polio returned to Asia Pacific

• 40 mins

The Evidence: Sharing Vaccines – what’s gone wrong?

The ethics of putting children in rich countries ahead in the global vaccine queue

• 50 mins

Peter Goadsby on migraine

Peter Goadsby on migraine attacks and the new treatments his research has inspired.

• 27 mins

Tooth and claw: Lions

Our complex relationship with Earth’s greatest predators by the people who know them best

• 26 mins

The Evidence: How Covid damages the human body

Covid the chameleon - the multiple ways this virus attacks our bodies

• 49 mins

Tooth and claw: Bears

Adam Hart explores our complex relationship with bears

• 26 mins

Tooth and claw: Tigers

What's it like facing a charging tiger and how best can we protect their growing numbers?

• 27 mins

Dare to Repair: How we broke the future

Why electronic gadgets dont last as long as they used to and why repairing them is hard.

• 27 mins

Dare to repair: The fight for the right to repair

Exploring how citizens are fighting back for the right to repair their own stuff

• 27 mins

Dare to repair: Fixing the future

How does repair and repair-ability fit into our sustainable future?

• 27 mins

Whatever happened to…those Covid-19 stories

Claudia Hammond and panel study ideas that have disappeared

• 53 mins

A sense of music

What happens when music meets the animal mind?

• 27 mins

Introducing: Season 2 of 30 Animals That Made Us Smarter

How animals make us smarter – we thought you might like to hear our brand new episode

• 18 mins

Lost for words

David Shariatmadari explores the science of language, dementia and ageing

• 27 mins

The Life Scientific: Dr Nira Chamberlain

Nira Chamberlain on how mathematics can solve real-world problems.

• 27 mins

The Life Scientific: Professor Martin Sweeting

How Martin Sweeting made a satellite on his kitchen table

• 27 mins

The Evidence: How will the pandemic end?

Keeping a lid on risks of new covid variants as vaccinated countries ease restrictions

• 48 mins

Tamsin Edwards on the uncertainty in climate science

All climate change models are wrong. Tamsin Edwards tells Jim Al Khalili why.

• 27 mins

Future vaccines

How the pandemic will change the vaccine landscape

• 33 mins

Covid origins: The science

What the science says about the start of the pandemic

• 39 mins

China's great science leap

Is China set to become the next science superpower?

• 27 mins

China's great science leap

Will China’s ambitions in space, quantum & biotech lead it to science super-power status?

• 27 mins

The Evidence: To boost or not to boost?

The science and the ethics of vaccine booster shots

• 50 mins

Earthshot 1

Winning ideas to improve the world around us.

• 27 mins

Earthshot 2 – Tackling our energy crisis

Balancing our growing need for electricity while addressing climate change

• 27 mins

Earthshot 3 - The prize winners

Five categories, a million pounds in each. Who has won the Earthshot prize?

• 27 mins

Chilean mummies

Jane Chambers learns about the world's oldest examples of mummification

• 26 mins

The Evidence: When misinformation kills

Tackling the “infodemic” – misinformation and Covid-19

• 50 mins

Geoengineering The Planet

Geoengineering: can it work?

• 27 mins

Geoengineering The Planet

How we cool the planet with the latest geoengineering technologies.

• 27 mins

Listening to coral reefs

Conservationist Rory Crawford meets the scientists surveying coral reefs using sound

• 27 mins

Genetic dreams, genetic nightmares

The story of the controversial birth of genetic engineering in the 1970s.

• 27 mins

The Evidence: Healthcare pushed out by the pandemic

The killer diseases ignored because of Covid-19

• 50 mins

Genetic dreams, genetic nightmares

How genetic engineering became big business

• 27 mins

Genetic Dreams, Genetic Nightmares

Gene edited babies and gene drives to eradicate pests

• 27 mins

The James Webb Space Telescope

A new giant space telescope that will show us the first stars that shone in the universe

• 33 mins

The Evidence: When will the pandemic end?

Lessons from Omicron to end the pandemic

• 50 mins