3. Mirror, Mirror

Curious Cases

BBC

Technology, Science

4.8 • 4.1K Ratings

🗓️ 26 October 2024

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

9 year old listener Koby sends Hannah and Dara on a mission to find the shiniest thing in the world. And so they enter a world of mirrors…

The journey takes them into the subatomic goings on of shiny metal surfaces, where electrons waggle and dance and send light waves back at *just* the right angle. Our curious duo play with an astonishingly reflective plastic film that can be found hidden in devices we all use. And they probe the mysterious power of refraction, harnessed to make the $2 million mirrors which reflect the lasers at the huge LIGO experiment.

And everyone ponders the surprisingly reflective properties of a pint in space.

Contributors:

Dr Felix Flicker: University of Bristol, author of The Magick of Matter Professor Stuart Reid: University of Strathclyde Quinn Sanford: optical engineer from 3M GariLynn Billingsley: Optical Sciences Group Leader at LIGO

Producer: Ilan Goodman Executive Producer: Alexandra Feachem A BBC Studios Audio Production

Transcript

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0:00.0	2024 presidential election ahead.
0:04.6	Join America on the road to the US election.
0:07.5	It's the BBC podcast full of lively chats about politics and social media investigations.
0:13.0	Expert insights this way.
0:15.0	We'll guide you through all the key moments as the United States chooses which direction to go in next.
0:21.0	Final destination, the White House.
0:24.0	Navigate your way to election day and beyond, America's.
0:28.0	Listen on BBC Sounds.
0:30.0	You're about to listen to a brand new episode of Curious Cases.
0:33.2	Shows are going to be released weekly,
0:34.8	wherever you get your podcast.
0:36.0	But if you're in the UK, you can listen to the latest episodes first
0:39.6	on BBC Sounds.
0:43.4	Music Radio Podcasts.
0:45.8	I'm Hannah Fry and I'm Dara O'Bree.
0:51.8	And this is curious cases.
0:53.4	The show will we take your quirkiest questions, your cruncheous conundrums, and then we solve them.
0:58.0	With the power of science.
0:59.4	I mean do we always solve them?
1:00.5	I mean the hit rate is pretty low but it is with science it is with science
1:08.0	Hannah what is our question this week we've got one in from a young curio this week.
1:14.0	Here we go.
	...

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