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BBC Inside Science

A New Volcanic Era?

BBC Inside Science

BBC

Technology, Science

4.51.3K Ratings

🗓️ 15 February 2024

⏱️ 28 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

As lava consumes homes on the Reykjavik Peninsula in Iceland, evacuated communities have been witnessing eruptions shifting and intensifying. We take a look at the latest science that’s helping teams on the ground accurately predict where the danger is coming from, helping people to stay safe. Our go-to volcanologist, Dr Evgenia Ilyinskaya, and her colleague, Professor Andrew Hooper, from the University of Leeds tell presenter Victoria about these new technological advancements, and ask the crucial question: are we entering a new millennium of volcanic activity in Iceland?

When looking at clear ocean water, you might assume that, aside from fish and some algae, there isn’t much living in it. But Prof Carlos Duarte knows it is full of life. In fact, his new study shows just how many different microbes – bacteria, viruses & fungi – live in all parts of our ocean. He and his team at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia have created the largest ocean genome catalogue to date. Prof Mark Blaxter from the Wellcome Sanger Institute joins us to discuss this new study, the benefits of hypothesis-free science, and why he believes cataloguing the code of life of all the species on earth is an important endeavour.

And, lastly, an old dinosaur fossil in New Mexico has been re-examined. What was believed to be of the infamous Tyrannosaurus rex may have been a different species all along. But not all palaeontologists agree. How do scientists even tell a dinosaur species from a fossil? Prof Stephen Brusatte tells Vic that it’s all about comparing bones.

Presenter: Victoria Gill Producers: Florian Bohr, Louise Orchard, Hannah Robbins Editor: Martin Smith Production Co-ordinator: Jana Bennett-Holesworth 

BBC Inside Science is produced in collaboration with the Open University.

Transcript

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0:00.0

I'm John Ronson and I'm an invisible enemy.

0:05.0

That changed people psychologically.

0:08.0

Words can be dangerous if you don't know the context.

0:12.0

We were told to stay at home.

0:15.0

We lived with an invisible enemy,

0:17.0

with only the internet for company.

0:19.0

That changed people psychologically.

0:21.0

I'm John Ronson, and I'll be unerthing the roots of the

0:24.4

culture wars that engulfed us then and still do now.

0:29.2

The award-winning podcast, Things Fell Apart Returns.

0:33.0

Listen on BBC Sounds.

0:35.0

BBC Sounds.

0:36.0

BBC Sounds, music radio podcasts.

0:40.0

Hello and welcome to the podcast edition of BBC Inside Science, first broadcast on the 18th of January 2024.

0:47.0

I'm Victoria Gill.

0:49.0

This week we're diving into an ambitious search for the genetic secrets hidden deep in the ocean.

0:54.1

It's a haystack and that haystack contains a lot of needles, but the needles are of different

1:00.3

nature. So it is up to the particular researcher decide which needles

1:05.8

are interested on and probe the haystacked in search for those needles.

1:10.3

And could scientists have unearthed another king of the dinosaurs. A widely reported

1:16.7

Tyrannosaur discovery last week has raised some questions in the fossil hunting

1:21.2

world and I'll be finding out how to tell a new species from a possible 66 million year old red herring.

...

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