Declining Data, Climate Deadlines and the Day the Dinosaurs Died

BBC Inside Science

BBC

Technology, Science

4.5 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 5 May 2022

⏱️ 37 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Covid-19 infections in the UK are at an all-time high. But most people in England can no longer access free Covid-19 tests, and the REACT-1 study, which has been testing more than 100,000 individuals since the pandemic began, ended last week after its funding stopped. Martin Mckee, Prof of European Health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, shares his insights on what these changes might mean for ambitions to 'live with the virus'. This week, the UN's latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report has unveiled a to-do list of ways to save the planet from climate catastrophe. How do scientists reach a global consensus on climate change amid war, an energy crisis, and a pandemic? Vic Gill speaks to report co-author Jo House, University of Bristol, and Ukrainian climate scientist Svitlana Krakovska who took part in signing off every line of the report while sheltering from the war in Kyiv. And from our planet's present and future to its ancient past. Scientists working on the Tanis fossil site in North Dakota in the US have dug up a dinosaur's leg, complete with skin and scales. Is this 66-million-year-old fossil, alongside similar nearby victims, the key to unveiling those transformative minutes after the infamous Chicxulub asteroid struck the earth and ended the era of the dinosaurs? BBC science correspondent Jonathan Amos has seen the fossil and speaks with Paul Barrett of London's Natural History Museum about the significance of this un-reviewed new finds. And from earth to Mars. After a year of analysing audio recordings from NASA's Perseverance rover, scientists have found not one but two speeds of sound on Mars. Trevor Cox, Professor of Acoustic Engineering at the University of Salford, guides us through this sonic wonder, and how sound may become a key tool for exploring distant worlds. Mars audio credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL/CNES/CNRS/ISAE-Supaéro

Transcript

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0:30.4	Hello, you lovely curious minded people. This is the podcast edition of BBC Inside Science,
0:38.3	originally broadcast on 7th April 2022. I'm Victoria Gill. This week we're asking how
0:44.4	the world's best climate scientists come up with a to-do list to save the planet. We assess
0:49.8	some fossilised forensic evidence from the day the dinosaurs died. And we have a special
0:55.1	audio column for you from the red planet. But first, Covid-19. I know, I'm sorry, but
1:01.6	sadly, the pandemic is far from over. In fact, in the last week, it's emerged that March
1:06.8	saw infection rates reach an all-time high in the UK. The data is now starting to show
1:11.8	the number of infections levelling off in younger people, but they're still on the increase
1:16.0	in the more vulnerable over 55s. In England, much of that data came from a study called
1:21.4	React 1, or real-time assessment of community transmission, which has been systematically
1:26.8	tracking Covid by sending out home test kits to randomly selected participants. That study
1:32.3	was brought to a close this week, and free NHS Covid testing ended last week, because
1:37.6	the government's moving into a new phase of managing the pandemic that it's calling
1:41.5	living with Covid. But how do we work out what's happening with the virus, as we try to
1:47.0	live with it, without all of that data? That's what I asked Martin McKee, who's professor
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