Fracking FAQs; Fingerprint feedback; Lipstick forensics; Snake hook

BBC Inside Science

BBC

Science

4.6 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 26 September 2013

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Fracking is touted as a technology that will lower UK energy bills. It's a controversial technique which unlocks natural gas from shale rock. But it raises many environmental concerns. So what does the science say? Adam Rutherford sorts science fact from science fiction, putting your frack FAQs to four experts. Reporter Gaia Vince travels to a gas well site in Warrington to discover the various techniques used to extract gas onshore in the UK.

Also on the programme, your feedback to last week's story on new fingerprint technology.

Lipstick forensics: Professor Michael Went at the University of Kent has developed a new method for unpicking the make-up of make up left at crime scenes.

And this week's Show Us Your Instrument comes from Cardiff University, as we showcase herpetologist Dr Rhys Jones's snake hook. It's a low-tech but vital piece of kit for handling snakes. It's also useful for scrumping.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know.
0:04.7	My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds.
0:08.5	As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely engaging voices.
0:18.0	What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars,
0:24.6	poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories and that's just a few examples.
0:29.7	If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC
0:35.4	Sounds.
0:36.4	Hello you, I'm Adam Rutherford and this is Inside Science, your weekly fix of the stuff that civilization
0:41.5	is built on. We're tackling the fractious issue of
0:44.5	fracking on your regular injection of science this week. What is fracking? How does it
0:48.3	work? And why is it so controversial? We'll also be wiping down a crime scene coffee cup with a new forensic
0:54.9	technique for detecting lipstick traces. Brace yourself for the worst Humphrey
0:59.0	Bogart impression you'll hear on Radio Ford this week. Plus we're following up on the fingerprint ID
1:04.9	on your brand new iPhone, including cat paws and nipples.
1:08.7	And the all-important instrument du jour
1:10.9	is life-saving and essential to your average snake scientist, but it's not very high-tech, it's a medium-sized stick.
1:17.0	But first and foremost, it's a fracking special this week.
1:21.0	This contentious mining technique has been on the news continuously
1:24.6	for several months now, with everyone from the government to the Church of England weighing in.
1:29.5	We figured it was time to really try to understand the science surrounding the controversies.
1:34.0	On Monday, the end of a test drilling operation at Bolkham and Sussex
1:38.0	proved that there were gas reserves inside the shale rocks, which could be potentially fracked in the future,
	...

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