Episode notes
During this year’s visit to the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition in London, Tom Whipple discovers how sea urchins are being used to develop techniques to digitally preserve natural history, why we haven’t got robot butlers just yet, and what it takes to bottle lightning. Plus, in his ongoing quest to assemble a World Cup squad of science Tom recruits health reporter James Gallagher to scout out the best football science from around the world. This week, we want to know if there is robust evidence for a home advantage. We speak with Associate Professor of Cell & Developmental Biology…
BBC Inside Science
by BBC Radio 4 · English · Tech & Science
A weekly programme that illuminates the mysteries and challenges the controversies behind the science that's changing our world.
More from BBC Inside Science
-
23 Jul 2026 · 26 min
Testing testosterone testing
Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth has announced that the US military will be screening military personnel aged 30 and older for testosterone deficiency. Those found with low testosterone levels will be offered voluntary hormone replacement therapy. The secretary says this is to ensure “a healthy, capable, and decisively dominant fighting force”. Tom Whipple is joined by Professor Joe Herbert from the University of Cambridge to discuss why jacking soldiers up with testosterone may or may not be the best idea. Marine Biologist Kathryn Ayres, from the non-profit organisation Beneath the Waves,…
-
16 Jul 2026 · 26 min
How might we spot nukes in space?
A few years ago a satellite speeding through the Van Allen belt in earth orbit raised concerns that it may include a nuclear weapon. An explosion in that orbit would take out much of our global space infrastructure. The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 specifically prohibits such a thing, but it has proven technologically impossible to verify and monitor over the decades. Tom Whipple is joined by Prof Areg Danagoulian, Associate Professor of Nuclear Science and Engineering at MIT to explore a clever concept to spot such a thermonuclear device in orbit that he has published in this month’s Nature…
-
9 Jul 2026 · 26 min
Are we one step closer to creating life in a lab?
Synthetic biologist Kate Adamal and her team at the University of Minnesota published their research into the lab-created ‘SpudCell’ in a significant step towards building life from scratch. Science journalist, Kai Kupferschmidt, joins us to discuss the implications of this research, as well as the controversies. Nature reporter Lizzie Gibney tells us how science has helped us better understand the route that the famous Carthaginian general, Hannibal – and not forgetting his elephants – took across the Alps. Plus, in this week’s scout of science stories behind the ‘beautiful game’ we learn…
-
25 Jun 2026 · 26 min
Can we engineer ourselves out of a heatwave?
As the UK and Europe battles with extreme weather warnings, is it time for us to consider some more extreme tactics to tackle the heat? Tom Whipple is joined by Mark Maslin, Professor of Earth System Science at University College London, to explore if solar geoengineering can help. Also on the show, science journalist Lizzie Gibney discusses the "Salah effect", when exposure to celebrities from stigmatised groups can help increase tolerance. She also examines new research into how the atom nucleus contain energy which can be used for telling the time. Plus, how laughter in great apes may…
-
18 Jun 2026 · 26 min
Finding the evidence for the social media ban
After this week’s announcement that under-16s will be banned from major social media platforms, we delve into the evidence behind the ban with Professor Amy Orben, Programme Leader of the Digital Mental Health Group at the University of Cambridge, and Dr Catherine Sebastian, Head of Evidence at Wellcome. Also on the show, what can penalty shoot-outs teach us about international diplomacy? And how does the valuation of a football player impact the number of crashes seen after their team plays? Professor of Mathematical Sciences at Bath and football fan, Kit Yates, joins Tom to assemble their…
-
11 Jun 2026 · 26 min
How do you build an unbuildable tower?
After 144 years the tallest tower on the Sagrada Familia is finally complete, but when Gaudi first designed it, the technology to build the tower didn’t exist. We’re joined by Tristram Carfrae, structural engineer and designer at Arup who was tasked with this impossible feat over a decade ago. With the reappearance of screwworm in North America, we ask – is it ever acceptable to intentionally drive a species to extinction? Tom is joined by Dr Gregory Kaebnick from the Hastings Center for Bioethics to dive into the science that could make it happen and the ethics stopping us. Four in five of…
-
8 Oct 2026 · 26 minNew
Will AI complete mathematics?
Tom Whipple investigates one of the biggest days in the 10,000 year history of maths. This week, overnight, OpenAI dropped hundreds of mathematical papers onto the internet. From the Margulis-Platonov conjecture to the Gaussian Propeller conjecture to Banach’s simple Lebesgue-spectrum problem. Decades of maths progress overnight. PhDs of work done in hours. This week saw the Nobel Prizes awarded for Chemistry, Physics and Physiology or Medicine. From mice with blue lights in their brain to massive ice cubes with blue lights underground, science journalists Kit Chapman and Caroline Steel tell…
-
1 Oct 2026 · 28 min
The future of particle physics
Tom Whipple travels 100m below Switzerland to the tunnels of CERN's Large Hadron Collider (LHC) where the beams have been powered down to begin the High-Luminosity LHC upgrade. Paulo Fessia, deputy head of the upgrade project, shows us what they're doing and why. In one of the cavernous halls on the site, Antti Onnela explains what the machinery is used for when it's not smashing particles together; understanding the formation of clouds. With Eva Sommer, Run Coordinator of the project, we learn how clouds are born from aerosol particles in a specialised chamber and how this informs climate…
-
24 Sep 2026 · 26 min
Do you have the correct time?
In October members of the General Conference on Weights and Measurements are voting to change how we keep time on Earth accurate. Currently an additional second, known as a Leap Second, can be added to make sure modern atomic clocks stay in sync with solar time. However, all of this might be about to change as the rotation of the Earth speeds up and interferes with our measurements. Tom takes a trip to meet Principal Scientist Setnam Shemar at the National Physics Laboratory to learn how our time lords keep us all on schedule. Plus, Associate Professor Claire Nichols from Oxford University…
-
17 Sep 2026 · 26 min
AI to solve the energy crisis?
Nuclear fusion energy, the idea of copying the sun’s heat source on earth to make limitless commercial energy is famously always 30 years away. This month, the UK and US have agreed to combine the brains of their nuclear fusion supercomputers in an attempt to improve models of plasma behaviour using AI. Tom Whipple is joined by interim CEO of UKAEA Tim Bestwick to understand what challenges must be overcome to make commercialised nuclear fusion a reality. With under a fortnight to go before the winner of the coveted Royal Society's Trivedi Book Prize is announced, we are marking its imminent…
Take it with you
The Melo app keeps playing with the screen off, works in the car and on your watch, wakes you to your station, and browses the whole catalogue offline. Free, no ads, no account.
