The Science Show

Jan 20 2025 246 ep. 52 mins 1.9k
The Science Show Podcast artwork

The Science Show gives Australians unique insights into the latest scientific research and debate, from the physics of cricket to prime ministerial biorhythms.

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Lab Notes: A debunked vaccine theory rears its ugly head — again

Jan 20 2025 13 mins  
Robert F Kennedy Jr is tipped to lead the US Department of Health and Human Services. Over the years, RFK Jr has repeatedly pushed the claim that childhood vaccines cause autism spectrum disorder — a theory that's been well and truly debunked. So where did this idea come from? What's bowel disease got to do with it? And what might the US expect with an anti-vaxxer at the helm of

Micronesian community and scientists unite to protect remote Ulithi atoll

Jan 17 2025 54 mins  
A remote community in the western Pacific is working with scientists to battle the effects of invasive species, a leaking WW2 oil tanker and climate change.

Science Extra: Echoes of a tsunami

Jan 14 2025 50 mins  
Strewn throughout the sands of an island in the Great Barrier Reef, shards of pottery lay for thousands of years before an archaeologist quite literally stumbled across them 20 years ago. As more pieces were lifted from the sand, a question was also raised: Who shaped and fired these clay pots? We also get to the bottom of a strange phenomenon that had the earth ringing like a be

Science Show Summer - Hedy Lamarr - actress, inventor, and amateur engineer

Jan 10 2025 54 mins  
Hollywood promoted her as the most beautiful woman in the world. But Hedy Lamarr was more than good looks. She invented and patented a new form of communication which is used widely today and even allows mobile phones to work.

Science Extra: The anatomy of a scam

Jan 07 2025 50 mins  
Do you get texts telling you there’s an unclaimed parcel waiting for you at the post office? Turns out scammers can find out if we’re expecting something in the post and time a scam text to coincide with our online purchases -- and it could all be completely legal. And while 2024 saw advances in artificial intelligence, they didn’t seem to wow us like they did in 2023. Are

Science Show Summer - Merlin meets Dr Crispy

Jan 03 2025 52 mins  
CRISPR is the most powerful means of gene editing ever developed. It led to Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier being awarded the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 2020. Jennifer Doudna speaks with Merlin Crossley about CRISPR, its capability, and the ethical questions which arise.

Science Extra: March of the cane toads

Dec 31 2024 50 mins  
Up with the sparrows or hanging with the night owls: we humans like to put ourselves into one of two camps. But when it comes to native animals, this idea of either being awake during the day or at night just doesn’t hold up. And while cane toads have already traversed most of northern Australia, there is an ambitious project to stop the pests from infiltrating the Pilbara -- b

Science Show Summer - The Extremely Large Telescope

Dec 27 2024 54 mins  
It might be the largest telescope humans will ever build. Jonathan Webb visits the site in Chile’s high dry Atacama Desert.

Science Extra: Weight of the world

Dec 24 2024 50 mins  
Once considered a problem for high-income countries, being overweight is now on the rise in low- and middle-income parts of the world. At least 2.5 billion adults are now overweight or obese. What’s causing this collective weight gain? And if 2023 was the year of hype about weight-loss drugs like Ozempic, 2024 felt like the year of acceptance. We find out why weight-loss drugs

Science Show Summer - A wire around the world

Dec 20 2024 53 mins  
Paul Davies retraces one of the great engineering achievements of the 19th century – the construction of a telegraph wire from the UK to Australia.