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30th Jan 2005
Space Science & Extraterrestrial Life
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On today's show we go in search of life's origins, extraterrestrial life, and the ingredients that make a planet a good home with astronomer Dr. Simon Goodwin, from the University of Cardiff, and Dr. Monica Grady, from the Natural History Museum, London. Also joining us on the programme are theoretical physicist Professor Michio Kaku, from City University New York, to discuss the possible existence of parallel universes, and NASA plant scientist Dr. Volker Kern, who describes interesting results when moss grows in the absence of gravity aboard a spaceship...
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Science News
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A novel approach could soon be adopted by scientists in the race to save endangered pandas - the iconic trademark of the conservation movement. Scientists have almost completed... |
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On average women outlive men by 5 years, but why ? A study from a team of scientists lead by Professor David Goldspink from Liverpool University studied 250 men and women of va... |
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Researchers studying the giant Australian cuttlefish have found that males of the species often successfully resort to the marine equivalent of cross-dressing to father offspri... |
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On average women outlive men by 5 years, but why ? A study from a team of scientists lead by Professor David Goldspink from Liverpool University studied 250 men and women of va... |
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A toxic chemical used to prevent barnacles from clinging to the bottoms of boats may be causing whales to go deaf and to beach themselves, according to a study by scientists at... |
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Chris - You work on the concept of parallel universes... Michio - People have often wondered whether there is a carbon copy of us elsewhere that's leading a different life. This... |
Questions
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I stopped taking antidepressants a while ago. After two weeks I couldn't sleep all night and then wouldn't be tired in the day. My doctor was mystified as prior to that my sleep had been really good. I also noticed that it was only happening on certain days of the week. This led me to think that it might be something I was eating, and I think I have become intolerant to refined sugar.
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I have to admit that I haven't heard of this. Some antidepressants stimulate appetite and a lot of the food we eat can be sweet things. This packs an energy punch which may cause you to stay awake. Other than that, I have to say that I'm as mystified as your doctor on this one!
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Is it possible that life on Mars managed to hitch a ride on a meteorite and started life on Earth?
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We think that conditions on the early Earth were very bad for life as there was no atmosphere. Mars might have been a better place to live at that time, and so life could have started there but we just don't know. To find out if life really did get going on Mars, we need to go there and have a look.
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If a meteorite hit the earth, could life be blown onto other planets?
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You need to travel at 11 metres per second to escape form Earth's gravity. It is much harder to blow things off the Earth than it is Mars, although it is potentially possible to go from Earth to Mars. Humans might even be doing it accidentally when we send satellites up into space: sometimes they get hit with things and things like paint might flake off. However, once above the atmosphere, everything we send up is sterilised by radiation. And space scientists do as much as they can to prevent space becoming contaminated.
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Do you think it's possible that future man could have conquered time travel and be coming back to look at us?
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Anything is possible. There are a number of theories about how we can travel through time but they usually involve going into the future using the theory of relativity. Essentially, this involves going so fast that your body clock slows down. When you stop moving so quickly, everything around you will have aged but you will be only a little bit older. In this way, you are able to travel into the future. Another method that has been suggested is to go to a black hole and go out the other end of it. Stephen Hawking doesn't believe time travel is possible because we would have seen people from the future if it were true. A lot of equations in physics don't work backwards, so going back in time seems unlikely. It would be very difficult.
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Could bomb testing make the world fall apart or cause tsunamis?
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I think it is very unlikely. The energy needed to cause something like a tsunami is huge, and to make the world fall apart it would need to be even bigger. It might be possible to cause a tsunami if a bomb was planted in a particular place and the Earth's plates moved. This would require considerable planning, so a tsunami shouldn't be caused by bomb testing, unless it was many times bigger than Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
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If there are parallel universes, do you think Elvis might still be alive and making hits in another ?
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It's an interesting question! I suggest you go along to Michio's talk at Naked Science on Tuesday and find out!
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| Interviews
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NASA scientist, Dr. Volker Kern Chris - You've been looking at how plants grow in space. Why?
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Astrobiologist Dr Monica Grady Monica - The focus of my work is investigating life on Mars to find out whether it's there. There are other questions we also hope to answer: would life on Mars be the same as that
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Astronomer Dr. Simon Goodwin Simon - In my work we cast the net slightly wider than Mars and look for life outside our solar system. We want to know what life there will be like and whether it is intelligent. The
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Fact or Fiction
A man doing the ironing uses about 140 calories an hour
 
![]() It's True -
that's about 10 calories on the actual ironing, and 130 calories trying
to pursuade his wife to do it !
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Dogs have longer memories than cats
![]() It's False - Tests carried out
at the University of Michigan, US, has found that dogs remember some things
for only about 5 minutes, but cats can recall them up to 16 hours later.
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Butterflies 'taste' with their wing tips
![]() It's False - Butterflies
actually taste what they land on - because they have taste buds in their
feet.
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Banging your head against a wall uses 150 calories an hour
![]() It's True - The average couch potato burns off about 60 calories an hour, a
brisk walk 300, and a brick wall 150 !
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Catfish have about 27,000 tastebuds
![]() It's True - Catfish have about
27,000 tastebuds (so there must be some exciting flavours on the bottom
of a pond) compared with humans who have about 20,000.
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Everest is the highest mountain in the world
![]() It's False - The highest
mountain in the world is not Everest, it is Chimborazo in Ecuador. Everest
is the highest above sea level, true, but Chimborazo (at only 20,700 feet)
is actually the farthest from the centre of the earth by some 2150m, making
it, strictly speaking, the highest mountain!
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