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14th May 2006

BSE, Cervical Cancer and Toxoplasmosis


Helen Scales

Chris Smith

As the ten-year ban on British beef exports is lifted, Professor Tony Minson from Cambridge University joins us to discuss what causes BSE, how it is spread and why it is such a problem. With another example of how animal diseases can be passed to humans is Dr Joanne Webster from Imperial College London who describes the life cycle of Toxoplasma gondii, how it makes mice as mad as hatters and a possible link to schizophrenia in humans. But it's not all doom and gloom as Professor Margaret Stanley from Cambridge University reveals how a cervical cancer vaccine is proving highly successful in clinical trials, and Derek Thorne has fun with food colouring in Kitchen Science.

 

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News

 

Sea Pores Over New Defences

German manufacturing giant BASF have developed a new way to protect sea walls from the incessant crashing of the sea - by giving them a holey coating which behaves like a trampoline. The spray-on treatment, which is currently being tested against the ravages o...

 

Phone Masts help Meteorologists

If you are going to predict the weather the first thing you need to know is what the weather is like now, the second thing you have to know is whether your prediction was right so you can improve your model. One of the hardest things to measure is rainfall, rainfall radar covers large areas but isn...

 

Pedal Powered Computing

In a step that will see computers become even closer to being an extension of the body, Microsoft Research are now looking into ways to implement foot pedals to help you control your desktop. At the moment they're looking at which aspects of the mouse and keyb...


Questions

 

Do TV and radio signals travel vertically, and if they do, do they disappear or travel off into space forever? If so, does that mean that a signal from the 1950s is still in space somewhere?


 

I was listening to my radio one night and I noticed that when I turned on my desk light there was a little blip of noise on the radio. I repeated this and I noticed that when I was on the border of completing the circuit, such that when the bulb was flickering, I got severe interference on my radio. My radio was running on batteries. Why does this happen?


 

As far as I know, mammals do not use the colours blue or green, but most other animals and plants do. Is there a reason for this?


 

Have we got a time bomb in the population with mad cow disease?



Kitchen Science

(c)  ? @ Wikipedia
 

Brownian motion in hot and cold water

Derek and Sheena visit Downham market high school to find out what effect molecular vibrations have on ink and water.



Fact or Fiction

US Pentagon staff get through 1000 rolls of toilet paper a day
TrueTrue
Acetylsalicylic acid is the chemical name for aspirin
TrueTrue



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