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8th Jun 2008

The Real Ithaca and the Secrets of the Odyssey


Kat Arney

Chris Smith
Photograph taken of the bust of Homer in the British Museum, London.

 

Ancient Greece is on the naked scientists' menu this week as we travel back in time to 1200 BC to discover how modern science and a 3000 year old poem have solved an ancient riddle. A team of classicists, geologists and archaeologists claim to have found the island of Ithaca, home of the legendary Greek hero Odysseus. Digging further into the past we also hear how geophysics can help archaeologists to see what lies buried underground but without having to lift a trowel. We also learn how dormant brain stem cells can be brought back to life, why it's not just size that is important when it comes to brains, and the mind-controlling parasite that turns its host first into an egg-incubator and then into a bodyguard. Plus, in Kitchen Science, savouring the Greek flavour, Ben and Dave recreate the science of the original Naked Scientist, Archimedes, and find out whether a heap of gold coins are the real thing...

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News

(c) National Science Foundation

Waking up stem cells

Many researchers are working on adult stem cells – the immortal cells that regenerate old or damaged tissues in our bodies – as they have great potential for treating many diseases, with fewer ethical issues than stem cells taken from embryos.  Now scientists at the Schepens Eye Research Inst...

(c) Prof. José Lino-Neto.

Parasite turns host into bodyguard

Scientists in the Netherlands and Brazil have discovered a parasite that turns its caterpillar host first into an egg incubator and then into a bodyguard! Writing in the journal PLoS one, University of Amsterdam researcher Amir Grosman and his colleages studied how a species of parasitic wasp calle...

(c) Damato

Tracing the roots of the brain

Human brains are amazing works of biological engineering, and one of our greatest challenges as scientists is to understand how they have evolved.  Now researchers writing in the journal Nature Neuroscience have shed some light on the origins of the brain, and how we developed such large, compl...


Kitchen Science

(c) Dave Ansell
Part 1 Part 2 Listen
...or download as MP3 [1] [2]

Eureka!

We recreate Archimedes' experiment to find out whether what claims to be gold is really gold, using some fairly basic equipment.


QotW

(c) Opencage @ Wikipedia

Surviving in Salt- and Fresh-water

How do fish survive in both salt water and fresh water?


Interviews

(c) Katpatuka @ wikipedia

Finding Forgotten Fingerprints

Forensic scientists have announced a major breakthrough in crime detection which could lead to hundreds of cold cases being reopened, finding fingerprints on metal even after they've been washed off...

(c) Jastrow @ wikipedia

The Secrets of Odysseus

Most of us have heard the tales of ancient Greece and the majority of the time we just think of these tales as another good story but there’s now a team of classicists and scientists who think the story told in one of the most famous of those ancient Greek myths, the Odyssey, might actually be based...

(c) RadicalBender @ wikipedia

Seeing Secrets Underground

These days when searching for ancient remains and hidden treasures you don’t need to have the magical map where X marks the spot. You can now see into the ground using the powers of geophysics to find X for yourself...


Questions

Does putting bananas in the fridge make them poisonous?


How does carbon dating work?


What are alternatives to carbon dating?


Why does the sound of nails on a chalk board get such a physical reaction from us?






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