Today there are over eight billion people on Earth. That’s an awe-inspiring figure… but how does it compare to the vast numbers who came before us? Listener Alpha wants to know how many people have ever existed, so CrowdScience sets out to do a

Can humans be part of healthy ecosystems?

1 Oct 6th, 2023 30m 22s

Humans have an outsized impact on the planet: we’ve wreaked havoc on countless ecosystems and one study estimates only 3% of land on Earth remains untouched by our influence. CrowdScience listener Teri has witnessed the harmful effects of devel

Bullying Parrots and Glacial Cocktails

2 Dec 30th, 2022 31m 2s

Over the past 12 months, CrowdScience has travelled the world, from arctic glacierscapes to equatorial deserts, to answer listeners’ science queries. Sometimes, the team come across tales that don’t quite fit with the quest in hand, but still d

Am I a psychopath?

1 Jul 23rd, 2021 35m 42s

One CrowdScience listener finds herself unconcerned about much of the world’s problems, it leaves her wondering: am I a psychopath?Inspired by a previous episode on empathy, this listener asked is it true that psychopaths don’t empathise and wh

Could we turn poisonous plants into edible crops?

1 May 14th, 2021 27m 59s

There are over 400,000 species of plant on earth, they’re on every continent including Antarctica. But humans only regularly eat about 200 species globally, with the vast majority of our nutrition coming from just three species. Many of the fru

Will mountains shrink as sea levels rise?

1 May 24th, 2024 28m 51s

The Blue Ridge Parkway is 469 miles of beautiful vistas, a mountainous road that winds from Virginia to North Carolina in the USA. The route is peppered with elevation signs, telling you how many metres above sea level you are. Which has CrowdS

What does prayer do to my brain?

May 17th, 2024 30m 29s

Prayer and meditation are key features of religious and spiritual practices around the world, suggesting they’re intimately linked to the human condition. But what is going on in the brain during prayer? And is praying beneficial for our mental

Why are people still dying from malaria?

May 10th, 2024 30m 47s

Mosquitoes are responsible for more human deaths than any other animal. These tiny creatures transmit many diseases, but the most devastating is malaria. It kills over half a million people every year, most of them children. So why are people s

Why am I bad at maths?

1 May 3rd, 2024 33m 2s

When CrowdScience listener Israel from Papua New Guinea received a bad grade on a maths test in third grade, he looked around the class and realised that almost all the other students had received a better result. Since then, he has always wond

How should we protect our coastlines?

Apr 26th, 2024 28m 30s

Coastlines around the world are changing, causing serious problems for the many communities living near the sea, as well as vital and fragile coastal ecosystems. In the second of a two-part special on coastal erosion, CrowdScience explores the

Are our coastlines being washed away?

1 Apr 19th, 2024 28m 15s

Around the world, coastlines are constantly changing due to the power of waves, currents and tides. Coastal areas are also some of the most heavily populated and developed land areas in the world. So it’s not hard to see how the natural process

Could climate change lead to more volcanic eruptions?

1 Mar 29th, 2024 28m 53s

We spend a lot of our time thinking about climate change, but listener Paul has a question that isn’t usually part of the conversation. He wants to know whether a hotter atmosphere will affect how often volcanoes erupt, or make them more explos

Is the BMI fatphobic?

1 Mar 15th, 2024 32m 41s

Crowd Science listener Maik wants to know what the BMI is and what his BMI score says about his body. He trains dogs for a living and wonders if, like different breeds of dog, we simply have different body types?Marnie Chesterton comes up wi

Do we all see the same colour?

1 Mar 8th, 2024 29m 10s

CrowdScience listener Gregory wants to know what affects the way we see the colours of the world. He was looking at a blue summer sky with a friend and they got to wondering whether they both see the same colour blue. So what does influence our

How bad is our data for the planet?

Mar 1st, 2024 27m 20s

Storing your data in ‘the cloud’ might sound like an ethereal, intangible place, but it’s actually a physical location - a data centre. CrowdScience listener Art is worried about how much energy and water data centres are consuming. He’s from I

Why do we have wisdom teeth?

1 Feb 23rd, 2024 29m 50s

Why do humans have wisdom teeth if so many of them get removed soon after they appear?Wisdom teeth, the third molars in the back of our mouths, are so called because they normally appear in late teenage, early adulthood – the time in life we su

When will the next earthquake hit?

Feb 9th, 2024 27m 41s

In 2011, CrowdScience listener Amanda survived the devastating earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand.It arrived unannounced - as all earthquakes do - leaving her with no time to prepare a response. So Amanda wants to know whether science will

Why do we daydream?

Feb 2nd, 2024 31m 42s

Have you ever been through a romantic break up, unable to shift the ex from your thoughts? You are, obviously, not alone…Listener Elkin, experienced just that. But rather than wallowing in self-pity, he sought out an explanation. Where better t

How should we measure cleverness?

Jan 26th, 2024 28m 41s

Presenter Marnie Chesterton and the team pit their wits against a multitude of mind-bending puzzles from an old TV gameshow - all in the name of answering a question from Antonia in Cyprus: how do we work out how clever someone is? Is IQ the be

Will electric cars help solve noise pollution?

Jan 5th, 2024 29m 54s

Noise pollution from vehicles in the public space has a huge impact on human health. But as the world switches to quieter electric-powered means of transport there’s a debate about whether we will actually see any noticeable improvement to our

2023 Year End Extravaganza, Part 2

1 Dec 29th, 2023 27m 54s

Welcome to Part 2 of our year-end extravaganza and the final episode of 2023! We’ve had a brilliant year hunting down the answers to your science questions - on everything from food and phobias to friction and flying - and in this episode pres

2023 Year-End Extravaganza, Part 1

Dec 22nd, 2023 37m 7s

Welcome to Part 1 of CrowdScience’s year-end extravaganza! It’s an extra-festive episode this week. For those who celebrate it, Christmas is the perfect time to pause and look back at the year just gone. Here on CrowdScience we’ve had a great 2

Where does our fat go when we exercise?

1 Dec 8th, 2023 28m 59s

If, like this week’s Crowdscience listener Lili, you enjoy working out in the gym, you may have wondered where your fat disappears to when you exercise? The short answer is that we convert it to energy that powers a whole range of physical pro

What’s the difference between reading and listening to books?

1 Nov 24th, 2023 27m 59s

CrowdScience listener Michael wants to know whether the brain responds differently if we listen to books instead of reading them. Do we retain information in the same way? And is there a difference between fiction and non-fiction? Anand Jagatia

How does food affect our mood?

1 Nov 3rd, 2023 27m 41s

“You are what you eat” is a well-known saying. But is it really true? That’s what we explore in this week’s CrowdScience thanks to a question from listener Claire from Australia. We each have trillions of tiny microbes and bacteria inside our