What's Your Limit?
Conditions on other planets are unlikely to be within the same ranges as that experienced by Earth. However, a degree of variance from ‘ideal’ ranges may be tolerable for a small number of organisms known as extremophiles. This investigation looks at the effects of subjecting a living organism (yeast) to some extreme…
Is There Life In There?
All life forms on Earth are based on organic biochemistry. This activity requires students to analyse an unknown soil sample (just recovered from a space mission to another planet!) and look for signs of possible indicators for life. Curriculum areas covered: • Cell biology • Food tests, including starch, sugar, protein…
Scientific Enquiry and its Place in the National Curriculum
This is a report of a SCORE workshop held in September 2011 at the Royal Society to explore the place of scientific enquiry in the national curriculum. The report summarises the main issues raised and describes the views of the participants. The workshop was chaired by Libby Steele, Head of Education at the Royal Society. The group…
Veritasium
In the build-up to the Christmas Lectures in 2012, the Royal Institution published a new video for every day of advent revealing the elements that really excite and inspire people. From the roof of the Royal Institution, Derek Muller from the Veritasium YouTube channel stresses the need to communicate the beauty and importance…
Your Days Are Numbered
This video, written and presented by Matt Parker and Timandra Harkness, considers the statistics of death. The only certainty is that everyone will die, but it is not known how or when this will happen. Based upon statistics, the odds of dying in particular ways are calculated and interpreted. The Normal Distribution curve is…
Young Journalists Academy Education Pack
In 2012, with support from the Wellcome Trust, the Young Journalists’ Academy summer school included a ‘Biomedical issues and the media’ strand. The strand featured sessions, workshops and visits from science journalists from the BBC, The Times, Eureka and the Wellcome Trust. This teaching pack was produced…
The ESA/ESO Astronomy Exercise Series
The object of this resource, produced by ESA and ESO, is to present various small projects that will pass on some of the excitement and satisfaction in scientific discovery, to students. Using elementary geometrical and physical considerations, students will be able to derive answers that are comparable with the results of much…
The Kilogram
This Catalyst article looks at the changing definition of the kilogram, a unit of mass and a base unit in the SI system (the International System of units). It has been found that the International Prototype Kilogram (IPK), made in 1879 and kept in a vault in Paris, has lost about 50microgrammes of mass over the years. This may…
Science – the Big Questions
This Cape Farewell video features a conversation at the National Oceanography Centre about how scientists from different disciplines work together to answer the big questions. This can be used to review some of the ways that scientists have arrived at their ideas about global climate change. It offers a way of summing up what students…
The Voyages
This Cape Farewell video clip provides a general introduction to the voyage of The Noorderlicht to Svalbard and to the Cape Farewell scientists Simon, Val and Sarah. The scientists discuss their work with two teachers, Mike and Subathra. The presentation called Setting the Scene complements the first video clip by providing a…
Life in the Water: Teacher Guidance
These teachers’ notes were produced to support the use of the series of video clips and activities about a Cape Farewell expedition to the Norwegian Arctic. The notes provide detailed guidance on each of the video clips and activities. They also suggest a series of six lessons based on the resources. The version of the notes…
Butterflies, Buoys and the English Channel
In this podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), Sue Nelson goes to the Eden Project in Cornwall, southwest England and to the South Downs in southeast England to find out what butterfly research is telling us about climate change. As well as the bad news, there is good…
Antarctica, Wild Geese and Ash Plumes
A podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). Richard Hollingham finds out that the freezing seas around Antarctica are not barren and lifeless. The Census of Marine Life is building up a picture of the richness and diversity of life in the world's oceans and has so…
Leeches, Earthquakes and Weird Sea-life
A podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). In this recording, Richard Hollingham talks to expert seismologist Brian Baptie from the British Geological Survey, who uses musical software to find out if earthquakes are getting more frequent. Another report comes from Plymouth…
Orangutans, Green Buildings and an Antarctic GP
A podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). With efforts to improve energy efficiency focused on green transport, sustainable power generation, growing your own food and reducing waste, it is often easy to forget that the very buildings we live and work in could also be made…
Spreading aliens, Arctic experience, and Antarctica
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at how hikers and walkers could be unwittingly changing the landscape by spreading alien species; what it's like to work as a marine biologist in the Arctic in temperatures of minus 40°C; and exactly how stable…
Bowerbirds, a Yellow Sub and Measuring CO2
A podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). Richard Hollingham finds out that bowerbirds are not just brilliant at making elaborate bowers, they are also good at mimicking other birds and most other sounds they hear, including human voices. He also goes to a Scottish forest…
The Risks of Following the Herd, and Banded Mongooses
A podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). Have you ever noticed that when you cross a busy road, as well as clocking the traffic, you subconsciously follow what your neighbours do? Scientists have recently put a figure on this and worked out that people are 2.5 times…
Volcanic Ash from Iceland, and Sediment Time Machines
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at how the eruption of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland gave scientists an unparalleled opportunity for research, and why sediment from rivers like the Thames can act like time machines to bygone eras. On…
Palm Oil Plantations, Charcoal, and a Flea Circus
A podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). Does your shopping basket contain chocolate, biscuits and shampoo? If it does, you may be unwittingly contributing to the destruction of the some of the world's pristine rainforests. Manufacturers now use palm oil in a huge…
Plastics in the Oceans and Tracking Satellites
A podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). Scientists recently found plastics floating in some of the most remote and inaccessible seas in the world, just off the coast of Antarctica. Although it clearly looks ugly in such a pristine environment, scientists are more concerned…
Hi-tech Physics, Toxic Soils and Mussel Shells
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) was recorded at the Diamond Light Source in Oxfordshire, England and discusses how two researchers are using hi-tech physics to study different aspects of the environment. The Diamond synchrotron is like a giant, silver doughnut,…
WWII Bunkers, Thugs and Aliens, and Calving Glaciers
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at why weathermen are using a converted World War II bunker to monitor clouds; how thug species such as bramble, nettle and bracken can be just as damaging to woodlands as alien plants; and why scientists are going to Greenland…
Noisy Coral Reefs, Melting Ice Sheets and Whale Speak
In this podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), Richard Hollingham hears how the underwater world isn't the soundless place often imagined. From chirping, gurgling and snapping sounds from busy coral reefs to clicking sperm whales, scientists are finding that all…
Bumblebee Declines, Microbes, and Amazing Birds
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at what UK farmers are doing to protect the country's vanishing bumblebees, butterflies and other pollinating insects; how scientists are trying to figure out how many types of microbes there are on our planet and why…
Romans Recycling, Dinosaur Colour, Gravity Mission
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at how the Romans recycled glass, dinosaur colour, and what Europe's gravity mission tells us about ocean currents. The height of the world's oceans can vary by as much as 200 metres. These huge differences…
Fish Poo, Dead Whales, and the Japan Earthquake
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at how the famous White Cliffs of Dover could be made of fish poo (at least partially), why one researcher is so interested in dead whales, and why the Japan earthquake was so powerful and devastating. Scientists have…
Science From a Plane, and Forecasting Space Storms
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at how a specially-designed twin turboprop research plane is helping scientists in a huge range of subjects from archaeology to ecology, and why a violent space storm could spell trouble for communications systems across…
The Earth's Magnetic Field, Snow, and Chernobyl
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at how scientists plan to measure the Earth's magnetic field from space, why one researcher is in the frozen town of Churchill in northern Canada, and how the Chernobyl disaster still affects Northern Ireland 25 years…
Tracking Insects With a Big Dish, Australian Floods
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at how tracking insects can help scientists forecast summer storms and floods, and the role one of Europe's key satellite missions played in the recent floods in Queensland, Australia. The huge Chilbolton Facility…
Flood Defences, the Southern Ocean, and Whiter Clouds
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at why removing some man-made coastal flood defences might not be such a bad idea, what it is like studying gas exchange in the wilds of the Southern Ocean, and – in what could be the first case of 'natural'…
Rip Currents in Cornwall, and Carbon Capture and Storage
This podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) looks at why understanding rip currents at Perranporth in north Cornwall could help save lives; and how exactly does carbon capture and storage (CCS) work and how can scientists be sure that CO2 will be stored forever? There…
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