URN

We spoke about nanophysics and whether Science Fiction can become reality - will nanobots really take over the world? Or is it just wild speculation?

Drexler

Above is Drexler. He "...envisioned a world utterly transformed by [molecular] assemblers... They would confer something approaching immortality. They would enable the colonization of the solar system."

Blimey.

But is he right? And is it right for us to try and reach this ideal? For more information:

http://pubs.acs.org/cen/coverstory/8148/8148counterpoint.html

Is it possible that we could build anything we could possibly want, atom by atom? Food? Clothes? A sense of humour for Presenter Dave? Our resident Professor Phil Moriarty doesn't believe we can due to the complications of surface science.

AND in Science in the News, we spoke about these guys:

Men from Mars...

They've just completed a one and a half year experiment to simulate what conditions would be like on a manned mission to Mars.

However, it would take me (Emma) 10x that amount of time to tame Dave's ego. So maybe it's not that long a time...

Remember to check out the podcast, available on this website and also on iTunes.

We spoke to Dr Frazer Pearce about whether it's possible for there to be life out there...

This is the Drake equation, which predicts the chance that there is life elsewhere in the Universe...

Drake Equation

This is PROOF THAT UFOs EXIST:

UFO

Or is it just a seagull relieving itself?

Finally, here are some links that we spoke about today:

http://www.badscience.net/2006/12/mediaslut-ideas-money-corporatewhore/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/21/hoagland-still...

Don't forget to download Frazer's podcast! It is FREE and available on the URN website and on iTunes.

We all know scientists are smart. Especially at the University of Nottingham. But if we were to quiz our resident scientists at common sense and popular culture, just how well would they do?

This is our Academic Leaderboard. Scored out of 15, we will see who really is the smartest cookie on campus.

Keith Smith - 9/15 - A stirling performance with wonderful knowledge of sport and scraping in at 60% - A 2:1.

Will Hartley - 4/15 - Despite claims of 'Keith's quiz was easier than mine!' Will unfortunately only managed to rack up 26.7%.

Roger Bowley - 4/10 - A lack of knowledge of the X-factor judges means that Roger comes in with a reasonable 40%. A pass at least.

Tony Padilla - 6/10 - With an ability to spell words such as 'embarass... embarress... embarrass', Tony storms in at joint first place.

Frazer Pearce - 3/10 - Receives a 'bonus point' from Dave for believing that 'Simon Cowell is the only judge that matters on the X-Factor so who cares about the others?' Narrowly missed the bottom of the table there, Frazer!

The Academic Leaderboard

In Week 4's show (24th October, 6-7pm), we spoke to particle cosmologist, Tony Padilla, about what makes up our Universe.

We will be covered the following topics:

- Dark matter
- Dark energy
- The expansion of the Universe
- Was Einstein wrong?
- Black holes and singularities

Dark Matter Pie Chart

Here is our audio clip on the 'basics' of dark matter and dark energy (if such things could ever be considered 'basic')...

And here is our view of the history of the Universe as we know it to be currently:

NASA Universe

We chatted to the esteemed Roger Bowley (retired lecturer extraordinaire) about Sixty Symbols - a video-based project aimed at exciting and informing people about physics.

This is Sixty Symbols in a nutshell...

We also chatted about Roger's life in general, and all of the famous scientists he has met.

The YouTube channel of Sixty Symbols now has had nearly 7,000,000 uploads and is consistently in the chart for iTunes U along with the Periodic Table of Elements; the sister project of Sixty Symbols.

http://www.sixtysymbols.com/videos/fractal.htm

This is the Schrodinger's Cat episode with Professor Poliakoff that we mentioned:

http://www.sixtysymbols.com/videos/schrodinger.htm

FINALLY, you can listen to the podcast here:

http://urn1350.net/thescienceshow/podcast