The Conversation Weekly

Last month the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its Synthesis Report of the Sixth Assessment Report. It showed global temperatures are now 1.1°C above pre-industrial levels. This warming has driven widespread and rapid global changes, including more frequent and intense weather extremes that are now impacting people and ecosystems all over the world. But when an extreme weather event hits, how certain can we be that it was made more likely by climate change? How do we know it wasn’t just a rare, naturally-occuring event that might have happened anyway?

Fear & Wonder is a new podcast from The Conversation that takes you inside the UN’s era-defining climate report via the hearts and minds of the scientists who wrote it. In this episode, we’re delving into one of the major shifts in the public communication of climate change – the attribution of extreme weather events to climate change.

Featuring Dr Friederike Otto, Senior Lecturer in Climate Science at the Grantham Institute at Imperial College London in the UK, David Karoly honorary Professor at the University of Melbourne in Australia, and Tannecia Stephenson, Physics Professor at the University of the West Indies, Jamaica.

Fear and Wonder is produced by Michael Green and is sponsored by the Climate Council, an independent, evidence-based organisation working on climate science, impacts and solutions.

Further reading:

• Have climate change predictions matched reality?
• Is climate change to blame for extreme weather events? Attribution science says yes, for some – here’s how it works

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For generations, cod fishing was a way of life in Newfoundland and Labrador, the easternmost province in Canada. But in 1992, after cod stocks in the north Atlantic plummeted, the federal government imposed a moratorium on cod fishing. It was to last for 32 years until June 2024, when the government lifted the ban in a controversial decision.

In this episode we speak to Tyler Eddy, a research scientist in fisheries science at Memorial University of Newfoundland, to shed light on what’s happened. It's a story that offers a cautionary tale for those politicians trying to balance the complex demands of protecting ecosystems that also support substantial economies.

This episode was produced by Katie Flood and Gemma Ware. Sound design was by Michelle Macklem and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Full credits for this episode are available. Sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, which is an independent, not-for-profit news organisation. And please do rate and review the show wherever you listen.

• The federal government has lifted the moratorium on Northern cod fishing after 32 years
• The Atlantic: The driving force behind ocean circulation and our taste for cod
• Tiny oceanic plankton adapted to warming during the last ice age, but probably won’t survive future climate change – new study

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Both the U.S. and China have plans to establish a permanent human presence on the Moon. You might be wondering: why now? The answer to that is the relatively recent discovery of water on the Moon. The question of how humanity will establish a Moon base is perhaps a deeper and more important one. We speak with two people, a planetary scientist who studies lunar geology and a scholar who works on space law and politics, about the challenges facing nations as humanity heads to the Moon.

Featuring Mahesh Anand, Professor of Planetary Science and Exploration at The Open University in the UK, and Michelle L.D. Hanlon, Professor of Air and Space Law at the University of Mississippi in the US.

This episode was written by Katie Flood and produced by Dan Merino and Katie Flood. The executive producer is Mend Mariwany. Eloise Stevens does our sound design and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Full credits for this episode are available here. A transcript will be available soon. Sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

Further reading:

• Lunar mining and Moon land claims fall into a gray area of international law, but negotiations are underway to avoid conflict and damage to spacecraft
• Space law hasn’t been changed since 1967 – but the UN aims to update laws and keep space peaceful
• Water on the Moon: research unveils its type and abundance – boosting exploration plans

If you like The Conversation Weekly, we encourage you to check out two limited series podcasts produced by The Conversation: Fear & Wonder and Great Mysteries of Physics. Available on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you like to listen to your podcasts.

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The human body is a complex organism, made up of trillions of cells. But not all of them are human. About half of them are fungi, microbes and bacteria. Scientists are starting to understand how and why these communities — referred to as microbiomes — are crucial to the functioning of various body systems. We speak to three experts who study the gut microbiome: a gastroenterologist, a neuroscientist and a biological engineer. Their research considers how these microbiomes are important, what the relationship is between microbiomes and well being, and how synthetically engineered microorganisms promise new forms of therapies.

Featuring Chris Damman, a gastroenterologist and clinical associate professor at the University of Washington, Andrea Merchak, an incoming postdoctoral scholar at the University of Florida, who studies the gut biome as it affects and is affected by various conditions, and Tae Seok Moon, a biological engineer at Washington University at St. Louis, who looks at how synthetic biology can be employed within the gut.

This episode was written and produced by Mend Mariwany, who is also the show’s executive producer. With production assistance from Katie Flood. Eloise Stevens does our sound design, and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Full credits for this episode are available here. A transcript will be available soon. Sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

Further reading:

• Fermented food: why eating sauerkraut helps your gut stay healthy
• Bile acids and gut microbes could potentially treat multiple sclerosis, according to new research in mice
• Fiber is your body’s natural guide to weight management – rather than cutting carbs out of your diet, eat them in their original fiber packaging instead

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The rise of drug-resistant infections is one of the biggest global threats to health, food security and development. Antibiotic-resistant superbugs were estimated to kill 1.27 million people in 2019, and the UN projects that drug-resistant diseases could cause 10 million deaths a year by 2050. In this episode, we hear from a microbiologist at a hospital in Nigeria working on the frontlines against antibiotic resistance, and find out about the new scientific techniques, including artificial intelligence, being deployed to find new potential antibiotics.

Featuring Nubwa Medugu, a clinical microbiologist at Nile University of Nigeria and André O. Hudson, dean of the College of Science and professor of biochemistry at Rochester Institute of Technology in the US.

This episode was written and produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware with assistance from Katie Flood. Eloise Stevens does our sound design, and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Gemma Ware is the executive producer of the show. Full credits for this episode are available here. A transcript is also available.

Further reading:

• Will we still have antibiotics in 50 years? We asked 7 global experts
• Resistance to antibiotics in northern Nigeria: what bacteria are prevalent, and which drugs work against them
• Antibiotic resistance is at a crisis point – government support for academia and Big Pharma to find new drugs could help defeat superbugs
• More reading from our series on The dangers of antibiotic resistance

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