The Music of Flowers

Here's a nice preview of this week's episode of How to Grow a Planet. Watch and see how a species of plant and a species of bee have evolved a partnership based on the sound of a wing beat. The series continues this Tuesday, 9pm, BBC2.

How to Grow a Planet

This week sees the start of what promises to be another great series of science programmes from the BBC with How to Grow a Planet.

The three part series, presented by Prof. Iain Stewart, aims to reveal how the greatest changes to the Earth have been driven, above all, by plants.

Stewart is a geologist and professor of Geoscience Communication at Plymouth University so expect to see the links between ancient plants and geology feature highly in this series.

“I had always thought of plants as being rather boring – less dramatic than the earthquakes and volcanoes I had been studying. But when you realise what plants do at the planet scale, and when you discover just how fundamental they are to life on Earth, they take your breath away", said Stewart.

In the first episode, to be aired on Tuesday 7th February at 9pm on BBC2, Stewart examines how plants first harnessed light energy to create our life-giving atmosphere. He looks at the epic batle between dinosaurs and poisonous plants and promises to use remarkable imagery to show plants 'breathing' and communicating with each other for the first time.

Also in episode one, Stewart will be sealed inside an air-tight chamber at the Eden Project in Cornwall in an attempt to demonstrate the oxygenating properties of the plants sealed in the chamber alongside him.

Stewart added: “I think it was being stuck in a transparent air-tight container for 48 hours with 274 of them that really made me appreciate plants. Locked in there, with half the oxygen removed, I suddenly realised how much I needed plants to keep me alive. It is a hell of a way to highlight something we so take for granted: photosynthesis!”

Here's a sneak preview of episode one:

'What a Wonderful World'

David Attenborough's wonderful new series Frozen Planet came to an end on BBC last night with a warning from the presenter that global warming is continuing to have profound effects on the polar regions of the planet. Despite the beautiful imagery, it was somewhat depressing stuff!

To lighten the mood, a remarkable montage of clips from BBC Natural History programming was played after Frozen Planet with David Attenborough voicing Louis Armstrong's What a Wonderful World to great effect. Enjoy! There is already internet mumblings about a Christmas Number One single.

Botany - A Blooming History

This Tuesday sees a new season of programmes tracing the history of botany kick off on BBC 4.

The centerpiece of the season is a three-part series: Botany- A Blooming History.

Presented by Timothy Walker, director of Oxford University Botanic Gardens, the series will reveal how a band of pioneers came to understand the mysteries of the plant kingdom and in doing so, helped to unlock the secrets of the natural world.

A Blooming History, will tell the story of how we came to understand the natural order of the plant world and how the quest to discover how plants grow uncovered the secret to life on the planet.

The series features the latest plant science and hows how botanists today are at the forefront of advances to fight disease, provide radical new forms of renewable energy and help feed the world's growing population.

During a journey which will take in the likes of Carl Linnaeus, who laid the groundwork for how we name all living creatures; Thomas Fairchild, the nurseryman who produced the first man-made hybrid and William Bateson, the botanist who coined the term 'genetics', Timothy Walker will show how plants are the centre of modern science.

Along with the three-part series, there is a supporting cast of three one-off documentaries: Apples - British to the Core will look at how Britain has helped shape the apple; Wonderful Weeds aims to look at how some of what we call 'weeds' are more useful than we give them credit for; Hidcote will look at the most influential British garden of the 20th century.

Botany: A Blooming History starts on BBC4 on Tuesday June 7th at 9pm.

(Source: BBC Press Office)

'Irish Giant' Documentary

We recently covered the story of Charles Byrne, the so-called 'Irish Giant' and the recent scientific breakthroughs which have been made using his remains.

Ronin films have produced an excellent documentary (As Gaeilge) for the BBC. The documentary aired last night and the opening sequence is presented here.

So you want to be a scientist?

In the age of TV talent competitions and the X Factor, the BBC have used the format to help amateur scientists turn their ideas into real experiments.

This week, four finalists for the "So you want to be a scientist?" competition were announced. These came from the some 1,300 ideas which were submitted since January.

The amateur scientists will now work with experienced researchers to design and implement their experiments and collect and analyse the results, They'll present the results at the British Science Festival in September when the judges will pick an overall winner.

The four finalists are:

Sam O'kell, a croupier, who wants to test his hypothese that concert crowds are more dense between 6-10 feet from the stage rather than at the very front.

Ruth Brooks, a retired special needs tutor, wants to protect her plants by establishing the homing distance of the Garden Snail. "How far away do I ahve to dump them before they find their way back to my garden?"

Nina Jones, a 17-year-old A-level student, is interested in Facebook and particularly what makes up a typical Facebook profile picture. Adults seem to show a big event in their lives, while teenagers tend to use a picture of themselves having a great time. Nina will see if this is true and why it occurs.

The final place (which was a very close call by all acounts) went to John Rowlands who wants to "investigate the frequency and brightness of noctilucent clouds".

Ideas which made the shortlist, but just missed out on a place in the final include an investigation by a gallery owner into why more people come into the gallery when he places a mannequin in the window. Do art lovers not like to be on their own?

Another shortlisted amateur scientist wanted to see whether getting a choir to sing a piece of music based on the sounds of bees to the hive once a week would increase honey production.

Angus Johnson on the other hand proposed an investigation into the ability of men and women in their ability to find one item amid a clutter of other objects. Are men much messier than women?

Science writer and broadcaster Dr. Adam Rutherford welcomed the competition noting that "science is not a bank of knowledge. It's a way of knowing. Qualifications and working in professional labs certainly does help, but if you've ever looked at something and thought "hmmm, how does that work?" or "what happens if I...?" then you're thinking like a scientist already."

If you're in school and interested in trying your hand at some scientific experiments, then you can try the BT Young Scientist Competition or SciFest.