Speculation about the future of the city centre started as soon as the world began locking down for COVID-19. Much of it has been focussed on the economics of “working from home”, but what have we learnt about urban isolation and inequality from this time of pandemic?
Are entrepreneurs the great innovators we’re told they are? What if the ideal of the lone genius is simply a myth? Innovation is a buzz term that’s become so over-used as to be almost meaningless. It’s time to be more innovative in our understanding of innovation.
Commercial and military interest in space is growing exponentially. More and more countries and companies are keen to make money from space-related activities. They are also keen to protect their interests. There are internationally agreed rules regulating activity in space, but there’s also conjecture and confusion about how and when they should be applied. In this episode we look at efforts to better map what is, and is not, permissible in the world above our sky....
Australia has long been at the forefront of wave-energy development, but the industry has struggled to find its place in the world of renewables. Can it ever hope to compete with solar Also, Cambridge University’s Erwin Reisner on global efforts to replicate the energy producing power of plants.
Imagine greenhouses that produce food using just sunshine and sea-water. In Australia and Africa they’re already a reality. We talk to one of the pioneers of the concept. Also, the latest research on the so-called “insect apocalypse”. And, the new aviation prize open to any enterprising spirit able to cross the Atlantic in a plane powered entirely by renewable energy.
Human civilization has a waste problem, and it’s likely to get worse as population levels grow and a consumerist mentality becomes the global norm. But there are many clever, practical ways to deal with waste, including bioremediation - a nature-inspired approach.
Around the world a growing number of people are choosing cryonics. They opt to be frozen when they die on the speculative hope that one day advancing science will allow them to be ‘reanimated’ and brought back to life. The rising popularity of this new death ritual has led to the creation of a cryonics facility in regional Australia, and a handful of Australians have already signed up. Currently there is no existing science to prove that it will work, but even as an idea cryonics raises some imp...
There’s bipartisan support in the United States for the establishment of a national AI research cloud. So, how would academics benefit and what role would big tech play in its operations? Also, problems with academic inclusivity in the developing world, and could alternative channels of distribution soon rival the primacy of peer-reviewed journals?
The research community is facing a “crisis of reproducibility”, according to the head of the Center for Open Science, Professor Brian Nosek. He says many of the traditional practices designed to make research robust, actually distort and diminish its effectiveness. In this episode, he details his ideas for reform. We also explore three plausible scenarios for how the academic sector could look in 2030.
Controlled Environmental Agriculture promises to be cleaner and greener. It’s focussed on technology and it’s essentially about bringing food production closer to the point of consumption. We examine the potential and the pitfalls.
Economists are predicting a further concentration of industries and sectors coming out of the COVID-19 crisis. What that will mean long-term remains uncertain. Meanwhile, in the tech sector, the giants of Silicon Valley are facing increased scrutiny. There are renewed calls in the US for tougher anti-trust regulation, but some doubt the effectiveness of such measures and argue instead for a wholesale rethinking of what we mean by competition.
Artificial Intelligence and other advanced technologies are now being used to make decisions about everything from family law to sporting team selection. So, what works and what still needs refinement? Also, they’re very small, very light and very agile - they clap as they flap their wings. Biologically-inspired drones are now a reality, but how and when will they be used?
Does carbon pricing work? It’s long been a contentious issue, but Australian researchers have crunched the data from 142 countries and now have what they reckon is the definitive answer. Also, are group purchasing plans the way to fund future renewable energy needs? And, the California research that could give new life to carbon, capture and storage.
There’s a new emphasis on land reclamation and building floating structures for everything from accommodation to marine farming to energy generation. Re-defining the use of the ocean is part of the emerging “blue economy” – one that can be both economically beneficial and environmentally responsible. How well can these often contradictory goals be reconciled?
Geoengineering is the deliberate manipulation of nature to lessen or reverse the impacts of global warming. Even its supporters concede it’s risky. A decade ago, the controversial technology was talked about as a “necessary evil” in the fight against climate change – a matter of when, not if. However, despite the continued heating of the planet, no large scale testing has yet been attempted. In this program we ask why? And where to from here?
