Our Changing World

A team of scientists are installing an array of seismic sensors along the South Island's Alpine Fault. Claire Concannon joins them to find out how and why. Standing in the last back field of a deer farm near Whataroa on the South Island's West Coast, orange high-vis vest on, shovel in hand, Professor John Townend is looking for the perfect spot - not too wet, not too stony, with a good view o...

Katy Gosset speaks to a PhD student designing new tech to catch predators and Claire Concannon meets the team who are working to restore a unique landscape on the South Island's West Coast. Whistles, song, calls, booms, rustling in the undergrowth, hooting at night. How busy the bush of Aotearoa must have been, this land of birds, before human-introduced predators and tree clearance. Today, two st...

On the 100th anniversary of radio in Aotearoa, Claire Concannon learns about the very first broadcast, explores how radio works, and finds out about current research into communicating using light. How are you reading this? On a computer, laptop, mobile phone? Connected to the internet by a cable or wirelessly through the use of radiowaves? Instantaneous round-the-world communication is now an eve...

Claire visits the team at K9 Medical Detection Charitable Trust to learn how their dogs are being trained to detect bowel and prostate cancer. Levi loves what he does. He gets picked up each morning at 8:30am, happy and excited to go to work. He spends his time investigating samples, figuring out whether they contain cancer or not. His payment - toys and play time. Follow Our Changing World on App...

Claire Concannon hits the Central Otago hills with Botany PhD student Ben Teele to imagine the landscape as it use to be, and to follow the clues to find leftover pockets of tōtara trees. The hillsides of Central Otago are known for their golden grass and tussock slopes with scattered low-lying shrubs. But once this landscape was covered in tōtara forest. Now only a few trees remain, cryptic and s...

Claire Concannon hears how the the New Zealand Plant Conservation Network's favourite plant competition is shaping up, while Katy Gosset learns about research to improve the quality and growth efficiency of grapevines. If you had to choose, what would your favourite plant be? Something beautiful and flashy like kōwhai or pōhutukawa? Or maybe something subtle like a native moss or grass? Or perhaps...

This week on Our Changing World, Aotearoa Science Agency's Damian Christie speaks to three scientists about the world of data. As we approach the end of our second year dealing with Covid-19, it's notable how many of us are now familiar with the basic concepts of epidemiology. Social conversations are no longer about house prices and sports results, but debates over elimination versus suppres...

Claire Concannon hears from Dr. Brigid Ryan of the University of Auckland about the New Zealand genetic frontotemporal dementia study and speaks to some of the family members involved in this unique research study. Frontotemporal dementia is one of the sneakiest forms of dementia, arriving with no warning signs and slowly chipping away at a person's personality, behaviour and language. It eve...

Stories about the potential of bioengineering to transform health care. A new tracheostomy kit design that has halved the time for emergency operations and 3D bioprinting of tissues to help healing. Stem cell infused wound dressings that promote healing, bone scaffolds that help knit breaks before dissolving naturally and clever device design to half the time of emergency life-saving procedures ar...

Stories of physics research in Antarctica - into, under, and from within the ice. Claire finds out about measuring sea ice thickness and supercooling. Katy Gosset learns how scientists detect neutrinos from outer space. The frozen continent of Antarctica is defined by its snow and ice. On land, freshwater ice sheets kilometres thick sit on top of rock. In the ocean, an area of sea ice twice the si...

Claire Concannon learns about experiments aimed at slowing Parkinson's Disease progression. Sonia Yee explores research into our perception of emotions in a mask-filled world. The complexity of the human brain is astounding. Billions of brain cells or neurons forming circuits, with countless connections sharing information. This allows us to perceive the world around us, form complex thoughts, res...

The return of South Island kākā to the the Ōtepoti Dunedin area has been a bit of a rollercoaster ride. Claire Concannon hears about the tragedies and the triumphs, and the plans for what comes next. The sun filters through trees as tūī and korimako compete for space at the sugar water feeders behind the Orokonui Ecosanctuary aviary. The giant bird cage contains three South Island kākā, waiting to...

Native mangroves in Aotearoa are expanding, putting them in conflict with some local communities & councils. A wade into the research about the value of mangroves & how they are managed. Unlike many of Aotearoa's native plant species, our mangroves are actually doing great. Is that a problem, with mangroves clogging some waterways and taking over estuaries? Or is it just nature adapting, prov...

Katy Gosset finds out how researchers investigate the plant penetration powers of myrtle rust. Claire Concannon speaks with the caretaker of a tropical forest and hundreds of butterflies. From the lab to lockdown, stories of caring for the forest. The destructive plant fungus myrtle rust is continuing its march across Aotearoa. Katy Gosset speaks to researchers studying its plant penetration power...

Two stories of looking to the skies. Claire Concannon joins a hunt for planets outside of our solar system. Katy Gosset reveals the results of the annual New Zealand Garden Birds Survey. This week, Our Changing World looks to the skies. We start by gazing out to space, exploring how scientists find planets outside of our solar system, and what they hope to learn. Closer to home (just outside the w...

This week, how information flows in the cell from DNA to proteins, and how scientists have tapped into this to enable a new way to make vaccines using messenger RNA. For hundreds of years humans have triggered the immune system on purpose, in advance, to prepare it for deadly invaders. Smallpox, measles, typhoid, and today, Covid-19. Follow Our Changing World on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher,...

How do you find a tiny robin in a whole lot of forest? Researchers have been tracking the movements of forty North Island robins, or toutouwai, that have been reintroduced to a large reserve area near Palmerston North. Claire Concannon finds out how these Massey University researchers monitor them, and what they are learning. The sound of static crackles in the damp bush. It's a common backgr...

How do you get in the zone to achieve your very best in an activity? And does a cheering crowd help? This week, two stories about the psychology of performance - the advantages of being at home, and how to find your flow. They say that sport at the very highest level is won and lost in the "top two inches"; it's as much about getting your mind in shape as it is your body. The pressu...

Researchers from the University of Waikato talk about Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport (RED-S) - a condition in which athletes don't take in the right amount of calories to do the exercise they are doing. Katie Schofield & Holly Thorpe explain why the problem is much more complex than just calorie intake, and why it is important to research this condition in a multidisciplinary way. Watching th...

Scientific research can be thought as on a spectrum from blue sky to applied - this week, two stories that span this. Claire Concannon learns about a blue-sky research project on bacterial evolution while Katy Gosset watches testing of a new system of base isolation designed to help homes during earthquakes. Using science to solve an urgent problem - like, say, developing a vaccine in the midst of...

On this week's Our Changing World - how songbirds learn their song, and how researchers in the Southern Hemisphere are trying to correct a long-standing male bias in the songbird world. The traditional view in the songbird research world is that male birds sing elaborate songs to attract a mate, while females stay silent. That's just the done thing. Or so it was thought. Now Southern Hemisphe...

Mathematical equations can help us get new perspectives, but sometimes can be difficult to understand. This week, one story about how maths has helped the understanding of a enigmatic quirk of heart rate control and another on how crafts can be used to better understand maths. Mathematical rules and equations can help us get new perspectives on our world, but sometimes can be difficult to comprehe...

Researchers at the Auckland Bioengineering Institute are working on what they hope will be the first New Zealand designed Class 3 medical device - a pressure sensor for the brain, to help people with hydrocephalus. The team explain the sensor design, how it works and how they test it. Feeling the pressure Professor Simon Malpas and his lab group are dedicated to figuring out how to detect pressure...

Two stories of Aotearoa New Zealand conservation communities who are caring for the flora and fauna in their backyards. Claire learns about the Catlins Bats on the Map project while Katy learns about saving scurvy grass. Bats on the Map One wall of the Owaka museum is covered with a giant map of the Catlins area, with stickers marking where bat detectors have been used to successfully detect pekap...

Claire Concannon meets a group of researchers who are determined to do the best science they can, to try to help the people they love. Emeritus Professor Warren Tate hadn't heard of the disease that would become such a big part of his life until his 14 year-old daughter, got glandular fever. Instead of recovering normally from this viral infection, her fatigue, pain and noise sensitivity symp...