Walking with Dinosaurs dug up by BBC after 25 years
More than 25 years ago the BBC inspired a generation of palaeontologists with its Walking With Dinosaurs series.
Now it is hoping to repeat the trick with a follow-up underpinned by scientific discoveries in which viewers will be invited to 'peer at dinosaurs' brains, assess the quality of a T-Rex's vision and watch lasers reconstruct the colour of dinosaur eggs'.
The six-part series, which launches on BBC1 on May 25, will examine six of the prehistoric creatures including spinosaurus, velociraptors, giant lusotitans and 'Hollywood royalty' Tyrannosaurus rex.
Kirsty Wilson, showrunner of Walking with Dinosaurs, said that the second series represented a major evolution of the brand because it was underpinned entirely by scientific research.
'All of our dinosaur designs are grounded
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The Sun
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- The Sun
Rancid-smelling super ants that form whopping colonies & even eat CABLES rampaging across Europe – & could infest the UK
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Locals reported watching the town's pavements and curbs sinking as the earth was carted away by the bugs, causing havoc with the roads. And a playground was forced to close after ants took over the entire area and turned it into a nest. City workers had to jet hot water into the labyrinth to wash them out. The wider state of Baden-Württemberg has suffered power cuts and internet outages after the insects chomped through electric cables. Watch incredible vid of ants OUTSMARTING humans to solve puzzle first T. magnum's destructive power comes from the sheer scale of their underground warrens and their tireless determination to expand. While most ant species organise a few thousand workers around a single queen, T. magum clans contain up to 20million and hundreds of queens. Instead of attacking one another, the smaller colonies merge together in alliance. The British Pest Control Association told The Sun that the UK is at risk from the advancing crusade. They explained the ants "spread mainly through horticultural imports, especially potted plants and trees from the Mediterranean". They added: "If T. magnum were to establish here, it could become a nuisance. "They form vast supercolonies, displace native species and can even cause structural issues by excavating under paving." Although the species has not marched into the UK yet, a spokesperson for Defra said the agency "remains vigilant" to the threat. The countryside around Zurich has been tormented by the ants since 2018. 9 9 9 Despite an almighty effort to clear them out, the ants remain "well established" in four areas. In Winterthur, they blocked a billion-pound construction project when they settled exactly where a multi-track railroad tunnel was planned. In the nearby Oetwil an der Limmat region, one supercolony infested an entire five-hectare potato field - about seven football pitches. A local, Agnes Wirth, told Swiss site SRF: "There were so many ants, you couldn't see the floor anymore." But that is dwarfed by the colony in Volketswil, on the other side of Zurich, where an area the size of 35 football pitches is teeming with the busy-body bugs. The infestation is so enormous that the local authority has been legally forced to act. Katharina Weber of the Zurich Department of Construction said: "In areas with large infestations, a coordinated approach by specialists is required. 9 9 9 "This means a plan is needed, and special pest controllers must be deployed. These can target the insecticide at the nests." In the UK, DEFRA recommends that anyone who sees a non-native insect species takes a photo and reports it. Mike Fox, record manager for the Bees, Wasps and Ants Recording Society, said: "As far as I know, there are no records of Tapinoma magnum becoming established in the UK but of course it could possible in the future." Niall Gallagher, the Technical Manager at British Pest Control Association, said they closely monitor pest species - including Tapinoma magnum. He told The Sun: "Research on Tapinoma magnum supercolonies in Switzerland has found that these ants live outdoors and can continue to forage at temperatures as low as 6 degrees during the winter months. 'Individual efforts by homeowners and gardeners are not sufficient to effectively control an infestation, and specifically tailored pest control solutions are needed to eradicate a colony." He recommend that anyone concerned about an ant infestation contacts a professional pest controller for help. Tapinoma magnum species According to the British Pest Control Association, one of T. magnum's most striking traits is their procession behaviour. These ants form conspicuous trails across pavements and up buildings, often in large, coordinated lines. These trails are reinforced with pheromones and can span several metres, connecting different parts of their supercolony. To the untrained eye, this may look like a very active colony of common ants – but the sheer volume and organised movement can be a telltale sign of T. magnum. In established infestations, these trails may even lead into buildings, across walls or deep into pavements and garden features. If the species were to establish here, pest professionals would likely rely on a combination of bait gels (such as indoxacarb or imidacloprid) and surface treatments, as was done successfully in Zurich, Switzerland. As always, public awareness and early reporting are vital tools in managing invasive pests. Think you've seen something unusual? Here's what to do:
The Independent
2 hours ago
- The Independent
Return of white storks to the UK described as 'emblem' for nature recovery
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BBC News
4 hours ago
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Great Exhibition Road Festival: What is the weirdest thing in the universe?
London's Exhibition Road will close to traffic this weekend as the famous museums and institutions of South Kensington combine for the Great Exhibition Road the series of free events taking place along the street, three researchers affiliated with Imperial College London (ICL) will take to the stage to try to answer one small question - what's the weirdest thing in the universe? For ICL research fellow Mariana Carrillo Gonzalez, the answer is to be found far away from our own planet."My object is black holes," she holes are regions of space where matter has collapsed in on itself, meaning they have such strong gravity that not even light can escape there's a key problem with them for scientists, explains Mariana."We still have no clue how they work."We can't observe them, we just observe the effects of a black hole. We observe the light that goes around the black hole and we observe how it deforms space and how things move... but we really can't see it because there's nothing that can escape from a black hole."We can prove they are there, we just have no idea what's inside," she adds."I think that's just a very weird thing." Nevertheless, Rita Ahmadi argues her research specialism is even more bizarre - "Quantum physics, by which I mean the physics of subatomic particles."They have behaviours that are different from the classical physics that you see around yourself, so the rules are different," the postdoctoral researcher rules include that "they can be observed in two different states at the same time, which is called superposition", while they also have an unusual problem when trying to observe them as "any interaction with a quantum system changes the state of the quantum system".Rita says such peculiarities mean "we know that the mathematics of quantum mechanics work properly so we know that the model works... but still we cannot make sense of that".Even so, quantum science is still seen as hugely important for the future."My research is quantum computing and I'm building devices out of that even without understanding if it makes sense." The other researcher taking part is Fernando Ernesto Rosas De Andraca whose area of expertise is another one full of conundrums."I took human consciousness as the weirdest thing I can think of," he says."Our best guess is that consciousness is somehow generated by the brain but most people would argue that single neurons are not conscious."So you have these little parts that are not conscious, you put them together and they are conscious and that's very strange."He also points to other arguments such as "the only thing you cannot doubt is your consciousness, but at the same time consciousness is this thing that nobody else can see so everybody else can doubt it".Elaborating further, Fernando brings up artificial intelligence (AI), declaring it as something he has become "completely obsessed" with."Most people believe that current AI systems are not conscious... but I think most people agree that there is no fundamental limits to say it will never be conscious so then the question is at one point it might become so," he says."We then get into a different arena that we have to be concerned about things like creating a system that can suffer." The reason for such existential arguments is the festival, which seeks to celebrate science and the arts for people of all ages through activities like insect yoga, quantum discos and robotics."We're always trying to find different and creative ways of exploring some of the topics that we study at Imperial," says James Romero, who is one of the festival organisers for the university."In this case it's challenging the researchers to tweak the public lecture format into a different format and introducing a competitive element into it."Once the three researchers have presented their arguments, a vote will be held with those in the crowd deciding which phenomena should be considered the weirdest in the universe."We thought that the researchers might be too polite to be competitive but clearly that's not necessarily the case," says James, having listened to their arguments."I came from Oxford," replies Rita. "I take debates very seriously."The Weirdest Object in the Universe debate is free to attend and will take place in the Sir Alexander Fleming Building at Imperial College London at 15:30 BST on Saturday.
