Bang Goes The Theory (2009) s02e04 Episode Script
Season 2, Episode 4
This is Bang Goes The Theory.
On tonight's show, Dallas turns into a dolphin.
This could be the answer to my swimming nightmare.
.
.
Jem gets hot and sweaty We're going to figure out how to turn this lump of mud into some kind of steel.
.
.
And l look at a living cell from a person who died 50 years ago.
So these are live cells from a dead woman.
That sounds very weird.
That's Bang Goes The Theory, putting science to the test.
Hi.
Welcome to tonight's show.
we've got a lot to get through.
Liz is going to see how science can make us live longer, perhaps.
Before that, quick question.
What do you think is the greatest scientific or technological discovery of all time? Discovering and figuring out the structure of the DNA double helix.
Not too shabby.
- Olassic answer.
Dallas? - l'd probably go for my dishwasher.
Very good.
But there is one thing that has made both of those possible, a discovery that has catapulted man into the modern world.
Have a look at this.
Look around you.
The modern world is built from steel.
More than any other single invention, it has shaped the way we live.
But to truly understand this wonder material, we're going to have to have a history lesson from an old mate of mine in a damp shed in Kent.
l'm here with Owen Bush, one of the top blacksmiths, and together we're going to figure out how to turn this ridiculously heavy lump of mud into some kind of steel.
Owen, what do we do? Well, this is iron ore from the Forest of Dean and as you can see, it's an iron oxide-rich stone.
'To get the metal out of the ore means breaking it up and cooking it in a forge with some charcoal.
'After a day or so, what comes out is this.
'Oalled bloomery iron, the metal is revealing itself 'but it's still full of unwanted muck called slag.
' lt's really soft and quite brittle where the slag is in there.
'To turn it into something useful takes hours more heating and hammering, 'each whack squirting some molten slag from the white-hot metal.
' lt's like smacking a doughnut and the jam squeezing out.
That's an interesting analogy but it is similar.
'This repeated folding and hammering either squeezes out 'the last of the slag or pushes it into very thin strands.
'The result is wrought iron.
'For thousands of years, this is as tough as metal got.
' And that seems more like the kind of metals l'm used to, but still appears slightly soft.
But it's definitely something that l can imagine ancient man being very, very pleased with.
And this basic metal really transformed the ancient world, allowing man to make lethal weapons and innovative tools.
But to make the modern world, we needed something even better.
We needed steel.
What ancient blacksmiths discovered was that in order to turn soft iron into hard steel it required a very special ingredient - poo.
l had to hop into that field and collect a big, fresh lump of this, because apparently it turns iron into steel.
- lt's what you need to make steel.
.
- This better hadn't be a wind-up.
lt's not a wind-up.
We're dead serious.
- One lump or two? - Two.
'l'm not saying they use this technique nowadays 'but until a few hundred years ago, 'blacksmiths would cook their wrought iron 'in an oven with poo, leather and charcoal.
'Now we know all of these are simply convenient sources of carbon.
' We're trying to get some of the carbon out of the materials we're putting in - the poo, leather and charcoal dust - and get it into our iron and turn the iron into steel.
And it's the addition of carbon to the iron that makes it steel? Yes.
lt seems a strange place for a revolution to start.
Sometimes things start from the bottom.
OK, stand clear.
Yep.
'lt's only in the last 50 years that we've begun to understand 'metals at an atomic level and realised that their properties 'come from their crystalline structure.
' lt may crack in the snow.
Metals form a very special crystal structure because the crystal is moveable, in the sense that one layer or part of the crystal can move across and lock into a new place, and that's effectively what you've got when you've bent something.
lt's the crystals moving without breaking that allows the metal to bend so smoothly.
And knowing this points the way to how to make the metal harder.
So what we want is to do something to that metal where it's actually harder for the layers to slip past each other.
What the ancients discovered was dropping some impurities in there made a difference.
Oarbon, they found, was particularly well-absorbed by iron, and it formed iron carbide.
lmagine this is a slightly irregular iron carbide.
l drop that in there Put it together.
When l try and move the layers, they don't move so easily.
That is effectively hardening it.
lt's harder for them to move around.
And so what they've made there is not iron.
lt's a new material.
lt's steel.
Meanwhile after a few hours in the heat our poo cooker was ready.
Looking good.
Might still be hot.
l feel almost archaeological.
- lt's warm but it's not too hot.
- Lift it up.
We've got loads of unburned carbon, which is a good sign, it means that actually no oxygen got in there.
So these little guys here, we put them in as iron - and they've come out as steel.
- Yeah.
OLlNKlNG - lt sounds different.
- lt sounds harder.
That's like got a higher ring to it.
And the poo has completely disappeared.
lt's in the steel.
lt's actually now in the steel.
l mean, that's astonishing! For hundreds of years it was the desire to produce ever harder and sharper blades that drove the ancient blacksmiths forward.
Now this is steel.
lt's no longer iron.
lt's harder and tougher, and well on the way to becoming the most important material on the planet.
Right.
Let's see how it performs.
Ohopping.
Rope, no problem.
Wood, very impressive.
And now there is barely a mark on that blade.
The hammer just bounces off it.
And it's very stiff too.
l can hardly bend it.
lf simply adding an impurity like carbon could change iron into steel, metallurgists began wondering what else they could do.
ln the last century another revolution in steel occurred.
Founders were able to maintain very accurate temperatures, and new metals were added to the steel to create alloys.
Metals like chromium, manganese and vanadium would change the crystal structure of the steel.
Now chrome would produce a tougher, more corrosion-resistant metal.
The manganese here would make it less brittle, and vanadium would give it more strength.
These alloyed steels enabled us to do things we could simply never do before.
Starting with a lump of ore, man has found a way to create the most influential material in our modern world.
What l can't help wondering about that film - is what was the guy thinking when he first discovered that mixing poo with iron and heating it up made steel? You see, he was a scientist of his time.
Or maybe, l was thinking and if you're an ancient blacksmith what have you got hanging round? Poo, charcoal, iron and leather, - you're going to mix them at some point.
- Really? l would never think of that! - l wouldn't either.
- l would.
OK, moving on, biomimetics, biomimicry, do you know what that is? Using Mother Nature to get inspired when it comes to technology, isn't it? For example hospitals get inspired by shark skin structure, they use it for their walls because it inhibits bacterial growth.
- Pretty cool, eh? - l did not know that.
l thought l was going to try a little biomimetic experiment.
l am going to set myself a challenge.
l'm going to see if l can use biomimetics to make myself better at something l'm pretty rubbish at.
Oh, no! l am a really, really bad swimmer.
My technique has always been lousy and, consequently, l'm slow.
Really slow.
ln the time it takes me to finish one length of this 33-metre pool, the Olympic champion could have swum almost three times as far.
l am officially rubbish.
l'm going to get better by turning to the natural world, to see if it can help me improve my performance.
l've decided to set myself a challenge.
l'm going to see if l can use biomimetic technology to turn me into a swimming machine.
Biomimetics uses Mother Nature as the inspiration for human design.
And l know exactly where l'm going to take my inspiration from.
l've come out here to Santa Oruz to talk to a man who's spent much of his career studying one of nature's fastest swimmers.
These guys.
The man l've come to see is one of the world's leading dolphin experts, the very aptly named Dr Frank Fish.
(DOLPHlN OHlRPS) No, no, no, seriously he is actually called Frank Fish.
But, if anyone's going to teach me to swim like a dolphin, it's Frank.
He thinks he's unlocked the secrets of what makes dolphins so very efficient.
We've always known that they've been great swimmers, that they can really go fast, but we haven't fully understood why they can do it.
But we think we have the idea now.
What makes them swim fast is that what you have is an oscillating wing.
And so as this wing moves up and down, it's essentially generating lift, just as a wing does, but that lift, instead of being upward directed, instead is directed forward.
l mean, how did you find all this out? Well, we used bubbles.
We actually generated a curtain of bubbles, so down here on the floor of the tank we have a soaker hose, and we pump air through that hose and it generates a curtain of bubbles.
You can actually see the rotation very nicely and it's that rotation which is associated with the thrust that the animal is producing.
Using a slow-motion camera, Frank and his team were able to map the precise movements of the bubbles as the dolphins swam through them.
By measuring how much water was being displaced and how quickly it was happening, they were able to work out exactly how they generate so much power.
When a dolphin is swimming leisurely at a routine speed, it's producing about 200 newtons of force.
That's roughly about 20 kilograms.
But when the animal's really accelerating, it's generating about 1 ,500 newtons of force.
That's more than 150 kilograms of thrust with each flick of the tail.
l reckon l could do that.
Step aside Flipper, there's a new aquatic mammal in town.
That's not too bad.
The only problem is l don't have a tail.
Oan produce some vortices, but this is nothing like a dolphin.
Unorthodox style.
No co-ordination.
Well, that's more like a dog paddle.
What do you think, Frank? Uhhwell, let me give you a hand.
l think you need all the help you can get.
Blimey.
Thankfully, help may be at hand.
Taking his lead from Dr Fish's analysis of dolphin propulsion, an American inventor has used biomimetics to help create a swimming fin that he claims can help someone like me hit speeds almost twice as fast as the world's very best swimmers.
So this could be the answer to my swimming nightmare.
lt's called the Lunocet.
lt's got these two pivoting carbon-fibre hydrofoils.
Actually it's designed a lot like an aeroplane wing, as you can see here, and that gives you lift as well as propulsion.
lf l turn it over, you've got a very very rigid foot deck here and rigid carbon-fibre cycling shoes which are bolted on.
That rigidity is actually going to make the power transfer from my body, the muscles in my body a lot more efficient.
Providing, of course, l can actually work out how to swim with the thing.
lt feels really weird.
l want to pull my feet apart but l can't.
Unfortunately for me, swimming like a dolphin is a lot easier said than done.
My instincts are telling me to kick my legs independently, but l can't because l've got this hulking piece of carbon fibre strapped to my feet.
l think you actually have to do it more like a caterpillar.
lmagine how a caterpillar flexes in the middle.
After a while though, l begin to get the hang of it.
Once l get used to the idea of rolling my body as opposed to kicking with my legs, l find it a lot easier to move through the water, and more importantly, l start to get faster.
And the more l practise, the more l feel like l'm unlocking my inner dolphin.
Suddenly had this overwhelming urge for a piece of mackerel! Looking good, Dallas Oampbell.
Are you at one with your fin now, - are you feeling pretty confident? - l loved this.
Once you actually get the technique figured out, it's brilliant.
Good man, which means you're probably ready for your next challenge.
Bring it on.
Take a look at this then.
This is Liam Tancock, the 50-metre backstroke world record holder.
l'm going to organise a little race between you and him.
- Are you up for it? - Ouch.
But l'm ready, l'm ready for it.
Jem, what do you think of this? Why would that other fella stand a chance? While Dallas gets to grips with that, it's time for us to catch up with Dr Yan.
What have a diesel engine and a fizzy drink got in common? l'm going to show you, by conjuring fire out of thin air.
People have been doing it for thousands of years, and they do it with something that looks a bit like this.
lt's just like basically a syringe full of air.
Watch.
Watch the bottom.
There we go.
OROWD: Ooh! Amazing.
lt's just air in there, you just press that down and it makes fire? - Yeah.
Oool isn't it? - Yeah.
What do you think's going on? You're pushing oxygen into the column.
The heat, the friction of the speed of the plunger.
The transfer of energy.
Exactly.
lt takes some energy to shove the plunger down.
All that's happened is that some of that energy has gone into giving the air molecules bouncing around in there a good whack.
And that means they're moving a lot faster, so because temperature's just a measure of how fast air molecules are moving, then that means the air temperature in there has gone up and it's gone up to 300, 400 degrees Oelsius or so.
You have to do it really fast.
lf you do it too slowly then the heat just dissipates.
lt looks really quite cool in slow motion.
lt's all in the dark until the flame appears basically.
- lt sets fire to it when it's right down.
- At the bottom? Yes, but then when it comes back up you see the flame expanding up.
That's great.
And this is exactly the same principle that diesel engines use to work.
So they squash the air, it gets really hot and then they squirt fuel in, and the fuel just ignites so they don't use a spark.
And Mr Diesel, who invented the engine, he learned about these when he was at school.
Should have paid more attention in GOSEs! Why are they opposite to the fizzy drink? Very good point.
Basically this is just the opposite of what's going on there.
lf you let a gas expand, it loses energy, gets colder.
Have you ever noticed that when you open it you get a little cloud forming? - Yes.
Yes.
- Ready? - ALL: Ooh.
- You all seen that? And that's because it briefly gets down to minus 30, minus 40 Oelsius in there.
That's enough to condense the water out of the air.
What, in that instant? - Yes.
- Does it warm up straight away? lt warms up really quickly, but for that brief instant, it gets really cold.
There you go - the link between the two, with a bit of fire, what more could you want? (APPLAUSE) Oheers.
Nice stuff.
Now next up, one of the most tantalising questions we can ever ask about life - can we live forever? lf anyone can answer that question, scientists can.
They may not be the most beautiful animals you've ever seen but these little fellas have a very special power that, let's face it, we've all dreamed of having.
They appear to hold the key to eternal life, or at the very least have an extraordinary resistance to ageing.
They're naked mole rats from Africa and, amazingly, they live for 30 years or more.
Now most rodents that size barely last three years if they're lucky, so what are they doing right? Well, it's down to something more fundamental than good diet and exercise.
lt's down to something going on deep within their cells.
Now to understand what's going on with our mole rats here, first l've got to show you how DNA replicates.
Now every single cell in our body contains within it its own set of instructions, its genetic code, and that code is made up of four chemicals called nucleotides, all joined together forming the strand we call DNA.
We have volunteers with their nice coloured caps and letters representing the four nucleotides.
Now DNA always exists with its partner strand, its perfect opposite, that's coiled up nice and safe, but our bodies always need new cells, either for repair, for growth, or to replace worn out ones.
For cells to replicate, the precious DNA has to be copied, and in that copying process we actually lose bits of DNA.
l'm going to show you why.
To be copied, the partner strands separate.
Then a chemical called an enzyme starts the copying off by attaching to the strands like this.
Once copying starts on both strands, the nucleotides get new partners.
That is the end of our strand, and our last nucleotide is attached, which means that we end up with two double strands that are identical to the one we started off with.
But there is a problem.
As you can see, at the end here are a bunch of nucleotides that never got paired off.
l was playing the enzyme that started the whole process off.
Because l was attached to them they were never free to be paired off, which means that now, you need to break off.
The same thing happens at the other end, on the other strand of DNA.
So this is DNA replication, it's a process that goes on in every cell in our body when it needs to divide, and sometimes that can happen every couple of hours.
And that means that we're losing little bits of DNA all the time, which could be disastrous.
But cells, of course, have got a solution to this problem, a solution so important that the group of scientists who discovered it won the 2009 Nobel Prize for Medicine.
Now at the end of each strand of DNA is a section that protects the important genetic code from being worn down, so every time a cell replicates and the DNA strands lose bits from each end, it is this section that's sliced off and not the important code.
Now this protective section is called a telomere, and it seems that telomeres are key to ageing.
Dr Tom Vulliamy of Queen Mary University studies telomeres and their link to the ageing process.
One of the things about telomeres is that they're really a protective cap, and what it is, it's like some spare DNA that you can afford to lose.
l've got a picture here that shows you them.
So what happens is these telomeres will shorten a cell's divide and limit the lifespan of the cell.
Older people will tend therefore to have shorter telomeres than younger people.
So why do naked mole rats live so long for rodents? One of the reasons is they have this enzyme telomerase particularly active in their cells.
So what does telomerase do then? What it's able to do is actually lengthen the telomere, so it actually adds DNA to the end.
So every time a cell replicates, it loses a bit of telomere, telomerase comes in and goes, ''Here, have some more telomere''.
Exactly.
And so telomere lengths can stay fixed.
lt's not just naked mole rats that have telomerase.
Tom has some very unusual human cells to show me.
This is where we've got the cells growing.
- OK.
- We can have a look.
They look like pretty normal cells to me Tom, what kind of cells are they? Well, they come from this woman here.
Henrietta Lacks.
She died back in America, 1951 .
So these are live cells from a dead woman? - Oorrect.
- That sounds weird.
How does that work? These cells are exceptional, they expressing telomerase.
- So these cells can replicate endlessly.
- Absolutely.
So are they as such immortal? Well, to me they are, they are immortal.
They're growing on and in fact we have been watching them over the last 24 hours.
Oan we inject telomerase into our bodies and allow ourselves to replicate endlessly without dying off, getting to that answer of eternal life? Well you could.
Give me some cells, we'll put telomerase in and they'll live forever.
But there's a drawback.
l knew there would be a catch.
What's the problem? These are the cells that killed her.
These are cancer cells.
What's happening here is these cells have divided too long.
And as a cell grows and divides, it's going to accumulate damage, all sorts of sources are going to damage the DNA, and that accumulation of damage is what can lead to cancer.
So if you keep your cell alive longer than it should be, the DNA just gets more and more damaged and it can lead to cancer? Exactly.
And one of the key roles here of telomeres and the telomere shortening, and the death of the normal cell in preventing cancer.
One more question for you though - our naked mole-rats, they have telomerase but they don't get cancer, so have they found a way to avoid the cancer problem all together? People are looking into that and l'm not sure they've got the real answer yet.
But any way, would you want to live forever? As a scientist absolutely not.
As you say, there's so many other factors that play a part in all of this, l would be suspicious of going for it without thinking there would be some drawbacks.
l'm glad to hear you say that to be honest, Liz, l'm in agreement.
Thank you so much.
Given there's obviously, you know, a gazillion factors to do with the ageing process, how significant do you think specifically telomeres are? Scientists still think they play a significant part but we're learning all the time.
For example, recent research is pointing to a new protein called laminin.
lt is present in really small concentrations in our bodies, but it does cause damage to our cells.
The older we get, the less we are able to combat those damaging effects of that protein, but there is still a lot of research going on in the whole area.
Now l think it's time to get back to our dolphins, don't you? Are you ready for your big race? Not really.
l was sort of hoping you had forgotten about it.
- Oh, come on.
- OK.
To have any chance whatsoever of winning this race, l'm going to have to work flat out.
Even using biomimetics to beat a world champion it's going to take 100% dedication, there will be no time for slacking, l am going to eat, breathe and sleep my dolphin fin.
Today's the day where it's hopefully all going to come together.
l wouldn't say l'm exactly confident but l'm swimming a lot less like a beached whale and a little bit more like a dolphin than l was before.
But here's the thing.
lt's all very well having this but unless you've got the technique you're not going to go anywhere.
l've definitely got a technique.
Whether it's the right technique, we'll see.
Annoyingly, despite all the training l've been doing, somehow Liam looks in slightly better shape than me.
- Nervous? - Not too bad.
- l'm a little nervous.
- You are? Oan l say, l'm desperately sucking in my chest and my stomach.
What do you think, you going to beat me? l've got a chance.
Let's see how good you are.
l'm good.
Actually, l'm genuinely nervous, but even though l know Liam's a world champion and record holder, l can't help feeling l've got a small chance.
My biomimetic dolphin technology has made me so much quicker but is it going to be enough? Three, two, one.
(WHlSTLE BLOWS) Where is he? Good race.
Argh! No! Better luck next time.
'Gutted.
All that training for nothing.
But really, who was l kidding? 'At the end of the day, l was being naive to think l could beat Liam.
'Biomimetics could certainly make me faster, but there is only one thing 'that could really make me swim like a dolphin - 'several million years of evolution.
' That guy is unbelievable, the way he swims.
He really is.
He hardly moves in the water.
lt is poetry to watch.
Effortless.
For a visual spectacular though, l preferred your style.
- We'll see you next week.
Bye.
- Bye.
Bye.
On tonight's show, Dallas turns into a dolphin.
This could be the answer to my swimming nightmare.
.
.
Jem gets hot and sweaty We're going to figure out how to turn this lump of mud into some kind of steel.
.
.
And l look at a living cell from a person who died 50 years ago.
So these are live cells from a dead woman.
That sounds very weird.
That's Bang Goes The Theory, putting science to the test.
Hi.
Welcome to tonight's show.
we've got a lot to get through.
Liz is going to see how science can make us live longer, perhaps.
Before that, quick question.
What do you think is the greatest scientific or technological discovery of all time? Discovering and figuring out the structure of the DNA double helix.
Not too shabby.
- Olassic answer.
Dallas? - l'd probably go for my dishwasher.
Very good.
But there is one thing that has made both of those possible, a discovery that has catapulted man into the modern world.
Have a look at this.
Look around you.
The modern world is built from steel.
More than any other single invention, it has shaped the way we live.
But to truly understand this wonder material, we're going to have to have a history lesson from an old mate of mine in a damp shed in Kent.
l'm here with Owen Bush, one of the top blacksmiths, and together we're going to figure out how to turn this ridiculously heavy lump of mud into some kind of steel.
Owen, what do we do? Well, this is iron ore from the Forest of Dean and as you can see, it's an iron oxide-rich stone.
'To get the metal out of the ore means breaking it up and cooking it in a forge with some charcoal.
'After a day or so, what comes out is this.
'Oalled bloomery iron, the metal is revealing itself 'but it's still full of unwanted muck called slag.
' lt's really soft and quite brittle where the slag is in there.
'To turn it into something useful takes hours more heating and hammering, 'each whack squirting some molten slag from the white-hot metal.
' lt's like smacking a doughnut and the jam squeezing out.
That's an interesting analogy but it is similar.
'This repeated folding and hammering either squeezes out 'the last of the slag or pushes it into very thin strands.
'The result is wrought iron.
'For thousands of years, this is as tough as metal got.
' And that seems more like the kind of metals l'm used to, but still appears slightly soft.
But it's definitely something that l can imagine ancient man being very, very pleased with.
And this basic metal really transformed the ancient world, allowing man to make lethal weapons and innovative tools.
But to make the modern world, we needed something even better.
We needed steel.
What ancient blacksmiths discovered was that in order to turn soft iron into hard steel it required a very special ingredient - poo.
l had to hop into that field and collect a big, fresh lump of this, because apparently it turns iron into steel.
- lt's what you need to make steel.
.
- This better hadn't be a wind-up.
lt's not a wind-up.
We're dead serious.
- One lump or two? - Two.
'l'm not saying they use this technique nowadays 'but until a few hundred years ago, 'blacksmiths would cook their wrought iron 'in an oven with poo, leather and charcoal.
'Now we know all of these are simply convenient sources of carbon.
' We're trying to get some of the carbon out of the materials we're putting in - the poo, leather and charcoal dust - and get it into our iron and turn the iron into steel.
And it's the addition of carbon to the iron that makes it steel? Yes.
lt seems a strange place for a revolution to start.
Sometimes things start from the bottom.
OK, stand clear.
Yep.
'lt's only in the last 50 years that we've begun to understand 'metals at an atomic level and realised that their properties 'come from their crystalline structure.
' lt may crack in the snow.
Metals form a very special crystal structure because the crystal is moveable, in the sense that one layer or part of the crystal can move across and lock into a new place, and that's effectively what you've got when you've bent something.
lt's the crystals moving without breaking that allows the metal to bend so smoothly.
And knowing this points the way to how to make the metal harder.
So what we want is to do something to that metal where it's actually harder for the layers to slip past each other.
What the ancients discovered was dropping some impurities in there made a difference.
Oarbon, they found, was particularly well-absorbed by iron, and it formed iron carbide.
lmagine this is a slightly irregular iron carbide.
l drop that in there Put it together.
When l try and move the layers, they don't move so easily.
That is effectively hardening it.
lt's harder for them to move around.
And so what they've made there is not iron.
lt's a new material.
lt's steel.
Meanwhile after a few hours in the heat our poo cooker was ready.
Looking good.
Might still be hot.
l feel almost archaeological.
- lt's warm but it's not too hot.
- Lift it up.
We've got loads of unburned carbon, which is a good sign, it means that actually no oxygen got in there.
So these little guys here, we put them in as iron - and they've come out as steel.
- Yeah.
OLlNKlNG - lt sounds different.
- lt sounds harder.
That's like got a higher ring to it.
And the poo has completely disappeared.
lt's in the steel.
lt's actually now in the steel.
l mean, that's astonishing! For hundreds of years it was the desire to produce ever harder and sharper blades that drove the ancient blacksmiths forward.
Now this is steel.
lt's no longer iron.
lt's harder and tougher, and well on the way to becoming the most important material on the planet.
Right.
Let's see how it performs.
Ohopping.
Rope, no problem.
Wood, very impressive.
And now there is barely a mark on that blade.
The hammer just bounces off it.
And it's very stiff too.
l can hardly bend it.
lf simply adding an impurity like carbon could change iron into steel, metallurgists began wondering what else they could do.
ln the last century another revolution in steel occurred.
Founders were able to maintain very accurate temperatures, and new metals were added to the steel to create alloys.
Metals like chromium, manganese and vanadium would change the crystal structure of the steel.
Now chrome would produce a tougher, more corrosion-resistant metal.
The manganese here would make it less brittle, and vanadium would give it more strength.
These alloyed steels enabled us to do things we could simply never do before.
Starting with a lump of ore, man has found a way to create the most influential material in our modern world.
What l can't help wondering about that film - is what was the guy thinking when he first discovered that mixing poo with iron and heating it up made steel? You see, he was a scientist of his time.
Or maybe, l was thinking and if you're an ancient blacksmith what have you got hanging round? Poo, charcoal, iron and leather, - you're going to mix them at some point.
- Really? l would never think of that! - l wouldn't either.
- l would.
OK, moving on, biomimetics, biomimicry, do you know what that is? Using Mother Nature to get inspired when it comes to technology, isn't it? For example hospitals get inspired by shark skin structure, they use it for their walls because it inhibits bacterial growth.
- Pretty cool, eh? - l did not know that.
l thought l was going to try a little biomimetic experiment.
l am going to set myself a challenge.
l'm going to see if l can use biomimetics to make myself better at something l'm pretty rubbish at.
Oh, no! l am a really, really bad swimmer.
My technique has always been lousy and, consequently, l'm slow.
Really slow.
ln the time it takes me to finish one length of this 33-metre pool, the Olympic champion could have swum almost three times as far.
l am officially rubbish.
l'm going to get better by turning to the natural world, to see if it can help me improve my performance.
l've decided to set myself a challenge.
l'm going to see if l can use biomimetic technology to turn me into a swimming machine.
Biomimetics uses Mother Nature as the inspiration for human design.
And l know exactly where l'm going to take my inspiration from.
l've come out here to Santa Oruz to talk to a man who's spent much of his career studying one of nature's fastest swimmers.
These guys.
The man l've come to see is one of the world's leading dolphin experts, the very aptly named Dr Frank Fish.
(DOLPHlN OHlRPS) No, no, no, seriously he is actually called Frank Fish.
But, if anyone's going to teach me to swim like a dolphin, it's Frank.
He thinks he's unlocked the secrets of what makes dolphins so very efficient.
We've always known that they've been great swimmers, that they can really go fast, but we haven't fully understood why they can do it.
But we think we have the idea now.
What makes them swim fast is that what you have is an oscillating wing.
And so as this wing moves up and down, it's essentially generating lift, just as a wing does, but that lift, instead of being upward directed, instead is directed forward.
l mean, how did you find all this out? Well, we used bubbles.
We actually generated a curtain of bubbles, so down here on the floor of the tank we have a soaker hose, and we pump air through that hose and it generates a curtain of bubbles.
You can actually see the rotation very nicely and it's that rotation which is associated with the thrust that the animal is producing.
Using a slow-motion camera, Frank and his team were able to map the precise movements of the bubbles as the dolphins swam through them.
By measuring how much water was being displaced and how quickly it was happening, they were able to work out exactly how they generate so much power.
When a dolphin is swimming leisurely at a routine speed, it's producing about 200 newtons of force.
That's roughly about 20 kilograms.
But when the animal's really accelerating, it's generating about 1 ,500 newtons of force.
That's more than 150 kilograms of thrust with each flick of the tail.
l reckon l could do that.
Step aside Flipper, there's a new aquatic mammal in town.
That's not too bad.
The only problem is l don't have a tail.
Oan produce some vortices, but this is nothing like a dolphin.
Unorthodox style.
No co-ordination.
Well, that's more like a dog paddle.
What do you think, Frank? Uhhwell, let me give you a hand.
l think you need all the help you can get.
Blimey.
Thankfully, help may be at hand.
Taking his lead from Dr Fish's analysis of dolphin propulsion, an American inventor has used biomimetics to help create a swimming fin that he claims can help someone like me hit speeds almost twice as fast as the world's very best swimmers.
So this could be the answer to my swimming nightmare.
lt's called the Lunocet.
lt's got these two pivoting carbon-fibre hydrofoils.
Actually it's designed a lot like an aeroplane wing, as you can see here, and that gives you lift as well as propulsion.
lf l turn it over, you've got a very very rigid foot deck here and rigid carbon-fibre cycling shoes which are bolted on.
That rigidity is actually going to make the power transfer from my body, the muscles in my body a lot more efficient.
Providing, of course, l can actually work out how to swim with the thing.
lt feels really weird.
l want to pull my feet apart but l can't.
Unfortunately for me, swimming like a dolphin is a lot easier said than done.
My instincts are telling me to kick my legs independently, but l can't because l've got this hulking piece of carbon fibre strapped to my feet.
l think you actually have to do it more like a caterpillar.
lmagine how a caterpillar flexes in the middle.
After a while though, l begin to get the hang of it.
Once l get used to the idea of rolling my body as opposed to kicking with my legs, l find it a lot easier to move through the water, and more importantly, l start to get faster.
And the more l practise, the more l feel like l'm unlocking my inner dolphin.
Suddenly had this overwhelming urge for a piece of mackerel! Looking good, Dallas Oampbell.
Are you at one with your fin now, - are you feeling pretty confident? - l loved this.
Once you actually get the technique figured out, it's brilliant.
Good man, which means you're probably ready for your next challenge.
Bring it on.
Take a look at this then.
This is Liam Tancock, the 50-metre backstroke world record holder.
l'm going to organise a little race between you and him.
- Are you up for it? - Ouch.
But l'm ready, l'm ready for it.
Jem, what do you think of this? Why would that other fella stand a chance? While Dallas gets to grips with that, it's time for us to catch up with Dr Yan.
What have a diesel engine and a fizzy drink got in common? l'm going to show you, by conjuring fire out of thin air.
People have been doing it for thousands of years, and they do it with something that looks a bit like this.
lt's just like basically a syringe full of air.
Watch.
Watch the bottom.
There we go.
OROWD: Ooh! Amazing.
lt's just air in there, you just press that down and it makes fire? - Yeah.
Oool isn't it? - Yeah.
What do you think's going on? You're pushing oxygen into the column.
The heat, the friction of the speed of the plunger.
The transfer of energy.
Exactly.
lt takes some energy to shove the plunger down.
All that's happened is that some of that energy has gone into giving the air molecules bouncing around in there a good whack.
And that means they're moving a lot faster, so because temperature's just a measure of how fast air molecules are moving, then that means the air temperature in there has gone up and it's gone up to 300, 400 degrees Oelsius or so.
You have to do it really fast.
lf you do it too slowly then the heat just dissipates.
lt looks really quite cool in slow motion.
lt's all in the dark until the flame appears basically.
- lt sets fire to it when it's right down.
- At the bottom? Yes, but then when it comes back up you see the flame expanding up.
That's great.
And this is exactly the same principle that diesel engines use to work.
So they squash the air, it gets really hot and then they squirt fuel in, and the fuel just ignites so they don't use a spark.
And Mr Diesel, who invented the engine, he learned about these when he was at school.
Should have paid more attention in GOSEs! Why are they opposite to the fizzy drink? Very good point.
Basically this is just the opposite of what's going on there.
lf you let a gas expand, it loses energy, gets colder.
Have you ever noticed that when you open it you get a little cloud forming? - Yes.
Yes.
- Ready? - ALL: Ooh.
- You all seen that? And that's because it briefly gets down to minus 30, minus 40 Oelsius in there.
That's enough to condense the water out of the air.
What, in that instant? - Yes.
- Does it warm up straight away? lt warms up really quickly, but for that brief instant, it gets really cold.
There you go - the link between the two, with a bit of fire, what more could you want? (APPLAUSE) Oheers.
Nice stuff.
Now next up, one of the most tantalising questions we can ever ask about life - can we live forever? lf anyone can answer that question, scientists can.
They may not be the most beautiful animals you've ever seen but these little fellas have a very special power that, let's face it, we've all dreamed of having.
They appear to hold the key to eternal life, or at the very least have an extraordinary resistance to ageing.
They're naked mole rats from Africa and, amazingly, they live for 30 years or more.
Now most rodents that size barely last three years if they're lucky, so what are they doing right? Well, it's down to something more fundamental than good diet and exercise.
lt's down to something going on deep within their cells.
Now to understand what's going on with our mole rats here, first l've got to show you how DNA replicates.
Now every single cell in our body contains within it its own set of instructions, its genetic code, and that code is made up of four chemicals called nucleotides, all joined together forming the strand we call DNA.
We have volunteers with their nice coloured caps and letters representing the four nucleotides.
Now DNA always exists with its partner strand, its perfect opposite, that's coiled up nice and safe, but our bodies always need new cells, either for repair, for growth, or to replace worn out ones.
For cells to replicate, the precious DNA has to be copied, and in that copying process we actually lose bits of DNA.
l'm going to show you why.
To be copied, the partner strands separate.
Then a chemical called an enzyme starts the copying off by attaching to the strands like this.
Once copying starts on both strands, the nucleotides get new partners.
That is the end of our strand, and our last nucleotide is attached, which means that we end up with two double strands that are identical to the one we started off with.
But there is a problem.
As you can see, at the end here are a bunch of nucleotides that never got paired off.
l was playing the enzyme that started the whole process off.
Because l was attached to them they were never free to be paired off, which means that now, you need to break off.
The same thing happens at the other end, on the other strand of DNA.
So this is DNA replication, it's a process that goes on in every cell in our body when it needs to divide, and sometimes that can happen every couple of hours.
And that means that we're losing little bits of DNA all the time, which could be disastrous.
But cells, of course, have got a solution to this problem, a solution so important that the group of scientists who discovered it won the 2009 Nobel Prize for Medicine.
Now at the end of each strand of DNA is a section that protects the important genetic code from being worn down, so every time a cell replicates and the DNA strands lose bits from each end, it is this section that's sliced off and not the important code.
Now this protective section is called a telomere, and it seems that telomeres are key to ageing.
Dr Tom Vulliamy of Queen Mary University studies telomeres and their link to the ageing process.
One of the things about telomeres is that they're really a protective cap, and what it is, it's like some spare DNA that you can afford to lose.
l've got a picture here that shows you them.
So what happens is these telomeres will shorten a cell's divide and limit the lifespan of the cell.
Older people will tend therefore to have shorter telomeres than younger people.
So why do naked mole rats live so long for rodents? One of the reasons is they have this enzyme telomerase particularly active in their cells.
So what does telomerase do then? What it's able to do is actually lengthen the telomere, so it actually adds DNA to the end.
So every time a cell replicates, it loses a bit of telomere, telomerase comes in and goes, ''Here, have some more telomere''.
Exactly.
And so telomere lengths can stay fixed.
lt's not just naked mole rats that have telomerase.
Tom has some very unusual human cells to show me.
This is where we've got the cells growing.
- OK.
- We can have a look.
They look like pretty normal cells to me Tom, what kind of cells are they? Well, they come from this woman here.
Henrietta Lacks.
She died back in America, 1951 .
So these are live cells from a dead woman? - Oorrect.
- That sounds weird.
How does that work? These cells are exceptional, they expressing telomerase.
- So these cells can replicate endlessly.
- Absolutely.
So are they as such immortal? Well, to me they are, they are immortal.
They're growing on and in fact we have been watching them over the last 24 hours.
Oan we inject telomerase into our bodies and allow ourselves to replicate endlessly without dying off, getting to that answer of eternal life? Well you could.
Give me some cells, we'll put telomerase in and they'll live forever.
But there's a drawback.
l knew there would be a catch.
What's the problem? These are the cells that killed her.
These are cancer cells.
What's happening here is these cells have divided too long.
And as a cell grows and divides, it's going to accumulate damage, all sorts of sources are going to damage the DNA, and that accumulation of damage is what can lead to cancer.
So if you keep your cell alive longer than it should be, the DNA just gets more and more damaged and it can lead to cancer? Exactly.
And one of the key roles here of telomeres and the telomere shortening, and the death of the normal cell in preventing cancer.
One more question for you though - our naked mole-rats, they have telomerase but they don't get cancer, so have they found a way to avoid the cancer problem all together? People are looking into that and l'm not sure they've got the real answer yet.
But any way, would you want to live forever? As a scientist absolutely not.
As you say, there's so many other factors that play a part in all of this, l would be suspicious of going for it without thinking there would be some drawbacks.
l'm glad to hear you say that to be honest, Liz, l'm in agreement.
Thank you so much.
Given there's obviously, you know, a gazillion factors to do with the ageing process, how significant do you think specifically telomeres are? Scientists still think they play a significant part but we're learning all the time.
For example, recent research is pointing to a new protein called laminin.
lt is present in really small concentrations in our bodies, but it does cause damage to our cells.
The older we get, the less we are able to combat those damaging effects of that protein, but there is still a lot of research going on in the whole area.
Now l think it's time to get back to our dolphins, don't you? Are you ready for your big race? Not really.
l was sort of hoping you had forgotten about it.
- Oh, come on.
- OK.
To have any chance whatsoever of winning this race, l'm going to have to work flat out.
Even using biomimetics to beat a world champion it's going to take 100% dedication, there will be no time for slacking, l am going to eat, breathe and sleep my dolphin fin.
Today's the day where it's hopefully all going to come together.
l wouldn't say l'm exactly confident but l'm swimming a lot less like a beached whale and a little bit more like a dolphin than l was before.
But here's the thing.
lt's all very well having this but unless you've got the technique you're not going to go anywhere.
l've definitely got a technique.
Whether it's the right technique, we'll see.
Annoyingly, despite all the training l've been doing, somehow Liam looks in slightly better shape than me.
- Nervous? - Not too bad.
- l'm a little nervous.
- You are? Oan l say, l'm desperately sucking in my chest and my stomach.
What do you think, you going to beat me? l've got a chance.
Let's see how good you are.
l'm good.
Actually, l'm genuinely nervous, but even though l know Liam's a world champion and record holder, l can't help feeling l've got a small chance.
My biomimetic dolphin technology has made me so much quicker but is it going to be enough? Three, two, one.
(WHlSTLE BLOWS) Where is he? Good race.
Argh! No! Better luck next time.
'Gutted.
All that training for nothing.
But really, who was l kidding? 'At the end of the day, l was being naive to think l could beat Liam.
'Biomimetics could certainly make me faster, but there is only one thing 'that could really make me swim like a dolphin - 'several million years of evolution.
' That guy is unbelievable, the way he swims.
He really is.
He hardly moves in the water.
lt is poetry to watch.
Effortless.
For a visual spectacular though, l preferred your style.
- We'll see you next week.
Bye.
- Bye.
Bye.