N1HRV — broadcast
20261012 033000 UTC
217 transcript segments
Google Cloud Speech-to-Text API (Chirp) + Gemini 2.5 Flash Non-Thinking
Data courtesy of The GDELT Project (https://www.gdeltproject.org/), from the Internet Archive TV News Archive.
Machine transcription. Treat it as a searchable index of what was broadcast, not a verbatim quotation record.

[00:03:32] Do you have a science question? Then send
[00:03:35] it to us as a video, text or voice message.
[00:03:39] If we answer it on the show, then we'll send you a little gift as a thank
[00:03:42] you. So, just
[00:03:44] ask:
[00:03:47] Is there water on the moon?
[00:03:50] At first glance, the moon looks a bit like a desert, and for a long
[00:03:54] time scientists were sure there was no water on
[00:03:57] it. Now though, we know that... there is, but
[00:04:01] where is it? And could we use
[00:04:02] it?
[00:04:06] Most of the moon's water is found at its south
[00:04:08] pole. Many craters there have no access to
[00:04:12] sunlight, and says NASA, are some of the coldest
[00:04:15] parts of the entire solar system. The water here
[00:04:19] is permanent ice. Some has been frozen for 3.5
[00:04:22] billion years. Temperatures are as low as
[00:04:25] 240° Celsius. The
[00:04:28] LRO lunar or... revealed that there is ice
[00:04:32] lying just below the surface here, either as solid deposits or
[00:04:35] mixed with lunar dust. And there's a lot of it. Estimates
[00:04:39] suggest hundreds of millions of metric
[00:04:42] tons.
[00:04:44] There's also water in moon dust, what's known as lunar
[00:04:47] regolith. NASA's LADEE mission showed that
[00:04:51] when rocks from space strike the moon's
[00:04:54] surface, they kick up not only dust, but
[00:04:57] also traces of water, even in areas subject to
[00:05:00] sunlight, but they are traces. The
[00:05:04] Sahara Desert contains around 100 times more water
[00:05:08] than lunar
[00:05:08] dust.
[00:05:12] Can we access it? That's something for future lunar
[00:05:16] missions to find out. Either way, it
[00:05:19] won't be easy to extract. Temperatures are
[00:05:22] very low, the terrain is difficult, and it'll take a lot of
[00:05:26] tech.
[00:05:29] Water access will be crucial for future lunar
[00:05:32] missions. It could be treated and turned into drinking
[00:05:35] water, or broken down into its
[00:05:38] components, hydrogen and oxygen, using electrolysis.
[00:05:44] These could be used for breathing or for rocket
[00:05:46] fuel.
[00:05:49] Until then, however, astronauts will still have to bring their water with
[00:05:53] them from
[00:05:53] Earth.
[00:06:01] Space exploration is all the rage among Gen Z-ers.
[00:06:05] That's because it boasts more opportunities than ever
[00:06:08] before. SpaceX and Blue Origin, as well as numerous satellite
[00:06:11] startups are stirring things up. It's no
[00:06:15] longer just government agencies that get to explore up
[00:06:18] there. The space industry is
[00:06:21] expanding and attracting
[00:06:24] talent.
[00:06:31] With the help of this simulator, Aloys Lüschel is training his mining
[00:06:35] skills. He hopes to one day extract raw materials far
[00:06:38] away on the moon. Lüschel studies space technologies at the Freiberg
[00:06:43] University of Mining and Technology in Eastern Germany and has big
[00:06:46] plans.
[00:06:49] It would be cool to have the opportunity to go to the moon, but on the other hand, it's also
[00:06:52] really cool just to be part of developing all of this and to find solutions
[00:06:56] essential for it to work, solutions without which it wouldn't be
[00:06:59] possible.
[00:07:02] Extracting raw materials in space is laborious,
[00:07:06] dangerous work. The low gravity makes it difficult, as do
[00:07:09] the meter thick layers of lunar dust and the lethal
[00:07:12] radiation, a challenge for the
[00:07:14] scientists.
[00:07:17] We're looking for simple, hardwearing solutions that are robust. On the
[00:07:21] moon, you can't easily repair equipment, for example, so everything has to be
[00:07:24] lightweight, reliable and robust.
[00:07:28] Like this rover, for example, developed by students here at the
[00:07:31] university. It moves across the rugged lunar surface,
[00:07:35] locating, extracting and transporting raw
[00:07:37] materials. Soon it'll be possible to produce rovers
[00:07:41] like this on the moon.
[00:07:47] A crewed lunar landing is planned for 2028
[00:08:06] as part of the Artemis IV mission. The plan is to
[00:08:10] then build a lunar station up there.
[00:08:13] It will be too expensive to restock this base with deliveries from
[00:08:16] Earth, so astronauts will need to use resources very
[00:08:19] carefully.
[00:08:23] Lunar astronauts will have to breathe the same air over and over, drink
[00:08:27] the same water, eat the same carrots, recycle like
[00:08:30] crazy. And by finding solutions we're developing
[00:08:33] technologies that are useful on Earth too.
[00:08:37] Data collected by the Artemis II mission, which launched in April
[00:08:41] 2026, will be used to prepare for the planned crewed
[00:08:44] lunar landing in
[00:08:45] 2028.
[00:08:51] This is what dwellings on the moon could look
[00:08:53] like.
[00:08:56] Together with the European Space Agency, London-based design
[00:09:00] and architecture firm Hassel has developed a master plan for a
[00:09:04] modular lunar base in which human beings could work and
[00:09:07] live long-term. One big challenge is the lunar
[00:09:11] radiation, so... thick walls could be
[00:09:13] essential. But how to build
[00:09:16] them? We're not going to bring our own concrete
[00:09:20] to build shell structures or caves to protect our
[00:09:24] astronauts, we better use local materials, so therefore we're
[00:09:27] going to use regolith, which is lunar dust, to
[00:09:31] create blocks that then what we called tetrapods that we
[00:09:35] can actually interconnect and create the structures, these shell
[00:09:38] structures, cave-like structures under which our
[00:09:42] astronauts can live inside their inflatable
[00:09:45] habitats. It sounds great and the
[00:09:49] model looks impressive too. But what about putting it into
[00:09:52] practice?
[00:09:55] Researcher Morrit is helping to develop the building material.
[00:09:59] Although there are abundant supplies of regolith on the
[00:10:02] moon, direct isn't
[00:10:06] necessarily suitable as building material. Regolith is a bit
[00:10:09] like sand, which means if you melt it it.
[00:10:25] together and afterwards you end up with a porous, solid
[00:10:28] composite material which could be used to make something like bricks for
[00:10:32] example. Bricks you could then use to build walls
[00:10:35] with. We also use heat-resistant plastics for
[00:10:38] 3D printing and we mix in regolith to boost the
[00:10:42] overall volume. That way we can achieve a larger volume and so need to take less
[00:10:46] plastic with us for
[00:10:47] printing.
[00:10:50] With a special high-temperature printer, it's even possible to
[00:10:53] process pure regolith. It can be used its own or
[00:10:57] mixed with plastic. 3D printing has great potential for
[00:11:01] lunar construction work. NASA
[00:11:04] conducted tests with large- format printers. One good
[00:11:07] option is to design lightweight inflatable structures and then
[00:11:11] clad them in
[00:11:12] regolith.
[00:11:16] And the plan would be to incorporate the assistance of small
[00:11:19] robots. What at first glance looks like a vacuum cleaner
[00:11:23] is actually a mobile 3D printer. It applies
[00:11:27] regolith layer by layer directly onto the lightweight base
[00:11:30] structure. All this is still just vision, but
[00:11:34] this or something similar could be what living on the moon looks like one
[00:11:38] day. Humanity is heading off to new realms and
[00:11:41] this exploratory urge drives researchers
[00:11:44] too.
[00:11:48] Ever since I've been working here and regularly seeing the astronauts walking
[00:11:52] around, I find myself thinking, wow, I'm... really working on these
[00:11:56] frontiers that we're currently pushing back, and working
[00:11:59] on lunar projects is incredibly inspiring, it fills me with
[00:12:03] enthusiasm, and I'm so grateful to be allowed to be so close to it all,
[00:12:07] it's totally
[00:12:08] crazy.
[00:12:13] Imagine it's the year 3000. What would
[00:12:16] archaeologists dig up from our time? Very likely bits
[00:12:20] of plastic and fragments of synthetic clothing, which are
[00:12:23] already found in dense layers in the ground, thanks to our
[00:12:26] appetite for disposable
[00:12:28] fashion.
[00:12:32] T-shirts emblazoned with the latest designs, bang on
[00:12:35] trend, super short distressed look hot pants,
[00:12:39] must have. The latest fast fashion
[00:12:43] collections will doubtless have a shorter product life
[00:12:46] cycle as
[00:12:47] ever.
[00:12:51] Friederike von works to improve sustainability in
[00:13:25] more than half of what we produce goes straight into the trash
[00:13:29] unused. That in itself is a massive
[00:13:32] problem.
[00:13:35] And fast fashion giants like Primark seem almost
[00:13:38] harmless in comparison to online Chinese sellers like
[00:13:42] Shein, which are more about ultra fast
[00:13:45] fashion.
[00:13:49] Product life cycles are getting significantly shorter, things need to be
[00:13:52] replaced more quickly and consumption.
[00:14:19] With the digital product passport, a consumer who wants to buy an item of
[00:14:23] clothing in a store, for example,
[00:14:25] can scan a QR code and will directly access a platform
[00:14:29] where they can retrieve product information. There
[00:14:32] is a whole range of product information currently being
[00:14:35] considered. One might be the durability of the
[00:14:38] fibers used in the textiles. In other
[00:14:41] words, how long-lasting is the fiber I'm about to buy.
[00:14:45] Other product information could be the garment's ecological or carbon
[00:14:48] footprint. And here's
[00:14:52] how it works: Production origin, material.
[00:16:07] sustainability of fibers and textiles by putting them to the test in the
[00:16:11] laboratory.
[00:16:13] Most fast fashion items are not made to
[00:16:16] last. It takes just few test cycles to
[00:16:19] reveal weaknesses, although these can easily be missed
[00:16:23] in the
[00:16:24] store.
[00:16:28] Here you can see that it is already opened along this edge. It's come
[00:16:32] completely undone and the fabric is very light. There is
[00:16:36] no locking stitch here.
[00:17:38] And it's not just brands associated with ultra fast fashion that are doing
[00:17:42] it. We see the same trend in higher price segments as well.
[00:17:45] This phenomenon. It's
[00:17:48] far from the case that higher prices mean better
[00:17:51] quality, and no matter how much it costs, isn't
[00:17:55] fashion by its very nature
[00:17:57] fleeting?
[00:17:59] Sustainable fashion like that sold in this slow fashion store in
[00:18:03] central Berlin remains a niche concept, and even if
[00:18:06] consumers are given more information about how a garment is made, will they
[00:18:10] actually use it? And how much does this information influence
[00:18:14] purchasing decisions anyway?
[00:18:17] Oliver McConnell, innovation strategist and fashion expert, has
[00:18:21] his reservations about the digital product
[00:18:23] passports.
[00:18:27] We see the appealing aspects of fast fashion, the trendy styles, the
[00:18:31] instant gratification, and so the question we really need to ask
[00:18:35] is, how do we bring immediate reward?
[00:19:37] it will be. Following a preparatory and
[00:19:41] introductory phase beginning in 2027, the
[00:19:44] digital product passport for textiles in the EU is set
[00:19:48] to come into effect in
[00:19:49] 2028.
[00:19:57] Archaeological discoveries,
[00:20:01] water on the moon and building a lunar base.
[00:20:05] We'll be back soon with more stories from world of
[00:20:08] science. See you then tomorrow, today. Take
[00:20:37] care.