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Unexpected Elements

Factual: Science & Nature

Factual: Science & Nature: Science & Technology

The news you know, the science you don’t.

The news you know, the science you don’t. Unexpected Elements looks beyond everyday narratives to discover a goldmine of scientific stories and connections from around the globe. From Afronauts, to why we argue, to a deep dive on animal lifespans: see the world in a new way.

The Science Hour

Unexpected Elements: Diet in India

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27/06/2015

Diet in India

BBC World Service - Unexpected Elements, Diet in India

The Indian slum children who eat too much junk food

The Indian slum children who eat too much junk food in combination with nutrient-poor diets

The charity Sneha has just completed a new study which examined in detail the diets of 7000 children under the age of five living in slums or shanty towns in Mumbai. The researchers were led by David Osrin, Professor of Global Health at University College London, and found to their surprise that children not only had nutrient-poor diets but also many were eating a lot of unhealthy sugary, fried and salted snack foods.

Banking for kids	
Banqer is an online educational app that is being used by teachers in New Zealand to teach their students financial literacy.  It does this by turning the classroom into a virtual economy.  Simon Morton reports for Click on Banqer in action at a school in Wellington, New Zealand.

Madagascar's lemurs cling to survival
The famous lemurs of Madagascar face such severe threats to their survival that none of them may be left in the wild within 25 years. That stark warning comes from one of the world's leading specialists in the iconic animals.

Endangered Madagascar tortoise
In a desperate bid to save one of the world's most endangered animals, conservationists are taking the controversial step of defacing the last survivors.

Changing behaviour	
We all know that elements of the environment affect our behaviour. But how about the bacteria, parasites and viruses that infect us?  Research is starting to reveal that they might all have an impact on the way we behave.

Voice
Radio 3 is currently in the midst of a season focusing on all aspects of the Classical Voice. Science is playing a growing insightful role in understanding how to get the best out of the singing voice. Many singers base their careers on a particular quality of voice, and that sometimes can sound as though we're imposing a lot of strain on our vocal cords. We hear from Julian McGlashan, an Ear Nose and Throat specialist at Nottingham University Hospitals who has taken singers and placed a video endoscope down each of their throats to observe how their vocal tracts behave differently according to the style they sing. And David Howard head of the Audio Lab at York University, discusses how new technology is helping us understand how it's possible for a singer's voice to cut above the sound of an orchestra and still be heard at the back of a vast auditorium.

Science Hour was presented by Claudia Hammond with comments from BBC Science Correspondent Rebecca Morelle. 

Producer: Deborah Cohen

(Picture: Indian children in Mumbai enjoy ice lollies. Credit: Getty Images)

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