Did you know that people with dyslexia can make very good spies? And people with autism are likely to have been the driving force of human creativity for the last 100,000 years? Dyslexia, dyscalculia, ADHD and autism are often misunderstood as negative conditions, when really they indicate strengths as well as struggles. This episode is narrated by…

Have you ever wondered why humans chose to ride horses? It was a moment in history which changed the future of both species forever. This relationship has endured for over five thousand years, and the horse has been described as one of the greatest technologies that man has ever harnessed. Horses are prized for their speed, strength and adaptabilit…

Have you ever wondered who had the bright idea of inventing the light bulb? Well, it’s credited to a rather unusual man, Thomas Edison. An man who had a gift – not so much for inventing as for taking an existing idea, and finding ways to make it better, or cheaper, or both. During his lifetime Thomas Edison invented a truly extraordinary range of t…

There’s a group of almost 4,000 volunteers known as the White Helmets. They have become famous for their bravery in the Syrian civil war. They are famous too for the white hardhats they wear. Most of the volunteers are men but there are also around 200 women. Their proper name is the Syria Civil Defence. They have been trained to protect and help p…

Have you ever considered what an extraordinary invention plastic is? The word plastic means mouldable and therein lies its ingenuity, it can be moulded into every conceivable size shape and colour. It can be thick or thin, large or small, strong or delicate. Plastic is complicated: it has life saving medical uses but is life threatening to the natu…

Have you ever wondered about the power of the moon? Craned your neck and stared, deep, into her mysteries? Like a wolf howling through the night, what questions would you ask of her, what secrets would you try to uncover? The moon has the power to conjure werewolves. It controls the tides of our seas and oceans, and it has inspired mankind to reach…

Have you ever wondered what is actually inside a packet of crisps? Potatoes, obviously, you would think. Air, perhaps just as obviously – but it’s not the air you are expecting. There's history in there too, and rivalry. Who made the very first potato crisp? And, what exactly is a crisp? Or potato chip, as they say in America. To be a crisp, does i…

Have you ever wondered what exactly are the Crown Jewels, or why kings and queens wear crowns? We tell the extraordinary history of the British Crown Jewels, and how over the centuries they have been lost and stolen, melted down, and remade. Among the crowns, sceptres and orbs, there is even a single stone – the Koh-i-Noor diamond – which is believ…

How do we see? And how do we see colour? Does the world look the same through another person's eyes? In this podcast discover how the human eye works and how it sees colour. You may be surprised to learn that not everyone sees colour in the same way: a few are colour blind; others are tetrachromats which means they have an extra type of cone cell i…

Why do we worry? And what can we do about it? This episode explains to children that day-to-day worries are a normal part of life. In fact, sometimes worry is a positive, rather than negative, thing. When faced with predators, a sense of fear protected our ancient ancestors and, even today, it can push us out of our comfort zone. And when it all ge…

Have you ever wondered why poo is funny? It’s stinky. It’s perfectly revolting, but if you say the word poo a few times, children – and some adults – start to smile, even laugh. And it can, of course, be surprisingly useful – as a food source, a fertiliser and for marking animal territory. But adult humans don’t tend to like talking about poo so we…

Have you ever sent a secret message to a friend? Or tried to use a clever code to protect a secret? Have you ever tried to crack a code? There are many ingenious ways to conceal, and reveal, a secret message. Keeping secrets, and code breaking, can be a matter of life and death, as Mary, Queen of Scots found out to her cost. Alan Turing's work as a…

All around the world during the darkest months of winter people light candles and look forward to a time of new hope. Why do Christians celebrate Christmas at this time of year? Why do Jewish people, Hindus, Jains, Sihks and some Buddhists celebrate with festivals of light at this darkest time? And how does Christmas vary from country to country? N…

Wherever they sailed, they plundered, pillaged and stole, so the story goes. But were the Vikings really the fierce invaders of the history books who ransacked our monasteries and captured human slaves? Or where they simply peaceful traders with an interest in travel? The clue is in the names: the word Viking did not originally mean a single group …

It is exactly 400 years since a ship called the Mayflower arrived on the east coast of America, bringing 102 English settlers to the New World. Today some 35 million people all over the USA claim to have had an ancestor on the Mayflower. As they built their colony on the Massachusetts coast, the so-called Pilgrims encountered the Wampanoag people w…

Have you ever wondered why chocolate tastes so good, why it is so completely and utterly scrumdiddlyumptious? In fact the raw cocoa bean tastes horrible, and it takes a lot to turn this tropical rainforest nut into chocolate. Humans have loved it for longer than you might think, and the Aztecs drank it before going into battle. But only about 120 y…

Have you wondered if zero is actually a number? Or if infinity is a number or a concept? What is an imaginary number? And how do numbers explain the shape of the ancient pyramids? Why is the number 60 so interesting? Just how large is the number Googol, the number that gives a certain search engine its name? And how does maths make our world more b…

Her real name was Krystyna Skarbek. She was Polish but spied for the British during WW11. She was brilliant and daring in a male-dominated field. And a law unto her self. She took risks few others would have done. And saved lives with her rare ingenuity. Codenames and pseudonyms, she had many: Madame Marchand, Jacqueline Armande or just plain Pauli…

Once the heavens were the domain of just gods and angels – which is one of the reasons why Icarcus fell back to earth. Humans only really mastered flight when they developed their understanding of two crucial concepts: lift and thrust. In the early 1900s, with the invention of the petrol engine, the Wright brothers took to the sky in a biplane, alb…

Welcome to Season 2 of The Wonder Podcast. This episode tells the true story of a thief who stole the Mona Lisa. Every year 10 million visitors come to the Louvre museum in Paris to see this portrait of a 16th-century Italian noblewoman by Leonardo da Vinci. But it was not until she was stolen on 21 August, 1911 that the Mona Lisa achieved global f…

The new coronavirus has had a huge impact on our daily lives, and has made some people very sick but others who caught it haven’t been ill at all. You might be wondering how we fight off illnesses like coronavirus. This week’s episode is about the immune system and how it works to protect humans from diseases caused by viruses and bacteria. Using t…

What do we love about a good film? Is it that they transport us to a different world? To places where our imagination can take flight? The films of Studio Ghibli are full of strange creatures and extraordinary flying machines; places where sprites live and incredible transformations are possible; and lots of cats – even a cat that looks like a bus.…

Seventy two years ago over 800 passengers arrived in the UK from the Caribbean aboard the Empire Windrush. This episode tells the story of their journey: from their initial optimism to the difficulties they faced adapting to life in Britain. The Empire Windrush lent its name to the 'Windrush generation', the people that came from the West Indies to…

Hello Wonder! Carnivorous plants are awfully strange, and strangely awful. They may sound like the stuff of nightmares, or science-fiction, but they are most definitely real and ready to commit murder to survive. They attract, then trap, their victims and devour the bodies. These deadly assassins grow in every remote region of the world, except Ant…

Hello Wonder! Have you ever wondered, what is the point of sport? Of kicking a ball? Hitting a ball? Serving a ball? Of running a race? Of cycling? Or swimming? Or which jockey, on which horse, finishes first? Why bother counting the number of runs made by a bat striking a red leather ball? Why does both playing and watching sport obsess us so? Is …

Hello Wonder! The fourth episode of The Wonder Podcast tells the story of a schoolgirl from Pakistan who stood up for girls’ rights to an education. To silence her, the Taliban, a group of religious extremists, shot her. Malala Yousafzai did not just survive: she became the youngest person ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Her journey began in the…

Hello Wonder! Welcome to the first episode of The Wonder Podcast. It tells the story of Buzz Aldrin – fighter pilot, astronaut and member of the first manned space mission to another world – and how he lent his name to a famous Space Ranger superhero. You guessed it, Buzz Lightyear. Most of us can only dream of adventures to far-off places but on 2…

Hello Wonder! The second episode of The Wonder Podcast tells the story of Queen Mary I who has been called a 16th-century Greta Thunberg – she was passionate, clever and very determined. She was also the first proper queen of England. Her father Henry VIII once called her ‘the greatest pearl in the kingdom’ yet today she is remembered as ‘Bloody Ma…

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