Futureproof with Jonathan McCrea

It’s over 50 years that a human being first landed on another world. It is undoubtedly one of the most monumental moments in human history. This week's Futureproof we look back at our special show to try to bring home the sheer audacity of what happened half a century ago on this day. We’ll hear about Ireland’s very own piece of the moon. Planetary Scientist and Professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at the UC Davis, Sarah T Stewart, tells us how the rocks that Apollo astronauts brought back have helped us come up with a new understanding of how the moon formed in the first place. And Senior Editor at The Economist and author of The Moon: A History For The Future, Oliver Morton, explains that July 20th 1969 wasn’t actually our first successful moon landing. So, when did we first get there and when are we going back? Listen and subscribe to Futureproof with Jonathan McCrea on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.    Download, listen and subscribe on the Newstalk App.     You can also listen to Newstalk live on newstalk.com or on Alexa, by adding the Newstalk skill and asking: 'Alexa, play Newstalk'.

Every minute of every day we are forced to make split-second decisions in order to navigate the worlds we have cultivated for ourselves. The most amazing thing is that all of these actions come as second nature - we don’t even realise we’re actually engaged in a highly sophisticated dance of thought and action. But how do we actually do this? How do we get from the formation of a thought to taking the right course of action? In other words - how do we get things done? David Badre is Professor of Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences at Brown University, on the faculty of the Carney Institute for Brain Science at Brown University, and author of ‘On Task: How Our Brain Gets Things Done’ he joined Jonathan to discuss. Listen and subscribe to Futureproof with Jonathan McCrea on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.    Download, listen and subscribe on the Newstalk App.     You can also listen to Newstalk live on newstalk.com or on Alexa, by adding the Newstalk skill and asking: 'Alexa, play Newstalk'.

If humans ever do manage to get to Mars, an untold number of problems will have had to have been solved to do it. From propulsion, life support, radiation and just actually landing there - there’s a lot to take care of. But what kind of effect might this kind of journey have on the human body itself? What kind of changes might we expect to take place? Nicholas Brereton, a research fellow at the University of Montreal’s Plant Biology Research Institute joined Jonathan to discuss. Also on the show, Jonathan is joined by Dr. Ruth Freeman and Dr. Shane Bergin to look at the science news stories of the week. Listen and subscribe to Futureproof with Jonathan McCrea on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.    Download, listen and subscribe on the Newstalk App.     You can also listen to Newstalk live on newstalk.com or on Alexa, by adding the Newstalk skill and asking: 'Alexa, play Newstalk'.

There’s nothing like a good mystery.  If you or I were out walking in the Rockies we’d probably barely notice the different types of rocks under our feet, let alone realise that some rocks are a little out of place.  But when John Craddock and his team of archaeologists found some unusual rocks at their feet they knew something was afoot. Dr John Craddock is Professor in the Geology department at Macalester College, Minnesota

Now, when it comes to the obesity crisis facing many developed nations all across the world it can be easy to be reductive about it. “Just eat less” or “ just cut out the junk” or something like that. But what if there was something going on inside your brain that meant you never felt satisfied? What if you felt hungry all the time no matter how much you ate? How could we fight such a primal urge? Dr Moran Shalev-Benami, from the Department of Chemical & Structural Biology & Principal Investigator at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel joined Jonathan to discuss