The new prime minister of Sudan has said he's held useful talks with u.s. Officials as he tries to secure his country's removal from America's list of state sponsored terrorism Abdullah said Sudan was unable to access World Bank or i.m.f. Funds while on the list but he hoped that situation would change in the near future the former president of Zimbabwe Robert Mugabe is to be buried later today his final resting place has been the subject of a dispute between his family and the government since he died earlier this month his state funeral was held 2 weeks ago from Harare his New Yorker the private ceremony will be held in the village where as a child here did Catalan the rolling farmland and played with his friends it was a last minute change of plans some believe his family wanted to honor his wishes the burial stated to him that near his mother and brothers is a far cry from the grand morsel e.-m. On a hilltop that was being constructed for him at the exclusive war heroes shrine in had died it the u.s. Federal Aviation Authority has said some operators of the Boeing 737 n. G. Airliner will have to carry out checks after cracks were discovered on small number of planes the faults of men found in a component known as a pickle fork used to attach the aircraft body to the wing and more than a 3rd of the runners in the women's marathon at the World Athletics Championships failed to complete the race because of Qatar's high temperatures and humidity the race was run in the dead of night but the temperature was still $32.00 degrees Celsius the coach of the Ethiopian team said No marathon would be run in his country in such conditions b.b.c. News. Hello and welcome to Tech tent your weekly Indispensable Guide to all the top news and trends from the technology world I'm recapturing Jones and this week we find out about Amazon's plans to take its Alexa voice assistant out of the home and into the outside world as Facebook buys a mind control device company we look at the growth of research into the interface between computers and the human brain and another Facebook story is that Libra digital currencies backing ever going to convince regulators it's a good idea joining me this week is b.b.c. Technology reporter Chris Cox Hi Chris hi everyone I'll be bringing you some stories about some sun get out and Google Translate looking forward to them and special guest is Caroline Carruthers author and chief executive of Carruthers and Jackson a data education consultancy welcome Caroline hire or it's good to have you with us here's a flavor of what's coming up near our interface is going to be a type of imaging technology that can see can if we can't be changed our life we knew that this project would raise a lot of questions from from regulators worldwide and as a citizen I feel that's normal. All of that coming up but 1st this week just like we practiced ready I'm always ready Showtime de los Angeles 85 degrees by Monday. We organize. A system is getting a range of new voices including the actor Samuel l. Jackson who you heard it's one of many new features and products unveiled at the company's annual event in Seattle this week many of them designed to make the voice assistant available in all sorts of new ways they included a smart ring and spectacle frames with Alexa built in i Reporter Cody Godwin went along I asked her whether Amazon wants their assistant to be with us everywhere. Yes I think they do the big things that they announced and I can say this with confidence because judging by the queue the demo space the glasses the echo frames are what they're calling them had the longest queue of all of the things that they announced what they've done is they've integrated Alexa into these glasses but not kind of in the way that we've been hearing there's not a are being projected on to what you're seeing there's not a screen within the lens it's just in the frame kind of by the sides of your ears that have full Alexa integration with that another thing they announced was a ring it's called the Echo loop it's jewelry not to be confused with their doorbell device but instead of having to use the wake word you just hit a little button it vibrates and then you speak directly into it and then you hold it up to your ear and hear what she has to say just coming back to those glasses they cood small glasses of people doing this because they're not smart are they as you said there's no screen it's basically just a loudspeaker in the side of your glasses so compared with I walk for years which had big problems but that was a lot more sophisticated in this well I even asked them Do you consider these to be smart glasses and they kind of gave the standard p.r. Answer of course we do they've got all these electric capabilities in it so I think they're seeing it is that I think some consumers might be more comfortable with that kind of smart glasses at least for now while they start to get used to the idea of wearing technology on their face and of course the key thing is it takes Alexa out of the. On the move you know they've had a pretty disastrous time with mobile phones but there's a found way of effectively getting it into mobile phones both the glasses and these new. Yeah they're. They're really trying to push that and I think they're coming into a space where we have Siri in the air Pods So there is that ability but they're really trying to take it one step forward even one of the demos they showed with the glasses in particular was it can not only direct you to the nearest grocery store in the demo they showed Whole Foods but it can also direct you to a specific aisle within it so if you don't know where a certain product is they've integrated or they're at least working on integrating that kind of capability you know this technology is being very popular very successful but they've always been pretty concerns about it some people. Have said there's no way I'm going to have a loudspeaker basically spying on me in my home did they address those privacy concerns it's who they did a little bit they announced that coming a little bit later this year Alexis is going to have a couple more commands that they're hoping will provide a bit more transparency for the consumers you'll be able to ask what did I just say and she'll repeat back what she heard you say or if the device is triggered and you don't know why you can say why did you do that which then ideally it will tell you oh I heard this or the device was triggered in a different room so then it also turned on so they're trying to make it a bit more comfortable there is also the option you can tell it to delete everything that you've said that day and then also I think in the settings you can set it to delete everything after a certain amount of time so they are trying to allow customers to feel a bit better about their privacy when it comes to their devices. Special guest this week Caroline Carruthers is a big specialist on data reform and she dater officer and lectures about that around the world Caroline this is about data this is the play from is in is it or is it just about giving us new way of interacting with devices because they must be learning a lot about us every time we interact with them they all muscly learning about us and it is about data. I'm not one of those people think it's a not a good idea to have these devices I think if they help augment our life make things easier for us help me find the sugar in the supermarket rather than wondering forever that's a great thing but I also want everybody to understand that they are listening so to take to be educated on what's happening and why. Did you do understand why some people were I mean I've heard lots of people say I will not have a listening device in my home I completely understand why but I really like the feature of what did I say because that could settle so many arguments in our house between myself and my husband when what what did you just say to me. But now I get the point I think that's starting to address it by putting features in that can tell people what they're storing about them and why they're storing it and give you the ability to delete it I'm not sure it goes far enough and I think that it's only by people understanding it in us looking at how we regulate different devices like this that we can really get to the bottom of it anyway a big emerging battle between Alexa and other voices is like Siri and the Google assistant that will continue let's have a look at a few of these other big tech stories with Chris folks Chris there is talk of Samsung getting cold feet about virtual reality was that about well this is a story about the Samsung Gear which was one of those virtual reality headset that you could dislodge your smartphone in to get a sort of a or experience Oh I remember going to a Samsung launch and finding one under my chair suddenly as I Mark Zuckerberg appeared for it was I was here and it was a collaboration with Oculus that's why Mark Zuckerberg was there but now Oculus is John Carmack has suggested the days are numbered for Galaxy Gear he delivered a speech which he called a eulogy to the device it does work with the latest Galaxy s 10 fine but not the new some some note 10 now the kit was quite popular a lot of people bought it but Mr Comics said that actually people didn't use it very regularly maybe they had too many sticking. Point is it was a bit clumsy to stick your phone in and it didn't give you the full v. Our experience as you get with a dedicated headset Well this week Facebook's Oculus said it was updating its quest headset it's now going to be able to work without controllers so that reduces another one of those friction points and it's developed a new virtual reality town square that it calls horizon where you'll be able to go in and meet other people in v.a.r. They don't have any legs it's all a bit with caring caring for others the you have believe in Vo there was a huge amount of hype a few years back it seems to me to faded a bit I think it's faded which is interesting as I think the technology is only now caught up to the hype so I think some of the technology that's coming out is amazing and I think you know it really should be a spectator sport watching other people in areas. Rather leaving one of those I found that the ones where you put your phone in the headset they don't give you that full no reality experience and a lot of people have tried that and gone this isn't really no good I'm going to miss out on the full experience it's interesting that Google is giving up on its daydream v.r. As well which was one of those where you put the phone in the headset another Google story Google Translate is widely used in all sorts of ways by businesses in public services but this controversy over its use by border officials in the United States yes so the documents show that u.s. Citizenship and Immigration Services are using free online translation tools such as Google translate and being when vetting the social media posts of immigrants so documents explain what to do when a refugee arrives in the u.s. To join their spouse or parents who have already been let in and if their social media posts are written in a foreign language the manual says why not paste them into google translate as an efficient method to find out what was being said the new site Pro Publica points out that online tools often miss translate things and they don't always understand slang or dialect to new ones well the u.s. Citizenship and Immigration Services say social media posts alone are not used to make immigration decisions and stuff can recall. Asked a professional translator If in doubt and who is Lisa Lee and what is her story tell us about social media influences Elisa Li is known in China as Wang Hong or an online celebrity Yes spose we would say influence she has more than a 1000000 followers on the scene away by the social networking site she usually posts glossy photos of travel and fine dining and her party lifestyle but the illusion has been shattered a little bit by her landlord Ms Chen who live streamed tour of Lisa Lee's apartment revealing it to be filthy him squalid She said Lisa Lee had failed to answer her calls several times so she went into the tenants apartment and found it covered in garbage and dog mess it was so dirty she said a professional cleaner refused to come in and clean it well after posting a live stream Lisa Lee reappeared and apologized to her landlord and said she would clean the flat the perils of being a public figure in social media you're listening to Tech Turn on the b.b.c. World Service with Rory Catlin Jones in a moment can Facebook's cryptocurrency ever convince regulators that it's a good idea. 2 But 1st this week's or Facebook Yes they're everywhere by a tiny company called Control labs it's a startup making devices including a wristband that can pick up electric signals signals from the brain and transmit them to a computer Facebook's virtual reality chief Andrew Bose worth said he hoped the social media giant would now be able to scale up the technology and get it into consumer products fast now neural interface is systems linking computers with the human nervous system are a hot area for research is right now with all sorts of potential applications in health care and other areas I've been speaking to a leading scientist in this field Dr Martin as Arvin a director of the physiological signals and Systems Laboratory at the U.K.'s show. Field university my area of research is focused on the noninvasive apparatus over use some electrodes placed on this card and we record tiny electrical activity is generated by praying to find some markers related to different diseases so helping us for technologies and prognosis approaches but also we use these brain activities helping people to control different devices with their minds so this device can be an assistive the voice or it can be again that can help them to improve their cognitive performance how far along this road is this research not just your research but more widely because the there is a lot of interest isn't there in this interface between humans and computers and almost sort of all mental humans now we're in the stage based on their recent adventures in Nero technology in imaging techniques in computational algorithm many things that previously thought it's a type of Saif I is coming to reality soon some of them we already use them for example cochlear implant or deep brain a stimulator some of them they are working in our laboratory and hopefully it might be in our daily life basis in a few years some of them are still maybe 50 year far from us but neural interface is going to be and a type of imaging technology that can significantly change our life the way that the interact with our environment we had a new perspective report Royal Society and we emphasize that it's time for our governments to think about how this technology should be how our public are interested in this technique what are the aspects that needs to be need to be invested more you can see people might begin to be worried that we're kind of messing up the boundaries between humans and. Computers and for instance there's talk of being able to augment the human brain perhaps train a doctor with all the knowledge that a doctor has by simply uploading something from from a computer is that possible and is that desirable. Of course in terms of thinking about some of these my movie is that they plug just one u.s.p.s. Daycare and they upload all our information though it's not going to happen that's now at least or in near future but I I cri that there are many. Concepts and not a lot of concerns about privacy we need to think about who should use it how it should be used and how it should be accessible to people and when you hear a giant company like Facebook buying up a small business in this area does that make you excited does it validate your research or do you do you worry about their involvement that's a that's a very interesting question so what is it that another prove that is going to be a new future neuron interfaces so such a big company that has a good vision about the future they realize that neural interface has a big potential and it needs to be invested but at the same time just personally I don't like this technology to be just a few because I take companies making game and won a playoff that I got to Manas. Sheffield University Caroline Carruthers a special guest. Should we be excited about this this technology is it is it a long way off or is it something that's going to have an imminent impact on our lives I think for me it's something I'm incredibly excited about I think the pros far outweigh the cons when it looks the areas of medical research for instance I mean anybody who's had family who suffer from a debilitating disease who can help give some independence back to people so they can use a computer they can talk if they maybe have lost their vocal cords you know that kind of process are amazing However there are cons and I think it's right that we now talk about the potential privacy impact of this before we go too much further down this technology yeah we've heard about all these great health care uses it's not quite clear to me where Facebook is going to want to use this technology in that. I think we need to be careful because a big corporation like Facebook want to do something unless it's profitable to them in some way shape or form so it be interesting to understand what they think they're going to get out of it and I would completely agree with the researcher that you were talking about in the interview I think it's important that this technology is shared so that we understand what's happening with it and why and there's got to be limits presume you're the expert we were experimenting on humans here this is this is not sort of happening just in our lab people's brains are being invaded and as an exotic is pretty fundamental part of who we are as humans so it's something we need to be careful but it's who is going to regulate it because it's the same way you know this technology data no one government has the ability to actually regulate regulate everything that we're covering So I think we need to start to think about this subject in a much broader fashion and exciting pop attention scary technology now back in June Facebook and a clutch of companies from the payments industry including Pay Pal and Visa unveiled a hugely ambitious project a crypto currency called Libra they stress that this was not going to be controlled by the social media firm but by a coalition called the Libra association that regulators and governments around the world have been fairy skeptical about this plan France and Germany have said it poses a threat to economic stability u.s. Politicians have been hostile and India is talking about a complete ban on trading in the currency in London this week the chief operating officer of the Libor Association better known Perez was on a charm offensive holding a press conference to explain just how helpful this would be to the billions of people without access to normal banking services but I put it to him there was a huge job to be done to overcome the skeptics we announced that long enough before launching anything we knew that these projects would raise a lot of. From from regulators worldwide and as a citizen I feel that's normal I mean we need to be sure that on one side we have innovation you know vision ongoing and that we promote innovation but it doesn't have to be at the cost of security and the end and the morning laundering considerations and these kind of things and that's that those are the discussions that we're having right now with the regulators around the globe and what you're basically offering is a new global payment system why though does it have to be a crypto currency because you immediately hit all sorts of problems in terms of the reputation of cryptocurrency is as a vehicle for fraud for speculation they've just got a terrible image haven't they there will be a need for education so to to explain people exactly what these chain system is and that we are using the technology because we feel that these technology is the future for fighting for turning and receiving money people people have been talking about the chain hyping the block chain up for quite some years vast amounts of money has been raised for various projects schemes there's been hardly any delivery of I've reported on schemes to do everything from dating on the block journey to health on the block chain to. Solving climate change on the blog change there's been almost 0 delivery why this belief in blogs you're very right and I would say that 1st this blog chain is not going to be a generic one it's going to be used for payments Secondly we are doing these with a set of partners who are aware reputable companies and companies who are having a scale in terms of technology and in terms of know how that will help solving the technical issues that the other kinds of companies you are referring to have stepped into the other issue of course is Facebook Facebook is right at the heart of this project Facebook's reputation is also causing problems aren't you actually attracting more concern from regulators because of the connection with Facebook. Well you know again I'm not talking for Facebook I'm not I'm representing the and so what they can say yes and Libra project was born at Facebook but right now Liber us as he usually has 28 different members and Facebook is one of them and we have very reputable companies across the board and we are planning to board up to 100 new 100 members when we launch so we face regulatory questions and we will have to. Answer the questions that are asked Also we are in touch with the data privacy agencies who are also asking us questions about how we're going to store customer data and and they want to be sure that we put in place the proper means to protect customer data and that's near and dear to our hearts and we want to be sure that we do things and things accordingly to those agencies as better on pairs of the leaper Association Karen Carruthers a special guest. Do you think we need a whole new technology in payments and is blocked in the answer I think there's room to maneuver I don't like well established I think it's always worth looking at how we do things and checking we do the best way I'm still convinced block change the answer from a block chain is a solution looking for a problem why do you say that they're being told it's the future of the world it's going to solve all sorts of problems health care climate change when it gives me a demonstration of what I can actually do that I'm a believer Chris folks you know I've been looking at this field for some years I've bought a bit of critic and he wants sold again. Are you a believer I'm really not yet because millionaire I try to buy some coins online and once I've gone through the complicated process I ended up losing so 15 euros to the to the internet somewhere just out somewhere so hopefully one day I'll come back maybe they're worth more than you could be a millionaire could be because. Karen. Briefly you got any money stashed in a one it's I'm pretty sure the some on a computer somewhere that I will never see the light of day of Ok maybe we need to move this podcast on to the dog chain yeah. What we're going to do we're going to be on the block chain from from the very same this week thanks to my special guest data specialist Caroline Carruthers thanks to my b.b.c. Tech this colleague Chris Fox not to become millionaires you heard all of us who are is that b.b.c. Don't call slash technology and get to join us again in the sense at the same time next week. Distribution of the b.b.c. World Service in the u.s. 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News with Jonathan Izod the trumpet ministration is facing renewed pressure over its dealings with Ukraine the Democrat run lower house of Congress has given the secretary of state Mike Pompei o a week to hand over documents connected to the impeachment investigation congressional committees of also summoned 5 State Department employees including its special envoy to Ukraine Kurt Volker who is now resigned the Washington Post is reporting that Mr Trump told 2 senior Russian officials he was unconcerned about Moscow's interference in the 2016 presidential election because the United States that the same in other countries the remarks were made in a meeting in the Oval Office in 2017 but the Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov and Ambassador segue yack Afghans have been queuing up to vote in the presidential election amid multiple bomb attacks on voting centers across the country the turnout so far is reported to be lower than 5 years ago with many staying at home due to security concerns. Downing Street has reacted angrily to the referral of Britain's prime minister bar's Johnson to a police watchdog the local government authority for London has asked the organization to decide whether Mr Johnson should face a criminal investigation over money paid to a us business woman when he was the city's mayor 9 sailors have been injured in South Korea after an explosion on board a cargo ship which was transporting petroleum products in the southeastern city of all sun 25 crew members and their captain had to escape quickly from the 25000 time ship which was spewing thick smoke following the blast Emergency crews say they're working to contain the fire and find out the cause of the explosion has been a major upset at the Rugby World Cup in Japan where the hosts of beaten Ireland in a poor match inches worker Ireland held on for 60 minutes against tenacious Japanese side before the home team went ahead by 16 points to 12 Japan increased their lead to 19 with a penalty goal 10 minutes later b.b.c. Knees. Welcome to Science in action from the b.b.c. World Service with me Roland Pease cheese a question Is animal mineral vegetable so I might have 2 feet over full feet a lot of people said to me they look just like can go days of course I'd be a bit worried if we had kangaroo. And they have these lovely little heads Well all I'll let on is it has something to do with a remarkable change in diet several 1000 years ago and we've called for a change in diet to day affairs of the fish harvested around the world they could be ending up in your dinner plates but I think the concern is that actually it's infecting fish the event eat or the livestock that you can eat it's even more wasteful how eating fish may save millions around the world from a lack of micro-nutrients well so later in the program dost blown from North Africa shows the sun Harun may have 1st formed millions of years ago that's all to come we are seeing what may be early signs on man induced climatic change it's about 30 years since a powerful voice in international affairs one of the United Nations that global warming is a grave threat to our planet British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher details the evidence including evidence that the polar ice is dangerously thinning our data can for the 1st year which forms the bulk of sea ice cover is remarkably certain and so is probably on able to sustain significant atmospheric warming without melting the lesson of these pole approaches is is that an environmental or climatic change produced by man made terror a self-sustaining all rather read quality. Civil Mrs Thatcher speech that year was a call to action but 3 decades on. At a special session this week it seemed no one was listening people are suffering people are dying entire secure systems are collapsing we are in the beginning of a mass extinction and all you can talk about is the money it came to tales of eternal economic growth how did you. Get it from birds frustration is understandable for 30 years since Mrs Thatcher spoke the c o 2 has continued to spew out and the scientific evidence continues to pile up along some of the deliberations at the un on Monday this week's climate action included the widely publicized release of the latest report from the i.p.c.c. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change into the state of the world's oceans and our ice accelerating melting accelerating sea level rise accelerating acidification all somewhat familiar messages to anyone who's been listening over the past 3 decades but they were hammered out in a document assembled from the published literature and painstakingly negotiated over several days and nights in Monaco and out by government representatives and scientists like Phil Williamson It's not so much the sort of arguments over the scientific information it is a policy document and if governments are accepting it and approving it they want to know what the words mean and during a discussion how to translate it into into 6 languages following but as words translate that then they may or may not mean exactly the same helping to write one of the chapters I also helped with the glossary we try to explain as much as possible how we are using the different words but still sometimes that might be ambiguity there is still scientific terms there that we can't avoid using not to be too subtle about it is there an issue that you have civil servants there from countries. With let's say an Arctic coastline or with a mountain glassy as he says he can't possibly say that we're not going to agree to it yes there is that possibility one of the countries who objected were those with the Arctic last years and those coastlines are not comment on that. Sort of where the rubber hits the road in a sense on the. Statement which is being created all questions are scientifically it might be very valid and it might be well where's the argument but from a particular policy perspective a government might say well actually that makes assumptions that we're uncomfortable with the description is the consensus view but everything has to be decided unanimously and if there is one country who is unhappy then the whole process stops until we've reworded it in a way that our country is happy with and that's the moment to nip out for another coffee. Among the points that you highlighted the melting of the Arctic which we were talking about on science in action last week there's obviously the sea level rise that people are concerned about there's the warming of the oceans which is has its own consequence is there any change is there except a ration is in any of these processes that you think it worth highlighting that is one of the of the features of comparing the measurements from 20 or 30 years ago to the last 10 years and saying there is now no doubt about it these processes are happening faster than what they were on the issue of a sea level rise and ice melt it's happening Redlich twice as fast as what it was 20 or 30 years ago you were probably too busy at the time arguing over Chapter 3 Paragraph 57 to hear greater than act the United Nations but she was expressing this creed occur about you've been talking about this now for 3040 years when he got it do you think I mean anything about your report will which will actually get. People to be more active well unsubsidized that's not for the scientists it transfer might be for social scientists on Friday of last week it was actually the 1st day of the science was going to a scientist we discussed whether we ought to go on strike in support of the Climate Action Day but we decided that actually that would delay the publication of the report and would not should be in anyone's favor that but I thought about going to another site well the reason for action is based on scientific evidence therefore we need to create scientific evidence and then it is for society for politicians to react and respond to it but clearly the awareness and I think that has come about through previous reports particularly the i.p.c.c. The report on 1.5 degrees of warming that was published last September it will affect everyone and there might be some benefits from it but on the whole it is bad news just one last point my colleague Matt McGrath made a very good point which is that the oceans have been our friend they've taken up a lot of the c o 2 from the combustion that we've done they've taken a huge amount of the heat that has been resulted from global warming. But there is I presume a sting in the tale that even if we stopped all these activities there is that c o 2 it's and the oceans will be like a story cheetah the vote will slow up the recovery is not fair point it is to some extent I'm very glad you said about oceans taking up he Times about 90 percent of the heat and that all the arguments on it was 5 or 10 years ago there is the law is there is there a hiatus but that the heat was going into the ocean and that the there are the drivers of climate change now whether there's a momentum of that change it gets redistributed the temperature increase of most of the ocean is pretty trivial it's not the one or 2 degrees except at the surface it's sort of point 01 of a degree but that is measurable and we know throughout the ocean there have been changes in their extradition in the carbon dioxide there. Sex it up the planet's never going to be the same again I know there are fundamental changes that are more much much more than just all the atmospheres a little bit different a different chemical composition it's a little bit warmer changes have happened and in the past and your logical past ice ages come and go there is have been driven by natural imbalances the natural dynamics giving it a really big shove in one direction is allowed come as no surprise but the system has its own internal behavior internal dynamics of a different time scales and it's the interaction of all those processes mostly complicated but it still also watch the obvious climate scientists feel Williamson from the University of East Anglia Now the next interview about ancient baby bottles might at 1st seem to be completely unrelated but listen and you hear there is a connection the bottles Well they're not really bottles but they date from thousands of years ago and according to molecular archaeology it's really done their remarkable play artifacts they are the most extraordinary precious little objects they tend to vary tremendously in for each one is practically unique they all have a basic shape of a sort of a bowl form they're pretty small sometimes 5 to 10 centimeters across some a very plain and then others take the form of these very cute little mythical animals that might have 2 feet or full feet a lot of people said to me they look just like can go days of course I'd be a bit worried if we had kangaroo piece in a big Thank You know it and they have these lovely little heads they did they have in common is a spout this is always it's quite clear they are used to feed liquids to infants you brought chemistry yes astonishes me you brought chemistry to try and prove that there really was milk in these vessels Yes What we doing is extracting molecules. The facts oils and waxes of the natural world that are absorbed into the ceramic fabric of a pot Normally this happens when cooking is taking place because they're water resistant these molecules Luckily survive for thousands of years and then we can use this combination of molecular and eyes topic techniques to determine what the food swerd that will be imposed system in the vessels I've got a coffee cup in front of me your idea that I could drop that somewhere buried and 2000 years later someone could come along and find enough traces of milk and coffee that here I could say I know what rodent was drinking but that's basically what you're doing I mean how old are these so these are about 3000 years old I mean there are old ones we know of the 1st ones around about 7000 years old but it was finding them in the graves that was the important thing and so you were off finding on the surface these fact molecules from the milk yes except they're not on the surface they're inside the innocent Yes and that's why they survived the tsunami unglazed clearly so Cain Yes And can you tell what kind of fat yes we can differentiate Firstly between the imminence we can't differentiate between whether they are cow sheep and goats but we can say it's movement and and we can say it's either milk or meat we can then differentiate pigs who are non ruminants we can also identify processing of fair plan. And beeswax which denotes honey processing but in this instance it's milk. Is can you tell whether it's coming from cows of sheep whether it's for example the mother's own milk we did find that all 3 contained animal milk but one of them they did seem to be some mixing of known women and facts so that could either come from pig or it could possibly be human milk because humans are non-dominant as well I have to say I find this utterly astonishing I sort of imagined the bottle feeding. They belong with plastic but I know that the seeds of the idea yeah this was thousands of years ago these you said ripped out 3000 of their old traces of this so the 1st they go about 7000 years but what's really interesting is that they also appear in all sorts of other cultures so the ancient Greeks used them the Romans used them I know of some in North Africa in a site in Sudan and I think that simply because the cup itself it's kind of the optimum shape it's almost like what you'd call up and it's something that clearly hasn't changed over thousands of years across many cultures What do you think it symbolizes apart from the cultural things we're talking about in terms of the transition from being so I guess hunter gatherers it is part of a much broader picture in that once we start hunter gathering settle down and become our culture lists these foods so milk from animals and obviously for Hugh I don't humans the other secondary products itches butter cheese and so on and also cereals become available for nearly thick mums to feed their babies so what that means is they have more babies more often so they're into birth interval becomes much shorter 2 years than hunter gatherer women where it was 5 years so more babies more often leads to essentially a baby boom a population boom and we call this the nearly thick demographic transition so this leads to essentially people living in largest settlements larger groups with the associated problems that come from that such as conflict in disease and ultimately leads to the rise of cities and sets on the path to heaven a zation the way we live today I mean you would think that a Cray a baseball bat a white van could pretty so I know yes it's kind of from baby bottles really to living in the connected world we live in today Julie Dunn from Bristol University. Whose paper was published by nature this week the nutrition is at the heart of a study just published by nature This concerns the micronutrients lacking in many of our diets simple elements like on zinc insulin iyam and the much discussed only the 3 fatty acids which are vital to our health according to the study of a 1000000 pretty all deaths worldwide each year can be attributed to deficiencies in these micronutrients and fish the authors argue could be the answer but proving it involves a lot of investigation lead author Christina Hicks told me where a sweet one species of cow or chicken wheat regularly consumed around the world every 2000 different species of fish and we really didn't have a handle on how variable the nutrient content of the concentration of these micronutrients was in the different species of fish is it a question of the species of fish or is it a question of the geography of where they're living I mean it's a combination partly because there's the fact is interact and it also depends on the nutrient that you're interested in and went out and collected all the information that was out there but that only really covered about $400.00 different species and they were biases that you would expect kind of a lot more intensive sampling of species in the global north for example one of the sort of the head Lorien figures that you can come up with we found that we could actually accurately predict the concentration of different nutrients in different species of fish from the characteristics species that tended to be smaller or to achieve a smaller maximum size tends to be higher in that concentration of for example ion where species that tend to be found in a cold then regime so in the high latitudes tended to be higher in concentrations of and make a 3 of these concentrations you detecting of a sufficient actually to make up the deficiencies that to our advantage. And in children around the world yes so could definitely identify sweets as species that a single serving would meet the dietary requirements for an adult but again it varied across different species for one species you may exceed that actually requirements whereas for another species you may have next to nothing so it is important to pay attention to what types of species people are eating and what types of species dietary guidelines are recommending and all the fish you're talking the ones that are being eaten in these different possible world what we found was that for a large number of countries where deficiencies were high in some instances over 50 over 70 percent prevalence of treat deficiency risk in things like ion the amount of ion that was contained in the fish that was being cool in their waters was sufficient to actually meet the dietary requirements for the entire coast population are you saying that there not be needin at the moment and that needs to involve some kind of policy change we cannot make change or that those people are getting what they need in those countries the fish that it's being caught is not being eaten by the people who live in those countries so they are being caught. They're being sold abroad so there's a range of different reasons we looked at was being pulled out of the water we then looked at who's pulling the fish out of the water so in many African countries there's an awful lot of foreign fishing that because it's all legal it's through licensing deals bilateral or multilateral agreements between countries but for example in Mauritania over 70 percent of the fish caught in head waters is caught by foreign vessels so that fish never even enters the domestic market and those are ending up on as it were my dinner plates although they could be ending up in your dinner plates but I think the concern is that actually it's being fed to you for. The you then eat over to the livestock that you then eat so it's even more wasteful really than it going straight to your dinner plate so it's being used as fish meal maybe it's not that I'm not eating the fish directly but farmed salmon I'm eating Yeah exactly this is pricing people out in these countries this international trade we're not suggesting that there needs to be a stop a complete stop to foreign fishing or a complete stop to foreign trade because it's very small quantities of the fish that would need to be retained likely and consumed preferably by targeting vulnerable populations that would have a really big impact given that you've identified violent it looks like the micronutrients in fish could actually bridge a lot of dark tree gaps where you know all there are 3 simple elements to a recipe for trying to make sure that gap actually is bridged I don't think it's a simple recipe Unfortunately I think it's a political We need to have a paradigm shift in the way fisheries policy and management proceeds I think it's really important that countries are able to prioritize domestic feed security concerns and that those are given consideration when trade deals licensing agreements awestruck say for example I talked earlier I think about Mauritania where foreign fishing makes up 70 percent of the catch a lot of those fish are small nutritious species and a lot of them are actually processed in Mauritania but they don't enter the martini and market so governments could require that these foreign companies and for in fact trees divert a small portion of their landings that they're processing in the factories towards targeted child feeding programs in those areas and those child feeding programs could be things such as colleagues that will fish have been developing in Bangladesh in places developing powder. That are out to 10 per each of babies and techniques that are included in school meals for example I find it disheartening that even we still failing to enable days maced in need to access the nutrients that are available but I guess that also holds promise to me it's disheartening because we still failing to solve the you know social and political issues it's about the availability and the technical challenge and facts and he should be surmountable in these cases Christina Hicks environmental social scientist at Lancaster University in the u.k. When we return to climate change for the last rites and climate change in the deep past the change that led to the drying out of the sorrow of the largest warmth is that in today's world but it wasn't always drawing indeed only a few 1000 years ago when those baby bottles were in use parts of the region with not but rather than look in the harbor itself for the evidence of the 1st everything. Just down moose looked down wind where the desert dust gets blown the Canary Islands were attractive because there are a lot of dated volcanic rocks there it's close enough to Africa that there is a considerable flux of dust from the Sahara to that area at the present time we knew that if there were a way to try to get some older records they should be present in places like the Canaries where dust falls so dramatic now from the Sahara like Bob Dylan they are blowing in the Wade and if you go to the Canary Islands to day you will probably see some so harm dust blown on to the surface but you're looking for dust that was blown to the surface some millions of years ago we would be looking for things from older volcanic rocks that are are buried by later lava flows Canaria and geologists and other Spanish geologists have studied the volcanic rocks on the Canary Islands for a long time. And so many of them are very well dated we know that go back in the years the other thing that's significant about these particular volcanic rocks on the Canary Islands is that they're composed largely of a volcanic rock called the salt and what's significant about those rocks is that they do not contain the minerals quartz and Mica and those are the 2 most common minerals in Sahara and dust so if we find of minerals like that we know that they've got to be exotic because they they didn't form in the rocks of those islands them selves so you're looking for effectively lives assigned just sandwiched between different layers of Basle erupted That's correct how thick coffee sways in some places half a metre So in other places about a metre of sand it's 2 things in the case of 4 to Ventura which is the eastern most island what we see is a layer of basalt that's been dated at about 4800000 years and then on top of that are layers of sand that are locally derived and these are composed primarily of Marine shell fragments that have been blown up from the island shelf there and then there are several layers of these sand dunes essentially buried sand dunes that are overlaying by a basalt that's dated to about 2800000 years but in between those different sand dune layers are buried soils and those are composed primarily silt and clay sized particles smaller than sand dust sized particles and those are the buried soils that contain these exotic minerals courts and Mike that are signature for the Sahara So how far back do the dust layers go what's the oldest one you found the oldest one we found is just up above the. Basalt that stated to about 4800000 years we don't know how much younger it is it has to be younger because it's on top of that layer so that is very consistent with an age of about you know a little less than 4800000 years or so we were talking earlier this summer it's a crime it's not just about the African heat that was coming up in Europe to drive very high temperatures and heat waves it's a horrible to play a global climate in that way it certainly can be dust particles that travel a long distance such as those from Africa at the present time make it all the way over to the Americas have an effect on the planetary radiation balance and depending on whether the dust as it is being transported over highly reflective surfaces such as desert regions or darker surfaces such as forests or the ocean it can have a distinctive cooling effect by reflecting radiation back out to space solar radiation Secondly dust that is delivered to the oceans from places like Africa can actually be a fertilizer for marine ecosystems because a lot of the primary producers are sort of the lowest organisms on the food chain are fight a plank in tiny marine plants commonly found in the in the surface waters of the world's oceans and one of the limiting factors for a lot of their growth is the element iron and when it's inappropriate forms iron and stimulate the growth of those organisms so that affects the entire marine food chain but in addition since these are plants they photosynthesize they require carbon dioxide so they actually serve as a a way. String carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and so he feels we've come full circle climate change never seems to be far away here on science in action as you can see if you visit a library of past programs at b.b.c. World Service dot com Don't forget song selection is also available as a podcast frequently with more extended interviews but that is it for this edition I have you'll join us again next time but till then for me are in peace and pretty soon signal Thanks for listening to a p.b.s. Visual arts reefs are supported by Spanish village Art Center in Babel park and there are 37 working artist studios and galleries and Talmage art show presenting the Carmel Valley artists at the San Diego Marriott Del Mar Sunday October 6th 10 am to 4 pm with all types of handmade crafts Talmage Art Show dot com. This is Terry Gross the host to Fresh Air I'm guessing you listen to k. P.b.s. 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World Service I mean some better voters in Afghanistan are choosing a new president amid serious concerns over security as you know you talk about as a citizen as a voter and as a presidential candidate I would like to tell the Taliban that threatening innocent people is not a sign of strength also the vast majority of them are now off treatment leading normal lives with good quality of life say through the treatment of smell and I'm I think this is a real milestone a new treatment for the deadly a skin cancer melanoma brings hope and in Texas a Sikh man who made national headlines in his role as a police deputy for gaining live exemption to wear a turban as part of his uniform has been shot dead during a routine traffic stop deputy Sandy Dahl. 10 year veteran was a hero and was a respected member member of the community and he was a trailblazer all that and more after the news. This is the b.b.c. News Hello I'm Jonathan Izod Afghans have been queuing up to vote in a presidential election amid multiple bomb attacks on voting centers across the country at least one person has been killed and 27 others wounded the turnout so far is reported to be lower than 5 years ago with many staying at home due to concerns security concerns sharp Sharifi has the latest from the capital Kabul even before these attacks the Taliban's warnings have put people off vowing to attacks these centers just a day before voting is started so people who are cautious to still are cautious the turnout isn't as significant as it was expected but here's the despite the attacks in these cities that have been head people are still in lower numbers or turning out to the polling center. There's renewed impetus to the impeachment investigation into President Trump with congressional committees ordering the secretary of state Mike Pompei o to turn over all Ukraine related documents within the week the House is also someone 5 State Department officials David Willetts reports from Washington the subpoena demands that might Pompei are released documents relating to a telephone conversation between President Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelinsky in July this year including records related to the trumpet ministrations decision to withhold aid money for the Ukraine at the time of that phone call Him Which president repeatedly urged Mr Zelinsky to launch an investigation into the conduct of Mr Trump's Democratic rival Joe Biden who's son had been doing business in the Ukraine nearly $400000000.00 of aid money was being withheld the u.n. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet has urged Guinea to prosecute those responsible for a stadium massacre 10 years ago she said there was a strong likelihood the crimes against humanity had been committed by the security forces during the killing or disappearance of more than 150 opposition supporters in the capital Conakry. A new study suggests that a combination therapy using 2 powerful drugs to fight the deadly skin cancer melanoma can increase a patient's long term survival by 50 percent the drugs involved target the immune system the details from our health and science correspondent James got her a decade ago people usually died within 9 months of being diagnosed with advanced melanoma once the cancer spread around the body it was almost impossible to recover the difference now is immunotherapy drugs they allow the body's immune system to attack a cancer where ever it has spread a clinical trial published in The New England Journal of Medicine tested 2 drugs a pelham a map and of on a map more than half of patients given the combination were alive 5 years later the former president of Zimbabwe Robert Mugabe has to be buried later today in a simple private ceremony in his royal homeland he was given a state funeral 2 weeks ago but his family resisted official plans to bury him at the National War Heroes shrine in the capital Harare the a.b.c. News opposition parties in Britain have been considering their next steps as they seek to avert the possibility of the u.k. Leaving the European Union without a deal in little more than a month's time a senior member of the 3rd largest group in parliament the Scottish National Party says there's now a realistic prospect of a vote next week to try to topple Prime Minister Abbas Johnson's minority government but there are disagreements about who might head an interim administration. Officials in northern India say more than 40 people have been killed in flooding caused by torrential monsoon rains in the state of the protests they say most people died when walls and roofs collapsed South Asia editor at a Rajan has the details floodwaters have inundated several villages and towns and what that produced forcing thousands to seek refuge in relief camps the Ganges River is flowing about the danger mark in some parts of the state flooding really just along the banks the region gets monsoon rain and relief from June to September causing fatalities and mass displacement a number of forecasters are predicting heavy rains in the next 48 hours in most of the affected districts of the state flash floods and heavy rains killed 17 people in western India Maharashtra state earlier this week 9 sailors have been injured in South Korea an explosion on.