Femen Walsenburg in love Eda 95.5 f.m. In Lake George and Hertz all 95.7 f.m. In saliva the universe to envelope Grove and 105.7 f.m. In Canyon City for questions or comments please call 719-473-4801 during regular business hours you can always become a member of k. Or c.c. By going to k. Or c c dot o r g and making your financial contributions safely on line. At 10 hours g.m.t. Welcome to the newsroom for the b.b.c. World Service I'm Alex Ritson remembering the victims of this week's terror attacks in Spain the. Oh. The king and queen have joined hundreds of people at a mass in Barcelona as the hunt continues for the prime suspect the Iraqi military has started its campaign to oust Islamic state from one of its final strongholds I tell dioecious you either surrender or die we promise now that we will continue the liberation process Grace Mugabe the wife of Zimbabwe's president is back home and free despite claims she assaulted a model in South Africa hundreds of thousands of people have lost their homes due to flooding in Bangladesh. And update from 17000000000 kilometers away as we mark the 40th anniversary of the voyage a probe You're listening to the b.b.c. World Service. Hello I'm Gerri Smith with the b.b.c. News a special mass has been held in Barcelona for the 14 victims of the twin terror attacks in Catalonia in northeastern Spain King Philippe and Queen Latey Thea joined the prime minister Mariano Rajoy and Catalonia as leader colors pushed him on in the ground a familiar church the Metropolitan archbishop of Barcelona. Relayed the message from Pope Francis is such a particle and then on up with much of your in the south of your day and yet here once again the holy father condemns what is which is a very grave offense against that creates and he praised God for help so we can continue working for peace and harmony in the world. Good luck on God again and. Cattle and police have sealed off an area and there's your own region as the search goes on for a young Moroccan suspected of driving a van into crowds along last round us one of Barcelona's tourist hot spots on Thursday 13 were people were killed there another victim died in a 2nd attack in the town of Cambria was the Iraqi army and its militia allies have begun a major attack until after in the north of the country they city is one of the Islamic state groups few remaining strongholds in Iraq Rami rehire reports announcing the start of the operation the Iraqi prime minister Hi there Labadee said I asked fighters had no choice but to surrender or die the assault is being carried out by the Iraqi army and predominantly Shia factions known as the popular mobilization units. The Iraqi Army says there are 2000 and I as fighters in the city tens of thousands of civilians are believed to have fled over the past few months the wife of the Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has returned home from South Africa despite being under investigation for an alleged assault on a woman in a Johannesburg hotel they'd been in South Africa for regional summit Grace Mugabe you had failed to turn up for a court hearing after charges were Broad's last week and claimed diplomatic immunity so even stand reports from Johannesburg according to the public broadcaster president were better than Gabby and his wife Grace when Gabby arrived in the capital Harare in the middle of the night aboard and Zimbabwe plain South African police had say they were on the high eyelid to make sure that Greece will get it did not leave the country but if it is Lady has returned home without being arrested or charged the head of the Roman Catholic Church in the Philippines cardinal Luis totally has voiced his concerns about what he called the waste of human lives caused by the government's war on drugs is Commons come at the end of a bloody week in the camp and all manner in which police have shot dead more than 70 people here rights groups have called the operation a killing spree and highlighted the death of a 17 year old boy. While news from the b.b.c. The prime minister of Bangladesh shaker Sina is visiting the northern part of the country to assess damage caused by the worst flooding in almost 30 years many villages have been count off by floodwaters which are continuing to rise food supplies in some areas are running dangerously learned across South Asia more than $16000000.00 people have been affected. President has done Rouhani of Iran says his top from policy priority is to prevent the United States destroying the nuclear deal that his country struck with the international community just last week Mr Rouhani said Iran was ready to walk away from the agreement if the u.s. Impose more sanctions President Trump has bitterly criticized the deal and has said in the past that he'd like to rip it up one of Afghanistan's most famous pop stars Ariana Saeed has held a fund raising concert in the capital Kabul despite threats from conservatives a concert was originally scheduled to be held on Friday to Mark Independence Day This report from our sanity Rajan. Ariana entertained hundreds of young men and women last night in Kabul it was a rare music concert in the city which has witnessed a C.D.'s of sorts that acts and explosions in the past few months Miss I described by our fans as Afghanistan's game Cardassian is known for a long hair and figure hugging outfits which are a taboo in Afghanistan clerics opposed to saying it was against Afghan culture the wreckage of a u.s. Naval ship sank by the Japanese towards the end of the 2nd World War has been discovered in the Philippine Sea The warship had just completed a secret mission to deliver parts for the Hiroshima nuclear bomb when it was hit by Japanese torpedoes 2 thirds of a crew of nearly 1200 initially survived the sinking b.b.c. News. You're listening to the news room from the b.b.c. World Service with me Alex Ritson a special master remember the people who were killed in last week's twin attacks in the Spanish region of Catalonia has been held in Barcelona's famous so Grandia familiar church Spain's King Philippe and queen the teeth are were there along with the country's prime minister Mariano Rajoy 13 people were killed on Thursday when a van was driven into crowds on the Los Rambler spit of art our correspondent Gavin Lee is in the City and joins us now Gavin what was the mood at the mass this morning. What essentially all looking at if you can hear me this lights technically if you but let me bring you up to date with what's happened here with the the king of Spain Philippe and the queen that if you're here for the mass with the prime minister Mariano Rajoy now with lots of the injured victims of 54 people still in hospital some of the families were invited to attend and take part a few of them were here today was very motion we saw we think to from with 2 families going in who've been deeply affected by what happened here on the last round of attacks and join the services in our service with multi-faith service there are members of the Muslim community here and again it's with a point worth saying given that the there had been small but still from just sort of far right demonstrations conflating the issues of human migration and anti Islam so that was a you know a show faith to say there's a big support here enjoying the service we're told Pope Francis called he wanted just before the service to say that's the whole of the Catholic Church and people all around the world stand shoulder to shoulder with what those who were affected by the Spanish attacks or the services just finished a short while ago and I'm not going to say they must have been about a 1000 people outside as well this at just to listen to the sounds of the church because the 1st essential public gathering of the Morial to what happened on Thursday night and Friday morning and Barcelona will observe another man. That silence later. They will I mean this time for a football match with boss on the football club where you got almost 100000 people to attend in the bar for the players and team of decided that they won't have any show of of personal names on the back it will simply say the back of the shirts boss alone it will be a minute's silence there as well so today I think it's going to be very much about the memorial people standing together lots of the shops actually just so you walk past that last round us and elsewhere saying we stand with that's wrong Lizzie might be crying but we're still together it's quite flighty as well here in this dip in a moment where if there's a sudden noise people will move very quickly from Least Squares a moment substitute a night ago where people run from the last run list because I've heard something so it is quite flighty The other thing very strong we saw yesterday because of the kindness of the taxi driver saying Look anybody stay confident for the money we will take you back that we are we've seen this as a pattern elsewhere in Europe haven't we had the potential of a started to drive down the thousands of people on the street started to applaud and cheer what they were doing to say Thank You think that's you know that's the sort of the acts of kindness that we've been sort of seeing for the past 48 hours briefly Gavin can you give us a the latest on the manhunt for the young Moroccan man who is suspected of driving the van into the crowds Barcelona. Like this is Eunice 22 years old we don't know if he is the main suspect Spanish media suggest he is but his police are saying he is part of it let me briefly tell you our colleague were Davis spoken to the father of one of the attackers who said he spoke in the 3 o'clock 2 hours before the attack he had no indication of the plot but the manhunt continues here on the day where people are being remembered in big numbers here for the memorial for the 1st time our correspondent Gavin Lee in Barcelona a minute's silence has been held in Finland to remember the victims of Friday's stabbings which police are treating as a terrorist attack the suspect a Moroccan asylum seeker remains in custody. 2 women were killed in the south and town of Turku from where our correspondent on the hologram reports the attack happened just on the edge of this Kabul to Market Square hundreds of candles have been placed in tributes and there is a constant flow of people coming to lay flowers and pools for a moment to reflect. Some are visibly upset there's a woman leading her daughter away hand on her shoulder people just stopping taking photos and the police are dotted all over the sunny square and I. Keeping watch this is the 1st terror attack in Finland history Police say they know the identity of the 18 year old Moroccan who they believe was responsible but they haven't released his name he was shot in the side and is now in a hospital here rife in Finland and 2016 and they say he was going through the asylum process they believe the knifeman acted alone 4 other people have been arrested and an international arrest warrant has been issued for another 2 women were murdered 8 injured and police believe he was deliberately targeting women because the men who were wounded were harsh when they try to prevent the attacks the interior minister has said that the terrorists want to pit people against each other we will not let this happen finish society will not be defeated by fear or hatred the Finnish security service is participating in this investigation and examining whether the attack had any links to the so-called Islamic states of Iraq and Syria as a news conference that they pointed out it's worse will be for many here in Finland's a very uncomfortable truth this type of attack did not require much planning and was therefore very difficult to prevent the city of Tal Afar as one of the last urban centers in Iraq which remains under the control of the group calling itself Islamic State American and Iraqi military commanders estimate that about 2000 militants are there now the Iraqi government has begun a major offensive to win back the city the stark choice for I asked the Iraqi prime minister declared in a nationwide broadcast was between surrender and death none of the sons of our honorable people you will see another promise being fulfilled the city of his making ready to join other liberated areas as the heroes are being prepared to make sacrifices and exert efforts to liberate this steadfast city I tell Di ash you either surrender or die. I as we promised before we promised now that we will continue the liberation process we triumphed in all the battles we fought while death and defeat the fate of diaspora in all the battles they fought. A body speaking on national television in Iraq our correspondent Rami really high on is monitoring the latest developments from Beirut Rami How long has this offensive been planned well the specific offensive on the law for must have the plans for it must have been laid down finally after the end of the battle for Mosul the much larger and more significant city to the east of the laugh but of course we cannot look at each specific offensive as an isolated battle the whole war against Islamics the Islamic state group has been going on since 2014 and of course in towards the north and the area between Mosul and the law for it was decided late last year that Mosul would be taken 1st and that the Laffer would be left till the end the latter of course is strategically placed between Mosul and the Syrian the border between Syria and Iraq so cutting off Mosul from the last far was a key part of the battle for Mosul itself and after Mosul was taken to laugh or became isolated besieged for for quite a few months now it's been under siege by Iraqi forces and finally the decision was taken to launch the battle so what kind of response is expected from I ask what sort of a force is I guess now. Well it's hard to say the Iraqi army has suggested that I as fighters into laughter are demoralized we cannot of course verify that it's very difficult to know also how well prepared they are for the battle we know that they put up a very very vicious fight for Mosul but then again they are now losing territory across the region in Syria in Iraq in Lebannon along the Syrian Lebanese border they are also under fresh attack by the Lebanese army the Syrian army and Hezbollah so they are in the process of losing more and more ground and it's quite possible that they could be the more allies but it's also quite possible that they will fight to the bitter end in just literally 5 seconds how many civilians are still inside Well according to the International Organization for Migration about 40000 thank you Rami Ryan in Beirut You're listening to the b.b.c. World Service Still to come on The Newsroom we'll have more on a pop concert held in Kabul by a woman known to her fans as Afghanistan's came card Asin 1st Jerry has the headlines a special mass has been held in the sacred a familiar church in Barcelona in honor of the victims of this week's terror attacks as the search for a key suspect continues as we've been hearing Iraqi government forces have begun an offensive to drive Islamic state militants from Tel Africa one of the groups last strongholds in the country. And Zimbabwe's 1st Lady Grace Mugabe has returned home from South Africa despite being accused of assaulting a woman in Johannesburg as you just heard Grace Mugabe is safely home in Zimbabwe the South African authorities now face questions over how this was allowed to happen straight to our correspondent in Johannesburg Sophie rips to Sophie 1st what evidence is there that she is in Zimbabwe Well according to his head this is him back when public broadcaster Grayson Gabby and her husband President Robert Mugabe both landed in the middle of the night in the capital Harare aboard an area Zimbabwe a plane there are pictures published by his estate's media where we can see the presidential couple greeting officials and their arrival South African police had to say they were on high alert to make sure that Grace Mugabi did not leave South Africa Abbott the 1st lady has returned home without being arrested or charged and how of the authorities responding. For now it remains unclear easier Grace will get beer was granted diplomatic immunity by this us African attorney. Is in but when government is created early as this weekend then she was able to leave South Africa without being asked any question by the police or being started or she left South Africa illegally but it's very unlikely as disease has him by the way plain she flew in the would have needed permission to take her from the South African authorities for no South African police and the representative from the South African Department of for an Air France refused to comment or confirm whether she was indeed granted diplomatic immunity to leave house that's going to go down in South Africa because she was accused of an assault. Well it's there's a lot of reactions here in South Africa and a lot of people would have liked for her to answer questions by the police and if Grace Mugabe was indeed granted diplomatic meetings then she won't be charged or arrested that 1000000 that there will never be a case open and that the 1st lady will be able to come back here is to South Africa without getting into trouble that means as well for the victims the alleged victim Gabrielle angle that there will be no investigation and that there is no recourse so if Grace Mugabe left South Africa to get his then the victim's lawyer will be in a position to learn Chakotay application so if he rips through in Johannesburg thank you as severe floods engulfed huge swathes of South Asia the prime minister of Bangladesh Shaykh has seen a is assessing the impact of the worst flooding in almost 30 years across the region over 16000000 people have been affected as much as a spokesperson for the in. The National photograph of the Red Cross in Bangladesh many millions of people affected in Bangladesh alone the current figures are that there are over 5000000 people affected with over 300000 this placed people have lost their livelihoods some of them have made makeshift shelters on top of corrugated iron roofs correspondent son joy is in Bangladesh and joins us live on the line sun Joy What is the latest. While I'm in Korea Graeme in North Bangladesh this is the worst hit area this is where 2 major rivers flow into Bangladesh from India and it's those rivers because of heavy monsoon rains those rivers birth their banks flooding in extremely vast area and almost everyone I've spoken to in the last couple of days from aid workers to villages to others say that they've never never seen so much water this is a country that's quite used to experiencing floods it happens every year but the scale of it this year is quite substantial and that's the reason why the Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was here today to have a look and get a sense of it because the biggest problem is because of the numbers affected even though there's a massive effort to try and get relief supplies to the affected people many of whom as you heard there have been seen some of them camping on embankments camping or in one case a half submerged bridge any kind of open land they can find the simply isn't enough supplies to go around and for everyone's needs and that's really the big worry at the moment and that really is the question with flooding on the scale a 3rd of the country under water what can the authorities do. I think what happened this time around was you know they were they were prepared of course for the flood they always are in if you look around for instance the only way you can navigate through much of this area now is by boat because the roads have been washed away railings have been snapped and I spent 7 hours on a boat also navigating my way through the infrastructure there are plenty of votes for instance they're quite prepared for this in eventuality but it's just a scale that's become simply overwhelming I saw a couple of 8 boats fall in with supplies of fresh drinking water was a start of distributing the more when that happened not only did people come rushing towards the both there were people actually a little further away with swam across the water to try and get the aid for that simply have to pull away because they didn't have that much water on them on the boat in the 1st place and that really is the concern the prime minister would have got a very good sense of it but it clearly needs a lot of effort from the government as well as the international aid agencies to try and make sure that humanitarian crisis as the Red Cross and present society is he talking about isn't isn't actually reached Sanjoy Thank you Sanjay mage and in Bangladesh we. That. We met with. The who orders the launch 40 years ago today of Voyager to the NASA spacecraft tossed with exploring the outer edge of our solar system during its journey its past eeriness and Neptune the only spacecraft to do so and it's now 17000000000 kilometers from Earth nestled among the scientific technology is a golden wreck or caring sounds of a thing place intelligent life discovers the probe as it whizzes through space. Voyager 2 has transformed our understanding of the solar system despite it's running on $970.00 s. Technology and just 20 watts of electricity the same power as a fridge light bulb Professor Ed Stone is the mission's chief scientist before Voyager the only known active volcanoes were here on Earth then we flew past io see a moon of Jupiter about the size of our moon 10 times the volcanic activity of earth that Terra centric view Earth somehow special suddenly turned out here is a little moon had 10 times more volcanic activity Another example is before Voyager the only known liquid water ocean here on Earth glorified by and here's a moon of Jupiter called Europa which has an ice crust cracked just like I spak on a liquid water ocean which in fact the go emission separately said yes there is a liquid water ocean but he says this service and at 40 years old forges time isn't over yet scientists expect its instruments to carry on operating until at least 2025 as the tiny probe heads into deep space and towards the stars Jerry has some other stories from our news desk the Lebanese army has recaptured a 3rd of a key region near its northeastern border with Syria from Islamic state fighters government troops launched an offensive in raspal Beric the last remaining I a stronghold in the country on Saturday the Army says there are about $600.00 militants in the mountainous region which I as has held since 2014 the Australian Government has published advice on countering vehicle terror attacks in public places the report suggests installing bollards fencing and c.c.t.v. Cameras along with more creative measures to slow down vehicles such as the strategic positioning of seating tree planting and statues. The African American comedian and civil rights activist to Gregory has died at the age of 84 he'd been taken to hospital recently suffering from a serious but unspecified condition Gregory was regarded as the 1st black comedian to perform regularly in front of white audiences he satirised racism in his stand up routines and joined the civil rights movement in the 1960 s. He is speaking at a rally in 2006 Let me just say to the black family. From one end of the plant to the m m I hear people talking about the family did. Something wrong with that we are my fam. We never stole nobody run away from their mother country family. And made him work for free we are our family and 12 sailing teams will depart the u.k. Later to spend a year sailing the globe in a 74000 kilometer race the Clipper around the world yacht race will feature 700 participants over 8 stages now have a listen to this. Supposed to be Afghan pop star already on the site performing top hundreds of friends last night in Kabul an act of defiance to conservative clerics who wanted the concert band for more I'm joined by the B.B.C.'s and our son at the Rajan of our son who is she is a very famous Afghan pop star and a very very few singers in Afghanistan and she lives in London but she goes to Kabul every now and then to perform and also she performs in European capitals and she refuses to wear a headscarf and she wears her body hugging cost him out fades and she has a long hair and that's why our fans affectionately call that Kim Kardashian nothing Afghanistan why she why is this concept so controversial She has been She's also a feminist and in a in her song says she tries to highlight the problems faced by Afghan women and she's also against these clerics imposing various rules and restrictions for Afghan women and she wanted to hold this concert in a stadium where Taliban used to execute people and she wanted to send out a message saying that you know music can bring happiness to Afghan people but because of threats the government was forced to cancel it it was held the day after that was on the independent state on Afghan Independence Day in a hotel in an open air concert even though it was hundreds of people she was sending. Very defiant message to the conservative clerics in the country. Thank you to Russian 2 countries one apology and an upside down flag it's a story of a brochure for the Southeast Asian Games our East Asia editor Michael Bristow is here to tell us more is a kind of mistake which would send the should or should it down the spines of anybody organizing a big event this happened at a sporting event the Southeast Asian Games as you mentioned taking place in Kuala Lumpur involving the dozen or so nations of self East Asia now for this event the organizers printed a special brew sure and which they handed out to dignitaries is a sat down at the opening ceremony in the Malaysia the Indonesian sports minister when he sat down and opened this brochure he noticed the Indonesian flag was actually up side down supposed to have a red band at the top white band at the bottom it was flipped so it made it look like Poland's National Flag of course Poland's not taking part in this particular event it caused a bigger pool in Indonesia the Indonesian president even got involved basically complaining saying this is a matter of national pride in the Malaysians of now apologized in Malaysian sports minister personally went to the hotel of the Indonesian Indonesian Council but counterpart on Sunday morning and he said a personal story so they're hoping that's an end to that particular matter do we know who made the mistake nobody's put in their hands up to the particular mistake with the brochures have been withdrawn and new ones being printed at the moment are East Asia correspondent Michael Bristow You've been listening to the news room from the b.b.c. World Service the same team make the Global News poll cost which is available to download from all the usual places. Distribution of the b.b.c. World Service in the us is made possible by American Public Media producer and distributor of award winning public radio contact designed to engage inform and entertain proud to offer the b.b.c. World Service bringing global news reach to an American audience because we live in an increasingly global rapidly changing and interconnected world a.p.m. American Public Media. You know I drive junky car Hello this is Nina Totenberg when my husband and I were courting he was really scandalized by my very old 6 to 6 and when we were invited to a state dinner at the White House he said that I should rent a fancier car I refuse of course it's amazing to think that I could turn that dumb car into my favorite programs go to k. R.c.c. Daughter war cheaper details. And space. Universe to join me for this week's discovery from the b.b.c. World Service and I will take you on a journey from outer space to inside the building blocks of. Where exploring the incredible range of properties is my favorite element. That's discovery on carbon with me Monica Grady. B.b.c. News with Jerry Smit a special mass has been held in Barcelona for the 14 victims of the 20. 1 king for Leap Day and Queen joined the prime minister and Catalonia as leader in the 6 Familia church where a message of solidarity from Pope Francis was read out Muslim needs is also attended. The Iraqi army and its militia allies have begun a major attack on the northern city of Tel Aviv or one of the Islamic state groups few remaining strongholds in the country Iraq's prime minister said the militants must either surrender or die state media in Zimbabwe say President Mugabe's wife has returned home from South Africa despite facing charges of assaulting a woman in a Johannesburg hotel Grace Mugabi is understood to have flown to Harare with her husband the head of the Roman Catholic Church in the Philippines cardinal Luis tag Lay has spoken out against what he called the waste of human lives caused by the government's war on drugs His comments come at the end of a bloody week in the capital Manila in which police have shot dead more than 70 people President Hassan Rouhani of Iran says his top from policy priority is to prevent the United States destroying the nuclear deal that his country's drunk with the international community just last week Mr Rouhani said Iran was ready to walk away from the agreement if the u.s. Impose more sanctions one of Afghanistan's most famous pop stars Ariana Saeed has held a fund raising concert in the capital Kabul despite threats from conservatives Messiah it is known for her long hair and figure hugging outfits which are a taboo in Afghanistan Malaysia has apologized after printing an upside down version of Indonesia's national flag in a commemorative magazine for the Southeast Asian games instead of showing a red horizontal band on top of a white one the magazine got them the other way round b.b.c. News. Oh in a. Crowd I was. 22 in Collette a star is one of the 1st nursery songs lent by children in many places throughout the world it was written in 1005 by Jane Taylor who probably didn't realize that the words she wrote were giving youngsters a lesson in astrophysics and introducing them to the wonderful world of carbon. Above there was a wire like a diamond and this is discovery from the b.b.c. World Service I'm Monica Grady professor of planetary and Space Sciences at the university and I'm going to try and share with you a few fascinating facts about my pet element carbon it's really versatile diamond hard and candy floss soft in combination with other elements especially hydrogen and oxygen that can exist as a solid a liquid or a gas and it's the basis for life what more could anyone want from a pet element. Where did carbon come from wasn't always been here I guess if you go back far enough in time say about 3700000000 years there was nothing much here actually there wasn't even a here here I'll go save the details but there was a bang a big bang and suddenly the universe was here and time and space existed but no carbon that didn't come until much later I'm Andrew pumps and I'm a cosmologist at University College London carbon light most of the elements that we see in the universe today was actually manufactured deep within stars and unlike the very light his talents it can only be made in the kind of inner most parts of stars under conditions of enormous temperatures and enormous pressures where you can ram the constituent parts together and form the nucleus of a new carbon atom So there you are the big bang followed by the formation of stars planets and the elements we know and love like carbon some simple enough that for cosmologists like Andre there's a problem even the intense furnace of a star 1st it wasn't clear whether you could form something like carbon because what you actually have to do is bring 3 helium atoms together kind of ram them together hard enough that they stick you can imagine that as a sort of staged process 1st of all you stick to helium atoms together and then you stick the 3rd one on. But Bit like I don't know building some dodgy flat pack furniture at that intermediate stage where you've only got the 2 helium atoms stuck together it's actually very unstable so it tends to fall apart rather easily and what this resonance does is just makes it very much easier for that 3rd helium atom to stick on really quickly and so that falling apart doesn't happen and you can actually manufacture large quantities of carbon just as we see throughout the universe today this resonance process that Andrew talked about explains why there's enough energy to transform 3 helium atoms into one carbon atom and so that means there is enough energy to actually produce a lot more carbon than it 1st being calculated so now we know that lots of stuff of happening then and we also know that carbon can be there is a tiny little diamonds and the space between the system is filled with enormous quantities of carbon strung together in chains and loops in any of this useful and if a company has been around almost since the dawn of time line there can't be much more to learn about it cannot we find carbon absolutely everywhere that we look a century is a really ubiquitous elements and we actually find it in space throughout the universe in the form of very primitive organic molecules things that we almost recognizes organic chemistry from here on Earth that they're known as Ph D.'s or poly cyclic aromatic hydrocarbons these things have to have long chains in them and so they really do start to look a little bit like the organic molecules that have these great long chains of carbons in oxygen and hydrogen is a way through them then nothing resembling life you couldn't look at one of these things and say oh wow there's life in deep space but it very clearly is sort of rule material that with a little bit of processing can turn into something like life carbon is essential. All life on Earth and plays a fundamental role in building the molecules from which all life is built well made from carbon d.n.a. The corkscrewed molecule that forms our genes is based on 2 letters of carbon containing molecules that twists to gether is a long string that loops and coils to form the chromosomes that govern whether we are male female blue or brown eyes dark or fair head and we often refer to carbon as the element of life Matthew Pan I work at University College London reader in organic chemistry and I run a research group who studies the chemical origins of life on Earth carbon occupies a very important and special place on the periodic table right in the top right hand corner and it's a position in which the elements that occupy the area the periodic table make strong stable bonds and they can make them readily under mild conditions carbon is the most prevalent this of those elements so carbon can form 4 different bonds with other elements and this allows carbon to form the framework of the base is the scaffold upon which biological molecules are built if you then look at the composition of cells cells for example then a large proportion of the atoms that make up carbon the biggest proportion is oxygen a lot of an oxygen is bound up in water and then after oxygen we have carbon and then hydrogen and also nitrogen phosphorus and so for those elements really make the basis of organic molecules so the molecules of life and the way carbon links up with other elements to form those molecules of life determines how they then join together to start building every living organism on earth. It's a feature called Tyrrel a-T. It's like a carbon based molecules become either left or right handed and that determines how they then link to other molecules and tens eventually what biological structures are made being the basis of the framework something very special occurs when we attach 4 different elements for different groups to carbon. When we do that on a carbon atom the carbon atom becomes what we would call Kyra so it has dissimilar tree with its mirror image so it's just like your hands your hands. There are mirror images of one another but if you try and superimpose them though never the same so there is a rip side down of the wrong way around and the same applies for molecules and this gives the molecules the ability within a Cairo environment to recognize one another so if you bring 2 molecules together one right handed and one left handed it will have different interactions to bring into right handed molecules together so again you can try this with your hands if you try and shake hands with someone right hander right and it works try right under left hand it doesn't work so that's chiral interaction by building organic molecules from carbon This allows carbon to have what we recognize as a right hand and a left handed set of molecules and we find these prevalently in organic chemistry and in biology it's all biological amino acids proteins a bill from the left handed I mean acids and all biological sugars that build things like nucleic acids and glucose so energy molecules in the molecules we use to transfer information in biology they're all built from right handed. Sugars and it's the interaction of these molecules that lets build up systems and networks of reactive molecules that propagate like. I'm one of the Great this is discovery from the b.b.c. Wilson. When I was at school called and had to Alice traipse this is the name given to different fashions of an element the composition is the same but the way the atoms are raised is different one outright was Dima. And that's really hard stone that twinkles beautifully when polished these outright was graphite the middle bit of a pencil whether carbon atoms are range in circles of 6 atoms that join together to make sheets that can slide over one another if I feel soft and slippery which is the effect of the sliding lairs. There's. Now 2 more forms of carbon before salaries and graphing. They're both related to graphite but different from it fullerenes oc ages of carbon imagine a soccer ball made of chicken wire and that's a full array they've got all sorts of uses if you can put things inside the cage but small doses of medicine to be delivered to a specific part of the body. Then there is. When you write with offensive. You x. Really the graphite that is in your pencil so the black truck is composite by many many many at least those of different thickness and probably at many a very very tiny portion of those cases will be seen really as some will be graphene graphene is a single sheet of carbon atoms and can be left as a sheet or rolled up into 2 groups an amazing form of carbon emissions as it Arnie and professor of the school of chemistry of the universe don't much. So graphene is related to graphite so everybody knows graphite because the material that we used to write in pencil and if you imagine to look into the structure of graphite we don't Betty Betty power for a minute she was see that disk. Style is for made by many many years which are stuck out on top of the chart like Lego bricks that you stick on top of each other and one lady or a single layer of graphite is graphene we have expertise in producing graphene in solution so what you have you have graphene from relations like inks we want to bring in devices that are made with those inks and these prices are very thin and are flexible so you can pour the damn you own textiles for example on paper on plastic so that in a future we will be able to interact with those devices you can have sensors on your clothes or or your bag or were Advair graphene a thin flat transparent and engineers work in ink it's miles away from my usual concept of carbon a something dark black solid and rather dirty the crystal lattice of graphene is unique and one of the most important properties of graphene is that the electrons can drive it really really fast in across the lattice so the crystal lattice is like glass and you let on satellite light and the glass is thrown spawn into so the light is not affected at all and here is more or less the same concept because these 2 dimensional is all so phase and because of that he could be a really good material for batteries for example because he can store very high charge density graphene is transparent and highly conductive so you can use it for solar South as a top electrode for solar cells for example or for trucks will displace Worthing and other new carbon based materials cannot be found in products as diverse as telephones and tennis rackets and microelectronics in particular is undergoing a kind of carbon based revolution carbon is changing the future but of course there's a major asked. At what we've done with carbon in the past which leads many to question whether humanity will be able to enjoy that future we've sort of hacked the carbon cycle if you go back to the Carboniferous when there was lots of c o 2 in the atmosphere and there was a huge amount of productivity a lot of that carbon was locked away and has now become fossil fuels so we've been using that carbon to drive our economies essentially since the industrial revolution in doing that a lot of that carbon that was taken up over millions of years during the Carboniferous is now being put back into the atmosphere that's one way in which we've been perturbing things but the other way is through land use change so we've been changing a lot of the face of this planet from natural ecosystems to ecosystems that are more productive for humans so for example crop plans and also pasture and these take up a huge proportion of the earth's Lance office and have replaced natural ecosystems and in doing that a lot of the carbon that was once in saw oil and once also in vegetative matter has now gone out to the atmosphere so that's another way we've been adding c o 2 to the atmosphere the story of carbon is one of cycles there is a cycle in space with it being created and destroyed in Stahl's and on earth a series of interlinked cycles that may have carbon between the atmosphere the lithosphere which is the rocky crust of the earth and the biosphere the bit with all the life in it there's currently a lot of focus on carbon and aunt Miss fear because it is related to climate change there are many different proposals on reducing the amount of carbon going into the atmosphere all boil down to reducing all consumption of those carbon rich fossil fuels oil gas and coal the politics of reducing carbon emissions is a huge stumbling block to any progress we need to make in actually getting that consumption down but what about. Looking at it from another direction can we remove what's already there take up an outer band that's fair it's something that'll cycle does their way over a rather long time frame the slow carbon cycle on earth is a process by which the c o 2 in the atmosphere is regulated naturally over geological time scale So over millions tens of millions $100000000.00 billions of years and it involves the ability of water to dissolve c o 2 inside it and so rainwater coming out of the atmosphere will have a little bit of c o 2 dissolved in the water that water falls onto the mountains typically and the mountains begin to erode and there are 2 sorts of erosion there's the physical erosion to sort of weathering physical weathering by rivers flowing in and cutting through the rock but there's also a 2nd process that goes on which is chemical weathering and in the chemical weathering process the minerals that make up the mountains the silicate rocks themselves become slightly dissolved by the water and in fact by the c o 2 in the water as well and so you end up with a sort of chemical very dilute solution of by carbonate ions which is where the carbon is and other metal atoms like magnesium and calcium and all of this gets swept out to sea through the river water and then again over geological time periods those counts on that and by carbon ions can recombine to form a mineral like calcium carbonate and that's the mineral that organisms in the sea typically make their shells from so sea shells made of calcium carbonate the shells of plankton are often made of calcium carbonate as well and then that when these organisms die of course that calcium carbonate falls to the bottom of the ocean into the sediment and gets wrapped up as a rock again so what was the carbon in the atmosphere eventually ends up as carbon in a carbonate rock like a limestone. Or chalk so when you look at the White Cliffs of Dover they're actually made up of billions of little organisms that had made their shells and died many millions of years ago that Simon Redfin professor of mineral physics at Cambridge University to help us fix someone made Company problem we need to speed up massively those processes which lock up the atmospheric carbon a new project has been launched to look at doing just that and ironically it chiefly relies on waste materials from processes which produced the carbon dioxide in the 1st place what we're trying to do is find ways to make what nature does happen as a more rapid rate and one way to do that is to look to places where we have the sorts of minerals at the surface that can easily be broken down by water that contain c o 2 in it and typical waste forms that are do exist on the surface actually a mine spoil heap so mine dumps and mine waste and tailings is very often composed of very very fine grained material that in the past was already expended a huge amount of energy to crush and make into small grains and now we can make use of the fact that they have a large surface area each grain of mineral there in the rock is now exposed potentially to the atmosphere and the water flowing through it and so potentially these mine dumps could be a place where we could accelerate the natural processes that occur at the Earth's surface and the other thing we're looking at in this project is the potential impact also of biological organisms sort of from the microbes that exist in these mine dumps and can themselves through their biofilms also exaggerate the chemical processes of the surfaces of these minerals so one area that we're looking at is in mind wastes and we have a partner in South Africa where we can do some field experiments they're looking for. These processes on the field scale experiments and another colleague cardif who is not only looking at these silicate mind wastes but also looking at Steel slag heaps that are actually occur in Britain he's done some experiments already on steels like to see whether the port Tolbert in that concert might provide another local area where we can capture c o 2 from the atmosphere into industrial waste the carbon cycle operates on a number of different time scales but fundamentally getting that carbon from the atmosphere into the biosphere and the lithosphere it's driven by biological processes. And of course the cycle doesn't stop there it sort of goes out the other way as well so the opposite process to photosynthesis is respiration where the carbon or the organic matter is actually converted back to c o 2 and that can happen both ever but clearly when there's oxygen in the atmosphere and that can then convert it back to c o 2 but it can also happen and i Robot Clee when there is no oxygen and that can happen in soils and sediments and weapons and in that situation the carbon can get converted to a very different carbon gas but methane c h 4 me think a c h 4 it's a greenhouse gas and in many ways is more potent than c o 2 carbon dioxide my colleague at The Open University Vincent Gallo actually professor of global change ecology spectacular interest in me thing you'd have thought by now we know everything there is to know about this ancient unutterable some carbon based gas that instance has been finding new things in unlikely places I have projects ongoing in Southeast Asia and also in the Amazon which is part of a big collaborative project where we're trying to understand. Exactly how the methane is produced in the Amazon level and is emitted to the atmosphere and we're pretty sure that trees are the principal means of escape for that soil produced anything tree you usually think of them as being a pretty good thing that pollen made up in their arms open but no. One I wouldn't want to say that trees one heart of the problem I mean we find this fascinating because forests are clearly a good thing they take up carbon dioxide from that misfit and they perform other what we call ecosystem services but in and trying to understand the system it's really important that we understand everything that's going on and it's counter intuitive process of methane escape by trees actually only have happens in certain locales principally where trees colocated with weapons so you have forests that are grown in marshy swampy environments and you get these in the seasonally flooded Amazon for example so these trees essentially. It living in a very swampy environment they need to try and maintain their root function so the roots that sometimes in the Amazon under 10 metres of water they need to somehow access oxygen we believe that the trees somehow getting oxygen down to their roots perhaps through tiny vessels that they've developed within the structure and that allows oxygen to get to their roots where they can form process of respiration in order to function and to live now because there's a pathway that gets down to the roots This also allows me thing that's produced and I vote in the soil to get out to the atmosphere and we've been making measurements on these tree stems for quite a while now and we're pretty sure that they're amongst the largest emissions of methane yet observed on natural ecosystems so that it's quite important to understand this especially if we want to model how the land surface interacts with the atmosphere so we can make better predictions in. The future but I should stress that you know this is all for us indeed would that we have some evidence to suggest that forests own up plans in free joining soils may actually harbor microbes on my surfaces that actually take up methane from the atmosphere which could be considered a global good if you like within within the me think cycle. We began this program with the formation of carbon in distant stars we've looked at its role in life its growing reading technology and the problem we've created with it for ourselves here on earth for me as a planetary scientist the role of all that carbon act in space is still so intriguing it's an area where we've barely scratched the surface but maybe with further exploration to come we'll find some interesting answers. Like always take the easiest route carbon is so prevalent its ability to form bonds is so. That I have little doubt if we find life it will be carbon based does it form the exact life that we would recognize on earth would he use exactly the same nucleotides exactly the same set of 20 I mean I guess it's maybe maybe not be very interesting to know but I don't think there is great scope for moving life outside of carbon but you could tweak the edges of what we have now and make you know fairly rudimentary changes to life and still have a network of reactions that would propagate information allow us to form the molecular catalysts have. And the networks of energy consuming molecules that form the basis of a living system quite unique to carbon actually its ability and tendency to create very large molecules is something that we know is what makes it suitable for creating life so the fact that we see that happening throughout the universe could be taken as a suggestion it's not really very hard carbon likes to make these complicated molecules and so maybe it's pointing us to life out there being pretty common so there is the prospect of carbon based life on many many of these other planets we have no idea whether it's out there or not we'll be looking for it that way the American scientists call Sagan he said we were made of star stuff and we are indeed made of Stoss stuff we are made of carbon and I like to think of us all as being children of the stars to a. Whole or in a way to. Where I was well you. Know once I was led to die and then I'm Monica Grady this is being discovery from the b.b.c. 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