#90: COP26 climate playlist; the science of Dune; life-saving treatment for children without immune systems; covid sweeps Iran

In rare cases children can be born without an immune system, and sadly their chances are very bad. Fortunately the team brings news of a life-saving implant which has now been approved for use in the US. If you’re thinking of seeing the new film adaptation of Frank Herbert’s epic novel Dune, you’ll want to hear the insights of ecosystem professor Yadvinder Malhi. Herbert was amazingly ahead of his time, anticipating the work of James Lovelock and the Gaia hypothesis, for example.  The team hears about the world’s largest artificial intelligence - the Megatron-Turing Natural Language Generation model - and finds out what it is capable of. They also discuss how hard Iran has been hit by the coronavirus pandemic: new data shows nearly every person in the country has had covid, some twice or even three times. And in the build up to COP26, the team is getting in the party spirit, and shares details of a climate-inspired Spotify playlist they’ve put together. You can listen to it here. On the pod are Rowan Hooper, Chelsea Whyte, Alice Klein, Bethan Ackerley and Matt Sparkes. To read about these stories and much more, subscribe at newscientist.com/podcasts.

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