\n You have full access to this article via your institution.<\/p>\n
Download the Nature Podcast 17 December 2025<\/a><\/p>\n In this episode:<\/b><\/p>\n 00:46 The gifts that sparked a love of science<\/p>\n Nature put a call out for readers to tell us about memorable presents that first got them interested in science, or mementos of their life in research. These include telescopes, yeast-themed wedding rings, and… cows\u2019 eyes.<\/p>\n Nature: The gift that shaped my career in science<\/a><\/p>\n 08:12 \u201cI am the Very Model of a Miniature Tyrannosaur\u201d<\/p>\n In the first of our annual festive songs celebrating the science of the past year, we tell the story of a diminutive dinosaur that turned out to be its own species.<\/p>\n Nature Podcast: Meet the \u2018Wee-rex\u2019. Tiny tyrannosaur is its own species<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Video: Hotly debated dinosaur is not a tiny T. rex after all<\/a><\/p>\n I Am the Very Model of a Miniature Tyrannosaur<\/p>\n I am the very model of a miniature tyrannosaur <\/p>\n A very different species from the T. rex that you knew before, <\/p>\n And though you may have thought I was a child, a small T. rex offspring, <\/p>\n I stand before you almost fully grown, a pocket-sized short king <\/p>\n For some of you this finding could be rather controversial. <\/p>\n As experts and debate have been at times quite adversarial <\/p>\n But this new study is quite clear, in fact it\u2019s almost trivial <\/p>\n That now Nanotyrannus stands before you unequivocal <\/p>\n My cousin T. rex is an icon palaeontological <\/p>\n But youngsters have been missing from the record prehistorical <\/p>\n So when I was discovered some researchers said it\u2019s crystal clear, <\/p>\n “It\u2019s similar, but miniature! We found our baby T. rex here!\u201d <\/p>\n For decades there were arguments and scientists did not agree <\/p>\n Until a team from Carolina took another look at me <\/p>\n They published careful measures of a fossil here for all to see <\/p>\n So now I get my very own tyrannosaur taxonomy <\/p>\n Their measurements were thorough with analysis of every bone <\/p>\n And counting rings of growth revealed that I was nearly fully grown <\/p>\n And so this study changes lots of data that you thought were known <\/p>\n I\u2019m not a baby T. rex, but a species of my very own!<\/p>\n My teeth are many more in number than T. rex has in its roar <\/p>\n And my arms are longer than the king of lizards\u2019 tiny claw, <\/p>\n In short, in matters predatory, Cretaceous and dinosaur <\/p>\n I am the very model of a miniature tyrannosaur <\/p>\n I am the Very Model of a Miniature Tyrannosaur was performed by Luke Thomas, with backing vocals by Kellie Lucken, Michael Broom, Mario Satchwell, Rachelle Schaum, Adam Pickles, Katy Roper, James Harvey and Catriona Clarke. That song was written by Dan Fox, with editing by Nick Petri\u0107 Howe and Shamini Bundell, and the music was performed by Phil Jackson with sound mixing by Jonathan Armitage.<\/p>\n 11:43 A very scientific quiz<\/p>\n An all-star cast competes for the glory or being the winner of the Nature Podcast\u2019s 2025 festive quiz.<\/p>\n Nature: Meet the \u2018Wee-rex\u2019. Tiny tyrannosaur is its own species<\/a><\/p>\n Nature: This company claimed to \u2018de-extinct\u2019 dire wolves. Then the fighting started<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Podcast: 3D-printed fake wasps help explain bad animal mimicry<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Video: \u2018Aqua tweezers\u2019 manipulate particles with water waves<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Podcast: Sapphire anvils squeeze metals atomically thin<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Video: Vesuvius volcano turned this brain to glass<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Podcast: Ancient viral DNA helps human embryos develop<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Video: Magnetic fibres give this robot a soft grip<\/a><\/p>\n Nature: These contact lenses give people infrared vision \u2014 even with their eyes shut<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Video: Is this really the world’s largest mirror? Researchers put it to the test<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Podcast: World\u2019s tiniest pacemaker could revolutionize heart surgery<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Podcast: Earth\u2019s deepest ecosystem discovered six miles below the sea<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Podcast: Nature goes inside the world\u2019s largest \u2018mosquito factory\u2019 \u2014 here\u2019s the buzz<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Podcast: Apocalypse then: how cataclysms shaped human societies<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Podcast: Honey, I ate the kids: how hunger and hormones make mice aggressive<\/a><\/p>\n 25:21 \u201cHard the Hydrogel is Stuck\u201d<\/p>\n Our second festive song is an ode to a rubber duck that was stuck to a rock, thanks to a newly designed, super-adhesive hydrogel.<\/p>\n Nature Podcast: Underwater glue shows its sticking power in rubber duck test<\/a><\/p>\n Nature Video: Why did researchers stick a duck to a rock? To show off their super glue<\/a><\/p>\n Hard the Hydrogel is Stuck<\/p>\n Hard the hydrogel is stuck <\/p>\n Firmly to this rubber duck <\/p>\n Piece of rock and duck stuck tight <\/p>\n Firm against the ocean\u2019s might <\/p>\n Hydrogels made now sticky <\/p>\n Waterproof in salt and sea <\/p>\n With some proteins to inspire <\/p>\n And AI as amplifier <\/p>\n Hard the glue is sticking <\/p>\n Firmly to the small duckling<\/p>\n Gel, with mollusc protein trick <\/p>\n Glue, with everlasting stick <\/p>\n Won\u2019t in water come unstuck <\/p>\n Tested on this rubber duck <\/p>\n Sticking for eternity <\/p>\n Until someone pulls it free <\/p>\n Diverse data trained it well <\/p>\n Making now this hydrogel <\/p>\n Hard the gel sticks well <\/p>\n Stronger than a mollusc shell<\/p>\n Hail the science-born prince of glues <\/p>\n Hail the duck with stickiness <\/p>\n More than gluing that which quacks <\/p>\n They\u2019ll fix submerged pipes and cracks <\/p>\n One and eighty proteins trialled <\/p>\n From the creatures of the wild <\/p>\n Then refined with AI tools <\/p>\n Then ducks sit in rocky pools <\/p>\n Hard the hydrogel is stuck <\/p>\n Firmly to this rubber duck <\/p>\n Hard the Hydrogel is Stuck was performed by Catriona Clarke, with Luke Thomas, Kellie Lucken, Michael Broom, Mario Satchwell, Rachelle Schaum, Adam Pickles and Katy Roper. That song was written by Nick Petri\u0107 Howe, with editing by Shamini Bundell, and the music was performed by James Harvey with sound mixing by Jonathan Armitage.<\/p>\n 28:42 Nature\u2019s 10<\/p>\n Each year, Nature\u2019s 10 highlights some of the people who have helped shape science over the past 12 months. We hear about a few of the people who made the 2025 list, including: a civil servant who stood up for evidence-based public-health policy; the science sleuth who revealed a retraction crisis at Indian universities; and the baby whose life was saved by the first personalized CRISPR therapy.<\/p>\n Nature: Nature\u2019s 10<\/a><\/p>\n Subscribe to Nature Briefing, an unmissable daily round-up of science news, opinion and analysis free in your inbox every weekday.<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n Never miss an episode. Subscribe to the Nature Podcast on<\/b> Apple Podcasts<\/b><\/a>,<\/b> Spotify<\/b><\/a>,<\/b> YouTube Music<\/b><\/a> or your favourite podcast app.<\/b> An RSS feed for the Nature Podcast<\/b><\/a> is available too.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"You have full access to this article via your institution. Download the Nature Podcast 17 December 2025 In…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":238299,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[18,1099,19,17,610,1100,62744,133,70984],"class_list":{"0":"post-238298","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-humanities-and-social-sciences","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-machine-learning","13":"tag-multidisciplinary","14":"tag-palaeontology","15":"tag-science","16":"tag-scientific-community"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115737491169625225","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=238298"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238298\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/238299"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}