CrowdScience

How do my ears sense direction?


Listen Later

How do we hear a sound and immediately know where it’s coming from?

That’s the question that CrowdScience listener Chiletso asked himself one day as he heard his son bounce a ball and instantly knew its direction. In this ear-opening episode, presenter Anand Jagatia sets out to discover what makes left, right, up and down, sound so different.

First, Anand gets blindfolded, so that Alan Archer-Boyd, former auditory scientist and lead engineer at BBC R&D, can put his sound localisation skills to the test. It turns out that having two ears and pinnae, those flappy bits of cartilage on the side of your head, help a lot.

Professor Eric Knudsen shares how the barn owl’s asymmetrical ears allow it to hunt mice, even in complete darkness.

And Anand uncovers how far he can push his own spatial hearing. Blind activist and researcher Thomas Tajo teaches him how to echolocate like a bat, and Dr Lore Thaler explains what is going on in the brain of experienced echolocators.

If you can, listen on headphones!

Presented by Anand Jagatia

Produced by Florian Bohr for the BBC World Service

Image: Boy with hands at his ears

Credit: Silke Woweries/Getty Images

...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

CrowdScienceBy BBC World Service

  • 4.7
  • 4.7
  • 4.7
  • 4.7
  • 4.7

4.7

421 ratings


More shows like CrowdScience

View all
In Our Time by BBC Radio 4

In Our Time

5,443 Listeners

The Documentary Podcast by BBC World Service

The Documentary Podcast

1,837 Listeners

The Naked Scientists Podcast by The Naked Scientists

The Naked Scientists Podcast

595 Listeners

Global News Podcast by BBC World Service

Global News Podcast

7,804 Listeners

Science Weekly by The Guardian

Science Weekly

410 Listeners

5 Live Science Podcast by BBC Radio 5 Live

5 Live Science Podcast

109 Listeners

Health Check by BBC World Service

Health Check

84 Listeners

6 Minute English by BBC Radio

6 Minute English

1,762 Listeners

Learning English Conversations by BBC Radio

Learning English Conversations

1,068 Listeners

Science In Action by BBC World Service

Science In Action

342 Listeners

More or Less: Behind the Stats by BBC Radio 4

More or Less: Behind the Stats

891 Listeners

Discovery by BBC World Service

Discovery

953 Listeners

Ask the Naked Scientists by Dr Chris Smith

Ask the Naked Scientists

75 Listeners

The Infinite Monkey Cage by BBC Radio 4

The Infinite Monkey Cage

1,961 Listeners

Newshour by BBC World Service

Newshour

1,052 Listeners

The Life Scientific by BBC Radio 4

The Life Scientific

241 Listeners

Unexpected Elements by BBC World Service

Unexpected Elements

354 Listeners

BBC Inside Science by BBC Radio 4

BBC Inside Science

396 Listeners

Curious Cases by BBC Radio 4

Curious Cases

805 Listeners

People Fixing the World by BBC World Service

People Fixing the World

243 Listeners

Americast by BBC News

Americast

771 Listeners

You're Dead to Me by BBC Radio 4

You're Dead to Me

3,018 Listeners

The world, the universe and us by New Scientist

The world, the universe and us

103 Listeners

Uncharted with Hannah Fry by BBC Radio 4

Uncharted with Hannah Fry

113 Listeners