Will activated charcoal, which these days can be found in everything from face creams to smoothies, really purify your pores? Science presenter and YouTuber Greg Foot is on a mission to bust marketing BS, looking for the facts behind the fads and challenging products’ bold claims with scientific evidence. In the second episode, Greg is joined by actress and beauty blogger Rebecca Humphries, consultant dermatologist Dr Emma Wedgeworth and Cambridge Professor of Chemistry, Melinda Duer to explore the science behind activated charcoal - could it act as a 'magnet' to draw out dirt and pollution from your pores as some products claim?Presenter: Greg Foot
Producer: Graihagh Jackson
Studio Manager: John Boland
Editor: Rami TzabarThe Best Thing Since Sliced Bread is a BBC Science Radio Unit Production

Will activated charcoal, which these days can be found in everything from face creams to smoothies, really purify your pores? Science presenter and YouTuber Greg Foot is on a mission to bust marketing BS, looking for the facts behind the fads and challenging products’ bold claims with scientific evidence. In the second episode, Greg is joined by actress and beauty blogger Rebecca Humphries, consultant dermatologist Dr Emma Wedgeworth and Cambridge Professor of Chemistry, Melinda Duer to explore the science behind activated charcoal - could it act as a 'magnet' to draw out dirt and pollution from your pores as some products claim? Presenter: Greg Foot Producer: Graihagh Jackson Studio Manager: John Boland Editor: Rami Tzabar The Best Thing Since Sliced Bread is a BBC Science Radio Unit Production

Skincare: Activated charcoal

While Sliced Bread takes a break we serve up Toast. A study of the spectacular failures of brands which had promised so much to consumers. In each episode, the presenter and BBC business journalist Sean Farrington examines one big idea. What did it promise? Why did people back it? Why did they get burnt? Some of the world’s most successful businesses have also brought us some of the world’s most remarkable failures. So, what led them to be toast? And what can we learn from their stories today? Sean unpicks all the early optimism, hype and ambition. He learns about the tremendous success of a brand before hearing how it faltered, with help from expert commentators and people who were directly involved. How do they view things now and what, if anything, could have been done differently? The self-made millionaire and serial entrepreneur, Sam White, is alongside him, analysing the missteps that changed a brand’s fortunes and reaching her own, often instructive, conclusions. From big tech to high street retail and, of course, food, Toast tackles the business ideas that, one way or another, ended up cooked. Sliced Bread returns for a new batch of investigations in January, 2026. In the new series, Greg Foot will investigate more of the latest so-called wonder products to find out whether they really are the best thing since sliced bread. In the meantime, Toast is available in the Sliced Bread feed on BBC Sounds. For this brand new series of Toast, episodes will be released weekly on Thursdays wherever you get your podcasts. But if you’re in the UK, you can listen to the latest episode on BBC Sounds first, a week earlier than anywhere else.Toast is a BBC Audio North production for BBC Radio 4.

Health & Fitness

While Sliced Bread takes a break we serve up Toast. A study of the spectacular failures of brands which had promised so much to consumers. In each episode, the presenter and BBC business journalist Sean Farrington examines one big idea. What did it promise? Why did people back it? Why did they get burnt? Some of the world’s most successful businesses have also brought us some of the world’s most remarkable failures. So, what led them to be toast? And what can we learn from their stories today? Sean unpicks all the early optimism, hype and ambition. He learns about the tremendous success of a brand before hearing how it faltered, with help from expert commentators and people who were directly involved. How do they view things now and what, if anything, could have been done differently? The self-made millionaire and serial entrepreneur, Sam White, is alongside him, analysing the missteps that changed a brand’s fortunes and reaching her own, often instructive, conclusions. From big tech to high street retail and, of course, food, Toast tackles the business ideas that, one way or another, ended up cooked. Sliced Bread returns for a new batch of investigations in January, 2026. In the new series, Greg Foot will investigate more of the latest so-called wonder products to find out whether they really are the best thing since sliced bread. In the meantime, Toast is available in the Sliced Bread feed on BBC Sounds. For this brand new series of Toast, episodes will be released weekly on Thursdays wherever you get your podcasts. But if you’re in the UK, you can listen to the latest episode on BBC Sounds first, a week earlier than anywhere else. Toast is a BBC Audio North production for BBC Radio 4.

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