Things You Can't Live Without – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Technical and general information from the podcast's RSS feed.

Things You Can't Live Without

Rio Tinto / Listen

Science

Society & Culture

Technology

Frequency: 1 episode/33d. Total Eps: 13

How do the objects we rely on come to be made? What goes into creating them? How did they become so vital to us? And what is the environmental impact of living with them, now and into the future?

Join material scientist Dr Anna Ploszajski as she welcomes different guests including scientists to discuss the truths about our reliance on the earth’s resources – and to look at what needs to happen to create a sustainable future for the everyday items we have come to rely on.

Things You Can’t Live Without is brought to you by Rio Tinto. Available wherever you get your podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Site

RSS

Apple

Data updated on 04/07/2026

Recent rankings

Latest chart positions across Apple Podcasts and Spotify rankings.

Apple Podcasts

🇨🇦 Canada - Science
02/04/2025
#85
🇨🇦 Canada - Science
01/04/2025
#75
🇨🇦 Canada - Science
03/01/2025
#91
🇨🇦 Canada - Science
30/11/2024
#100
🇨🇦 Canada - Science
25/10/2024
#85
🇨🇦 Canada - Science
21/10/2024
#89
🇨🇦 Canada - Science
17/10/2024
#89
🇨🇦 Canada - Science
16/10/2024
#77
🇨🇦 Canada - Science
15/10/2024
#90
🇨🇦 Canada - Science
12/10/2024
#67

Spotify

No recent rankings available

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

Links found in episode descriptions and other podcasts that share them.

See all

No links shared by this podcast

RSS feed quality and score

Technical evaluation of the podcast's RSS feed quality and structure.

See all

RSS feed quality

To improve

Score global : 63%

Publication history

Monthly episode publishing history over the past years.

Year

Latest published episodes

Recent episodes with titles, durations, and descriptions.

See all

Dr Adam Rutherford on bodies, blue-sky projects and blue-blooded crabs

Season 2 · Episode 1

Wednesday, March 26, 2025 • Duration 24:48

Geneticist Dr Adam Rutherford relies on refrigeration to preserve the unique DNA samples that underpin his lab work. Furthermore, as he explains to Dr Anna, fridges are good for keeping his beer cold! In an episode all about research and development, Adam and Anna are joined by Marie-Pierre Paquin, Head of Science and Partnerships at Rio Tinto, to explore how a mix of curiosity, diligence and data leads to scientific breakthroughs. Listen to find out how many periodic table elements are in the human body, why some parts of the world are richer in DNA samples than others, and why certain crustaceans have blue blood.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Get ready for Series 2

Season 2

Tuesday, March 18, 2025 • Duration 01:55

Series 2 of Things You Can’t Live Without is coming soon. Here’s Dr Anna Ploszajski with a preview of what you can expect. Make sure you follow the show to hear new episodes as they launch.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Hod Lipson’s Graphics Processing Unit: AI, robots eating robots and the unsung material that helps power our computers

Season 1 · Episode 10

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 • Duration 24:45

Hod Lipson - Columbia University professor and award-winning robotics researcher - shares with Dr. Anna the one item he can’t live without - his Graphics Processing Unit (GPU).

The conversation reveals how much GPUs underpin our electronic world, and how one somewhat unsung element - boron - is at the heart of making them work. Rio Tinto’s Chief Executive, Minerals, Sinead Kaufman, unpicks what boron is, how it’s extracted, and what needs to be done to keep us having the electronic devices so many of us rely on. We also look at how AI might have a role to play in the future of mining, why boron is “the WD-40 of the world” and what’s being done to help sustainability by “robots eating robots”!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Dr. Leah Alconcel’s Lasers: Missions to Jupiter, space junk and the future of communications

Season 1 · Episode 9

Wednesday, April 24, 2024 • Duration 25:48

Spacecraft engineer Dr. Leah Alconcel joins Dr. Anna to tell her about the one item she can’t live without - her lasers

From sending spacecraft to Saturn to the possibility of being able to watch TikTok in outer space, Dr. Leah shares the critical role that lasers have in her life. We are joined again by Rio’s Chief Scientist, Nigel Steward, who reveals how lasers are in fact a fundamental part of everyone’s daily lives and the role of the very small but powerful metals called Rare Earths which ironically (and thankfully) are not that rare.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Dr. Rosa Vásquez Espinoza’s Field Microscope: Boiling rivers, ancient Chinese water microscopes and working with communities to ensure ecosystems into the future

Season 1 · Episode 8

Wednesday, April 17, 2024 • Duration 27:31

Chemical biologist and explorer Dr. Rosa Vásquez Espinoza shares with Dr. Anna the one item she can’t live without - her field microscope.

Dr. Rosa takes us on an expedition to the Amazon as we understand how integral her microscope is to her day-to-day work searching for the tiniest creatures, from heat-loving microbes that exist in boiling rivers to the stingless bee native to Peru. Another exploration expert - Rio Tinto’s Managing Director of Studies, Alison Morley - joins us to share tales of following the clues found in the patterns in rocks and what these patterns tell us about our earth, before Dr. Anna asks both Dr. Rosa and Alison how we can ensure that these ecosystems being explored are protected for our future.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Buddha Lo’s Salt: Thanksgiving turkeys, open-water swimming and a material fundamental to our survival

Season 1 · Episode 7

Wednesday, April 10, 2024 • Duration 25:59

Cooking sensation and two-time Top Chef winner Buddha Lo joins Dr. Anna to share the one item he can’t live without - salt.

Buddha takes us to his kitchen in New York where he explains its critical role in food not just today, but throughout history. Rio Tinto’s Chief Advisor Process Development, Amy Lamb, joins the discussion to explain salt’s journey from the sea to the table and why you can’t eat the salt you use to grit the road, before Dr. Anna asks what lengths they’d go to to ensure that we didn’t have to live without this vital material.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Alie Ward’s Insulated Flask: Nicknames, vacuums and the reality of low carbon steel

Season 1 · Episode 6

Wednesday, April 3, 2024 • Duration 22:21

Daytime Emmy Award-winning science communicator, podcaster, TV presenter, writer and food buff Alie Ward joins Dr. Anna to share her unquenchable love for the item she can’t live without - her insulated flask.

As a self-confessed ice fiend, Alie shares the daily amazement her flask provides, which she tells Dr. Anna is akin to magic. To help unravel some of the mystery, chemist and broadcaster Andrea Sella helps lift the lid on the science of vacuums and we are joined again by Rio Tinto’s Chief Advisor of Discovery, Marie-Pierre Paquin, who delivers Alie the amazing news that a future of low carbon steel is coming.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Cerys Matthews’ Climbing Equipment: Everest, foie gras and our collective responsibility for the planet

Season 1 · Episode 5

Wednesday, March 27, 2024 • Duration 28:30

Singer, songwriter, author and broadcaster Cerys Matthews joins Dr. Anna this week to share the items she can’t live without - her climbing equipment.

Mark Davies, Chief Technical Officer at Rio Tinto, and climbing curator Nigel Buckley also join Cerys and Dr. Anna to discuss the days of climbing with wooden axes, conquering summits and current breakthroughs in achieving low-carbon aluminium.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Shelley Roden’s Trash: Spaceships, Mrs Incredible and the power of the circular economy

Season 1 · Episode 4

Wednesday, March 20, 2024 • Duration 25:46

Award-winning Foley artist Shelley Roden joins Dr. Anna on the podcast to explain why she can’t live without trash.

As a Foley artist, Shelley spends her days using trash to make the sound effects for live action and animated films. She’s worked on over two hundred titles such as Black Panther and Disney’s Encanto and she challenges Dr. Anna and Rio Tinto’s Metallurgical Engineer Saskia Duyvesteyn to a live sound quiz. Together, they look at the value of ‘waste’ and what the circular economy could mean for preserving the resources of this planet.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

OJ Borg’s E-Bike: World Record attempts, Lycra mishaps and how to keep the planet charged

Season 1 · Episode 3

Wednesday, March 13, 2024 • Duration 26:30

BBC broadcaster and cycling obsessive OJ Borg joins Dr. Anna to share the item he can’t live without - his e-bike.

Alongside bike historian Tony Hadland and Rio Tinto’s General Manager of Technical Development, Jared Osborne, they unearth the explosion in the popularity of the e-bike, investigate how you turn rocks into batteries and discuss the impact to the planet of keeping the world charged.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Read moreCollapse

Things You Can't Live Without – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

RSS feed quality and score

Publication history

Latest published episodes

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Things You Can't Live Without – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

RSS feed quality and score

Publication history

Latest published episodes

Similar podcasts and content

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Apple Podcasts

Spotify