Insect week : / artificial skin.

The first item on the programme is about the threat to the populations of certain insects in the UK. This has led to National Insect Week. Quentin Cooper talks to an entomologist and a beetle expert about what is threatening our insect population, what we can do to help, and why we should try to help. The second item on the programme is about the creation of artificial skin which could be used in skin grafts on patients who have suffered severe burns. This 'synthetic skin' substitute is being made out of spinning a polymer solution at 30 000 volts to create a mesh of fibres 1/100th of the width of a human hair, and it is thought that it might, one day, replace conventional skin grafts altogether.