Dame Sarah Mullally has been named as the new Archbishop of Canterbury designate - the first woman to be chosen to head the Church of England.
It is the first time in nearly 500 years of history that the Church has nominated a woman as its head. We'll ask who Sarah Mullally is - and whether she can restore trust and unity in her church.
Also in the programme: A senior member of the Jewish community in the UK says Thursday's deadly attack in Manchester was a shock but no surprise; we'll hear about tourism creaking in Cuba; and a ravenous baby planet has been making headlines.
(Photo shows Archbishop of Canterbury-designate Sarah Mullally delivering an address inside Canterbury Cathedral,on 3 October2025. Credit: Toby Melville/Reuters)
The launch of Taylor Swift’s much-anticipated 12th studio album, The Life of a Showgirl, has inspired this week’s episode of Unexpected Elements.
First up, we hear how a Brazilian songbird courts its mate as part of a boyband. We then find out about the microbes that dance to survive in their extreme habitat.
Next up, Professor Troy Magney, a forest ecophysiologist at the University of Montana, tells us about his TSWIFT machine and how it can assess the health of the planet’s forests.
Also in the programme, we find out why migratory birds trick weather data, how fish sing, and how hackers used SWIFT bank payments to nearly pull off a billion-dollar heist.
All that, plus many more Unexpected Elements.
Presenter: Marnie Chesterton, with Camilla Mota and Godfred Boafo
Producers: Imaan Moin and Alice Lipscombe-Southwell, with Robbie Wojciechowski and Lucy Davies
Police have named the man who killed two people at a synagogue in Manchester. Jihad Al-Shamie, a 35-year-old British man of Syrian descent, was shot and killed by officers outside the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue. Also, Donald Trump has declared the US is now in an armed conflict with drug smugglers in the Caribbean Sea. A man alleged to be a high-up figure in the Tren de Aragua gang has been arrested in Colombia. A former Israeli hostage who was held in captivity in Gaza for 16 months has called on Hamas to sign President Trump's peace plan. The disgraced rapper, Sean Diddy Combs, is set to be sentenced on prostitution charges. Luxembourg's Grand Duke Henri is formally abdicating his throne. There is a rogue planet gobbling up gas and dust at an unprecedented rate. Open AI's Sora app raises yet more concerns about artificial intelligence and copyright.
The Global News Podcast brings you the breaking news you need to hear, as it happens. Listen for the latest headlines and current affairs from around the world. Politics, economics, climate, business, technology, health – we cover it all with expert analysis and insight.
Get the news that matters, delivered twice a day on weekdays and daily at weekends, plus special bonus episodes reacting to urgent breaking stories. Follow or subscribe now and never miss a moment. Get in touch: globalpodcast@bbc.co.uk
The British Prime Minister Keir Starmer says Britain must defeat what he called the "rising hatred of Jewish people", after a deadly attack at a synagogue. Two Jewish people were killed and four others injured after a car was driven towards worshippers at the site in Manchester. Police declared it a terrorist incident. They shot the suspect dead.
Also in the programme: Venezuela's opposition leader tells us she welcomes America's attacks on alleged drug smugglers, saying they'll force President out. We look at protests in Morocco; and is Formula One getting too hot for the safety of its drivers?
(Photo: A member of the Jewish community holds a Torah at a police cordon in Manchester, Britain, 2 October 2025. Credit: Photo by Adam Vaughan /EPA/ Shutterstock)
Scientists detect for the first time an unknown source of GPS interference coming from space. Also, as AI begins to design more and more DNA sequences being manufactured synthetically, how can those manufacturers be sure that what their customers are asking for will not produce toxic proteins or lethal weapons? And… how camera traps in polish forests reveal that the big bad wolf is more scared of humans than anything else.
For that last few years instances of deliberate jamming and interference of GNSS signals has become an expected feature of the wars the world is suffering. Yet this disruption of the signals that all of us use to navigate and tell the time nearly always emanate from devices on the ground, or maybe in the air. But in ongoing research reported recently by Todd Humphreys of University of Texas at Austin and colleagues around the world is beginning to reveal that since 2019 an intermittent yet powerful signal has been causing GPS failures across Europe and the North Atlantic. The episodes have been thankfully brief so far, but all the signs suggest it comes not from soldiers or aeroplanes, but from a distantly orbiting satellite somewhere over the Baltic Sea. It may not be malevolent, it could be a fault, but the net of suspicion is tightening.
A team of scientists including some from Microsoft report today in a paper in the journal Science an investigation to try to strengthen the vetting of synthetic DNA requests around the world. As AI-designed sequencies increase in number and application, the factories that produce the bespoke DNA are in danger of making and supplying potentially dangerous sequences to customers with malicious intents. But how do you spot the bad proteins out of the almost infinite possible DNA recipes? Tessa Alexanian of the International Biosecurity and Biosafety Initiative for Science, and one of the authors explains some of the thinking.
Finally, Liana Zanette of Western University in Ontario and colleagues have been hanging around in Polish forests scaring wolves. Why? Because as wolf numbers rise in protected reserves, more and more human-wolf interactions occur. And a suspicion has arisen that the legal protection they enjoy has led to them losing their fear of humans in a dangerous way. Not so, says Liana’s team, blowing away the straw arguments and setting fire to the political motivation to reduce their protection status. Wolves are still terrified of Nature’s apex predator – us.
Presenter: Roland Pease
Producer: Alex Mansfield
Production Coordinator: Jana Bennett-Holesworth
(Image: Simulation screen showing various flights for transportation and passengers. Credit: Oundum via Getty Images).
At least two people have been killed in an attack outside a synagogue in Manchester in northern England on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Three others are in a serious condition after the incident, in which a car was driven at people and a man was stabbed. Greater Manchester Police have confirmed the suspected assailant was shot dead by armed officers. Detectives have declared it a terrorist attack. Also: the head of Hamas’s armed wing in Gaza tells mediators he does not agree to the plan set out by US President Donald Trump to end the war with Israel. Rescue workers in Indonesia say there are no longer any signs of life under the rubble of a school which collapsed in East Java, with nearly sixty people still missing. Britain's Royal Society is marking 75 years since the mathematician and Second World War codebreaker, Alan Turing, created a test to help distinguish a machine from a human. And an ice core from Antarctica that may be more than 1.5 million years old is being melted down by scientists to unlock key information about Earth's climate.
The Global News Podcast brings you the breaking news you need to hear, as it happens. Listen for the latest headlines and current affairs from around the world. Politics, economics, climate, business, technology, health – we cover it all with expert analysis and insight.
Get the news that matters, delivered twice a day on weekdays and daily at weekends, plus special bonus episodes reacting to urgent breaking stories. Follow or subscribe now and never miss a moment.
Get in touch: globalpodcast@bbc.co.uk
Violent clashes, arrests and deaths during Morocco’s GenZ 212 protests
Why Senegal's fishermen are blaming a BP natural gas project for lack of fish
And Nigeria's First Lady raises $13million for national library – but why has it taken so long?
Presenter : Nyasha Michelle
Producers: Yvette Twagiramariya, Mark Wilberforce, Bella Hassan and Joseph Keen in London. Makuochi Okafor was in Lagos.
Senior Producer: Paul Bakibinga
Technical Producer: Pat Sissons
Editors: Andre Lombard and Alice Muthengi.
Two people have been killed by a car that drove into a crowd outside a British synagogue on the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur. Another man was stabbed at the site. We hear the latest news on the incident.
Also in the programme: a wide-ranging interview with the leader of the Venezuelan opposition, Maria Corina Machado, who is in hiding after being barred from last year's election; and a BBC analysis of Ukrainian drone attacks against Russian oil refineries.
We also hear about a new exhibition in Cambridge that sheds light on craftspeople in ancient Egypt.
(Photo: People gather near the scene following an incident outside a synagogue in Manchester, Credit: REUTERS/Temilade Adelaja)
The Israeli navy has intercepted boats carrying aid to Gaza and detained the activists on board. Also: Indonesian rescuers search for 59 children trapped under rubble of collapsed school, BBC analysis finds a surge in Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian oil refineries, the EU considers constructing a drone wall, comedy turns into controversy in Saudi Arabia, the latest on the US government shutdown, a preview of the Czech parliamentary elections, and we look back at the life of world-leading chimpanzee expert Jane Goodall.
The Global News Podcast brings you the breaking news you need to hear, as it happens. Listen for the latest headlines and current affairs from around the world. Politics, economics, climate, business, technology, health – we cover it all with expert analysis and insight.
Get the news that matters, delivered twice a day on weekdays and daily at weekends, plus special bonus episodes reacting to urgent breaking stories. Follow or subscribe now and never miss a moment.
Get in touch: globalpodcast@bbc.co.uk
The Israeli navy has intercepted boats carrying aid to Gaza and detained the activists on board. Also: Indonesian rescuers search for 59 children trapped under rubble of collapsed school, BBC analysis finds a surge in Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian oil refineries, the EU considers constructing a drone wall, comedy turns into controversy in Saudi Arabia, the latest on the US government shutdown, a preview of the Czech parliamentary elections, and we look back at the life of world-leading chimpanzee expert Jane Goodall.
The Global News Podcast brings you the breaking news you need to hear, as it happens. Listen for the latest headlines and current affairs from around the world. Politics, economics, climate, business, technology, health – we cover it all with expert analysis and insight.
Get the news that matters, delivered twice a day on weekdays and daily at weekends, plus special bonus episodes reacting to urgent breaking stories. Follow or subscribe now and never miss a moment.
Get in touch: globalpodcast@bbc.co.uk
