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This week’s programme features the paper-munching microbes that are turning landfill into biofuels; an undersea sand dune the size of a twelve-storey building; Anglesey’s Antarctic origins; and how we can harness peat bogs to combat flooding and climate change. What draws these different areas of scientific research together is the 2014 Bangor Science Festival.

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Adam meets some of the scientists whose work is being showcased at the Festival. Dr. James McDonald from Bangor University’s School of Biology is giving a talk entitled ‘Marvellous Microbes’. He tells Adam about his work on bacterial enzymes and how we can harness them. We also meet two geologists: Dr. Katrien van Landeghem who’s investigating giant undersea sand dunes and the ice sheets which swept across the British Isles in the last ice age; and Angela Honey from GeoMôn, the Anglesey Geopark, who’s leading walks on the Anglesey coast as part of the Festival.

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And we hear from wetlands expert Dr. Christian Dunn. He’s recreated a peat bog on the roof of Bangor University’s science building and he tells Science Café producer Jeremy Grange about the importance of peatlands in preventing flooding and climate change.

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Bangor Science Festival, which is part of National Science and Engineering Week 2014, runs from 14th – 23rd March.