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Season 2011
Comedian Ben Miller returns to his roots as a physicist to try to answer a deceptively simple question: what is one degree of temperature?
His quest takes him to the frontiers of
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Comedian Ben Miller returns to his roots as a physicist to try to answer a deceptively simple question: what is one degree of temperature?
His quest takes him to the frontiers of current science as he meets researchers working on the hottest and coldest temperatures in the universe, and to a lab where he experiences some of the strangest effects of quantum physics - a place where super-cooled liquids simply pass through solid glass. Plus, Ben installs his very own Met office weather station at home.
Ben's investigations in this personal and passionate film highlight the importance of measurement and accuracy in the 21st century.
There is a strange and mysterious world that surrounds us, a world largely hidden from our senses. The quest to explain the true nature of reality is one of the great scientific
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There is a strange and mysterious world that surrounds us, a world largely hidden from our senses. The quest to explain the true nature of reality is one of the great scientific detective stories.
Clues have been pieced together from deep within the atom, from the event horizon of black holes, and from the far reaches of the cosmos. It may be that that we are part of a cosmic hologram, projected from the edge of the universe. Or that we exist in an infinity of parallel worlds. Your reality may never look quite the same again.
Nobel Prize winner Sir Paul Nurse examines why science appears to be under attack, and why public trust in key scientific theories has been eroded - from the theory that man-made climate
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Nobel Prize winner Sir Paul Nurse examines why science appears to be under attack, and why public trust in key scientific theories has been eroded - from the theory that man-made climate change is warming our planet, to the safety of GM food, or that HIV causes AIDS.
He interviews scientists and campaigners from both sides of the climate change debate, and travels to New York to meet Tony, who has HIV but doesn't believe that that the virus is responsible for AIDS.
This is a passionate defence of the importance of scientific evidence and the power of experiment, and a look at what scientists themselves need to do to earn trust in controversial areas of science in the 21st century.
Horizon reveals the latest research into one of the most mysterious and common human experiences - pain.
Breakthroughs have come from studying a remarkable woman in London who has
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Horizon reveals the latest research into one of the most mysterious and common human experiences - pain.
Breakthroughs have come from studying a remarkable woman in London who has felt no pain at all in her life, a man in the US who cut off his own arm to survive, and three generations of an Italian family who don't feel extremes of temperature.
We witness a new treatment that involves a pioneering computer game 'snow world' that contains the power to banish pain.
And we find how powerfully our moods and emotions shape what pain we feel.
Horizon meets the scientists working to make fatal car crashes a thing of the past.
A remarkable fusion of mechanical engineering and biology promises to save countless lives across the
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Horizon meets the scientists working to make fatal car crashes a thing of the past.
A remarkable fusion of mechanical engineering and biology promises to save countless lives across the world.
The programme has exclusive access to the secretive world of the most advanced car crash tests.
Horizon reveals how the latest advances in trauma medicine, psychology and even extreme sport are transforming your chances of surviving on the roads.
And the programme shows how researchers are creating a new virtual crash test dummy that could change how our cars are designed forever.
Dr Kevin Fong finds out how close scientists are to being able to mend your heart if it stops working. He meets some of the people who have undergone pioneering heart operations and the
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Dr Kevin Fong finds out how close scientists are to being able to mend your heart if it stops working. He meets some of the people who have undergone pioneering heart operations and the scientists who are pushing the limits of cardiac treatment.
We meet a man who has had his heart replaced with an artificial one powered by a mechanical pump he carries around in a rucksack, and witness a scientist bring a dead animal heart back to life on a workbench.
Plus, the work of an American scientist who is using stem cells to turn what she calls a 'ghost heart' - the scaffold of a heart - into a replacement heart for humans.
Dr Alice Roberts asks one of the great questions about our species: are we still evolving? There's no doubt that we're a product of millions of years of evolution. But thanks to modern
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Dr Alice Roberts asks one of the great questions about our species: are we still evolving? There's no doubt that we're a product of millions of years of evolution. But thanks to modern technology and medicine, did we escape Darwin's law of the survival of the fittest? Alice follows a trail of clues from ancient human bones, to studies of remarkable people living in the most inhospitable parts of the planet, to the frontiers of genetic research to discover if we are still evolving - and where we might be heading.
Across the world scientists are releasing predators, nature's ultimate killers, close to where people live.
In Florida, a new population of panthers, feared as ambush predators, have
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Across the world scientists are releasing predators, nature's ultimate killers, close to where people live.
In Florida, a new population of panthers, feared as ambush predators, have been released near to the busy town of Naples. In the Italian Alps, bears have been reintroduced after they became virtually extinct, and now try to get into people's homes in the middle of the night.
And in Yellowstone National Park, wolves have been brought back 70 years after they were exterminated.
Horizon meets the scientist behind this radical scheme, and the people who now have to share their backyards with these predators.
Documentary exploring the impact of colours on people's lives, and how perceptions of them can be influenced by age, gender and mood. The programme examines scientists' claims that
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Documentary exploring the impact of colours on people's lives, and how perceptions of them can be influenced by age, gender and mood. The programme examines scientists' claims that different hues have hidden powers, from the winning properties of red to how blue seemingly makes time speed up.
Around the world, a new generation of astronomers are hunting for the most mysterious objects in the universe. Young stars, black holes, even other forms of life.
They have created a
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Around the world, a new generation of astronomers are hunting for the most mysterious objects in the universe. Young stars, black holes, even other forms of life.
They have created a dazzling new set of super-telescopes that promise to rewrite the story of the heavens.
This film follows the men and women who are pushing the limits of science and engineering in some of the most extreme environments on earth. But most striking of all, no-one really knows what they will find out there.
Horizon explores the secrets of what makes a long, healthy and happy life. It turns out that a time you can't remember - the nine months you spend in the womb - could have more lasting
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Horizon explores the secrets of what makes a long, healthy and happy life. It turns out that a time you can't remember - the nine months you spend in the womb - could have more lasting effects on you today than your lifestyle or genes. It is one of the most powerful and provocative new ideas in human science, and it was pioneered by a British scientist, Professor David Barker. His theory has inspired a field of study that is revealing how our time in the womb could affect your health, personality, and even the lives of your children.
For centuries we have dreamt of reaching the centre of the Earth. Now scientists are uncovering a bizarre and alien world that lies 4,000 miles beneath our feet, unlike anything we know
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For centuries we have dreamt of reaching the centre of the Earth. Now scientists are uncovering a bizarre and alien world that lies 4,000 miles beneath our feet, unlike anything we know on the surface. It is a planet buried within the planet we know, where storms rage within a sea of white-hot metal and a giant forest of crystals make up a metal core the size of the Moon.
Horizon follows scientists who are conducting experiments to recreate this core within their own laboratories, with surprising results.
What makes us good or evil? It's a simple but deeply unsettling question. One that scientists are now starting to answer.
Horizon meets the researchers who have studied some of the
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What makes us good or evil? It's a simple but deeply unsettling question. One that scientists are now starting to answer.
Horizon meets the researchers who have studied some of the most terrifying people behind bars - psychopathic killers.
But there was a shock in store for one of these scientists, Professor Jim Fallon, when he discovered that he had the profile of a psychopath. And the reason he didn't turn out to be a killer holds important lessons for all of us.
We meet the scientist who believes he has found the moral molecule and the man who is using this new understanding to rewrite our ideas of crime and punishment.
Six months after the explosions at the Fukushima nuclear plant and the release of radiation there, Professor Jim Al-Khalili sets out to discover whether nuclear power is safe.
He
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Six months after the explosions at the Fukushima nuclear plant and the release of radiation there, Professor Jim Al-Khalili sets out to discover whether nuclear power is safe.
He begins in Japan, where he meets some of the tens of thousands of people who have been evacuated from the exclusion zone. He travels to an abandoned village just outside the zone to witness a nuclear clean-up operation.
Jim draws on the latest scientific findings from Japan and from the previous explosion at Chernobyl to understand how dangerous the release of radiation is likely to be and what that means for our trust in nuclear power.
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