Tesla: Master of Lightning • 2007

58:33

Visiting a hidden location buried beneath the hills of Scotland, Helen experiences some of the most extreme acoustics in the world. Here she learns just how much information can be carried by sound. She discovers how sound has driven the evolution of truly incredible biological systems and complex relationships between creatures that exploit sound for hunting - and escaping from predators. Helen demonstrates how sound waves diffract (bend around objects) and in doing so help us sense danger and locate it. Helen explains how we are not limited to passively detecting sound waves; we can also use them to actively probe the world.

S1E2 • Sound Waves: The Symphony of Physics • 2017 • Physics

58:00

Hannah starts her journey by asking whether everything could be bigger, finding out what life would be like on a bigger planet. As the Earth grows to outlandish proportions, gravity is the biggest challenge, and lying down becomes the new standing up. Flying in a Typhoon fighter jet with RAF flight lieutenant Mark Long, the programme discovers how higher G-force affects the human body, and how people could adapt to a high G-force world. But by the time Earth gets to the size of Jupiter, it's all over, as the moon would impact the planet and end life as we know it. Next, Hannah tries to make living things bigger. The programme examines the gigantopithecus, the biggest ape to ever exist, creates a dog the size of a dinosaur and meets Sultan Kosen, the world's tallest man. Humans are then super-sized with the help of Professor Dean Falk to see what a human body would look like if we were 15m tall. The sun gets expanded, and Professor Volker Bromm looks back in time to find the largest stars that ever existed, before the sun explodes in perhaps the biggest explosion since the big bang.

S1E1 • Size Matters with Hannah Fry • 2018 • Physics

51:42

Planet Earth shrinks to half size causing altitude sickness and a cosmic disaster, the sun gets as small as a sun can be, turning Earth into a frozen mud ball. We also see what happens to a man who shrinks to the same size as a wasp.

S1E2 • Size Matters • 2019 • Physics

53:09

Meet Nikola Tesla, the genius engineer and tireless inventor whose technology revolutionized the electrical age of the 20th century. Although eclipsed in fame by Edison and Marconi, it was Tesla's vision that paved the way for today's wireless world. His fertile but undisciplined imagination was the source of his genius but also his downfall, as the image of Tesla as a "mad scientist" came to overshadow his reputation as a brilliant innovator.

American Experience • 2016 • Physics

52:00

Planet Earth grows to outlandish proportions that causes lying down to become the new standing up, the sun gets big ideas giving us a 20,000-year winter before blowing up in the biggest explosion since the big bang, we meet a dog the size of a dinosaur and Joe himself turns into a 49ft giant.

S1E1 • Size Matters • 2019 • Physics

86:25

This documentary presents the story of Nikola Tesla, the great scientist, visionary, and inventor who gave the world alternating current electricity, as well as being the father of radio. The film tells the story of this man's astonishing genius, his visions and inventions. Tesla's own scientific and autobiographical writings, as well as archival photographs and re-enactments are used to tell the story. A native of Austro-Hungary, Tesla came to America in 1884. Working first with Edison, the two inventors fell out over Edison's insistence on using direct current. Tesla took his alternating current vision to Westinghouse. His New York address was renowned for the bolts of lightning emanating from it, as Tesla worked to unlock the secrets of energy and electricity. His quest took him to Colorado. The film follows Tesla's exploits and eccentricities, which made him a darling of the press. Included is the well-known and touching story of his devotion to a certain white pigeon. Largely forgotten today in spite of the great debt the modern world owes him, the film pays tribute to this overlooked genius.

2007 • Physics