Professor Brian Cox journeys to South-East Asia to understand how life first began.
Professor Brian Cox journeys to South-East Asia to understand how life first began.
Prof Brian Cox visits the USA retelling evolutionary history and the origin of the senses.
In this film Brian asks how a lifeless cosmos can produce a planet of such varied biology.
In this episode, Brian travels round Australia to explore the physics of the size of life.
For 10,000 years or more, humans created new plant varieties for food by trial and error and a touch of serendipity. Then 150 years ago, a new era began. Pioneer botanists unlocked the patterns found in different types of plants and opened the door to a new branch of science - plant genetics. They discovered what controlled the random colours of snapdragon petals and the strange colours found in wild maize. This was vital information. Some botanists even gave their lives to protect their collection of seeds. American wheat farmer Norman Borlaug was awarded the Nobel peace prize after he bred a new strain of wheat that lifted millions of people around the world out of starvation. Today, botanists believe advances in plant genetics hold the key to feeding the world's growing population.
3/3 • Botany: A Blooming History • 2011 • Nature
This instalment examines the earliest land vegetation and insects. The first plants, being devoid of stems, mainly comprised mosses and liverworts. Using both sexual and asexual methods of reproduction, they proliferated. Descended from segmented sea creatures, millipedes were among the first to take advantage of such a habitat and were quickly followed by other species. Without water to carry eggs, bodily contact between the sexes was now necessary. This was problematical for some hunters, such as spiders and scorpions, who developed courtship rituals to ensure that the female didn't eat the male.
3/13 • Life on Earth • 1979 • Nature
Deep within the arid expanse of the Kalahari Desert lies a true anomaly of nature: a land shaped by the unstoppable flow of inland floods to create one of the greatest wildlife havens in Africa. Experience the life-giving might of the Okavango Delta, in all its lush beauty.
3/6 • Africa's Wild Horizons • 2017 • Nature
Make way for the ocean’s biggest fish – a whale shark! This awe-inspiring gentle giant feeds on plankton and can reach 18 metres in length. Plus, get a dose of adrenaline as you swim with thousands of hammerhead sharks that gather in massive pulse-quickening shoals in the famous Galapagos Islands!
Part 3 • The Magic of The Big Blue • 2011 • Nature
In recent years, our knowledge of life beneath the waves has been transformed. Using cutting-edge technology, One Ocean takes us on a journey from the intense heat of the tropics to our planet's frozen poles to reveal new worlds and extraordinary never-before-seen animal behaviours.
1/8 • Blue Planet II • 2017 • Nature
With the help of some surprising creatures from around the world, this series sets out to discover how animals take to the air, defying the force all airborne animals must conquer, gravity. Part 1: Defying Gravity In Africa, a caracal's 'rocket-propelled' launch enables it to catch birds in flight. In the Australian outback, a kangaroo's hop is key to finding water in a desert of over a million square kilometres. On an English farm, an insect's ultimate ejector seat accelerates it to 700G with help from a clutch in its crotch. And high above the jungles of Borneo, a leaping snake's unique shape allows it to glide, even without wings.
1/3 • Life in the Air • 2016 • Nature
