- Frank Witte
Recent Mars missions have produced compelling evidence for what was once a wet world, where life could well have flourished. Now scientists are about to embark on a mission with the best chances yet of finding it. Touching down near the Martian north pole, the Phoenix lander will begin looking for the chemical hallmarks of life past and present. But what do we already know about our near planetary neighbour? Frank Witte finds out...
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- Stuart Clark
When the clipper ship Southern Cross sailed into a living hell off Chile during the night of 2 September 1859, little did the sailors know that they were witnessing the aftermath of a gigantic solar explosion that had engulfed the Earth. Today, astronomers are still unpicking the consequences of this tremendous event.
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- Chris Smith
There was a time when almost every action movie seemed to involve the hero or villain becoming swamped in quicksand, sinking away until only their hat remains on the surface. But contrary to what Hollywood would have you believe, although it’s almost impossible to escape from quicksand, it's even more difficult to drown...
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- Catherine Zentile
Snowflakes form when water vapour condenses directly into ice crystals, and for many years writers have used their delicate beauty as a metaphor for fragility and uniqueness. But now scientists are studying these same qualities to understand one of the most important molecules on Earth – water.
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- Frank Witte
Things usually are not what they seem, and sometimes the fundamentals become discomfortingly alien... Frank Witte discusses particle physics including what is matter, is matter a particle, or a wave ?
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- Anne Holden
The Hubble Space Telescope has been sending us back incredible pictures of the cosmos. How have recent policy changes affected it's future?
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- Catherine Zentile
Scientists recently spotted a planet being born. It's just formed and is still enshrouded within the disk of dust that formed it. So like a baby in the birth canal, the newborn, placenta and amniotic fluid of planetary formation are all still there for scientists to see. In terms of age, this was a teenage pregnancy, but what it can tell us about the planetary birth process makes this particular cosmic conception very exciting...
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- George Pendle
The fantastical, tragic and largely unknown story of John Parsons is one of the most intriguing tales to be found in the annals of modern science. Founder of the Jet propulsion Lab, and obsessed with magic. George Pendle investigates.
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- Bob Bury
Discovered by Wilhelm Roentgen almost by accident, X rays are part of the electromagnetic spectrum that includes visible light. Bob Bury desribes how they work and can be used.
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- Dave Ansell
How were superconductors discovered, what are they, how do they work, what can they do for us, and what's new in the field of superconductivity.
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