Physics

At the dawn of a new century, a new theory is being born. It threatens to demolish the foundations of 20th century physics. Its authors are two of the world's leading cosmologists. If they're right, Einstein was wrong. It all began when Andy Albrecht and Joao Magueijo met at a conference in America in 1996. This program began from Newtonian view of the universe then takes you through the General Relativity and the Flatness problem. This leads to the Horizon problem and its solution, the Inflation theory. However modern astronomy doesn't stop here, the Inflation theory has its flaw too, and what happened before the big bang? This can all be answered by changing one thing, the one thing no body dare to question until now.

Professor Jim Al-Khalili investigates the most accurate and yet perplexing scientific theory ever - quantum physics. At the beginning of the 20th century scientists were led into the hidden workings of matter, into the sub-atomic building blocks of the world around us. They discovered phenomena unlike any encountered before - a realm where things can be in many places at once, where chance and probability call the shots and where reality appears to only truly exist when we observe it. Albert Einstein hated the idea that nature, at its most fundamental level, is governed by chance. Jim reveals how, in the 1930s, Einstein thought he'd found a fatal flaw in quantum physics because it implies that sub-atomic particles can communicate faster than light in defiance of the theory of relativity. In the 1960s the scientist John Bell showed there was a way to test if Einstein was right and quantum mechanics was actually mistaken. Jim repeats this critical experiment - with shocking results.

Join scientists as they grab light from across the universe to prove quantum entanglement is real. Einstein called it 'spooky action at a distance,' but today quantum entanglement is poised to revolutionize technology from computers to cryptography. Physicists have gradually become convinced that the phenomenon—two subatomic particles that mirror changes in each other instantaneously over any distance is real. But a few doubts remain.
The film follows a ground-breaking experiment in the Canary Islands to use quasars at opposite ends of the universe to once and for all settle remaining questions.

Professor Brian Cox takes on the story of the force that sculpts the entire universe - gravity. Gravity seems so familiar, and yet it is one of the strangest and most surprising forces in the universe. Starting with a zero gravity flight, Brian experiences the feeling of total weightlessness, and considers how much of an effect gravity has had on the world around us. But gravity also acts over much greater distances. It is the great orchestrator of the cosmos. It dictates our orbit around the sun, our relationship with the other planets in our solar system, and even the way in which our solar system orbits our galaxy. Yet the paradox of gravity is that it is actually a relatively weak force. Brian takes a face distorting trip in a centrifuge to explain how it is that gravity achieves its great power, before looking at the role it plays in one of the most extraordinary phenomena in the universe - a neutron star. Although it is just a few kilometres across, it is so dense that its gravity is 100, 000 million times as strong as on Earth. Over the centuries our quest to understand gravity has allowed us to understand some of the true wonders of the universe, and Brian reveals that it is scientists' continuing search for answers that inspires his own sense of wonder.

The first second of the Universe, the creation of everything when space, time, matter and energy burst into existence. It is the most important second in history, which seals the Universe's fate and defines everything that comes after - including us.

Physicist Dr Helen Czerski journeys to the extremes of the temperature scale, where the everyday laws of physics break down and a new world of scientific possibilities begins. In the first part, Frozen Solid, Helen reveals how cold has shaped the world around us and why frozen doesn't mean what you think it does. She meets scientists pushing temperature to the limits of cold, driving technologies such as superconductors.
The second part, A Temperature for Life, explores the narrow band of temperature that has led to life on Earth, how life began where hot meets cold and how every living creature depends on temperature for survival. In the last part, Playing with Fire, Helen Czerski explores the science of heat. She reveals how heat is the hidden energy contained within matter with the power to transform it from state to state.