Millions remember the countdowns, launchings, splashdowns and parades as the U.S. raced the USSR to the Moon in the 1960s, but few know that both superpowers also ran parallel covert space programs to launch military astronauts on spying missions.
As of May 31st, 2010, astronomers have confirmed the detection of some 455 extrasolar planets, indicating that alien solar systems are ubiquitous in the Milky Way Galaxy and throughout the cosmos.
The Boeing 747 entered service with Pan American Airlines in January 1970 and has since become the workhorse of the world’s long-haul, high-capacity fleet. It was the first passenger jet to have a twin-aisle cabin section and a staircase leading to an upper deck in the nose section.
Powered by four Pratt & Whitney/General Electric/Rolls-Royce turbofans the Boeing 747 remains the world’s fastest subsonic passenger jet. It has carried more than 3.5 billion passengers on 35 billion miles of revenue-earning service with 80 airlines.
NOVA goes behind the scenes at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory to offer a look at the construction and launch of the two Martian exploratory rovers, ‘Spirit’ and ‘Opportunity’.
Exploring the mysteries of black holes and theories about the existence of other kinds of holes, such as ‘mini’ or microscopic black holes that exist at the atomic level; ‘white holes’ – the opposite of black holes where matter is ejected; and ‘wormholes’ – gateways in hyperspace that connect points in space and time and possibly lead to other dimensions.
In the world of road making, the Alcan Highway is a feat worthy of comparison to the legendary byways of ancient Rome. Stretching 1,500 miles from British Columbia to Fairbanks, Alaska, the Alcan traverses incredibly difficult and hostile territory, crossing the Canadian Rockies, raging rivers and dense forest.
NOVA goes behind the doors of Boeing’s Phantom Works and Lockheed’s legendary Skunk Works to record classified meetings, fly the most revolutionary planes, and examine the high-stakes battle to build the most capable and versatile fighter ever created – the Joint Strike Fighter.
In the first in this four-part series, we chart the extraordinary rise of blogs, Wikipedia and YouTube, and trace an ongoing clash between the freedom the technology offers us, and our innate human desire to control and profit.
Exploring how the web affects politics and the struggle for power in both democractic and authoritarian states, and also how the internet has inspired freedom of speech via social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
Telling the inside story of the gold rush years of the dotcom bubble, and revealing how retailers such as Amazon learned great lessons.
This episode also charts how, out of the ashes, Google forged the business model that has come to dominate today’s web, offering a plethora of highly attractive, overtly free web services – including search, maps and video – that are in fact funded through a sophisticated and highly lucrative advertising system which trades on what we users look for.
Are we empowered, connected and enlightened with the world’s knowledge at our fingertips? Or distracted and addicted with shorter attention spans? Are our skittering brains bombarded and stupified by the ‘yuck and wow’ of the web? Is the web really changing us – the way we think, the way we behave, the way relate to each other? And is it for better or for worse?
