Seasons & episodes
S48 · E12Bat Superpowers 2021-09-15 · 55 min
Bats have been implicated in deadly epidemics such as COVID-19 and Ebola, yet scientists are discovering evidence that they may hold a key to a longer and healthier life. From caves in Thailand and Texas to labs around the globe, NOVA meets the scientists who are decoding the superpowers of the bat.
S48 · E13The Cannabis Question 2021-09-29 · 55 min
As state-legalized cannabis spreads, NOVA investigates the latest scientific evidence for its potential benefits and risks, and how criminalization has disproportionately harmed communities of color.
S48 · E14Particles Unknown 2021-10-06 · 55 min
Outnumbering atoms a billion to one, neutrinos are the universe’s most common yet most elusive and baffling particle. NOVA joins an international team of neutrino hunters as they try to capture an elusive fourth form of neutrino. Their results may force scientists to redraw their blueprint of the subatomic world, the Standard Model of physics, and change our understanding of how the universe works.
S48 · E15Arctic Drift 2021-10-13 · 55 min
Join scientists on the most ambitious Arctic research expedition of all time. Experts from over twenty different nations join the voyage of the massive Polarstern icebreaker as it’s gripped by the polar ice and drifts for nearly an entire year. From this unique research station, they can make long-term observations and perform experiments in unprecedented detail. Facing hungry polar bears, perilous sea ice cracks, and brutal cold, the team strives to understand the forces that are changing the region—and the world—forever.
S48 · E16Edible Insects 2021-10-20 · 55 min
From crunchy crickets to nutty fly grubs, NOVA takes a tasty look at insect foods and how they could benefit our health and our warming planet. From Thailand to Texas, insect farmers are showing how the tiny critters stack up as an environmentally friendly alternative to beef protein and, pound for pound, deliver far better nutritional value than the finest steak. But will Americans overcome the “ick” factor and share the appetite of many cultures around the world for insect feasts?
S48 · E17NOVA Universe Revealed: Age of Stars 2021-10-27 · 55 min
The sun is our life-giving source of light, heat, and energy, and new discoveries are unraveling its epic history. Join NOVA on a spectacular voyage to discover the sun’s place in a grand cycle of birth, death and renewal that makes this the age of stars. Witness how stars of every size and color came to populate our universe; how stars stage a dramatic exit when they explode as supernovae, which can outshine an entire galaxy; and how, billions of years in the future, the age of stars will lead ultimately to an age of darkness.
S48 · E18NOVA Universe Revealed: Milky Way 2021-11-03 · 55 min
Straddling the night sky, the Milky Way reminds us of our place in the galaxy we call home. But what shaped this giant spiral of stars and what will be its destiny? NOVA travels back in time to unlock the turbulent story of our cosmic neighborhood, from its birth in a whirling disk of clouds and dust to colossal collisions with other galaxies. Finally, peer into the future to watch the Milky Way’s ultimate fate as it collides with the Andromeda galaxy, over 4 billion years from now.
S48 · E19NOVA Universe Revealed: Alien Worlds 2021-11-10 · 55 min
It’s an age-old question: are we alone? Or do other lifeforms and intelligences thrive on worlds far beyond our own? Ultra-sensitive telescopes and dogged detective work are transforming alien planet-hunting from science fiction into hard fact. Join NOVA on a visit to exotic worlds orbiting distant suns, from puffy planets with the density of Styrofoam to thousand-degree, broiling gas giants. Most tantalizing of all are the Super-Earths in the “Goldilocks zone,” just the right distance from their sun to support life, and with one of them signaling life’s essential ingredient, water, in its atmosphere. Are we on the brink of answering that haunting question?
S48 · E20NOVA Universe Revealed: Black Holes 2021-11-17 · 55 min
Take a seat on the ultimate thrill ride to explore nature’s strangest and most powerful objects. Black holes can reshape entire galaxies, warp the fabric of space and time, and may even be the key to unlocking the ultimate nature of reality. A new generation of high-energy telescopes is bringing these invisible voids to light, showing that “supermassives” millions or billions of times larger than our sun lurk at the center of nearly every galaxy, including our own. But what happens if you stray too close to one? And what lies beyond the black hole’s abyss? If nothing can ever escape it, is that the end of the story? Or could they be a portal to another dimension—or another universe, full of black holes?
S48 · E21NOVA Universe Revealed: Big Bang 2021-11-24 · 55 min
The Big Bang is when many think the universe started and time itself began. But what clues can we discover about this ultimate genesis of everything? And can we ever know what existed before the Universe’s birthday? With stunning animation based on space telescope images, NOVA explores infant galaxies filled with violent blue stars that formed just a few hundred million years after the Big Bang. Before that—before the coming of visible light itself—stretch the “cosmic Dark Ages.” But scientists haven’t stopped there; instead, they’ve come up with an incredible theory for what happened billionths of a billionth of a second from the universe’s birth. If they’re right, we’re on the brink of understanding more than we could ever have hoped about our cosmic origins.
S48 · E22High-Risk High-Rise 2022-01-05 · 55 min
Gleaming symbols of prestige, skyscrapers are an ingenious way to save space in dense urban areas. But even as we devise ways to defend them against fires, wind, and earthquakes, can we also make them more livable, interactive, and eco-friendly?
S48 · E23Butterfly Blueprints 2022-01-12 · 55 min
The hidden scientific secrets of butterflies reveal them to be more inventive and resilient than we ever imagined. Follow their extraordinary life cycle and migrations to tropical rainforests, windswept prairies, and even inside a chrysalis as it’s being spun.
S48 · E24Alaskan Dinosaurs 2022-01-19 · 55 min
A team of intrepid paleontologists discovers that dinosaurs thrived in the unlikeliest of places—the cold and dark of winter in the Arctic Circle. How did they survive year-round and raise their young in frigid and dark winter conditions?
S48 · E25Ancient Maya Metropolis 2022-01-26 · 55 min
The ancient ancestors of today’s Maya people thrived in large sophisticated cities across Central America for centuries. Why, around 750 CE, did they begin to abandon many of their major cities? Archaeologists investigate dramatic new evidence of the catastrophic droughts and instability that pushed cities beyond their limits.
S49 · E1Arctic Sinkholes 2022-02-02 · 55 min
In the Arctic, enormous releases of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, threaten the climate.
S49 · E2Secrets in the Scat 2022-02-09 · 55 min
Scott Burnett is “Scatman”—an Australian ecologist on the trail of the secrets of poop. By identifying and analyzing animal scat for DNA and hormones, he discovers essential details of their behavior, how they fit in the ecosystem, and even how to protect them.
S49 · E3Great Mammoth Mystery 2022-02-16 · 55 min
Sir David Attenborough investigates a unique site in southern England where amateur fossil hunters uncovered giant mammoth bones and evidence of Neanderthals. A team of paleontologists and archaeologists soon discover that the site preserves rare evidence of the extinct beasts and early human inhabitants of Britain dating to over 200,000 years ago.
S49 · E4Augmented 2022-02-23 · 55 min
Follow the dramatic personal journey of Hugh Herr, a biophysicist working to create brain-controlled robotic limbs. At age 17, Herr’s legs were amputated after a climbing accident. Frustrated by the crude prosthetic limbs he was given, Herr set out to remedy their design, leading him to a career as an inventor of innovative prosthetic devices.
S49 · E5Determined: Fighting Alzheimer's 2022-04-06 · 55 min
Follow three women at risk of developing Alzheimer’s as they join a groundbreaking study to try to prevent the disease – sharing their ups and downs, anxiously watching for symptoms, and hoping they can make a difference.
S49 · E6Dinosaur Apocalypse: The New Evidence 2022-05-11 · 55 min
In the Badlands of North Dakota, a team of scientists think they might have found the fossilized remains of animals killed on the day an asteroid struck Earth 66 million years ago. The evidence points to a catastrophic event, with a jumble of rare fossils, including a pterosaur embryo still in its shell and a well-preserved patch of triceratops skin, mixed in with tiny spheres of clay and glass that could be the fallout from the massive asteroid impact. Sir David Attenborough guides us on a search for clues that could give an unprecedented snapshot of what happened in the dinosaurs’ final moments on Earth.
S49 · E7Dinosaur Apocalypse: The Last Day 2022-05-11 · 54 min
In the second episode of this two-part series, the search continues for signs of what happened on the day the dinosaurs died. Scientists uncover extremely rare fossils and more evidence that could link the dig site in North Dakota to the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs 66 million years ago. Among the fossils are tiny spheres of glass locked in amber. Inside one of the spheres is a speck of rock that appears to be a chemical match to the killer asteroid itself. And scientists uncover one of the most spectacular finds of all: an almost perfectly preserved dinosaur leg. Sir David Attenborough guides us on a search for clues that could provide an unprecedented snapshot of what happened in the dinosaurs’ final moments on Earth.
S49 · E8Why Ships Crash 2022-05-18 · 54 min
When the bow of the colossal Ever Given container ship plowed into the bank of the Suez Canal on March 23, 2021, international supply chains ground to a halt. What went wrong? Follow the dramatic efforts to free the ship and the investigation into one of the most expensive shipping disasters ever. Maritime experts analyze other recent accidents and try to figure out how such devastating crashes could be prevented.
S49 · E9Ice Age Footprints 2022-05-25 · 54 min
Thousands of ancient footprints stretch for miles across New Mexico’s White Sands National Park, capturing moments when Ice Age humans encountered now-extinct beasts, including mammoths and enormous ground sloths. These footprints tell an intimate story about what life was like during the Ice Age and reveal surprising new evidence about when humans arrived in North America.
S49 · E10Ultimate Space Telescope 2022-07-13 · 54 min
How did NASA engineers build and launch the most ambitious telescope of all time? Follow the dramatic story of the James Webb Space Telescope—the most complex machine ever launched into space. If it works, scientists believe that this new eye on the universe will peer deeper back in time and space than ever before to the birth of galaxies, and may even be able to “sniff” the atmospheres of exoplanets as we search for signs of life beyond Earth. But getting it to work is no easy task. The telescope is far bigger than its predecessor, the famous Hubble Space Telescope, and it needs to make its observations a million miles away from Earth—so there will be no chance to go out and fix it. That means there’s no room for error; the most ambitious telescope ever built needs to work perfectly. Meet the engineers making it happen and join them on their high stakes journey to uncover new secrets of the universe.