Key Stages: 2 - 4

Description

PAYU Price Code link:  Price Code M

Episode Length 50 min

Documentary series tracing man's exploration of our solar system.

Episode 1: Different Worlds
This Episode examines how early space probes such as Mechta, named after the Russian word for 'dream', heralded the beginning of planetary exploration. Mehta was the first man-made object to join the nine planets orbiting the sun - but how could the probe help man's understanding of how the planets came to exist?

Episode 2: Terra Firma
This Episode investigates geological activity, looking at the discovery of frozen lava plains on Venus, and a volcano on Mars that would dwarf Mount Everest. Scientists postulated that despite these intriguing surface features, the planets were effectively dead. However, pictures from the moons of Jupiter and Neptune would soon contradict this theory.

Episode 3: Giants
This Episode looks at the vast planets of gas at the far reaches of our solar system that remained an enigma to astronomers for centuries - Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. In 1977, the Voyager space craft began a twelve-year journey that would span four billion miles, and discover storms that last for centuries, shattered moons, and gigantic ocean worlds.

Episode 4: The Moon
This Episode investigates our understanding of the moon. Even after twenty years of lunar exploration, including six manned missions, scientists remained confused by the evidence held in lunar rock, unable to solve the riddle of the moon's formation. Finally, a young astronomer from Arizona suggested that the moon could have been born from the Earth itself.

Episode 5: Star
This Episode examines the quest to understand the sun, the centre of our solar system, from the simple etchings of the astronomer Galileo to the discoveries of the latest solar probes. The latest scientific images reveal that the sun is a gigantic nuclear generator, a swirling mass of superheated gases that travel along powerful magnetic field lines.

Episode 6: Atmosphere
This Episode describes the investigation of weather systems found throughout the solar system. Scientists have discovered sulphuric acid rain and metallic snow on Venus, while space probes have revealed the arid surface and frozen seas of Mars and the mysteries of the gas giant, Saturn.

Episode 7: Life
This Episode examines how our understanding of the evolution of life on earth has changed and explores the evidence for life on other planets. In 1976, two robotic probes suggested that the surface of Mars was dead. But the latest research reveals that this may not be the case and that it is possible that life on earth many have evolved from Mars.

Episode 8: Destiny
This Episode looks at the fate of the solar system and explores the new planetary systems that are being found around nearby stars.

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