NOVA Season 15, Episode 4: Why Planes Burn

1

Top Gun and Beyond

Today's sophisticated fighter jets can almost fly themselves, but well-trained pilots are still needed to win air battles. NOVA looks at how planes and pilots are adapting to high technology.

55 min

2

How to Create a Junk Food

Julia Child introduces NOVA's behind-the-scenes look at how science aids in the creation of snack foods.

55 min

3

Buried in Ice

Scientists investigate the frozen remains of members of the 19th century Franklin Expedition to the Canadian Arctic and ask why all perished.

55 min

4

Why Planes Burn

Airplane fires are often deadly. NOVA looks at efforts to make fires aboard planes less likely and more survivable.

55 min

5

Battles in the War on Cancer: A Wonder Drug on Trial

In part one of a two-part special presentation, NOVA reports on the trials to determine whether the new drug Interleukin-2—the first to make use of the body's own disease-fighting strategy—will live up to its promise as a pivotal cancer breakthrough. Jane Pauley of NBC News hosts and narrates.

55 min

6

Battles in the War on Cancer: Turning the Tide

Breast cancer claims the lives of four American women every hour. Jane Pauley of NBC News hosts and narrates this NOVA report on stepped-up efforts to reduce the death rate from this all-too-common killer.

55 min

7

The Mystery of the Master Builders

Princeton professor and author Robert Mark tracks down the engineering secrets of some of the beautiful buildings in the world including Notre Dame in Paris, St. Paul in London and the Roman Pantheon.

55 min

8

Whale Rescue

It was a blustery day in December 1986, and the New England Coast was in the midst of a winter storm, accompanied by strong on-shore gales and an unusually high tide—conditions perfect for stranding whales in the confined shallows of Cape Cod. NOVA recounts this tragic episode and the happy suprise ending for the young whales who survived after being nursed back to health by the New England Aquarium in Boston.

55 min

9

The Man Who Loved Numbers

NOVA explores the life of Srinivasa Ramanujan, a poor clerk from India who astounded mathematicians in the 1910s with his brilliant insight into the world of numbers.

55 min

10

Race for the Superconductor

NOVA charts an electronics revolution in the making as Japan and the United States race to develop a material that will conduct electricity at room temperature with zero resistance.

55 min

11

Can You Still Get Polio?

Most cases of polio in this country are caused by the vaccine designed to prevent it. NOVA examines the controvery surrounding the nation's vaccine policy.

55 min

12

Pioneers of Surgery: The Brutal Craft

Part one of a four-part series on the pioneers of modern surgery relives the early days, when surgery was practiced without the benefit of anaesthesia or antisceptics and patients usually died.

55 min

13

Pioneers of Surgery: Into the Heart

Once unthinkable, open-heart surgery is now an everyday miracle. NOVA looks at the brave doctors and patients who make it possible.

55 min

14

Pioneers of Surgery: New Organs for Old

From kidneys to hearts, NOVA examines the daring attempts to replace diseased organs with transplanted ones.

55 min

15

Pioneers of Surgery: Beyond the Knife

Surgeons have always been eager to help patients, even at the risk of killing them. NOVA looks at some of the excesses of surgery, and at how new drugs and technologies are rendering some operations obsolete.

55 min

16

Can the Vatican Save the Sistine Chapel?

Science meets art in the controversial effort to restore Michelangelo's famous Sistine Chapel frescoes.

55 min

17

Can the Next President Win the Space Race?

Thirty years after Sputnik, the United States space program is mired in uncertainty, while the Russians, Europeans, Japanese and others sprint onward and upward.

55 min

18

Do Scientists Cheat?

NOVA examines the troubling question of scientific fraud: How prevalent is it? Who commits it? And what happens when the perpetrators are caught?

55 min

19

Who Shot President Kennedy?

Using previously unavailable technology, NOVA probes the available evidence surrounding the 1963 assassination of John F. Kennedy.

55 min

20

The Light Stuff

Reliving a Greek myth takes an effort of mythic proportions, as NOVA reveals in its behind-the-scenes report of a human powered-flight across the Aegean Sea, a journey that symbolically recreated the mythical flight of Daedalus. NOVA follows the epic journey of the human-powered plane Daedalus 88 from the early prototypes to its dramatic landing in the surf after a 74-mile flight from the island of Crete to Santorini.

55 min

21

The All-American Bear

The life of the shy, intelligent black bear in the wild—foraging, mating, playing and constantly preparing for its remarkable hibernation—is captured for the first time on film by NOVA.

55 min

22

Can We Make a Better Doctor?

NOVA embarks on a 10-year project to profile—in its entirety—the education of a doctor. In the premiere episode, we follow a handful of students as they start their freshman year at Harvard Medical School under a revolutionary program emphasizing early clinical contact with patients.

55 min