Professor of physics Jim Al-Khalili investigates the most accurate and yet perplexing scientific theory ever - quantum physics, the perplexing theory of sub-atomic particles. Turning his attention to the world of nature, can quantum mechanics explain the greatest mysteries in biology? The European robin navigates using one of the most bizarre effects in physics - quantum entanglement, a process which seems to defy common sense. Jim finds that even the most personal of human experiences - our sense of smell - is touched by ethereal quantum vibrations. According to new experiments it seems that our quantum noses are listening to smells. Jim discovers that the most famous law of quantum physics - the uncertainty principle - is obeyed by plants and trees as they capture sunlight during the vital process of photosynthesis. Jim wonders if the strange laws of the sub-atomic world, which allow objects to tunnel through impassable barriers in defiance of common sense, could effect the mechanism by which living species evolve?

Professor Jim Al Khalili from the University of Surrey delves into over 50 years of the BBC science archive to tell the story behind the emergence of one of the greatest theories of modern science, the Big Bang. The remarkable idea that our universe simply began from nothing has not always been accepted with the conviction it is today and, from fiercely disputed leftfield beginnings, took the best part of the 20th century to emerge as the triumphant explanation of how the universe began. Using curious horn-shaped antennas, U-2 spy planes, satellites and particle accelerators, scientists have slowly pieced together the cosmological jigsaw, and this documentary charts the overwhelming evidence for a universe created by a Big Bang.

The key to understanding the universe seems to be understanding its smallest components. But the quantum realm bears little resemblance to the universe we know. Image a particle that can be many places at the same time and communicate changes instantly across vast distances, even to the other side of the Universe. Shrinking down billions of times, into the realm of atoms and sub-atomic particles, takes us into a bizarre world of paradoxes and multiverses. Explore with us quantum physics and the potential applications in computer science.

Inside the world-renowned physics laboratory Fermilab, a team of scientists are constructing an audacious experiment to hunt for a mysterious new ‘ghost’ neutrino. If they find it, this could transform our understanding of the nature and fabric of our universe. The problem is, these tiny particles are almost impossible to detect.
Elsewhere, physicists conduct experiments in some of the most extreme environments on the planet: from deep mine shafts in South Dakota to vast ice fields at the South Pole. In these unlikely places supersized neutrino detectors hope to unlock the universe’s deepest secrets. Could neutrinos overturn the most precise theory of particle physics that humans have ever written down? Could they even be a link to a hidden realm of new particles that permeate the cosmos – so called dark matter? Scientists at Fermilab are edging towards the truth.

On a trip to the fortified Moroccan village of Ait-Ben-Haddou in the Atlas Mountains, Professor Brian Cox reveals how by watching the stars' motion across the night sky, it is quite natural for man to think he is at the centre of everything. That view was held for many ages, but innate human curiosity has eventually led to an understanding of mankind's true place in space and time, and an appreciation that Earth is not a focal point but a mere particle of rock in a possibly infinite expanse of space, 13.8 billion years from the beginning of the universe.

Our world, our solar system, our universe, none of it would exist without a ghostly particle called the neutrino. They are our early warning system whenever there's trouble in the universe. Neutrinos trigger star-killing explosions, supernovas. Neutrinos can answer so many questions, from why do we exist to how was the universe created. Neutrinos can be the very reason that we exist at all. The more we understand these elusive particles, the more we can gain insight into how the universe works.