Discovery

Alan Turing, born 23 June 1912, is famous for his key role in breaking German codes in World War II. But for mathematicians, his greatest work was on the invention of the computer. Alan Turing's brilliance at maths was spectacular. Aged 22, just a year after his graduation, he was elected a fellow of King's College Cambridge. And it was just a year after that, that he turned his attention to problems in the foundations of mathematics and ended up showing that a simple machine, set up to read and write numbers and to run a few basic functions, could in principle do all the things that are do-able in mathematics. His 'universal' machine was just a concept - a paper tape that could be read, interpreted and acted on robotically. But the concept was profound. World War II shortly afterwards took Turing's talents into other directions, but even while designing machines at Bletchley Park to break the German Enigma codes, he was wondering how much more a computing machine might do - play chess for example.And although the war work might have delayed Turing's academic work, it greatly accelerated progress in electronics, so that in 1945 he returned to his first love, creating a complete design for what he expected to be the world's first fully programmable computer, the National Physical Laboratory's ACE - the Automatic Computing Engine. In the end, beset by hesitation and bureaucratic delays, the ACE was overtaken by a rival team in Manchester, whose Small Scale Experimental Machine first ran on 21 June 1948. But the Manchester Baby as it became known, fulfilled the requirements laid down in Turing's seminal 1936 paper, and in a handful of instructions had the power to do any kind of maths or data processing, like a computer of today does. Turing soon joined the Manchester team, and again with remarkable prescience started work on artificial intelligence, wondering whether electronic machines could be programmed not just to do maths, but to think in the way human minds do - a hot topic of debate even now. Those explorations were cut short by his death in 1954, two years after he’d been prosecuted for his homosexuality. His death at a time when official secrecy still hid his code-breaking work, and when the history of computing was already being written meant that few appreciated his central role in today's dominant industry. But some enthusiasts hope they can write him back in where he belongs.In this second of two episodes devoted to Turing, the BBC's Roland Pease follows the events following Turing's design for the ACE machine at NPL, and the race against the Baby Computer in Manchester.(Image: Alan Turing. Credit: Bill Sanderson/Science Photo Library)

Alan Turing - born a hundred years ago on June 23 - is most famous for his key role in breaking German codes in World War II. But for mathematicians, his greatest work was on the invention of the computer. Discovery explores the legacy of the great man with a two-part special.Alan Turing's brilliance at maths was spectacular. Aged 22, just a year after his graduation, he was elected a fellow of King's College Cambridge. And it was just a year after that, that he turned his attention to problems in the foundations of mathematics and ended up showing that a simple machine, set up to read and write numbers and to run a few basic functions, could in principle do all the things that are doable in mathematics. His 'universal' machine was just a concept - a paper tape that could be read, interpreted and acted on robotically. But the concept was profound. World War II shortly afterwards took Turing's talents into other directions, but even while designing machines at Bletchley Park to break the German Enigma codes, he was wondering how much more a computing machine might do - play chess for example.And although the war work might have delayed Turing's academic work, it greatly accelerated progress in electronics, so that in 1945 he returned to his first love, creating a complete design for what he expected to be the world's first fully programmable computer, the National Physical Laboratory's ACE - the Automatic Computing Engine. In the end, beset by hesitation and bureaucratic delays, the ACE was overtaken by a rival team in Manchester, whose Small Scale Experimental Machine first ran on June 21 1948. But the Manchester Baby, as it became known, fulfilled the requirements laid down in Turing's seminal 1936 paper, and in a handful of instructions had the power to do any kind of maths, or data processing, like a computer of today does. Turing soon joined the Manchester team, and again with remarkable prescience started work on artificial intelligence, wondering whether electronic machines could be programmed not just to do maths, but to think in the way human minds do - a hot topic of debate even now. Those explorations were cut short by his suicide in 1954, following prosecution for his homosexuality. His death at a time when official secrecy still hid his code-breaking work, and when the history of computing was already being written meant that few appreciated his central role in today's dominant industry. But some enthusiasts hope they can write him back in where he belongs.In this first of two episodes devoted to Turing, producer Roland Pease follows the events leading up to Turing’s design for the ACE machine at NPL.(Image: Alan Turing. Credit: Bill Sanderson/Science Photo Library)

Two teams of virologists found themselves at the heart of bioterrorism maelstrom late last year when their studies on mutant bird flu were suppressed by US authorities. While security experts feared the reports were recipes for bioweapons of mass destruction, the researchers argued they held important lessons for the threat of natural flu pandemics developing in the wild.Now the authorities have backed down and the reports have been released. Kevin Fong hears how tiny variations in the genes of bird flu can completely change the behaviour of the pathogens and he asks whether deliberate genetic manipulation in the lab can replicate the natural genetic variations occurring in farms around the world.In 2009, the new strain of H1N1 flu emerged from a few villages in Mexico to infect the world in weeks. What experts fear is that a simple genetic change to H5N1 bird flu could allow it to spread as fast, but with far deadlier consequences. They argue that by identifying dangerous variants in the lab first, we'd be better prepared with vaccines ahead of the danger.Producer Roland Pease.(Image: A coloured transmission electron micrograph of the H5N1 virus, better known as bird flu. Credit: Science Photo Library)

Astronomer Marek Kukula from the Royal Observatory at Greenwich explores the scientific implications of the forthcoming transit of Venus across the face of the Sun, a rare astronomical event that will not occur again until 2117. Previous transits have helped establish fundamental facts about our solar system, including the distance and relative positions of all the planets that orbit our sun. But now, the forthcoming transit in June 2012, the last this century, will help planet hunters searching for other worlds across the galaxy (exo-planets). As Marek discovers, technology now makes it possible to pinpoint not only a planet's mass, size, and distance from its star but we can also establish whether it has an atmosphere and what that atmosphere might consist of and therefore whether it could theoretically support life. Thanks to the next transit event, the search for another Earth has taken a bold step forward.(Image: Venus (black dot) is silhouetted as it orbits between the Sun and the Earth during the transit of Venus seen from Bangkok on 6 June 6 2012. Credit: AFP/Getty Images)

Professor Jim al-Khalili talks to Cern physicist Tejinder Virdee, about the search for the elusive Higgs boson, also known as the "God particle". Last December, scientists working at the Large Hadron Collider caught a tantalising glimpse of the Higgs; but they need more data to be sure of its existence. Twenty years ago, Tejinder set about building a detector within the Large Hadron Collider that's capable of taking 40 million phenomenally detailed images every second. Finding the Higgs will validate everything physicists think they know about the very nature of the universe: not finding it, will force them back to the drawing board. By the end of the year, we should know one way or the other.

Plastic Surgery does not always have a good press, more often associated with the excesses of Hollywood. But the birth of modern day reconstruction has far nobler roots. Dr Kevin Fong looks at the surprising, and heroic origins of the field of plastic and reconstructive surgery. It is a field that was born in response to the great air-battles of World War II, and the development of a new fighter plane - the Hawker Hurricane - that left its legacy not just in terms of success in the air, but in the devastating injuries caused to many of the airmen who flew them. He looks at the work of pioneering surgeon Archie McIndoe and his brave airmen "guineapigs" who underwent months, if not years, of painful surgery that led to the birth of modern day reconstructive surgery.

How fixed are our moral beliefs? Can these beliefs be reduced to neurochemistry?While we may believe that our moral principles are rigid and based on rational motives, psychological and neuroscientific research is starting to demonstrate that this might not actually be the case.In this edition of Discovery, Dr Carinne Piekema investigates how scientific studies are starting to shed light on how our social behaviour is affected by our environment and neurochemistry. She discusses with Carol Dweck about how people's moral opinions can be modified through behavioural techniques, and with Molly Crockett and Paul Zak about how similar effects can be brought about by directly altering brain chemistry.While this knowledge might have future benefits, the ability to alter people's behaviour and attitudes towards others also raises potential ethical issues. In the final part, Carinne talks with neuroethicist Neil Levy who invites us to consider the philosophical questions raised by such advances.

Imagine if your health as an adult is partly determined by the nutrition and environment you were exposed to during a critical period of development - the first 1000 days of life. A strong body of scientific evidence supports this explosive idea, and is gradually turning medical thinking on its head. To understand the cause of chronic adult disease, including ageing, heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis, obesity and lung problems we need to look much further back than adult lifestyle – but to the first 1000 days.Dr Mark Porter investigates this influential idea and meets the world experts leading this burgeoning field of research. He talks to David Barker, Professor of Clinical Epidemiology at the University of Southampton and the man behind the Barker Theory. This links the risk of developing illnesses in adult life to poor nutrition in the womb – typically evident when a baby is born underweight. Low birth weight is associated with a number of long term health problems in adults, ranging from osteoporosis to stroke. Chronic disease may be expressions of key developments in the womb. "That does not mean you are doomed, it means you are vulnerable" explains Professor David Barker.Researchers have studied the Dutch Famine or 'Hunger Winter' at the end of the World War II where babies developing in the womb were exposed to severe conditions. Nearly 70 years later, Tessa Roseboom, a researcher at the Academic Medical Centre in Amsterdam, has found long term health risks for Dutch adults who were in the womb during that difficult winter.In recognising the long term impact of events during these early critical phases of development, the medical profession could dramatically change its approach to disease prevention.

One hundred years ago, the first humans reached the South Pole of this planet. More than 40 years ago, man first walked on the moon. When will our species first set foot to explore the planet Mars? Kevin Fong seeks a likely launch date, and asks who will get us there and why we really need to explore the Red Planet.

Can the heroic age of Antarctic exploration help to show us the way back to the Moon?One hundred years ago, Scott reached the South Pole. However, more than four decades passed before people went back there. On the Moon, Neil Armstrong took his leap for mankind in 1969 and it has been forty years since the last astronaut left the lunar surface. Presenter Kevin Fong talks to space scientists and historians to find out if Robert Scott's Antarctic exploits provide a road map for future human exploration of the Moon and the planet Mars.Imperial and geopolitical motivations lay behind both South Polar exploration and the effort which took humans briefly to the lunar surface. But what would get us back to the Moon - would it be geopolitical rivalry or science?In times of economic austerity (in the West at least), what scientific questions are important enough to justify exploration of the Moon? The six short Apollo visits to the lunar surface were enough to crack the mystery of how the Moon itself formed - namely that a Mars sized planet crashed into the early Earth. The molten rock that was blasted into orbit by that collision coalesced as our lunar neighbour.Sending astronauts back to explore the rocks of the Moon could solve the most important mysteries about the early Earth - when did life first evolve and under what sort of conditions? Their findings could also settle the questions about the origins of our oceans here on Earth . Among Kevin's other interviewee are NASA's Chief Administrator Charles Bolden, Apollo 17 astronaut Harrison Schmitt (the only geologist to walk on the Moon), NASA scientists Chris McKay and Jennifer Heldmann, Dr Ian Crawford of Birbeck College, University of London and space historian Roger Launius of the National Air and Space Museum of the Smithsonian Institute.

Kevin Fong looks beyond the failure of Robert Falcon Scott's expedition to be the first to reach the South Pole and focuses instead on the scientific legacy of Scott's explorations of Antarctica between 1901 and 1912.In recent years, much has been written about Scott the polar loser and bungler. But that personalised focus ignores the pioneering scientific research and discoveries. The revelations transformed Antarctica from an unknown quantity on the map into a profoundly important continent in the Earth's past and present. Before Scott and Shackleton trekked across the vast ice sheets in the early 1900s, no-one was sure whether there was even a continent there. Some geographers had suggested Antarctica was merely a vast raft of ice anchored to a scattering of islands. The science teams on Scott's expeditions made fundamental discoveries about Antarctic weather and began to realise the frozen continent's fundamental role in global climate and ocean circulation. They discovered rocks and fossils which showed Antarctica was once a balmy forested place. They mapped the magnetism around the South Pole for both science and navigators. They found many new species of animals and revealed the extraordinary winter breeding habits of the penguins. The dedication to scientific discovery is most poignantly revealed by fossils that Scott's party collected after their disappointment of being beaten by Amundsen and a few weeks before they froze to death trudging across the Ross ice shelf. They found a particular plant fossil which had been one of the Holy Grails on the early explorations of Antarctica's interior. Its discovery proved an hypothesis raised by Darwin among others that all the southern continents were once linked together by a landmass that would lain where Antarctica is today. The fossils were also important evidence to support the new and controversial theory of Continental Drift - a theory which now underpins the entirety of modern Earth science.(Image: Historical image of the team of the Terra Nova Expedition standing by a Norwegian tent at the South Pole. Credit: Science Photo Library)

To mark the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, the BBC's Sean Coughlan narrates one of the most authentic versions of events in existence. Using voice synthesis to re-create the strange, twitter-like, mechanical brevity of the original Morse code, this programme brings to life the tragedy through the ears of the wireless operators in the area that night.On the night of the disaster, the network of young Marconi wireless operators on different ships and land stations frantically communicated with each other across the cold expanses of the North Atlantic in an effort to mount a rescue for the doomed vessel. All these messages were recorded at the time in copper-plate handwriting, now scattered across the world in different collections, but together forming a unique archive. Conceived and created by Susanne Weber.Producer: Alex Mansfield

In the last of the Global Body series, Lynne Malcolm is joined by a panel of experts to discuss the future of the health of the human body.Lynne is joined by, Tony McMichael – Professor of Population Health at the Australian National University in Canberra; Professor Maxine Whittaker, form the Australian centre for International and Tropical Health at the University of Queensland and Professor Robyn Norton, Director of the George Institute and Professor of public health at the University of Sydney and Professor of Global Health and James Martin Professorial Fellow, University of Oxford.(Image: Computer artwork of the blood circulation system in a human figure. Credit: Science Photo Library)

As part of the BBC World Service's Human Race season, ABC in Australia's Lynne Malcolm explores how Homo sapiens have adapted to changes in their environment, economy and social structures; how health is affected by new environments and lifestyles; and what might happen to the human race in the future? Is the 'Hollywood Dream' of a city of beautiful, fit, wealthy people anything near the truth for this huge city? It's a city with a long history of immigrants settling from all over the world. Lynne Malcolm explores how some of these inhabitants have adapted biologically to their new environment over time, and what the impact is on their health and bodies. BBC Correspondent, Valeria Perasso, discovers however, that it's not all good news, with obesity on the rise in the city and there are also massive discrepancies in the standards of health, and quality of life amongst its inhabitants.(Image: a female face surrounded by a distorted DNA autoradiogram. Credit: Science Photo Library)

As part of the BBC World Service's Human Race season, ABC in Australia's Lynne Malcolm explores how Homo sapiens have adapted to changes in their environment, economy and social structures; how health is affected by new environments and lifestyles; and what might happen to the human race in the future? Lured by the bright lights, or driven from the countryside by political and economic turmoil, population pressures, and environmental vulnerability, billions of people have been migrating to the cities in the developing world. The BBC's correspondent in Manila Kate McGeown, discovers what happens to our human bodies when we leave the fields and shorelines and head into the big city. She reports back to Lynne, how traffic, pollution, smoking, overcrowding and lack of affordable fresh food is sparking an epidemic of diabetes, heart disease, hypertension and cancers. Often outweighing the benefits of higher wages, better access to healthcare and education.

As part of the Human Race season on the BBC, Discovery starts its exploration into the Global Body. Over the next 4 weeks, Lynne Malcolm finds out how the modern world is affecting our biology. The series starts in Sri Lanka, where it asks whether the predominantly rural lifestyle of fishermen and farmers is well suited to the human body. BBC Correspondent Charles Haviland takes us to the shores of Sri Lanka to see what life is like for fishermen and to the mountains where people live off the variety of crops they grow for themselves. These populations are pretty healthy. But he also discovers that some of the rural inhabitants – the tea pickers – have a much harder time. There’s a report on how an inherited disease, thalassaemia, that makes people debilitated, and is quite common amongst Asian people is treated in Sri Lanka. And the programme discovers that thalassaemia survives because it confers resistance to malaria.(Image: Conceptual computer artwork of a male figure seen against autoradiograms of genetic sequences. Credit: Science Photo Library)

It's nearly a year (11 March 2011) since Japan was struck by a huge earthquake and Tsunami. Clouds of radioactive fall out from damaged nuclear reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi power station spread across heavily populated areas - many kilometres from the plant. The government and power company TEPCO have been heavily criticised for not telling the local population soon enough about what was going on - in many cases people evacuated to areas with higher radiation levels than those they fled. As a result, deep mistrust developed towards government or TEPCO pronouncements on the nuclear incident. In this special one hour edition of Discovery Mariko Oi, visits the Fukushima prefecture to find out what has happened since. She meets scientists working to piece together an accurate picture of the effects of the radioactive fall out, both on the environment and human health. She hears from local community grassroots organisations, many people living in fear of radiation, they argue for a mass clean up operation to reduce radiation levels to zero and further evacuations, especially of children. Mariko examines the current decontamination efforts, which involve removing and disposing of huge quantities of soil and concrete contaminated with caesium 137 – a radioactive isotope which can persist in the environment for 30 years or more. The programme questions whether attempting to remove such contamination is really effective - or even necessary, and contrasts the fears of radiation with the scientific reality.(Image: A journalist watching stricken Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant at Okuma town in Fukushima prefecture. Credit: AFP/Getty Images)

Located in the western pacific, the Mariana Trench is the deepest part of the ocean, plunging down 11km. Down there it's pitch black, icy cold and the pressure is immense. Now explorers with funding from the private sector are planning to return to the bottom of the Trench, for the first time for over 50 years. Rebecca Morelle meets Jim Gardner, who works for the US Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping, and has just completed the most detailed survey ever of the Mariana Trench, using sonar.Alan Jamieson, an ecologist at Oceanlab at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, uses remote controlled submersibles to study the animals and plants that live at extreme pressure in the deepest parts of the oceans. He tells Rebecca why he believes it is preferable to deploy robots rather than humans to do this research. Legendary marine biologist and underwater explorer, Sylvia Earle, argues that it is essential for us to visit the depths of the ocean and see the extraordinary environment with our own eyes. As the former science chief for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA - the ocean's equivalent of NASA - Sylvia Earle says that the seas have always been the poor relation to space.Rebecca finds out from Bill Raggio of precision glass company Rayotek in San Diego, how to build a glass sphere for Triton submarines which will stop the three-man crew from being crushed by the pressure a the bottom of the Mariana Trench.And Sandra Brook from the Marine Conservation Biology Society talks about how research scientists may work with the commercial teams, like Triton, in the future as resources dry up for purely research submersibles.

Located in the western pacific, the Mariana Trench is the deepest part of the ocean, plunging down 11km.Down there it's pitch black, icy cold and the pressure is immense. The only time it was visited, was over 50 years ago by US naval lieutenant Don Walsh and Swiss engineer Jacques Picard. Now four teams of explorers are risking their lives in a new race to the deep. Rebecca Morelle travels to California to meet former property developer Chris Welsh who is hoping to travel by himself to the bottom of the trench in a five metre long torpedo like submarine equipped with wings and a tail fin. Her next stop is with the Triton team, who take her for a ride under the Caribbean sea in one of their submersibles, a prototype for the vessel that will be able to travel to the Mariana Trench. Rebecca also reports on a project being lead by James Cameron, the director of the film Titanic. And her final visit is to DOER Marine, where Liz Taylor tells her about the company’s plans to build a reusable submarine.

It sometimes seems to rule our lives and yet some scientists think it is an illusion. From birth to death we seem to be swept up in a relentless and inescapable journey through time, but what is this strange place we call the present moment? Why does the past seem fixed and the future so uncertain. Was the universe born into time or did time arise with the universe? Will time continue forever or will it fade like the stars? These are some of the questions that were discussed at a recent conference in Bergen and Copenhagen and on a ship between the two. In Discovery this week, science writer Zeeya Merali joins some of the leading physicists and cosmologists discussing the nature of time and its place in our lives and the Universe.Producer: Martin Redfern

Angela Saini explores the revolution taking place in the streets beneath our feet as she reveals the story behind a new urban design movement called shared space. She travels to The Netherlands where shared space was born, inspired by the radical traffic planner, Hans Monderman, who envisaged a world without barriers, signs, pavement and traffic lights. But not everyone is taken with this revolution, in particular the blind and visually impaired who say that shared space is fundamentally flawed and makes their lives less safe.

Geoff Watts meets researchers trying to find a new way to fight depression by studying those who never get it. In the second of two programmes Geoff meets scientists at the University of Manchester, studying the brains of people who have undergone traumatic life events without becoming seriously depressed and comparing them to the brains of those people who do. The hope is that new psychological therapies or even preventative medications might be developed to treat the one in five people who will at some point in their lives, become clinically depressed.(Image: MRI scan of the head and brain. Credit: Corbis Royalty Free)

Geoff Watts meets researchers looking for clues to the origins of depression as a way of finding new solutions to treating it. In the first of two programmes Geoff talks to the father of evolutionary medicine, Randolph Nesse and asks why hasn't natural selection made us less vulnerable to psychological diseases? Could it be that depression is in some way useful to our lives?(Image: A depressed young boy. Credit: Science Photo Library)

Jason Palmer explores the past, present and future of Seti. In the second programme he looks at what sort of signal might ET send us, and how might we respond?Jason talks to Seti's co-founder Frank Drake as well as its current active researchers, including Seth Shostak, Jill Tartar and Doug Vakoch.

In the first of two programmes, the BBC's science reporter Jason Palmer, meets the researchers behind Seti, the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence and looks at the prospects for success in the face of funding issues and the sheer size of the task. He talks to Seti's co-founder Frank Drake as well as its current active researchers, including Seth Shostak, Jill Tartar and Doug Vakoch.(Image: Computer artwork of our solar system. Credit: Science Photo Library)

For more than half a century aeronautical engineers have been working on the dream of hypersonic passenger flight. London to Sydney in four hours is an often cited goal. In Discovery Gareth Mitchell looks not at the past history of hypersonics, but at current developments. He meets engineers working on the propulsion systems and developing new materials specifically for hypersonic flight. Technologies which could be one applied to space craft as well as aeroplanes.

Folk tales are full of fleeting phenomena like will o' the wisps, faint glows that must have spooked our ancestors. But these days, it's just about impossible to escape the omnipresent illumination of modern life, and these evocative spooklights have vanished like ghosts. Chemist Andrea Sella explores the science of lights so dim, they can be witnessed only in complete darkness. From the spontaneous combustion of marsh gas to the lightning sparks emitted by crushed sugar, Professor Sella finds there's more to light than ever meets the eye.

The Higgs particle is the final cornerstone of scientists’ model of the material universe. The Large Hadron Collider at CERN was built so researchers could discover it. Last week, they announced a partial sighting – the ghost of a Higgs particle hoving into view in their plethora of data. But it could be just a phantom, and may start to fade with more data next year. Roland Pease meets the scientists who are chasing this legendary particle, and gets exclusive access to the preparations for next year’s experiments.

An increasing understanding of genetics has uncovered new targets for antiviral drug treatments. Although still in the very early stages, scientists say they may be able to develop drug treatments which can be used against a range of viruses. At present antiviral drugs are very specific, usually attacking just one virus. However the research which Kevin Fong examines in this edition of Discovery suggests 'broad spectrum antivirals', drugs capable of curing all viral infections from the common cold to HIV, may be with us in a few years time. Such drugs could revolutionise medicine dealing a blow to viruses in much the same way as the invention of antibiotics did to bacterial infections over the last century.

When leptin failed to be a wonder solution to obesity, this hormone produced by fat cells, disappeared from the headlines. Twenty years on scientists now believe leptin is critical to how the body works, regulating appetite, the immune response, inflammation and depression. Vivienne Parry investigates.

One hundred years since humans first ventured to the South Pole, we are on the verge of a new era in Antarctic exploration. In Discovery, Andrew Luck-Baker talks to scientists who'll soon be entering the last untouched realms on the planet. They are poised to drill into ancient lakes trapped beneath thousands of metres of polar ice. British, Russian and United states scientists all have ambitious projects underway to do this. Among other quests, they will search for unique forms of life in these deep and hidden icy lakes. Their efforts might ultimately lead to finding life on other worlds.

For six months, CERN scientists guarded the best kept secret in science - that they'd seen tiny subatomic particles called neutrinos breaking the universal speed limit. The measurements were at the boundaries of scientific techniques - the discrepancy was just 10s of nanoseconds; parts of their apparatus barely ran at that speed. For six months they checked and then re- checked again every step of their analysis. And still the result held up. When the results were finally released at the end of September, the headline writers had a field day. Nothing sells copy like proof that Einstein was wrong. But fellow researchers at CERN were less excited. The overwhelming belief was that there still remained some hidden error. And for those who ran the experiment, the dreadful concern that sooner or later that error could turn up, and their triumph might become the stuff of mockery. And the next day the investigations continued. Roland Pease meets the scientists who have staked their reputations on the result, on the critics who think they can spot the mistake, and the theoreticians who think they can explain it all.

In the second of a two-part Discovery series, Robots that Care, Jon Stewart visits research institutes in the USA and UK to explore the brave new ideas about how robots may be able to help humans on a one-to-one basis.He talks to key roboticists in Japan, Europe and the USA, their collaborators and volunteers about the practicalities and ethics of using robots to help people.A number of studies have been done and more are underway in the use of robots for people wanting to lose weight and for children who are autistic. Robotocists are also conducting long-term projects with people who have suffered strokes. The robots are designed as personal instructors to help motivate and restore motor function. But they must be emotionally smart and coax rather than order about like a sergeant major. The roboticists are also examining how they might customise their robots to fit the personalities of the people whom they will serve.We have put robots on the moon but it seems that it is more difficult to put them in homes. A visit to a robot house in the UK shows that there are many pitfalls still to overcome before robots will be useful in our living rooms and kitchens.Finally, Robots that Care asks: what are the dangers of making the robots too human? Are there problems of dependency? What ethical and moral questions arise when robots socialise human beings?

In the first of a two-part series, Jon Stewart charts the advances in robotics that are increasingly leading to direct one-to-one contact between humans and robots. Jon visits robotocists and their collaborators in the US and UK and asks how the robots will be used in the future. He examines the way cinema has shaped our ideas of robots and investigates the gulf between our expectations of what robots can do and the reality.A fundamental question that scientists are posing is how we should consider the robots who, in the near future, will live alongside us in our homes. Should they be considered slaves, pets or friends? Jon also explores how the ideas of author Isaac Asimov, that firstly robots should do no harm, have evolved over the decades.Photo: Getty

Angela Saini reports from India on the country’s vast e-governance project aimed at driving out corruption, reducing bureaucracy and getting the nation’s 1.2 billion people online. Everything from a country-wide unique ID scheme (based on the iris system – Biometrics), to a roll out of service kiosks where everything from a parking fine to a death certificate can be issued. One of the main drivers behind this is immense task reducing both corruption and bureaucracy by going electronic - that's the idea - does it stand up? She asks critics as well as proponents. This can be thought of as a kind of Click special - and combines some of the science and technology with the impact and implications on society.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.

Explorations in the world of science.