Polly wants a crackdown when it comes to the illegal trade in the world's most beautiful and intelligent birds: parrots. NOVA goes undercover with a US government sting that breaks an international parrot smuggling ring, landing some surprising suspects.
NOVA profiles "Genie," a girl whose parents kept her imprisoned in near total isolation from infancy. When social workers discovered her as a teenager, Genie had not learned to walk or talk. This NOVA documentary includes never-before-seen footage of Genie during her rehabilitation and probes how and when we learn the skills that make us "human."
NOVA explores the legacy of the great Auk, a magnificent flightless bird that was hunted to extinction over a century ago. In a journey retracing its migratory route, host Richard Wheeler kayaks from Newfoundland to Cape Cod and discovers that other marine species face the Auk's luckless fate.
NOVA tackles the long-taboo subject of menopause, profiling new research and examining the medical and ethical controversies that arise when science enables women to postpone menopause or even to bear children long after "the change." Stockard Channing narrates.
NOVA travels deep into the Amazon wilderness in search of a mysterious tribe- a tribe that dismembered and partially ate three prospectors in 1976. Locating the group, NOVA lives with them for three months, gaining insight into the customs and beliefs of a people whose lifestyle has not changed for centuries.
NOVA probes the 1994 Los Angeles earthquake. Even as the city struggles to repair itself from the tragedy, seismic pressure continues to build. Scientists fear that newly discovered faults could, at any moment, trigger California's most devastating natural disaster.
Ten million years ago, an enormous volcanic eruption buried much of what is now Nebraska in up to 10 feet of ash, preserving countless skeletons of prehistoric big game animals. NOVA joins the discoverer of this treasure trove to learn what life was like when a lot more than buffalo roamed the West.
Hobbled by defective eyesight because of its original, bungled prescription, the Hubble Space Telescope was recently repaired in a dramatic Space Shuttle mission. NOVA follows the exploits of astronauts who saved the day, and the stunning work that Hubble has performed in the months since its repair.
NOVA travels to Lake Baikal, the world's oldest and deepest lake, containing one-fifth of all the fresh water on Earth. Investigating Baikal from above, below and all around, NOVA charts its dramatically changing environment over the course of four seasons.
NOVA explores the common threads that link the more than 5,000 languages of Earth, including a controversial theory that claims to reconstruct words from a time when only a handful of languages were spoken, recalling the biblical story of the Tower of Babel.
The subjects of Stone Age cave paintings thunder onto the screen as NOVA explores Woolly Mammoths. Recent discoveries show that the hairy ancestors of elephants fought off extinction much longer than anyone thought, surviving on an isolated island in the Arctic Ocean until as recently as 4,000 year ago.
NOVA investigates the myth and reality of the first known Europeans to reach North America -Vikings. These intrepid Norsemen explored and settled parts of present-day North America 500 years before Columbus set sail.
NOVA looks at the most successful life forms on the face of the planet in Ants: Little Creatures Who Run the World, hosted by Harvard University's internationally renowned ant authority, naturalist Edward O. Wilson. What's impressive about ants is how they practice what we preach: family values. Unselfishness is the rule. Everything they do is for their colony's good. For them, socialism works.
NOVA uses recently discovered documents to uncover the complicity of German architects and engineers in the Holocaust. Focusing on Auschwitz, the program tells a tale of ever-deepening evil as the prison camp was methodically converted into a super-efficient factory for genocide.
Born joined at the pelvis, Siamese twins Dao and Duan were brought to the United States from Thailand to assess their chances for being separated surgically. NOVA covers the intricate planning and protracted operations that eventually made the two girls into two distinct individuals.
Why do some people crave chocolate? Why does music make some people cry at the movies? How did kissing begin? Mystery of the Senses, a five-part NOVA special airing over four consecutive nights, seeks answers to these and other questions as it explores the complexities of smell, taste, touch, hearing, and vision. In this exploration, series host and naturalist Diane Ackerman travels around the world to investigate the science, history, and cultural values that influence our senses.
Why do some people crave chocolate? Why does music make some people cry at the movies? How did kissing begin? Mystery of the Senses, a five-part NOVA special airing over four consecutive nights, seeks answers to these and other questions as it explores the complexities of smell, taste, touch, hearing, and vision. In this exploration, series host and naturalist Diane Ackerman travels around the world to investigate the science, history, and cultural values that influence our senses.
Why do some people crave chocolate? Why does music make some people cry at the movies? How did kissing begin? Mystery of the Senses, a five-part NOVA special airing over four consecutive nights, seeks answers to these and other questions as it explores the complexities of smell, taste, touch, hearing, and vision. In this exploration, series host and naturalist Diane Ackerman travels around the world to investigate the science, history, and cultural values that influence our senses.
Why do some people crave chocolate? Why does music make some people cry at the movies? How did kissing begin? Mystery of the Senses, a five-part NOVA special airing over four consecutive nights, seeks answers to these and other questions as it explores the complexities of smell, taste, touch, hearing, and vision. In this exploration, series host and naturalist Diane Ackerman travels around the world to investigate the science, history, and cultural values that influence our senses.
Why do some people crave chocolate? Why does music make some people cry at the movies? How did kissing begin? Mystery of the Senses, a five-part NOVA special airing over four consecutive nights, seeks answers to these and other questions as it explores the complexities of smell, taste, touch, hearing, and vision. In this exploration, series host and naturalist Diane Ackerman travels around the world to investigate the science, history, and cultural values that influence our senses.
What amazing processes go on inside super-athletes and couch potatoes alike? NOVA uses the latest medical imaging techniques to explore the body's incredible inner workings-with the help of Olympic ice skater Bonnie Blair, world record long jumper Mike Powell and others.
In the third installment of a 10-year project, NOVA checks up on a group of aspiring doctors who've been chronicled since their first day of medical school in 1987. Now bona fide MDs and in the middle of residency training, the group faces the awesome responsibility of curing the sick and keeping their own lives intact.
What does it take to win at Indy? NOVA follows champion race driver Bobby Rahal and a team of engineers as they strive to design a new car that can win the checkered flag at the Memorial Day classic. The program also features racing insights from top drivers Emerson Fittipladi, Willy T. Ribbs and Lyn Saint James.