Black holes are nature's ultimate abyss, capable of swallowing up a star the size of our Sun in seconds. There are millions of them out there, too dark to see, but gobbling up everything that gets too close. More frightening still, there is one at the center of the Milky Way - our galactic home. But is there more to a black hole than just darkness? This film looks at these menaces in a new light, to discover that they are not only destroyers - they are vital anchors for the planets and stars in galaxies like our own. Stunning CGI animation strips away the event ...

The Sun is a nuclear inferno, its surface raging with violent eruptions. Huge plasma storms eject electromagnetic debris across the solar system, with up to 20 threatening Earth every day. Dark spots on the surface indicate that an eruption is brewing, but once we've seen them, the race is on - a giant solar storm could be heading straight for Earth. The US Air Force shows us how they keep the skies safe by warning astronauts and rerouting pilots to avoid blasts of radiation. But where does all the Sun's power come from? This film delves inside this gas goliath to ...

Asteroids are constantly threatening Earth, with thousands lurking too close to our planet for comfort. We travel to Arizona to meet the team who spend every night scanning the heavens for asteroids that could threaten earth, and reveal how scientists test an intense laser beam they hope could one day deflect an asteroid away from Earth. But is there more to these deadly space rocks than the next Armageddon? At NASA we see astronauts train in weightless conditions for the first manned mission to an asteroid, and discover how asteroids could become cosmic gas stations ...

Mars has been a tough training ground, with half the missions sent there ending in failure. Swirling dust storms, deadly radiation, and arctic temperatures await the first, pioneering, astronauts. Despite the dangers, space agencies around the world race to launch the first human mission. So why explore this seemingly cold, barren wasteland? Mars was once a lot like earth. This film visits ancient riverbeds, polar ice caps, and giant volcanic regions, to find out what went wrong for this alien planet. Stunning CGI animation will sweep up Martian dust storms, dive

Alien worlds are out there. Astronomers now think almost every star has planets orbiting around it, creating billions of different environments in deep space. Weird bacteria exist in the most extreme places on Earth, there's no reason why life shouldn't thrive elsewhere. How will we find life elsewhere in the universe? Diving into the deepest depths of our galaxy in search of the places life could be hiding. Stunning CGI animation cracks open frozen moons blasting ice into space, reveals hidden oceans, and unveils the bizarre worlds where mountains are made of ...

Comets appear from nowhere and then blaze across the sky in a magnificent display of cosmic fireworks before disappearing into the darkness. This film reveals our extraordinary relationship with comets, exploring how these icy dirt balls may actually hold the key to all life on Earth. Stunning CGI animation tears open the comet to reveal the secrets locked inside its nucleus. We travel back in time to witness the early earth and the storm of meteor impacts that could have brought the water to its oceans. While they may pose a threat to life on earth, Comets could also...

We strip apart black holes, one of the most feared objects in the universe, and tear off swirling galaxies of stars, planets, and cosmic dust layer by layer to explore the secrets of these hungry menaces lurking right on our cosmic doorstep.

We strip apart the Sun and tear off boiling seas of plasma, light particles, and force fields layer by layer to explore the secrets that lie beneath the surface of Earth's powerhouse.

We strip apart asteroids and peel back surfaces, slice open craters, and exploding out rocks layer by layer to explore these miniature worlds and the secrets of the early solar system.

Jupiter is a planet of extremes. Twice the size of all the other planets in our solar system combined it's formed almost entirely from Hydrogen just like the sun. Yet little is known about this super sized world. Now NASA have launched a billion dollar space mission called JUNO to explore Jupiter's long-held secrets. We join JUNO scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory to unlock the mystery of intense radiation belts around the planet. In New York a dramatic experiment with molten rock reveals what could be supercharging this deadly radiation. Conditions in ...

How much more is there to the Universe than meets the eye? In this episode, we join the scientists who hunt for our hidden cosmos. In New Mexico, radio astronomers probe the cold and seemingly empty void of space to uncover vast clouds of hidden matter called intergalactic plasma. But astronomers now realize that our universe has a 'dark side' - a second kind of matter and a mysterious 'energy' that together make up most of the universe. We join teams in the UK, Italy and the United States hunting for so called dark matter and dark energy. We go behind the scenes at ...

The solar system and its planets seem like a familiar place. Yet scientists now think they've detected something huge lurking in the far reaches of the system we call home. Could it be that a missing, giant ninth planet orbits our sun in the dark reaches of space? We'll meet the astronomers hunting for this hypothetical world. Scientists who are only now beginning to understand how such a massive planet could have ended up so far away from the Sun - way beyond where science predicts planets can form. We join teams in the UK, Germany and the United States who are ...