Kind: captions
Language: en
I'm on a hunt for one of the Earth's
most alluring and Elusive ingredients
and my journey starts off with a
bang I'm David poke and I've managed to
talk my way into this hidden Lair deep
underground in search of gold the gold
is microscopic yes you can't see with
the naked ey so we're way past the days
of finding big gold nuggets sticking out
of the wall going hey Bob I got one here
I'd like to strike it rich but that's
not why I'm here I'm on a quest to
understand the basic building blocks of
the universe the
elements I want to know what they are
how they've shaped our lives and how we
are shaping them they are going to let
me pour the gold into the mold there's
about $12 million here Dave oh my God go
what's that gorilla doing
there what are things made of it's a
simple question but the answer is
astonishing let's take the basic
requirements for life you and me and the
dizzying variety of shapes sizes and
species on planet Earth the magic number
is
six that's right all living things share
these half dozen elements including some
of the most abundant in the Universe
like carbon so all life I mean trees old
bacteria us Justin Bieber everything
made of carbon chains that's the idea
these and the other building blocks of
life can be found here on the periodic
table this iconic chart and all the
elements it represents are essential to
understanding everything from
Plants to
planets from the birth of the
universe to the cells of the human
body what are these elements
anyway why do they behave the way they
do oh man this is what I call a table of
the
elements I think it's best if we do this
with shields down a little homegrown
chemistry sorts the benign tastes like
salt from the big guns oh here we go oh
I'll assume you've stripped this car
down taking out the engine and all the
dangerous Parts no we want to create the
biggest nightmare that they might come
across I am not seeing much car over
there that's cuz there's not much car
left David we examine the hidden order
within atoms that dictates reactivity
conductivity appearance and more we are
at 50,000 times magnification those are
the atoms let's keep going in a little
bit more those are atoms I and seeing
atams along the way we reveal the story
of how Humanity's Mastery of the
elements has stimulated trade provoked
Wars and powered the rise of
civilization and Industry copper is King
okay copper is used for everything we
use it for infrastructure we use it for
electronic Goods I love copper I do I'm
getting that as we explore the farthest
reaches of the periodic table and push
the limits of science itself this is
plastic dude it is a CL where will the
elements take us next should I worry
that my gloves are on fire it might be
slippery you're warning me about the
slipperiness dude there's three sharks
in here this side over here which has
the rare earth metal that they're not
supposed to like in the water she comes
oh she didn't like it at all she was
aiming right at it and she was like what
the heck is this thing it's sky laab and
the ultimate goal of this is to find
earthlike planets
exactly hunting the elements on Nova
premiering April 4th on
[Music]
PBS