Professor of physics Jim Al-Khalili investigates the most accurate and yet perplexing scientific
theory ever - quantum physics.
1) Einsteins Nightmare
Professor Jim Al-Khalili investigates the most accurate and yet perplexing scientific theory ever -
quantum physics. At the beginning of the 20th century scientists were led into the hidden workings
of matter, into the sub-atomic building blocks of the world around us. They discovered phenomena
unlike any encountered before - a realm where things can be in many places at once, where chance and
probability call the shots and where reality appears to only truly exist when we observe it. Albert
Einstein hated the idea that nature, at its most fundamental level, is governed by chance. Jim
reveals how, in the 1930s, Einstein thought he'd found a fatal flaw in quantum physics because it
implies that sub-atomic particles can communicate faster than light in defiance of the theory of
relativity. In the 1960s the scientist John Bell showed there was a way to test if Einstein was
right and quantum mechanics was actually mistaken. Jim repeats this critical experiment - with
shocking results.
2) Let there be Life
Jim Al-Khalili routinely deals with the strangest subject in all of science - 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?
