Science Britannica. Part 3 Clear blue skies.

Professor Brian Cox presents the final episode of this three part documentary series; he explores the drivers of scientific progress and looks to the future to see how science will progress, mainly focusing on the benefits and restrictions of curiosity driven research. Cox recreates one of John Tyndall’s experiments by mixing milk and water, and then shining a light in to the tank, Cox explains why different colours appear in the liquid and how this is the same effect found in the sky. He then goes on to explain another of Tyndall’s experiments which led Tyndall to accidently sterilise air by leaving air in a box for days whilst testing what objects would do in air without dust. Cox looks at on-going research about the sun; he interviews Helen Mason, who is conducting such research. They discuss whether curiosity driven research is an expensive waste of time and whether funding should only be allocated to research that is deemed helpful. Cox visits the Royal Society to look at how they’ve changed their research to focus on immediate practical problems in order to contribute to the economy and create wealth; something some people believe has less academic merit. Cox recreates an experiment by John Harrison; bimetallic strips are dropped in to boiling water and the two strips separate – Harrison used these strips to make an accurate clock so that the navy could know their longitude. Cox then visits a GlaxoSmithKline laboratory to look at how medicine has progressed; he interviews Dr Tom Webb who explains how targeted and focused the processes of creating new drugs are. Cox discusses some of the drawbacks of such targeted research such as dismissing results that do not give you the exact answer you are looking for. Cox recreates an experiment by William Perkin to prove the importance of negative results; the experiment originally attempted to create synthetic quinine but instead created a new die, mauveine. Cox visits the building site of The Francis Crick institute and interviews Sir Paul Nurse who wants to create an institute that offers scientists creative freedom but with relevant objectives. Cox concludes that the reason so many British scientists have been successful is because British institutions have allowed free thinking and encouraged sometimes controversial research.