This is what a nuclear disaster area looks like.
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Broadcast locations and times:

North America: PBS, July 28 & 29 @ 10pm ET / 9pm Central
Europe: ZDF/arte, July 31 @ 10pm
Australia: SBS, August 6, 13, 20 @ 8:30pm EST

Not broadcast in your country? Contact your local broadcaster and/or email www.genepoolproductions.com

Music by Kevin Macleod http://incompetech.com 'Come Play With Me' & 'Lost Frontier'

*Watch with headphones on!
Is 45 minutes really the longest anyone can stay in a perfectly silent, pitch-black room?
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Check out Audible: http://bit.ly/AudibleVe
Want to watch the whole hour of silence? http://youtu.be/jr1UMFC9DV0

Many stories have circulated claiming the longest anyone has stayed in an ultra-quiet anechoic chamber is 45 minutes, the reason being any longer would drive you insane. To me this sounded like unsubstantiated rubbish, like the claim the Great Wall is the only manmade structure visible from space. So I put my own psyche on the line, subjecting myself to over an hour of the most intense quiet on Earth. No, this was not THE quietest room on Earth (-9dB) but it is one of the quietest, and the truth is once you put a person inside, they are by far the loudest thing in there so the sound rating of the room is irrelevant.

I was not surprised to find that I could stay in there for as long as I liked and feel perfectly fine. What was surprising is that my heartbeat was audible. You can hear it on the sound recording. Now I wasn't consciously aware of the sound of my heart while in the room, but I was more aware of the feeling of it beating.

Huge thank you to everyone at BYU: Duane Merrell, Spencer Perry, Cameron Vongsawad, Jazz Myers, Ann Clawson, and Robert Willes.

Well an atom's made of protons, neutrons, and electrons
the first two in the nucleus, the third around it
it's mostly empty space, but it feels solid in any case

The elements are all the different types of atoms
they differ by the number of protons in the middle.
Hydrogen has only one, but Uranium has a ton

It's just chemistry that you and me are made of these atoms

Well atoms bond together to form molecules
Most of what's surrounding me and you
Water, sugar, things yet undreamed of of of of

Look around you, see the combinations in a eucalypt tree
Mendeleev's periodicity
gives us sand and water and the air above ove ove ove ove

It's just chemistry that you and me are made of these atoms:
Hydrogen, Oxygen, Carbon, Nitrogen, make up the world's life forms

Do do do you, do do do do
but do you wonder how
matter forms something strange
when there's a chemical change?

Where did these atoms come from? They were fused in stars
Light elements combine releasing light from afar
Fusion in the sun, creates Helium

I guess what I be saying is you gotta use your reason
To open up your mind and see the cause of the seasons
-How do we know what's true? The scientific method shows you

It's just chemistry that you and me are made of these atoms

Atoms bond together to form molecules
Most of what's surrounding me and you
Water, sugar, sand and you'll find things undreamed of

So Argon, Neon, Xenon
There's no need to overstate
'Cause we are of course
This, of this, of this, we're made: atoms

Inspired by this article by Prof. Emily Oster: http://bit.ly/Cellcancer
Check out Audible: http://bit.ly/AudibleVe
Featuring Physics Girl: http://bit.ly/PhysGirl

Special thanks to Chris Gale and Physics Girl for filming this video.

Music by:
Amarante Music "One Last Time": http://bit.ly/VeAmarante
Kevin McLeod, Incompetech.com "Harlequin"

JJ Thomson proposed the first model of the atom with subatomic structure. He had performed a series of experiments and was credited with the discovery of the first sub-atomic particle, the electron. He therefore proposed a new model of the atom called the plum pudding model. In this model, the plums represent negatively charged electrons which can be plucked out of the atom, leaving behind some positively charged pudding. In this film, cherry tart is used as a delicious substitute for plum pudding.

Countries are powered by a diverse range of energy sources, but in Australia electricity generation mainly has one source: fossil fuels. Coal, natural gas, and oil account for over 90% of the country's electricity. Hydro provides 7% with only 0.3% provided by wind and solar. Should Australia consider nuclear power? It is a complicated issue leaving many uncertain about its place in Australia's energy future.

Vitamins are 13 molecules essential for life that our bodies can't make themselves.
Watch Vitamania here: https://ve42.co/vita

Now available worldwide, except France and Germany where it will be broadcast on ARTE soon. Subscribe on the Vitamania website for updates.

Use #vitamania to join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

Vitamania is a Genepool Productions feature documentary for SBS Australia, CuriosityStream, and ARTE France. Principal production investment from Screen Australia, in association with Film Victoria.

What was the procedure to launch a nuclear missile?
Uranium premieres: July 28 & 29 on PBS at 10pm ET/ 9pm Central
France and Germany: July 31 at 10pm on ZDF/arte
Norway: August 5 & 6 at 21:30 on NRK2
Australia: August 9, 16, 23 at 8:30pm on SBS
Sweden: TBD
Middle East: TBD

For more information on other screenings go to
https://www.facebook.com/uraniumtwistingthedragon
www.genepoolproductions.com

A big thank you to The Titan Missile Museum, Yvonne and Chuck.
http://www.titanmissilemuseum.org/

Space footage courtesy of NASA

People have a lot of different ideas about what gravity is: a downward force that stops you from flying off into space, an attraction smaller objects experience towards larger objects, or a mutual attraction between all masses. It is the last of these ideas that best reflects a scientific conception of gravity.

I have the photic sneeze reflex so I sneeze when I look at bright light.
Check out 23andMe: http://ve42.co/23andme
*So technically the single nucleotide swap (C instead of T) is not actually in a gene per se but in an intergenic region on chromosome 2. It's also not clear exactly how this affects physiology or causes the sun sneeze but there is correlative evidence that every copy of this single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) is associated with a 1.3x increase in likelihood of having the photic sneeze reflex.

I have wanted to make a video about sun-sneezing for a long time. It is something I've experienced my whole life. When I go from a dark room indoors into full sunlight I invariably sneeze. I thought everyone did it. So my original question was why do people sneeze when they see bright light? That led me to consider what possible evolutionary advantages there could be to sneezing in sunlight. The obvious advantage to me is that sunlight kills pathogens of which there may be many in your snot or mucus. So sneezing in sunshine is a much better idea than sneezing inside a dark, damp cave where you may be living.

For more info, check out:
Web-Based, Participant-Driven Studies Yield Novel Genetic Associations for Common Traits
http://journals.plos.org/plosg....enetics/article?id=1

Filmed by Raquel Nuno

How can you Yo-Yo without the string attached?
Check out Audible: http://bit.ly/AudibleVe
For more Ben Conde: http://bit.ly/VeBenConde
For Beyond Slow Motion: http://bit.ly/VeBeyondSlowMo

For more on yo-yos check out: http://bit.ly/290wR3a

How to yo-yo without a string attached... So many crazy tricks and the science that makes it possible.

Edited and animated by Daniel Joseph Files

Everything is not as it first appears. This simple plastic ball looks purple until you swing it in a circle and reveal its true nature. Inside are three light emitting diodes (LEDs), which are red, green and blue. They turn on and off in sequence very quickly. When still, the ball appears purple because your eyes and brain don't 'refresh' quickly enough to perceive the changing colours. However, when swung in a circle, the ball changes colours at different locations so the colours don't merge with each other and the ball's true nature is revealed. Now let's not think too carefully about how this illusion is conveyed through video (because the camera doesn't refresh quickly enough to perceive the colours changing either - so you have no hope of seeing it on YouTube even frame by frame).

My hypothesis is that the algorithm, rather than viewer preference, drives views on the site. As the algorithm shifts, various YouTubers experience burnout (as what used to work no longer works) and right now click-through rate is the key metric. So clickable titles and thumbnails are the only way to get a lot of impressions and hence views - they are the only way to go viral. This leads me to wonder which audiences will become most prevalent on the site and if there will even be a place for educational content. In the long-term, hopefully YouTube is able to measure satisfaction through surveys and other metrics to ensure an optimal experience for everyone on the site.

Flipchart artwork by Maria Raykova
Filmed by Raquel Nuno
Thumbnail by Ignat Berbeci

Scientists have combined ultrasound, viruses and synthetic drugs to control regions of the brain.
Check out Skillshare: https://skl.sh/veritasium (first 500 get 2 months free)

Special thanks to Prof. Mikhail Shapiro and Dr. Jerzy Szablowski:
http://shapirolab.caltech.edu

Human brains are complicated - the most complicated thing in the known universe, many people say. So far we understand little - just that certain regions of the brain appear to be involved in certain activities and certain disorders. In extreme cases this has led to the practice of removing sections of the brain, or using electrodes or optical fibers to control activation rates. What is unique about this approach is it offers a way to turn on and off specific brain regions without invasive surgery. It has promise because it combines existing technologies: micro-bubbles, ultrasound, synthetic viruses, and synthetic drugs to achieve this goal.

Special thanks to Patreon supporters:
Donal Botkin, James M Nicholson, Michael Krugman, Nathan Hansen, Ron Neal, Stan Presolski, Terrance Shepherd

Animations and editing by Alan Chamberlain

Music from http://epidemicsound.com "Experimental1"

Negative Pressure Exists! http://bit.ly/TFilQ8
Vsauce's Space Straw: http://bit.ly/XubIm3
Smarter Every Day's Prince Rupert's Drop: http://bit.ly/10VQBGW
ViHart's Optimal Potatoes: http://bit.ly/14egJoe

Thanks to Questacon for filming! Check out their slow-mo playlist: http://bit.ly/ZoWFGR
Science Alert brings science to your news feed: http://on.fb.me/14ehuxA

Music by Kevin Mcleod (http://incompetech.com): Pale Rider & The Cannery

It takes the moon about 27 days to orbit the Earth. What makes it go round? It is the gravitational attraction of the Earth on the moon. Due to the moon's velocity, the Earth keeps pulling the moon towards it without the moon actually getting closer to the Earth. This is similar to how satellites orbit the Earth.

In Queenstown, New Zealand, I jumped off the Kawarau Bridge - the site of the first bungy jump. It was a thrilling experience, preceded by a terrifying, gut-wrenching half hour wait. All in all an awesome adventure, even if the woman fitting my harness didn't know the first thing about the acceleration of free-falling bodies.

The aurora borealis or northern lights is one of the most spectacular natural displays on the planet. Theories about its origins have been debated for centuries and common misconceptions persist that the aurora is the sun's rays scattered off ice crystals in the high atmosphere. In truth, the light is created more than 100km above Earth's surface as high speed electrons and protons ejected from the sun in a solar flare or coronal mass ejection collide with air molecules in the upper atmosphere. The charged particles from the sun excite air molecules which then de-excite by emitting light. The display is most common around the north and south poles because the Earth's magnetic field deflects the solar wind from the equator to the poles. Here the magnetic field dips towards the Earth's surface, channeling the charged particles into the atmosphere.

Music is by Kevin MacLeod http://incompetech.com, the song is called Mirage

How to light a candle without touching a flame to the wick. A common misconception is that a candle burns by burning the wick. What is actually burning is wax vapour which is drawn up through the wick. When you blow a candle out, wax vapour continues to rise off the candle so you can light this vapour which burns back down to the wick, relighting the candle.

How should we depict an atom? Like a solar system with electrons orbiting the nucleus on hula hoop orbits? That idea is so last century! Bosi takes us into the quantum world, where an electron's position and velocity aren't well defined - all we can calculate are the probabilities e.g. of finding an electron at different points in space. When we do that, we find electrons do not neccessarily occupy circles or spheres in space. Rather their probability densities make all sorts of interesting shapes from the dumbell to the peanut with the donut around it.