How the Universe Works
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How the Universe Works
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What Does Space Smell Like?
Space smells like gunpowder and steak.
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How can we peer back into the Big Bang? It may be as easy as turning on your television.
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02:35
How the Universe Works
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1 Percent of TV Static Comes from Light of the Big Bang
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Will gravity or expansion win? There are three endgames: the universe will continue expanding forever, gravity and expansion will find balance, or gravity wins and the universe begins to get smaller.
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02:19
How the Universe Works
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Will the Universe Expand or Contract?
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Jupiter's weather doesn't come from the sun; it comes from deep within the planet itself. Jupiter also spins faster than any other planet in our solar system.
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02:18
How the Universe Works
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Why Jupiter Has A Giant Red Spot
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The Planck telescope peers through space and time towards the beginning of everything to capture an image of our universe from more than 13 billion years ago, 380,000 years after the Big Bang.
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01:45
How the Universe Works
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13 Billion Years Ago, This Was Our Universe
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It may take light as much as a million years to escape from the suns fiery interior; from there, it has to travel 93 million miles to Earth, traveling at 186,000 miles per second -- about 8 minutes.
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02:40
How the Universe Works
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Today's Sunlight Was Produced Before Human Civilization Began
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In November 2012, astronomers spotted a new planet 100 light years from Earth. There may be as many as 200 billion rogue planets in our galaxy - and one could be headed our way.
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02:51
How the Universe Works
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Rogue Planet Collision
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In 2005, NASA's Cassini spacecraft captured an astounding sight: geysers of icy water spewing from Enceladus, one of Saturn's moons.
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02:46
How the Universe Works
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Is There Life on Saturn Moon Enceladus?
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The core of Saturn is a scalding 21,000 degrees, twice the temperature of the sun's surface.
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03:34
How the Universe Works
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The Birth of Saturn
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On December 7, 1995, NASA's Galileo spacecraft dropped a probe into Jupiter's atmosphere.
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01:47
How the Universe Works
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Lessons From NASA's Galileo Probe
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To discover what created the Milky Way, scientists have to look back 13.6 billion years to the moments just after the Big Bang.
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03:27
How the Universe Works
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Did A Black Hole Create the Milky Way?
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Do black holes create stars? Theres direct evidence that the ravenous appetite of a black hole sparks stars into life.
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02:55
How the Universe Works
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How the Milky Way Got Its Stars
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Earth's orbit around the sun is unstable and the farther Earth is from the sun, the more it cools. Are we headed for a global catastrophe?
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03:48
How the Universe Works
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Snowball Earth
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Everything we know and see started with the Big Bang but physics has yet to figure out exactly how it happened.
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02:52
How the Universe Works
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What Physics Doesn't Know About the Big Bang
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NASAs Solar Dynamics Observatory listens to the sun by speeding up 40 days of recording into a few seconds
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02:49
How the Universe Works
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This Is What The Sun Sounds Like
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Mars is about half the size of Earth, yet has volcanoes that are much larger than the ruptures on our planet. In this web exclusive, explore off-world volcanoes.
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05:29
How the Universe Works
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Volcanoes on Other Planets
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NASA's space probes find Triton covered in frozen nitrogen ice.
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02:22
How the Universe Works
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Nitrogen and Moon Dust
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You can thank dark matter! As the universe expanded, dark matter became a web that stretched across space. It pulled in normal matter to create galaxies.
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03:10
How the Universe Works
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How Do Galaxies Form?
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Scientists have been searching for dark matter particles for years, yet we still have no idea what they look like. One theory suggests we can’t find it because there are many different dark matter particles.
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02:24
How the Universe Works
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What REALLY is Dark Matter?
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Exoplanets are smaller and dimmer than stars. It makes them incredibly difficult to spot.
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01:27
How the Universe Works
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How Do Scientists Find Exoplanets?
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Some alien worlds orbiting red dwarf stars might resemble giant eyeballs. They could be some of the most beautiful places to live in the universe.
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02:04
How the Universe Works
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Living Near a Red Dwarf Could be Gorgeous
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The Earth could be a second generation planet.
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02:55
How the Universe Works
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Why Are There Few Earth-Like Planets?
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It’s beautiful, but don’t get too close. The planet’s density exerts a gravitational pull over 15 times stronger than on Earth.
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00:30
How the Universe Works
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This Planet is a Giant Diamond
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The area where dark meets light on an exoplanet is called the terminator line.
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00:33
How the Universe Works
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The Terminator Line on a Planet
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Meet the artist who has created a machine that creates portraits using his own blood as ink. The result is some amazing art but even more interesting science.
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02:44
How the Universe Works
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All In Vein
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As if making origami cranes wasn’t impressive enough, see how one man makes them dance together. Tiny magnets control their synchronized movement.
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01:24
How the Universe Works
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Throwing Shapes
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A space shuttle's camera captured several white blinking dots on film near planet Earth. What are these objects and why were they blinking?
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02:45
NASA's Unexplained Files
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Blinking Dots
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The U.S. Air Force created the Condon Report in 1968 to address supposed UFO sightings. The report stated that "further extensive study of UFO's probably cannot be justified" and is seen by some as an attempted government cover up.
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01:55
NASA's Unexplained Files
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The Condon Report
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James McDivitt, a NASA astronaut and engineer in the 1960's, reported he saw and filmed a strange object in space. Is there a logical explanation or was there really something out there?
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01:46
NASA's Unexplained Files
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Something Out There
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Countless mysterious objects have been caught by NASA's cameras. Many astronauts have even reported seeing unidentified flying objects. Has NASA recorded the first traces of extraterrestrial life?
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00:31
NASA's Unexplained Files
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Sneak Peek
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After the Apollo 16 astronauts return to Earth, photos taken in space appear to show an unidentified flying object floating near the spacecraft. It takes decades for experts to determine what was hovering near the American astronauts
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02:33
NASA's Unexplained Files
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Apollo 16 Mystery Sighting Solved Decades Later
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On a routine space walk, Astronaut Luca Parmitano starts to feel water building up in his helmet. Mission Control aborts the walk but Parmitano struggles to get back to the ISS as the water still rises.
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02:05
NASA's Unexplained Files
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Drowning in Space
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It looked like a massive spacecraft launching from the sun. What was the mysterious dark object?
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03:08
NASA's Unexplained Files
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The Time Scientists Thought They Saw The Real Death Star
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