Join or Sign In
Sign in to customize your TV listings
By joining TV Guide, you agree to our Terms of Use and acknowledge the data practices in our Privacy Policy.
Nova Season 44 Episodes
Season 44 Episode Guide
21 Episodes 2016 - 2024
Episode 1
Secrets of the Sky Tombs
Wed, Jan 4, 201753 mins
The towering Himalayas were among the last places on Earth that humanity settled. Scaling sheer cliff sides, a team of daring scientists hunts for clues to how ancient people found their way into this forbidding landscape and adapted to survive the high altitude. They discover rock-cut tombs filled with human bones and enigmatic artifacts, including gold masks and Chinese silk dating back thousands of years, and piece together evidence of strange rituals and beliefs designed to ward off the restless spirits of the dead.
Episode 2
The Nuclear Option
Wed, Jan 11, 201753 mins
Five years after the earthquake and tsunami that triggered the unprecedented trio of meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, scientists and engineers are struggling to control an ongoing crisis. What's next for Fukushima? What's next for Japan? And what's next for a world that seems determined to jettison one of our most important carbon-free sources of energy? Despite the catastrophe-and the ongoing risks associated with nuclear-a new generation of nuclear power seems poised to emerge the ashes of Fukushima. NOVA investigates how the realities of climate change, the inherent limitations of renewable energy sources, and the optimism and enthusiasm of a new generation of nuclear engineers is looking for ways to reinvent nuclear technology, all while the most recent disaster is still being managed.
Episode 3
Search for the Super Battery
Wed, Feb 1, 201753 mins
We live in an age when technological innovation seems to be limitlessly soaring. But for all the satisfying speed with which our gadgets have improved, many of them share a frustrating weakness: the batteries. Even though there have been some improvements in last century, batteries remain finicky, bulky, expensive, toxic and maddeningly short-lived. The quest is on for a "super battery," and the stakes in this hunt are much higher than the phone in your pocket. With climate change looming, electric cars and renewable energy sources like wind and solar power could hold keys to a greener future... if we can engineer the perfect battery. In Search for the Super Battery, renowned gadget geek and host David Pogue explores the hidden world of energy storage, from the power--and danger--of the lithium-ion batteries we use today, to the bold innovations that could one day charge our world. He wants to uncover what the future of batteries has in store for our gadgets, our lives - and even our planet. Might the lowly battery be the breakthrough technology that changes everything?
Episode 4
Ultimate Cruise Ship
Wed, Feb 8, 201752 mins
Weighing 54,000 gross tons and stretching over two football fields, the Seven Seas Explorer is no ordinary boat. Join pioneering shipbuilders as they endeavor to build the ultimate cruise ship. It will be decked with the finest gold, marble, and crystal and designed to offer guests the roomiest accommodations of any commercial cruise ship. However, engineering opulence is no easy feat. NOVA follows a pioneering team of ship builders as they embark on what is advertised to be a milestone in maritime engineering.
Episode 5
The Origami Revolution
Wed, Feb 15, 201753 mins
The centuries old Japanese art form has gone high tech. Building with examples in biology and applying sophisticated mathematics, computer software and good old fashion imagination it looks like any structure can be folded and practical applications are everywhere.
Episode 6
Why Trains Crash
Wed, Feb 22, 201752 mins
From derailments to head-on collisions to drivers killed at road crossings, deadly train accidents claim dozens of lives each year. But just how unsafe are the railroads? NOVA investigates recent rail tragedies and advances in train tech that could help prevent them, taking a special look at Japan's super-efficient bullet trains, which have a perfect safety record. What would it take to usher in a new golden age of safer, faster, more modern and reliable train travel?
Episode 7
Holocaust Escape Tunnel
Wed, Apr 19, 201754 mins
For centuries, the Lithuanian city of Vilnius was one of the most important Jewish centers in the world, earning the title "Jerusalem of the North," until the Nazis destroyed it. About 95% of its Jewish population of Vilna, its name in Hebrew and Yiddish, was murdered and its synagogues and institutions were reduced to ruins. The Soviets finished the job, paving over the remnants of Vilna's famous Great Synagogue, for example, so thoroughly that few today know it ever existed. Now, an international team of archaeologists are trying to recover this lost world. They will excavate the remains of its Great Synagogue and uncover one of Vilna's greatest secrets: a lost escape tunnel dug by Jewish prisoners inside a horrific Nazi execution site.
Episode 8
Building Chernobyl's Mega Tomb
Wed, Apr 26, 201752 mins
An international team of engineers races to construct a gargantuan dome to contain the lingering radioactive materials and crumbling remains of the Chernobyl nuclear reactor, decades after being the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster.
Episode 9
Chinese Chariot Revealed
Wed, May 17, 201753 mins
Experts reconstruct and test China's first super-weapon, the chariot, which dominated the battlefields for more than 1000 years.
Episode 10
Poisoned Water
Wed, May 31, 201753 mins
In this special report, NOVA investigates the water disaster in Flint and unravels a disturbing truth about the vulnerabilities of water systems across the country. Discover the delicate intricacies of water chemistry, the biology of lead poisoning, and the engineering challenge of replacing this ravaged infrastructure.
Episode 11
Eclipse Over America
Mon, Aug 21, 201753 mins
On August 21, 2017, millions of Americans witnessed the first total solar eclipse to cross the continental United States in 99 years. As in all total solar eclipses, the moon blocked the sun and revealed its ethereal outer atmosphere - its corona - in a wondrous celestial spectacle. While hordes of citizens flocked to the eclipse's path of totality, scientists, too, staked out spots for a very different reason: to investigate the secrets of the sun's elusive atmosphere. During the eclipse's precious seconds of darkness, they gathered new clues on how our sun works, how it can produce deadly solar storms, and why its atmosphere is so hot. NOVA investigates the storied history of solar eclipse science, and joins both seasoned and citizen-scientists alike as they don their eclipse glasses, tune their telescopes, and behold the Eclipse Over America.
Episode 12
Death Dive to Saturn
Wed, Sep 13, 201744 mins
For over a decade, the Cassini space probe has been sending dazzling images of Saturn's breathtaking rings and mysterious moons. Join Nova on a suspenseful ride during Cassini's final hours as it dives into Saturn's atmosphere.
Episode 13
Secrets of the Shining Knight
Wed, Oct 4, 201752 mins
Discover what it was like to be a knight in shining armor and follow the historic manufacturing process. Master armorers re-engineer the Greenwich armor - considered some of the greatest armor ever made - and then put it to the test.
Episode 14
Ghosts of Stonehenge
Wed, Oct 11, 201752 mins
Who built Stonehenge and why? Groundbreaking archaeological digs have revealed major new clues about Britain's enigmatic 5,000-year-old site and the people who constructed it.
Episode 15
Secrets of the Forbidden City
Wed, Apr 3, 202454 mins
The architectural design of Beijing's ancient complex of palaces and temples enabled it to survive centuries of earthquakes.
Episode 16
Killer Volcanoes
Wed, Oct 25, 201753 mins
Volcanologists search for an elusive volcanic mega-eruption that plunged the medieval earth into a deep freeze. Investigate the geologic evidence from Greenland all the way to Antarctica to identify the 750-year-old culprit.
Episode 17
Killer Hurricanes
Wed, Nov 1, 201752 mins
Killer Hurricanes pursues the riddle of an 18th century Caribbean superstorm that killed 20,000, the highest known death toll of any single weather event. To reconstruct its epic scale and investigate what made it so devastating, NOVA joins historians and storm sleuths as they track down clues in eyewitness chronicles, old ruins, and computer simulations.
Episode 18
Killer Floods
Wed, Nov 8, 201753 mins
All over the world, scientists are discovering traces of ancient floods on a scale that dwarfs even the most severe flood disasters of recent times. Over a vast expanse of Washington state, called the Cahnneled Scablands, the level prairie gives way to bizarre, gargantuan rock formations: house-sized boulders seemingly dropped from the sky; a cliff carved by a waterfall twice the height of Niagara; and potholes resembling ones scoured out by rivers today, but hundreds of times bigger. Like forensic detectives at a crime scene, geologists study these strange features and reconstruct catastrophic Ice Age floods more powerful than all the world's top ten rivers combined. This film follows their efforts to uncover the geologic fingerprints of other colossal megafloods in Iceland and - improbably - on the seabed of the English Channel, where hundreds of thousands of years ago another deluge smashed through a land bridge connecting Britain and France. It turned Britain into an island for the first time. These great disasters ripped through terrain and transformed continents in a matter of hours.
Episode 19
Extreme Animal Weapons
Wed, Nov 22, 201752 mins
Why some animals have extreme armaments, including claws, horns, fangs and stings.
Episode 20
Bird Brain
Wed, Dec 20, 201752 mins
Join NOVA to witness the brainpower of birds. Long mocked as empty-headed, our feathered friends hide surprisingly acute intelligence. But how smart are they? Watch as scientists test avian aptitude and challenge our basic notions of intelligence.
Episode 21
Day the Dinosaurs Died
Wed, Dec 27, 201753 mins
Investigate how an asteroid vanquished the dinosaurs 66 million years ago. Join scientists as they drill into the impact crater and, for the first time, reconstruct the hell on earth that unfolded in the minutes, hours and months after the impact.
