Browse all episodes of Scientific American Frontiers

Episode 01

Episode 02

Episode 03

Special from the Soviet Union

Episode 05

Episode 06

In the episode entitled, "Sci-Fly", Scientific American Frontiers comes to the Georgia Institute of Technology to film the International Aerial Robotics Competition and its creator, Prof. Robert C. Michelson during its inaugural year.  The competition involved fully autonomous aerial robots attempting to complete a complex task without human intervention.

Episode 08

Special from France

Episode 10

Episode 11

Episode 12

Episode 13

Special from Egypt and Israel

Episode 15

Bionics

Special From Germany

Contests

Science 911

Science and Sports

Life's Big Questions

About All Your Can Eat

Science Italian Style

Prime Time Primates

It's a Kid's World

Wild West

Dragon Science

In the episode entitled, "Flying High" (Robo Flyers segment), Alan Alda travels to the Georgia Institute of Technology to film the International Aerial Robotics Competition and to interview its creator, Prof. Robert C. Michelson.

Flying High

Creatures of the Deep

21st Century Medicine

Inventing the Future

Science Safari

Pieces of Mind

Going to Extremes

Robot's Alive

Expedition Panama

Beyond Science?

Nordic Sagas

The Art of Science

The New Zoos

Science in Paradise

Journey to Mars

Animal Einsteins

Life's Little Questions

Spiders!

Voyage to the Galapagos

Natural Born Robots

Never Say Die

Mediterranean on the Rocks

The Frontiers Decade

Some of the nations top neuroscientists uncover new evidence of our brain's ability to change.

Changing Your Mind

Discover the science behind people who push themselves to the limits of human performance.

SuperPeople

How did life arise on Earth? What separates humans from apes? Will machines one day invent themselves? Learn more here.

Life's Really Big Questions

Learn about advances in the repair and replacement of the hard-working heart.

Affairs of the Heart

Why can't you tickle yourself? Is laughter uniquely human? These little questions might have some big answers.

Life's Little Questions II

Alan Alda learns that sometimes saving endangered species requires restoring whole ecosystems.

Wild Places

Researchers are uniting biology and technology to give hope to the paralyzed.

The Bionic Body

Get to know chimpanzees, how they socialize with each other, new dangers they face, and just how similar our species truly are.

Chimps R Us

Join aviation engineer Paul MacCready and Alan Alda as they test fly a variety of unconventional planes.

Flying Free

Alan Alda explores the real science behind fad foods, eating habits and lifestyles.

Fat and Happy?

Pet Tech

The Gene Hunters

Scientists reconstruct past events from evidence of excavated remains.

Dead Men's Tales

Alien Invasion

Medical treatments for children with physical disabilities.

Growing Up Different

Science and technology improves on sports.

On the Ball

New technologies and research techniques, some from the work of pioneer oceanographer Robert Ballard, open up the oceans' depths to humans.

Beneath the Sea

Science and engineering students participate in a design contest, an aerial robot contest, a human powered submarine race and robot soccer games.

Games Machines Play

Body Building

A Different Way to Heal?

Unearthing Secret America

Make Up Your Mind

The Intimate Machine

Forever Wild

Mysteries of the Deep

Deep Crisis

The Wonder Pill

Calls of the Wild

You Can Make it On Your Own

Worried Sick

Losing It

Don't Forget

Future Car

Hot Times in Alaska

The Dark Side of the Universe

“Coming into America” explores how prehistoric immigrants (host Alan Alda calls them “the true American pioneers”) might have arrived here---up to 20,000 years ago. Conventional wisdom has been that the “Clovis people” made their way down from Siberia about 13,000 years ago and spread out. But archaeologists interviewed point to artifacts in various places around the U.S. that are far older---and there's evidence that the ice sheets remained in place longer than previously thought---casting doubt on that theory.

Coming Into America

Surgical Slimmers

Cars That Think

Going Deep

Chimp Minds

Hot Planet - Cold Comfort

Hydrogen Hopes

Hidden Motives

The Secret Canyon

Cybersenses

Robot Pals

Scientific American Frontiers was an American television program primarily focused on informing the public about new technologies and discoveries in science and medicine. It was a companion program to the Scientific American magazine. The show was produced for PBS in the U.S. by The Chedd-Angier Production Company, Watertown, Massachusetts, and typically aired once every two to four weeks. To this day, the shows can be viewed on-line at their website, and continue to air regularly on the national digital channel World.

The show first aired in 1990 with MIT professor Woodie Flowers who served as the original host from 1990 to the spring of 1993. Actor Alan Alda became the permanent host starting in the fall season of 1993 and continued until the show ended in 2005. Alda's tenure has been notable for his humble and often humorous approach: in one memorable segment, he became car sick while driving an experimental, virtual reality vehicle. In 2005, Alda published his first round of memoirs, Never Have Your Dog Stuffed: and Other Things I've Learned, published by Random House; in the book, he recalls his intestines becoming strangulated while on location in Chile for the show, an incident that nearly cost him his life since he was in a remote region and it was difficult to get to a doctor. Finally he found one, who turned out to be a M*A*S*H fan. Further, the treatment was familiar to Alda; the historical development of techniques for vascular anastomosis during the Korean war had featured in the show's scripts.