Would a mile-high skyscraper ever be possible? Explore the physics behind some of the tallest buildings and megastructures in the world. -- In 1956, architect Frank Lloyd Wright proposed a mile-high skyscraper, a building five times as...

We’ve talked about many important concepts for engineers, but today we’re going to discuss a hugely important one that you might not even realize is an engineering concept: ethics. We’ll talk about what a Code of Ethics is. We’ll explore...

They don’t call water the building block of life for nothing, most living things need it. The palo verde tree, however, has managed to skate by needing it a lot less than the rest of us.

This week we’re exploring a field of engineering that is essential to how you’re watching this video: computers and computer engineering. We’ll explain differences between hardware and software, how engineers are working on making...

Sometimes, a species has declined so dramatically that they require serious human intervention to ensure they don’t disappear forever. Here are six ways we’re using conservation and science to keep those species alive.... Chapters ...

Ancient trees are fascinating, but the answer to the question in the title isn't as cut and dried as it might first seem. There are two major contenders for the superlative, and Hank has all the important information on both of them in...

This week we are exploring biodevices and the part they play in the healthcare world. We’ll look at the challenges of implantable biodevices, like biocompatibility, power and connectivity, packaging, structural design, delivery systems,...

Time travel is a staple of science fiction stories, but is it actually possible? It turns out nature does allow a way of bending time, an exciting possibility suggested by Albert Einstein when he discovered special relativity over one...

Paul Andersen explains the major plants structures. He starts with a brief discussion of monocot and dicot plants. He then describes the three main tissues in plants; dermal, ground and vascular. He also describes the plant cells within...

Hopefully this course has gotten you excited about all the things we can do with engineering. If so, today we’re going to try to help you answer a very important question: how do you become an engineer? What are the steps? What kinds of...

In this episode we looked at robots and the engineering principles of robots. We learned how robots use sensors to interpret their environment, how actuators and effectors allow a robot to manipulate the objects around it to accomplish a...

This week we are exploring alternative energy sources. We'll look at how biomass can be burned as a fuel source, how hydrogen can be used in a fuel cell to generate electrical power, and how nuclear fission provides power to the grid....

Today we’re going to explain how exchangers...exchange heat. We’ll look at concentric tubes, finned tubes, plate heat exchangers, and shell-and-tube heat exchangers. And we’ll look at some equations to help us sort through heat transfer...

Today Shini explains the law of conservation, beginning with simple, steady-state systems. We’ll discuss conversion and yield, accumulation, and how generation and consumption can affect how much accumulation there is in a system.

Around 750-1250 CE, the Islamic empire made incredible scientific advancements that still influence many fields of research today. What we know about some of the great minds of that time, as well as what we’ve learned from modern...

Our need for data storage grows everyday... but by how much?

How do we design the most efficient machines and processes? Today we’ll try to figure that out as we discuss heat & work, reversibility & irreversibility, and how to use efficiency to measure a system.

When you think of herbs, you might picture rosemary, basil, or dill weed, but you can add something a bit bigger than that to your mental herb collection: good ol' bananas.

Plants! If oxygen and good smells aren't enough for you, here's a collection of episodes that might win you over.

Biofuels can provide energy without the reliance on environmentally harmful fossils fuels -- but scientists are still searching for a plentiful source. Craig A. Kohn demonstrates how cellulose, the naturally abundant tough walls of plant...

Engineers are problem solvers, and our own health is full of problems to be engineered. In this episode we discuss drug discovery and drug delivery. We’ll explore everything from classical and reverse pharmacology to the new field of...

In our first episode of Crash Course Engineering, Shini explains what engineering is, and gives a brief overview of its four main branches (civil, mechanical, electrical, and chemical) as well as a look at some of the other fields of...

Today we’ll explore more about two of the three main types of materials that we use as engineers: metals and ceramics. We’ll discuss properties of metals, alloys, ceramics, clay, cement, and glass-ceramic materials. We’ll also look at...

Explore the science of the groundbreaking technology for editing genes, called CRISPR- Cas9, and how the tool could be used to cure diseases. -- From the smallest single-celled organism to the largest creatures on Earth, every living...