Paul Andersen describes the important characteristics of viruses. He starts with a brief description of origin theories. He then describes the two characteristics of all viruses; genetic information and protein coats. He also...

Today we’re going to build the ticking heart of every computer - the Central Processing Unit or CPU. The CPU’s job is to execute the programs we know and love - you know like GTA V, Slack... and Power Point. To make our CPU we’ll bring...

Simon Sinek has a simple but powerful model for inspirational leadership -- starting with a golden circle and the question "Why?" His examples include Apple, Martin Luther King, and the Wright brothers ...

Artificial Intelligence has helped astronomers discover 2 new planets in systems that we'd already looked at, and new theories about how Mars lost some of its water have surfaced.

Attention isn't just about what we focus on -- it's also about what our brains filter out. By investigating patterns in the brain as people try to focus, computational neuroscientist Mehdi Ordikhani-Seyedlar hopes to build computer...

This week we answer skeptics like Descartes with empiricism. Hank explains John Locke’s primary and secondary qualities and why George Berkeley doesn’t think that distinction works -- leaving us with literally nothing but our minds,...

ank explains the gift that your brain gives you every day: the gift of neural plasticity -- the ways in which your brain actually changes at the cellular level as you learn.

Today we’re going to look at how our computers read and interpret computer files. We’ll talk about how some popular file formats like txt, wave, and bitmap are encoded and decoded giving us pretty pictures and lifelike recordings from...

What's both edible, and capable of sending you an email to let you know there's explosives nearby? Spinach! Well, spinach with some nanotechnology embedded within it. Learn how Popeye's favorite veggie is involved in the field of plant...

Hank brings you the news of a newly discovered dinosaur he is kind of afraid to look at, a way to sequence your genome in less time than it takes to get your clothes dry cleaned, & two new adventures that will take place in space - one...

Dr. Ellen Ochoa is incredible! She published over a dozen papers, co-filed three patents, and was a NASA engineer, all before becoming an astronaut and spending nearly a thousand hours in space.

We’ve talked a lot about advances in biotech. But none of those could have happened without advances in computing. It’s time to get back to data and explore the unlikely birth, strange life, and potential futures of the Internet. In this...

Computers and computing have changed a lot over the History of Science but ESPECIALLY over the last 100 years. In this episode of Crash Course History of Science, we have a look at that history around World War Two and how that conflict...

Take some time with us to look back on a few of our episodes about scientists who deserve a little more recognition than they got.

Who invented microphones, PCs, and video game consoles? In honor of Black History Month, Hank talks about some African Americans scientist/inventors who've helped make all our lives more awesome.

De-extinction, or using the power of modern biotechnology to bring back extinct species like mammoths and dinosaurs, would be cool. But is it really as easy as the movies make it look? Or do the cruel hands of time make it impossible?...

Paul Andersen explains how mathematics and computational thinking can be used by scientists to represent variables and by engineers to improve design. He starts by explaining how mathematics is at the root of all sciences. He then...

Email is one of the most essential things to our life. But do you actually know what happens when you click the "send" button, and how it's sent to your friends?

In 2007, Paul Rothemund gave TED a short summary of his specialty, DNA folding. Now he lays out in clear, abundant detail the immense promise of this field -- to create tiny machines that assemble themselves.

In our SERIES FINALE of Crash Course Computer Science we take a look towards the future! In the past 70 years electronic computing has fundamentally changed how we live our lives, and we believe it’s just getting started. From ubiquitous...

Zombies are EVERYWHERE!! Wait, don't panic- we mean in pop culture, not outside your window. But why is that? Bad guys and monsters seem to go through phases: one decade there's a dozen movies about aliens, ten years later it's vampires....

It's the beginning of a new semester! We have some psychological tips that can help you to take better notes.

Today we begin our discussion of computer graphics. So we ended last episode with the proliferation of command line (or text) interfaces, which sometimes used screens, but typically electronic typewriters or teletypes onto paper. But by...

Today, we're going to talk about how the Internet works. Specifically, how that stream of characters you punch into your browser's address bar, like "youtube.com", return this very website. Just to clarify we're talking in a broader...