KUED Program Guide

Chimps R Us
An episode devoted to our closest cousins, chimpanzees, with whom we share 98% or our genetic material. This episode tells stories on the social life of chimps, on their thinking abilities, and on their very human sense of self-awareness. Also, Alan Alda meets Jane Goodall, who pioneered studies of chimps in the field and now devotes her energies to conservation in the wild, and to the establishment of sanctuaries for chimps discarded as pets and from medical research.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1108
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

Fat and Happy?
This episode discusses America's latest epidemic, obesity. While 20% of adults are clinically obese, now 25% of children are too, and the proportion is steadily increasing. What shape will Americans be in within a decade or so? The program looks at research on fad diets; on the real relationships between activity and weight; on how well-meaning mothers teach their kids to overeat; on how obese research subjects bend the truth about what they eat; and on the movement of Native Americans, suffering from widespread obesity-related diabetes, to get back to traditional wild food diets.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1110
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

Flying Free
The guiding spirit behind this program and the subject of this episode's "Frontiers Profile," Paul MacCready became famous when, at the age of 50, he built the first human -powered airplane. In the 25 years since, he has gone on to build even more amazing machines. Alan Alda helps to test the latest creations of engineers at Aerovironment, the company MacCready founded. These range from the immense - the 200-foot-wingspan, solar-powered Helios, designed to fly in the stratosphere fro up to six month at a time, the minute - the Black Widow, a six-inch-wingspan, nearly undetectable surveillance airplane built for the Department of Defense.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1109
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

Pet Tech
This episode explores the convergence of high technology and the family pet. Alda meets an African Gray parrot with the cognitive abilities of a four-year-old child, and tries out high-tech games for bored parrots and lonely dogs.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1201
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

The Gene Hunters
Alda meets some of the brightest gene-hunting scientists today, including Nobelist Jim Watson, the Human Genome Project's Eric Lander and developmental geneticist Nancy Hopkins. He also examines a controversial gene therapy project that's attempting to grow new blood vessels in diseased hearts.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1202
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

Dead Men's Tales
Alda meets scientists reconstructing mysterious past events from the evidence of excavated remains. Stories include the mysterious destruction of the Jamestown colony and the unconfirmed hanging of outlaw Wild Bill Longley.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1203
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

Alien Invasion
This program explores the impact that invasive species and viruses have on environmental and human health around the world. Increasingly, foreign animal and plant species jump national and international boundaries and wreak havoc on ecosystems that offer no natural resistance or predators to the unwelcome guests. Alda looks at some of the most egregious aliens and what's being done to control them.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1204
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

Growing Up Different
Many children face challenges far beyond the usual stresses and strains of growing up. Alda meets several kids who are growing up different, along with the doctors and researchers who are trying to mitigate the difficulties they face. The program looks at the controversial use of cochlear implants to give some hearing to profoundly deaf kids, the latest in augmentative communication technology to provide speech to children without it, new insights on the fundamental nature of autism and the implications for treating autistic children.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1205
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

On The Ball
This program explores the way science and technology are improving the world of sports for athletes, officials and even spectators. Host Alan Alda travels to Calgary to visit with Joan Vickers, whose research has improved the skills of golfers and basketball, tennis and even dart players. Alda also goes to Fenway Park to try out some high-tech equipment that is helping umpires separate balls from strikes. Then, he heads to the University of California Davis' Tennis Science Center to pick up some tips on his personal favorite sport.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1206
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

Beneath The Sea
Until very recently the vast area under the world's ocean surfaces was virtually unknown and unreachable by humans. Now, with new technologies and research techniques in hand, the undersea world is starting to yield its secrets. In this program we'll see how scientists using new technologies are exploring life in the undersea world. Stories will include a profile of pioneering ocean explorer Robert Ballard.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1207
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

Games Machines Play
To many educators, nothing beats a contest to bring out the best in their science and engineering students. The episode looks at three such contests: the grand-daddy of them all, the MIT design contest ( this year featuring a challenge in which pairs of robots face off on a gyrating teeter-totter); a human powered submarine race; and the series of contests pitting teams of robot soccer players against each other to win RoboCup 2001.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1208
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS

Body Building
This episode is about the remarkable advances being made to repair and replace damaged human body parts. It will tell the story behind one of 2001's biggest medical developments, when a totally self-contained artificial heart called the Abiocor was first implanted into human patients, replacing their own failing hearts and prolonging their lives. Alan visits Robert Langer's lab at MIT where progress is being made in growing tissue for body parts like livers, heart muscle, cartilage and eye retina. Also at MIT, Alan takes a look at the innovative "liver chip," a microscopic array of living liver cells that are the first step in modeling all the key functions of the body on the lab bench. The program reports on efforts at the Miami Project to Cure Paralysis and at Washington University in St. Louis to grow new nerve cells and help injured spinal cords to heal themselves. And Alan goes to the Cleveland Metrohealth Center to meet some courageous paralyzed volunteers as they test out Functional Electrical Stimulation (FES) systems, a technology that bypasses the damaged spine to send electric signals directly to arm and leg muscles, allowing individuals to walk, grip objects, and to literally stand tall once more.

Rating: TVG
Episode #: 1209
Length: 56 minutes, 46 seconds.

English, DVS