BIG SCIENCE is a proposed television series about pioneering research sites around the world. More importantly, it’s about the diverse team of people who make science happen.
Host and astrophysicist Brian Koberlein takes us behind the scenes of the most exciting research happening right now on our planet. Through his curiosity, enthusiasm, and humourous insights, we explore how science isn’t the work of isolated geniuses, but an ennobling act that touches all of humanity.
Brian connects the dots between the critical roles everyday people employed by the facilities, such as forklift operators, mechanics and maintenance workers, technicians and programmers, bring to the projects of research scientists trying to answer humanity’s most important questions.
Brian immerses himself in the dedicated communities keeping their facilities running despite increasing outside pressures and a shifting political will, and in doing so, Brian demonstrates how BIG SCIENCE impacts the world, local residents, and how it creates unusual and interesting cultures.
On Earth Day, April 22, 2017, more than a million people attended March For Science demonstrations at 600 places around our planet. Never has there been a better time to show the general public how science stands on the shoulders of ordinary but committed people, and why it is crucial to support it.
Support Big Science on Television
Our Kickstarter campaign has wrapped up, but it’s not too late to contribute to our project.
Meet our resident scientist, Brian Koberlein
Brian Koberlein is a passionate communicator of science. He’s also in charge of helping the crew of Big Science make sense of the big ideas we encounter in our production and how they relate to the rest of us.
Brian writes a daily blog called ONE UNIVERSE AT A TIME that has about 200,000 readers a month, and a podcast with about 20,000 downloads a month. His main interest is in breaking down complex scientific concepts into easily digestible ideas and has a reputation for cutting through hype and presenting topics clearly and honestly. Brian has worked as a farmhand, a factory worker, an actor, a musician, and a programmer, so he brings a down-to-earth approach to his science. He’s currently a senior lecturer at the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York. In addition to scholarly papers, he’s written a textbook on computational astrophysics.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more of our behind the scenes web series “Big Science: Observations”
We raised more than $21,000 on Kickstarter
To help launch our documentary project, we turned to the crowdsourcing community. We asked people to pledge toward an $18,000 goal. We finished with $22,237. There is a hunger for accurate, human-scale stories about science on television. Our backers understand that science is about more than beakers, test tubes, and eureka moments. It’s also about teamwork and unpredictable challenges.
A hundred and ninety people from 16 countries backed BIG SCIENCE. We also received the endorsement of a physics Nobel Laureate named Arthur B. McDonald.
I am pleased to see the series entitled Big Science that is being developed to describe this area of science to the general public. I look forward to seeing the episodes that will emphasize the team aspects of this work, showing the wide variety of personal contributions that enable these Big Science projects to provide a much greater understanding of our universe.
Dr. Arthur B. McDonaldWe’re making a ‘sizzle reel’
Our Kickstarter campaign raised money to send Brian and a small team of American and Canadian producers to the Green Bank Radio Observatory. This giant moveable telescope in southern West Virginia is working with Breakthrough Listen to detect evidence of extraterrestrial life. Once the sizzle reel is done, we will use it in our appeal for funding to network executives and streaming services. The video will show our talents, vision, and ability to film on location at a major research facility.
