MEMBER REVIEW: Highly recommended. I found this series truly fascinating. It really brought out the personalities of the discoverers and drama

behind their quests. DESCRIPTION: This is an exciting PBS series about one of the great adventures in the history of science: the long (and

continuing) quest to understand what the world is made of – to identify, understand and organize the basic building blocks of matter. Episodes

introduce viewers to some of history’s most extraordinary scientists: Joseph Priestley and Antoine Lavoisier, whose discovery of oxygen – and

radical interpretation of it – led to the modern science of chemistry; Humphry Davy, who made electricity a powerful new tool in the search for

elements; Dmitri Mendeleev, whose Periodic Table brought order to the growing gaggle of elements; Marie Curie, whose groundbreaking research on

radioactivity cracked open a window into the atom; Harry Moseley, whose discovery of atomic number redefined the Periodic Table; and Glenn Seaborg,

whose discovery of plutonium opened up a whole new realm of elements, still being explored today. This DVD shows us not only what these scientific

explorers discovered but also how, using Broadway-caliber actors to reveal the creative process through the scientists’ own words, and conveying

their landmark discoveries through re-enactments shot with working replicas of their original lab equipment. Knitting these strands together into a

coherent, entertaining whole is host Michael Emerson, a two-time Emmy Award-winning actor.