This grant partially funds the development, production, and broadcasting of three one-hour PBS documentaries about three women scientists (Ada Byron Lovelace, Irene Joliot-Curie, and Frances Kelsey) by a documentary filmmaker who made a prior successful film, with Foundation support, about Lisa Meitner, Otto Hahn, and the discovery of nuclear fission. The new films will highlight the role of women in science whose stories are not world-famous, but who have made vital scientific contributions and whose lives and times are rich with drama and storytelling interest. Ada Byron Lovelace, a mathematician and the only daughter of Lord Byron, created what is considered the first computer program. Her first name, ADA, was chosen for the computer language used by the U.S. Department of Defense for its complex systems. The French physicist and radiochemist Irene Joliet-Curie, the eldest daughter of Pierre and Marie Curie, discovered artificial radioactivity, which opened up an entire new field with applications in chemistry, biology, and medicine and for which she won the Nobel Prize. Frances Kelsey, a pharmacologist and physician whose denial of FDA approval for an insufficiently tested drug, thalidomide, prevented thousands of deformities in newborns and led to stricter drug testing standards and regulations for the licensing of drugs. The project is supported by KQED, the presenting PBS station in San Francisco, and by PBS Central. Supplementary funds will be generated to make up the total budget of $1.75 million for the three shows. Project Director: Rosemarie Reed, Documentary Filmmaker, Rosemarie Reed Productions, Ltd.

This grant supplies funding for a four-part PBS NOVA series on space and time, The Fabric of the Universe, based on Brian Greene's bestselling book of the same title. The very successful 2003 NOVA series The Elegant Universe, supported by a Foundation grant, was also based on a Brian Greene bestseller and narrated by him. For this new series, Greene will explore the most fundamental questions in science, drawing on the work of Newton, Einstein, Feynman, Wheeler, Scully, and Guth, and ranging from classical physics to quantum mechanics and contemporary physics, including such current mysteries as dark energy and dark matter, gravity waves, and the horizon problem of cosmology. Greene, a professor of physics and mathematics at Columbia University, has proved to be a master at explaining complex scientific ideas in everyday language and at generating both huge audiences as well as media interest. His The Elegant Universe series was seen by over 9 million broadcast viewers and viewed online by an additional 1.4 million. It sold about 150,000 copies in DVD/VHS format. It won both the Emmy Award and a Peabody. Similar results are anticipated for the new series. Project Director: Paula Apsell, Senior Executive Producer, NOVA.

Partial support for the Open Mind Online Digital Archive. Project Director: Richard D. Heffner, Host, The Open Mind; University Professor of Communication and Public Policy, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey.