1000+ images about I ❤️ Cox on Pinterest | University of manchester, BBC and Brian cox Pinterest • The world’s catalog of ideas I ❤️ Cox Professor Brian Cox. Particle physicist, teaches at the University of Manchester, works on the ATLAS project at CERN 105 Pins499 Followers Future Decoded 2016 - About About Share About Future Decoded Unleashing the power of algorithms on a universe of endless data is a well established topic, but to-date, no-one has really explained how you make the leap from where you are today to build a digital business that embraces the power of data and algorithms at the heart of all that you do. Future Decoded 2016 at the Excel, London on November 1 and 2, 2016 will be entirely dedicated to showing how any business can become a digital business, highlighting where to start and the challenges that will be faced along with the prizes that might be won from a symbiotic relationship with technology that combines the best of human capacity with the best of digital capability.

Over two days, the event will focus on three key phases, each of which will provide the context to explore and discover significant topics that will equip business leaders with the insight, motivation and skills to build the next generation of their organisation. Inspiring the Digital Business Designing the Digital Business Building the Digital Business Future Decoded 2016 will showcase the future in a way that will empower you to make the most of the opportunities the future will bring allowing you, your people, your organisation and more broadly, the society we live within, to achieve more. Highlights from 2015 Microsoft announces plans to offer cloud services from the UK. Microsoft pilot programme to expand the reach of BBC micro:bit. Cities Unlocked: Tech to help people living with sight loss, and the sighted, achieve more. Interesting tech. Happy? Sad? Angry? This Microsoft tool recognizes emotions in pictures. Future Decoded 2015 YouTube playlist Headline sponsors risual risual helps businesses to achieve their full potential by making the most out of their investments in Microsoft technology enabling them to drive further and continued value and success. Dell Big Data, Mobility, Security, Cloud: Technology is changing business & business is changing technology. Are you ready?

Imagine IT that transforms with you, so you can transform your business. Embrace the power of Dell Future Ready Enterprise: solutions that are flexible, scalable & secure; to achieve business outcomes & accelerate results, today & tomorrow.Visit us at our stand, Be & become Future Ready. Hewlett Packard Enterprise Hewlett Packard Enterprise is an industry leading technology company that enables customers to go further, faster. With the industry’s most comprehensive portfolio, spanning the cloud to the data center to workplace applications, our technology and services help customers around the world make IT more efficient, more productive and more secure. Microsoft in Education Microsoft Education's presence at Future Decoded has a simple goal. This goal is to showcase the innovative use of Microsoft technology to improve the educational experience in the classroom and draws upon the voices of the many inspiring school leaders, Microsoft Innovative Educators and active and informed students that make up our broader community. It's going to be an inspirational 2 days for all! We are delighted to announce that Future Decoded 2014 won Best UK Partner Event at this year's prestigious CRN Awards. Microsoft thank all our partners and vendors for contributing to this success.

Sponsorship is now full – thank you to all our fantastic sponsors participating in Future Decoded 2015 Platinum sponsors Lenovo Technology Ltd As the global #1 PC company Lenovo is a leader in providing innovative consumer, commercial and enterprise technologies. Our portfolio of high-quality, secure products and services covers PCs including the legendary Think and multimode YOGA brands, workstations, servers, storage, smartphones,tablets and apps. BT BT is one of the world’s leading providers of communications services, serving customers in more than 170 countries. Its activities include networked IT services; local, national and international telecommunications services for use at home, at work, on the move; broadband, TV, internet; and converged fixed/mobile products and services. Gold sponsors Modality Systems Modality Systems, a PGi company, is a global provider of communication and collaboration services and applications built around the Microsoft productivity suite which incorporates Skype for Business & Office365. We help our customers realize the business value to be gained now and into the future. Usage, Health & Future. Cloudamour Cloudamour is an innovative, market-leading Cloud Partner which empowers businesses through utilising the Microsoft Cloud.

We specialise in providing Managed Services with the Microsoft stack - Azure, Office 365, Enterprise Mobility Suite, SharePoint Online and Skype for Business. Start your cloud journey with us today... eBECS eBECS is a specialist in the design and delivery of Microsoft Business Solutions for industry verticals in manufacturing, distribution, oil & gas, retail, general heavy industry and all aspects of the service industries. Pythagoras We deliver a selection of services and solutions, built across Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Office 365, SharePoint and Azure. Our industry aligned teams work alongside organisations throughout the public and commercial sectors, empowering them to realise their potential by overcoming their strategic, digital and technical business challenges. 365agile Agile allows people to access all of the data stored in back-office systems such as CRM, Finance, Asset Management, Property Management, Housing, ERP, Network Shares, EDRM and Sharepoint on their tablet and smart phone. Rackspace Ltd Rackspace (NYSE: RAX), the #1 managed cloud company, helps businesses tap the power of cloud computing without the challenge and expense of managing complex IT infrastructure and application platforms on their own.

Rackspace engineers deliver specialized expertise on top of leading technologies developed by Microsoft, OpenStack, VMware and others. Automated Intelligence Automated Intelligence (AI) provides information management software and services that enable Microsoft customers to easily transition to, and make the most of, Microsoft SharePoint, Microsoft Azure and Office 365. Our usability and information governance apps make it easier to deliver an enhanced strategy in the Microsoft Cloud. #EasierWithAI Equinix Equinix, Inc. (Nasdaq: EQIX) connects the world’s leading businesses to their customers, employees and partners inside the most interconnected data centers. In 33 markets across five continents, Equinix is where companies come together to realize new opportunities and accelerate their business, IT and cloud strategies. Nintex Nintex® is the world’s leading workflow company. Nintex’s workflow automationplatform enables everyone – business users, developers and IT professionals – toquickly and easily automate processes. Nintex connects people – including mobileusers – with processes and content, whether on-premises or in the cloud, on today’swell-known content management systems and collaboration platforms.

Citrix Citrix is leading the transition to software-defining the workplace, uniting virtualization, mobility management, networking and SaaS solutions to enable new ways for businesses and people to work better. Citrix solutions power business mobility through secure, mobile workspaces that provide people with instant access to apps, desktops, data and communications on any device, over any network and cloud. With annual revenue in 2014 of $3.14 billion, Citrix solutions are in use at more than 400,000 organizations and by over 100 million users globally. Silver sponsors Jabra Jabra audio devices provide a Microsoft-optimised voice solution that offers plug-and-play usage and full compatibility to Skype for Business and Lync. Fast implementation, comfort fit and excellent sound all create a positive user experience that results in wide-scale adoption, immediate efficiency gains and a faster payback on the investment. K2 Use K2 to create any business application you can imagine, with workflows and forms that spanroles, departments and data sources. Work smarter and stay focused on growing your business,instead of managing processes. Polycom Polycom helps organizations unleash the power of human collaboration.

More than 400,000 companies worldwide defy distance with video, voice and content solutions from Polycom. Polycom and its partner ecosystem provide flexible collaboration solutions for any environment that deliver the best user experience and unmatched investment protection. Advantech Advantech is a leader in providing trusted, innovative products, services, and solutions. Advantech offers comprehensive system integration, hardware, software, customer-centric design services, embedded systems, automation products, and global logistics support. Vision Solutions Vision Solutions provides high availability, disaster recovery, migration and cross-platform data sharing solutions for Windows and cloud computing. With our Double-Take solutions you can adopt cloud-based disaster recovery, perform near-zero downtime migrations without risk and share data on any combination of physical, virtual or cloud servers. Plantronics Plantronics is a global leader in audio communications for businesses and consumers. We have pioneered new trends in audio technology, creating innovative products that allow people to simply communicate. From UC to Bluetooth® headsets to gaming solutions, we deliver uncompromising quality, an ideal experience, and extraordinary service. Veeam Software Veeam® recognizes the new challenges companies across the globe face in enabling the Always-On Business™.

To address this, Veeam has pioneered a new market of Availability for the Modern Data Center™ by helping organizations meet recovery time and point objectives (RTPO™) of less than 15 minutes for all applications and data. FLEX FLEX is ICS Solutions’ game changing automation technology for Office 365 and SharePoint. FLEX delivers best practice Office 365 and SharePoint deployments in 70% less time and cost than a traditional bespoke approach, whilst driving mass user adoption through its intuitive app store user experience. Westcoast Founded in 1984, Westcoast Ltd has grown to become the number one UK distributor for many vendors including Microsoft, HP, Toshiba, Samsung and many more. Westcoast turns over in excess of £1bn. Its success is shown through consistently winning awards, and being ranked in the Sunday Times Top Track of the 100 Largest Privately Owned UK Companies. Firebrand Training Get Microsoft trained, certified and back to work fast. Firebrand is your fastest way to learn Microsoft skills, or develop your team through government-funded apprenticeships. We’re a Microsoft Gold Learning Partner and over 50,000 students have saved more than one million hours training with Firebrand.

Why wait? Bronze sponsors Sennheiser The headset is one of the most important collaboration tools – the critical element that connects you to your customers. Whether in the office, at a meeting, travelling, or working from home, Sennheiser offers a comprehensive range of premium wired and wireless headsets to enhance your communications experience. HEAT HEAT Software was formed from the merger of Frontrange and Lumension and is a global leader in hybrid service management and unified endpoint management software solutions.From the Data Center to the Desktop, HEAT Software has all your system center patching needs covered. TeleWare We create software which is designed and developed in-house by our team of experts, to improve communications infrastructures for customers. Our products are designed to help businesses route, record and analyse their communications to improve customer experience, increase productivity and meet regulatory requirements... Barracuda Networks As the first Microsoft Azure Certified Security Solution Provider with Azure Certification, Barracuda’s solutions have been tested for readiness and compatibility with Microsoft Azure public cloud, Microsoft Cloud Platform hosted by service providers through the Cloud OS Network, and on-premises private cloud Windows Server Hyper-V deployments.

Cloudhouse Technologies Cloudhouse is a Microsoft-centric software vendor that exists to minimise the cost and complexity of delivering applications to users. We re-purpose complex legacy or web apps for deployment onto Windows 10 devices and/or Azure or hybrid Cloud, thus accelerating the journey to modern Microsoft platforms. Fifty Five and Five Fifty Five and Five is a digital marketing agency. We focus on Microsoft partners, vendors and technologies. We run campaigns, develop content, and direct strategy - across search, social, web, email, automation and analytics. We drive digital conversations, and ultimately generate leads. Mindtree Mindtree was ‘Born Digital’ and continues to bring extraordinary depth across the entire digital value-chain. With a strong blend of expertise and execution, Mindtree delivers customer experiences while driving greater efficiency and modernizing business operations—programs that result in real value for our clients’ business and their customers. Profisee Profisee is a Microsoft Gold ISV Partner and master data management software company focused on delivering enterprise-grade MDM capabilities through its Master Data Maestro software suite. Profisee was formed from the management team of Stratature, the leading MDM software provider acquired by Microsoft in 2007.

Venture 1 Consulting Venture 1 Consulting is a highly-focussed IT Services company specialising in the design and implementation of Microsoft solutions across both the public and private sectors. We help businesses to scale quickly, improve agility and reduce their cost of IT ownership through the effective use of Microsoft's public cloud and on premise technologies. COBWEB Cobweb delivers cloud solutions that transform how customers work, helping them collaborate, communicate, be more secure and productive. Built around Office 365 and our Cobweb London Cloud, these bespoke cloud solutions incorporate a range of services from Microsoft and others, e.g. Email, collaboration, Skype, archiving, security & backup. Xamarin Turn C# skills into mobile development success with Xamarin. Build rich, fully native mobile apps for Android, iOS and Windows in C# using Visual Studio and shared code. Test apps written in any language on real devices. Xamarin's products are used by over 1,000,000 developers from companies including Microsoft, Kimberly-Clark, and McKesson. K3 We’re a technology provider with a difference; believing that technology transforms, but only when applied intelligently.

That’s why our focus is you and your needs - whether your business is starting up, evolving or maintaining market dominance. As a leading global supplier of ERP and CRM covering all verticals including Retail, Manufacturing and Distribution we deliver the complete customer experience. Parallels Parallels is a global leader in cross-platform solutions which make it possible for businesses of all sizes to run and access applications they need on a variety of platforms. With more than 900 employees worldwide, our suite of proven cross-platform solutions is anchored by Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition and also includes Parallels Mac Management for Microsoft SCCM as well as Parallels Remote Application Server. Global Knowledge UK Global Knowledge UK, a strategic Gold Microsoft Learning Partner of over 20 years, works with organisations to provide innovative and flexible learning solutions including virtual (online), learning on-demand and blended. In addition, IT and business apprenticeships delivered by PDS and recent acquisition of Developmentor adds to our growing portfolio. Inframon Ltd We believe that technology can be inspiring and that it should be used to enable your business and empower your users.

Born in the datacenter, Inframon was founded in 2005 to meet the market need for a Microsoft Operations Manager specialist partner. Since then we have continuously evolved our services and to become the cloud transformation specialists. Microsoft Legal & Corporate Affairs The Microsoft Legal and Corporate Affairs team works on the cutting edge of business and regulatory issues around the world, playing a proactive and engaged role pioneering new legal and corporate affairs solutions. We are at Future Decoded to discuss your move to the cloud with confidence! Satya Nadella CEO, Microsoft Satya Nadella is Chief Executive Officer of Microsoft. Before being named CEO in February 2014, Nadella held leadership roles in both enterprise and consumer... More about Satya Satya Nadella is Chief Executive Officer of Microsoft. Before being named CEO in February 2014, Nadella held leadership roles in both enterprise and consumer businesses across the company. Joining Microsoft in 1992, he quickly became known as a leader who could span a breadth of technologies and businesses to transform some of Microsoft’s biggest product offerings. Most recently, Nadella was executive vice president of Microsoft’s Cloud and Enterprise group.

In this role he led the transformation to the cloud infrastructure and services business, which outperformed the market and took share from competition. Previously, Nadella led R&D for the Online Services Division and was vice president of the Microsoft Business Division. Before joining Microsoft, Nadella was a member of the technology staff at Sun Microsystems. Originally from Hyderabad, India, Nadella lives in Bellevue, Wash. He earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Mangalore University, a master’s degree in computer science from the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee and a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Chicago. He is married and has three children. Clare Balding OBE Clare Balding began her career as an amateur ﬂat jockey, becoming Champion Lady Rider. The transition from competing to presenting began... Martha Lane Fox Co-Founder, lastminute.com Martha Lane Fox co-founded Europe’s largest travel and leisure website lastminute.com with Brent Hoberman in 1998, they took it public in 2000 and...

More about Martha Martha Lane Fox co-founded Europe’s largest travel and leisure website lastminute.com with Brent Hoberman in 1998, they took it public in 2000 and sold it in 2005. Martha was appointed a crossbench peer in the House of Lords in March 2013. She is currently chair of Go On UK, a coalition of public and private sector partners that are helping millions more people and organisations online. In March 2014 she was appointed Chancellor of the Open University. Martha co- founded and chairs LuckyVoice, revolutionising the karaoke industry. She chairs MakieLab. She is a Non-Executive Director at Marks & Spencer and the Women’s Prize for Fiction. In 2015 Martha joined the board of the Creative Industries Federation and the Open Data Institute. In 2007 Martha founded her own charitable foundation Antigone.org.uk and also serves as a Patron of AbilityNet, Reprieve, Camfed and Just for Kids Law. In 2013 Martha was awarded a CBE.

Mike Stone Chief Digital and Information Officer, UK Ministry of Defence Mike has been Chief Digital and Information Officer for the UK Ministry of Defence since May 2014. His remit covers all Communication and... More about Mike Mike has been Chief Digital and Information Officer for the UK Ministry of Defence since May 2014. His remit covers all Communication and Information Systems/Services used by Defence Forces globally, whether in the field or in the corporate space. His other responsibilities include being CEO of Information Systems and Services (a 2,500 person, £2bn pa organisation) and Service Information Risk owner. Prior to this Mike was CEO of Defence Business Services from March 2012-April 2014. DBS provides the entire back office for Defence in the HR, financial and vetting arenas. In earlier roles, Mike was COO of Mastek, an Indian global solutions provider, President of Service Design for BT Global Services, COO of BT International and CEO of BT Open Access. Mike began life as an Army Officer and was commissioned into the Duke of Wellington’s Regiment, an Infantry Regiment, in 1976. He retired in 2002 in the rank of Brigadier.

His last post was as Army CIO. Mike enjoys problem-solving on a grand scale and is adept at leading/turning around large-scale transformation, technology and client focused programmes, whilst maintaining strong stakeholder engagement and delivering tangible and quantifiable financial benefits. Hywel Sloman IT Director, Arsenal Football Club Hywel Sloman has been IT Director at Arsenal Football Club since February 2011. He is responsible for all technology for the Club. This includes football operations... More about Hywel Hywel Sloman has been IT Director at Arsenal Football Club since February 2011. He is responsible for all technology for the Club. This includes football operations, fan services, ticketing, retail, CRM, stadium management, hospitality management and club-wide functions. Hywel has driven the technology transformation of the Club since joining Arsenal, overhauling business processes and applications to generate significant commercial growth and improve fan services, while undertaking a three-year infrastructure overhaul. Prior to joining Arsenal, Hywel worked in professional services at both Deloitte and Accenture, working on major IT projects such as BBC iPlayer. Craig Kreeger Chief Executive, Virgin Atlantic Newly appointed Virgin Atlantic Chief Executive, Craig Kreeger joined the airline in February 2013.

He takes the reigns of Sir Richard Branson’s airline after a 27-year career... More about Craig Newly appointed Virgin Atlantic Chief Executive, Craig Kreeger joined the airline in February 2013. He takes the reigns of Sir Richard Branson’s airline after a 27-year career at American Airlines (AA). Born in 1959, the native Californian grew up in Sacramento. He studied Economics at the University of California, San Diego and graduated from UCLA with an MBA in 1985. Kreeger joined AA in 1985 as a Financial Analyst, becoming Managing Director of the division in 1989. Three years later he became MD of the banking division and later went on to hold positions in Corporate Development and Domestic Yield Management. He was promoted to Vice President of Revenue Management in 1995 where he oversaw revenue decisions on over 3000 flights per day. He moved across to Passenger Sales in 1998 and was responsible for generating $10 billion in annual revenue for the airline. In 2004, Kreeger moved his family to London where he took up the position of Senior Vice President, International.

This new role saw him leading on all of AA’s business overseas. From London he oversaw the start-up of operations in China, Russia and India. In August 2010 he relocated back to Dallas and became sVP for Customer Experience. Now responsible for over 25,000 employees; his key achievements included the launch of AA mobile platforms and the creation of social media customer engagement strategy. A year before joining Virgin Atlantic, Kreeger held the role of sVP, Customer – a role which involved overall organisation of 40,000 employees and responsibility for all customer-facing functions worldwide. Attracted to VA for a number of reasons; Kreeger cites the “fantastic people culture, great customer service and highly aspirational brand qualities” as being his top three. He’s also very clear about the objectives he’s set himself during his time at VA. He intends to start with the airline’s financial performance and returning to profitability. This is coupled with his desire to create and execute long-term plans for a sustainable business. Fundamentally, his aim is to keep staff and customers fully engaged with the brand and continue to grow advocacy.

Chris Bishop Scientist and Lab Director, Microsoft Research Chris Bishop is a Distinguished Scientist at Microsoft Research Cambridge, where he leads the Machine Learning and Perception group. He is also Vice President... Chris will be talking about... The Road to General Artificial Intelligence The creation of machines with human-level, or even super-human, intelligence has long been seen as the ultimate ambition of computer science. New developments in machine learning, coupled with exponential growth in both data and processing power, suggest the time may be ripe to take the next steps towards this elusive goal. In this talk I will highlight some recent progress in this field, and offer some speculative thoughts on potential future directions. About Chris Bishop Chris Bishop is a Distinguished Scientist at Microsoft Research Cambridge, where he leads the Machine Learning and Perception group. He is also Vice President of the Royal Institution of Great Britain, and Professor of Computer Science at the University of Edinburgh. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and a Fellow of Darwin College Cambridge. His research interests include machine learning and its applications. Scott Guthrie EVP Cloud and Enterprise, Microsoft As executive vice president of the Microsoft Cloud and Enterprise group, Scott Guthrie is responsible for the company’s cloud infrastructure, server...

More about Scott About Scott Guthrie As executive vice president of the Microsoft Cloud and Enterprise group, Scott Guthrie is responsible for the company’s cloud infrastructure, server, database, CRM, ERP, management and development tools businesses. His engineering team builds Microsoft Azure, Windows Server, SQL Server, Microsoft Dynamics, Active Directory, System Center, Visual Studio and .NET. Prior to leading the Cloud and Enterprise group, Guthrie helped lead Microsoft Azure, Microsoft’s public cloud platform. Since joining the company in 1997, he has made critical contributions to many of Microsoft’s key cloud, server and development technologies and was one of the original founders of the .NET project. Guthrie graduated with a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Duke University. He lives in Seattle with his wife and two children. Graham Cluley Security Analyst, grahamcluley.com Graham Cluley is an award-winning security blogger, researcher and public speaker. He has been a well-known figure in the computer security industry... Graham will be talking about...

Why we need a trustworthy internet We put trust in technology every day – from a simple start-the-day appliance like the coffee machine through to the car, the train, the plane that take us to our destinations and the underlying complex network of systems that deliver life’s essential services like electricity and water. We place trust in technology and we’re right to be concerned if we see things go awry. We're right to whistle-blow and say "Hey! You're not doing that right!" But does that apply at the internet scale? What about concerns about Internet of Things and the potential misuse of data by corporations and governments? Does this draw interest beyond stories about adultery websites being hacked? Security veteran Graham Cluley examines the risks associated with Internet of Things, and the ways in which big data can both make our lives better and be abused, and gives a rallying cry for software engineers to put security and privacy at the very centre of their code. About Graham Cluley Graham Cluley is an award-winning security blogger, researcher and public speaker. He has been a well-known figure in the computer security industry since the early 1990s when he worked as a programmer, writing the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows.

Since then he has been employed in senior roles by companies such as Sophos and McAfee. Graham Cluley has given talks about computer security for some of the world's largest companies, worked with law enforcement agencies on investigations into hacking groups, and regularly appears on TV and radio explaining computer security threats. Graham Cluley was inducted into the InfoSecurity Europe Hall of Fame in 2011, and was given an honorary mention in the "10 Greatest Britons in IT History" for his contribution as a leading authority in internet security. David Chappell Principal, Chappell & Associates David Chappell is Principal of Chappell & Associates in San Francisco, California. Through his speaking, writing, and consulting, he helps people... David will be talking about... The New Default Platform The success of cloud computing, the emergence of IoT, and the growing popularity of machine learning all lead to an inescapable conclusion: We’re seeing the rise of a new default platform for IT. In this last keynote of the morning, David Chappell will describe this platform, showing how it encompasses IoT and machine learning and more. He’ll also give you a perspective on what you need to do to thrive in this new era.

Azure and its Competitors: The Big Picture Public cloud platforms such as Microsoft Azure are an important part of the future. Becoming a major player in this area is essential to Microsoft’s long-term survival. Yet there are plenty of competitors, including Amazon Web Services, Google, and more. How do these alternatives compare to Azure today? And what’s likely to happen going forward? In this session, David Chappell will provide an independent perspective on these topics, illustrating the big picture of how Azure compares with Amazon, Google, IBM, VMware, and others. About David Chappell David Chappell is Principal of Chappell & Associates in San Francisco, California. Through his speaking, writing, and consulting, he helps people around the world understand, use, and make better decisions about new technology. David has been the keynote speaker for more than a hundred conferences and events on five continents, and his seminars have been attended by tens of thousands of IT leaders, architects, and developers in fifty countries. His books have been published in a dozen languages and used regularly in courses at MIT, ETH Zurich, and many other universities. David has also been a Series Editor for Addison-Wesley and a columnist for several publications.

In his consulting practice, he has helped clients such as Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Microsoft, Stanford University, and Target Corporation adopt new technologies, market new products, and educate their customers and staff. David's comments have appeared in The New York Times, CNN.com, and many other publications. Earlier in his career, he wrote networking software, chaired a U.S. national standardization working group, and played keyboards with the Peabody-award-winning Children's Radio Theater. David holds a B.S. in Economics and an M.S. in Computer Science, both from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Professor Brian Cox Physicist Arguably the UK's best known physicist, Professor Brian Cox's books and TV programmes have been read and watched around the world... Brian will be talking with Krysta Svore about... Quantum Computing: Transforming the Digital Age In 1981, Richard Feynman proposed a device called a “quantum computer” to take advantage of the laws of quantum physics to achieve computational speed-ups over classical methods. Quantum computing promises to revolutionize how we compute.

Over the course of three decades, quantum algorithms have been developed that offer fast solutions to problems in a variety of fields including number theory, optimization, chemistry, physics, and materials science. Quantum devices have also significantly advanced such that components of a scalable quantum computer have been demonstrated; the promise of implementing quantum algorithms is in our near future. This session will attempt to reveal some of the mysteries of this disruptive, revolutionary computational paradigm and how it will transform our digital age. About Brian Cox Arguably the UK's best known physicist, Professor Brian Cox's books and TV programmes have been read and watched around the world and credited with making science engaging and accessible to millions. With his down-to-earth, likeable enthusiasm, Brian is frequently labelled a 'rock star scientist'. Once the keyboard player for D:Ream, he has come a long way to his position as Professor of Particle Physics at Manchester University and a key part of the ATLAS and the CERN Large Hadron Collider projects. Brian's blockbuster TV shows include Wonders of the Universe, Wonders of the Solar System and Wonders of Life, each looking at the fundamental science behind everything from stars and planets to atoms and microbiology.

He has also presented Stargazing, Space Hoppers, The Big Bang and numerous editions of Horizon. His books accompanying the Wonders of... series have become huge bestsellers, as did his co-authored title Why Does E=mc2? From speaking at TED in the US to World World Economic Forums in Davos and China, Brian's presentations engage, inform and entertain featuring awe-inspiring images from the depths of the universe as well as his trademark infectious enthusiasm for his subject. Alongside the story of life, the universe and everything, Brian argues that science can unite the world in an attempt to discover our shared origins. He also explains the work of CERN and their attempts to use cutting-edge technology and engineering to recreate events fractions of a nanosecond after the Big Bang "in the hope of revealing the underlying simplicity of the universe.” An International Fellow of the Explorers Club Brian was awarded the prestigious Lord Kelvin Award for his work in promoting science to all. When not ﬁlming around the world, Brian writes for a range of newspapers and journals and co-hosts Radio 4's Inﬁnite Monkey Cage, the comedy and science programme.

He and his friend and co-host Robin Ince examine the big and not-so-big science questions alongside comedians, scientists and celebrities both on air and on tour. Brian also serves as the Royal Society’s Professor for Public Engagement in Science. Krysta Svore Senior Researcher, Microsoft Research Krysta manages the Quantum Architectures and Computation Group (QuArC) at Microsoft Research in Redmond, WA. She is passionate about quantum computation and... Krysta will be talking with Brian Cox about... Quantum Computing: Transforming the Digital Age In 1981, Richard Feynman proposed a device called a “quantum computer” to take advantage of the laws of quantum physics to achieve computational speed-ups over classical methods. Quantum computing promises to revolutionize how we compute. Over the course of three decades, quantum algorithms have been developed that offer fast solutions to problems in a variety of fields including number theory, optimization, chemistry, physics, and materials science. Quantum devices have also significantly advanced such that components of a scalable quantum computer have been demonstrated; the promise of implementing quantum algorithms is in our near future.

This session will attempt to reveal some of the mysteries of this disruptive, revolutionary computational paradigm and how it will transform our digital age. About Krysta Svore Krysta manages the Quantum Architectures and Computation Group (QuArC) at Microsoft Research in Redmond, WA. She is passionate about quantum computation and determining how to better solve problems on a quantum computer. Her research focuses on quantum algorithms and how to implement them on a quantum device, from how to code them in a high-level programming language, to how to optimize the resources they require, to how to implement them in hardware. Her team also works on designing a scalable, fault-tolerant software architecture for translating a high-level quantum program into a low-level, device-specific quantum implementation. She works in collaboration with Microsoft Station Q, Microsoft Research's center for topological quantum computation. Kevin Ashton Inventor of the “Internet of Things” Kevin Ashton led pioneering work on RFID (radio frequency identification) networks, for which he coined the term “Internet of Things” and co-founded the Auto-ID Center at MIT...

Professor Brian Cox Live: it's a bracing feeling not to be talked down to <p><strong>Royal &amp; Derngate, Northampton</strong></p><p>Dizzying cosmology show provides workout for the brain, with one part entertainment to 13.8bn parts education</p><p>Professor Brian Cox finds a lot of things “beautiful”, not least the fact that 1,200 people in Northampton have chosen to spend their Friday evening at “a lecture on cosmology with interruptions by <a href="">Robin Ince</a>”.</p><p>That about sums up this live show by the telly physicist. Yes, there are comic contributions from his sidekick on Radio 4’s <a href="">Infinite Monkey Cage</a>. But they’re seasoning. The main dish is Cox’s primer on the big bang, the nature of the universe and the uniqueness (or otherwise) of humankind.

I’d call it an idiot’s guide, but I’m one rung up from an idiot, and could follow barely half of it.</p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">'Can you grow potatoes on Mars?’: Brian Cox and Robin Ince answer your questions</a> </p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Stage Universal: A Guide to the Cosmos by Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw – digested read <p>‘To measure the distance to Neptune, we work in parsecs, which are a parallax of one arcsecond. Actually, let’s just look at some pictures’</p><p>Cosmology is amazing. It allows us to dare to imagine a time when the entire observable universe was compressed into a region of space smaller than an atom. Imagine. The Milky Way, home to 400 billion stars, along with billions of other universes, all compressed into a sub-atomic patch. It feels mind-blowing, doesn’t it? Except it isn’t, really. And what this book is going to do is allow you to answer some of the big cosmic questions while lying down in your back garden after having a few drinks. How old is everything?

How big is it? Science can tell you. All you have to do is stare into my amazing eyes and let yourself come on a journey.</p><p>Before the Big Bang, the universe was relatively cold and empty – a bit like your brain, I’m guessing – and those particles that did exist were moving apart from each other at a staggering rate. Two particles only one centimetre apart would be separated by 10 billion metres only 4 x 10<sup>-36</sup> seconds later. It would probably help if you understood just how small a number 4 x 10<sup tabindex="-1">-36</sup> really is. Just try to think of the smallest thing you can think of and then imagine it much, much smaller. This period before Big Bang is known as the epoch of inflation.

Don’t let’s worry about what happened before the epoch of inflation.<br tabindex="-1"></p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Science and nature Alexander von Humboldt biography wins Royal Society science book prize <p>Andrea Wulf wins £25,000 award for The Invention of Nature, a biography of the 19th-century explorer who has more things named after him than any other human </p><p>A biography of the 19th-century explorer Alexander von Humboldt, who has “faded from collective memory” despite being dubbed “the Shakespeare of the sciences” by his peers, has won the £25,000 prize for the best science book of the year.</p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">The Invention of Nature: The Adventures of Alexander von Humboldt, the Lost Hero of Science by Andrea Wulf – review</a> </p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">Andrea Wulf on a scientific adventurer 'chased by 10,000 pigs'</a> </p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Royal Society prizes for science books Science and nature Brian Cox:

 ‘It’s a book about how to think’ In Universal: A Guide to the Cosmos, Brian Cox shows how anyone can see the world like a physicist.

Here he explains why he loves changing his mind<p>Professor Brian Cox is advanced fellow of particle physics in the School of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Manchester. He is about to embark on a nationwide tour to promote the ideas in his new book, <em>Universal: A Guide to the&nbsp;Cosmos</em>.</p><p><strong>I was looking through your tour dates. You are playing Wembley…</strong><br>The bigger the venue the fewer people you can see is a general rule. It’s just great that cosmology can get people out. I did another event at Wembley Arena for 8,000 children, which was brilliant.</p><p>You can see the Andromeda galaxy with the naked eye, and it’s two and a half million light years away</p><p>Is space-time real? Is the universe really a fabric?

I don’t know – but I do know the model works brilliantly</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Brian Cox Ex-Python Eric Idle and Brian Cox to take on The Entire Universe for the BBC <p>Christmas special will feature an ‘explosion of comedy, music and dance’ choreographed by former Strictly judge Arlene Phillips</p><p>Former Monty Python star Eric Idle will star alongside Professor Brian Cox, Warwick Davis and Noel Fielding in a BBC Christmas special “depicting the birth of the entire universe”.</p><p>Written by Idle, the one-hour show will feature the return of Rutland Weekend Television, the haphazard station depicted in Idle’s sketch show of the same name during the 1970s.</p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">Strictly Come Dancing 2016: full lineup revealed</a> </p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> BBC 'I brought the graph': Brian Cox refutes claims of climage change denier on Q&A – video <p>The celebrity physicist Brian Cox <a href="">holds up a graph to the One Nation senator-elect and climate change denier Malcolm Roberts on the

 ABC’s Q&amp;A</a> showing the rise in global temperature.

Roberts had claimed: ‘We’ve had a pause in this so-called warming for now 21 years.’ He later says ‘the data has been corrupted’ and ‘manipulated by Nasa’ – prompting Cox to ask whether he believes ‘we landed men on the moon?’</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Q&A Q&A smackdown: Brian Cox brings graphs to grapple with Malcolm Roberts <p>One Nation senator-elect asks repeatedly for ‘empirical data’ – and the celebrity physicist has plenty at hand</p><p>The celebrity physicist Brian Cox came prepared to the ABC’s Q&amp;A on Monday night with graphs, ready to counter claims by his co-panellist, the climate denier and Australian senator-elect <a href="">Malcolm Roberts</a>.</p><p>Roberts, one of four senators elected from Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party, took the first opportunity to espouse long-refuted climate-denialist claims, including that warming stopped more than 20 years ago, starting the so-called “hiatus” or “pause”.</p><p lang="en" dir="ltr">We've had a pause in warming &amp; NASA corrupted data, says Malcolm Roberts

.

<a href="">@ProfBrianCox</a> examines the graphs <a href="">#QandA</a> <a href=""> lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="">#qanda</a> Roberts is wrong. Latest mean global <a href="">#sealevelrise</a> to end of 2014 chart by CSIRO <a href=""> <a href="">pic.twitter.com/Cu6eZ86sPU</a></p><p lang="en" dir="ltr">It's amazing how much people who have no understanding of climate science at all keep saying "show me data!" after ignoring all data. <a href="">#QandA</a></p><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The maths on the CSIRO just doesn't add up, says <a href="">@LindaBurneyMP</a>.

<a href="">@GregHuntMP</a> &amp; <a href="">@ProfBrianCox</a> respond <a href="">#QandA</a> <a href=""> <span>Related: </span><a href="">What you need to know about One Nation's Malcolm Roberts and ‘sovereign citizens’ | Jason Wilson</a> </p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Q&A Bluedot festival review – cosmic vibes permeate rave revival <p><strong>Jodrell Bank, Cheshire</strong><br>Jean-Michel Jarre, Air, Underworld and the physicist Brian Cox happily coexist on the bill at a boutique weekend of electronic music, science and stargazing</p><p>Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the inaugural Bluedot festival is that nobody thought to stage it sooner. The iconic <a draggable="true" href="">Jodrell Bank observatory</a> has long played host to live music. Flaming Lips, Sigur Rós and Elbow have all put in memorable performances in the shadow of the handsome 76-metre-in-diameter <a draggable="true" href="">Lovell radio telescope</a>.

But this bespoke, immersive, science-themed weekender offers something unique and (with apologies for the pun) out of this world.</p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">The Pale Blue Dot [video] | @GrrlScientist</a> </p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">Jean-Michel Jarre: ‘All the people on my new album are geeks’</a> </p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Music festivals Starmus festival: enough brains and Brians to fill the multiverse Brians Cox, Eno and May joined Stephen Hawking and Richard Dawkins in Tenerife to celebrate the synergy between astronomy and music, while astronaut Chris Hadfield, interviewed below, talked of our innate instinct to explore<p>Around the giant pool of the Mediterranean Palace hotel in Tenerife hundreds of people are focused on a familiar star.

As pounding bass-filled music booms out of the PA, a great mass of the young, the middle-aged and the old are all glazed with submission as they appear to seek the meaning of the universe in the transformative process of ultraviolet radiation.</p><p>A few yards away in a darkened auditorium beneath a strange mock pinkish pyramid the <a href="" title="">Starmus festival</a> is under way.

Dedicated to celebrating a synthesis between astronomy and music that is of a more transcendent kind than that practised around the Mediterranean Palace pool, it has drawn hundreds of people focused on very different but no less familiar stars: <a href="" title="">Brian Cox</a>, <a href="" title="">Richard Dawkins</a>, <a href="" title="">Brian May</a> and, the&nbsp;greatest scientific supernova of them all, <a href="" title="">Stephen Hawking</a>.</p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">Prof Brian Cox: ‘Being anti-expert – that’s the way back to the cave’</a> </p><p>David Bowie loved the result and said it was the most poignant version ever</p><p>Should human exploration stop?

That’s a ridiculous expectation because human exploration is innate</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Space Bluedot: exploring the festival frontier <p>This month, a new festival will boldly go beyond the same old weekend lineups with a boundary-breaking blend of science, music, technology and comedy</p><p>With the vast <a href="">Lovell telescope</a> as its backdrop, the first ever <a href="">Bluedot festival</a> will take place later this month, in and around the Jodrell Bank observatory in Cheshire. The three-day event will combine a weekend music festival with an interdisciplinary scientific symposium, scheduling big-name musicians alongside prominent scientists and technologists. Taking its name from the <a href="">Pale Blue Dot</a> photograph of Earth made famous by Carl Sagan, Bluedot’s unusual programme hopes to inspire the sense of curiosity and wonderment suggested by its surroundings. “Bluedot offers an experience unlike any other,” says festival director Ben Robinson, “with over 300 cutting-edge artists pushing the boundaries of live performance.”</p><p>The festival will be divided into several different areas, each one programmed according to different themes.

The Nebula stage, “where new stars are born”, is the arena for up-and-coming musicians; the Roots stage, situated in nearby woodland, covers folky and acoustic acts; and the Lovell stage, directly behind the famous telescope, will host the headliners, all of whom have a certain scientific flavour. These include French electro-pioneer <a href="">Jean-Michel Jarre</a>, famed for his majestic, hi-tech concerts; the shape-shifting Canadian innovator <a href="">Caribou</a>; and the brainy, maths-flecked Manchester rockers <a href="">Everything Everything</a>.

</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Festivals Kit Buchan 2016-07-10T08:30:17Z The week in TV: Forces of Nature with Brian Cox; Brief Encounters; Boy Meets Girl; Life Stripped Bare <p>From the astrophysical to the plain physical, as Brian Cox does space sums and ITV braves Ann Summers parties in 1980s Yorkshire</p><p><strong>Forces of Nature with Brian Cox</strong> (BBC1) | <a href="" title="">iPlayer</a><br><strong>Brief Encounters</strong> (ITV) | <a href="" title="">ITV Player</a><br><strong>Boy Meets Girl</strong> (BBC2) | <a href="" title="">iPlayer</a><br><strong>Life Stripped Bare</strong> (C4) | <a href="" title="">All4</a></p><p>Some people seem to have a problem with <a href="" title="">Professor Brian Cox</a>. Admittedly, there’s the voice.

It <em>coos</em>, relentlessly, to the extent that one can suddenly be drawn into the extraordinary sensation of sliding down his ever-smooth pink cheeks into a fluffy chocolate box full of smiling, tiny, Brian Cox blue bunnies, all cooing. A bit of grit wouldn’t go amiss. He is also prone to overuse of the word “beautiful”, strung out to include an inordinate number of vowel sounds, and employed to denote everything from a sunrise to a dung beetle to a filthy maths equation.</p><p>Didn’t one working-class man, even in Yorkshire, even in 1982, ever do anything but play darts?</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Television There’s expertise, and misuse of expertise | Letters <p>Professor Brian Cox disdains the rejection of expertise (<a href="" title="">Opinion, 2 July)</a>. But he conflates rejection of expertise with rejection of the misuse of expertise.

When experts fail to predict catastrophic events like the financial crisis, and when experts extract the costs of their mistakes from non-experts, like the austerity after the financial crisis, and when experts don’t seem to have the best interests of the electorate at the heart of their advice, then the rejection of their advice is rational, isn’t it? Perhaps even scientific?<br><strong>Dr Jon Dickson</strong><br><em>Sheffield</em></p><p>• An interesting report <a href="" title="">on how much of the nation’s tax London pays</a> (7 July), but it would have been more useful if it had also mentioned what the expenditure on the capital was.<br><strong>Martin Cooper</strong><br><em>Bromley, Kent</em></p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Brian Cox Brief Encounters review – dildo-wielding Ann Summers parties meet Thatcherism It’s fun in the north with this fun, if silly, tale of first-generation Ann Summers party hosts.

While Brian Cox’s Forces of Nature is a tour, if not a tour de force<p>“I can’t even touch the stuff, never mind sell it!” So says Stephanie, the beleaguered hero of new ITV drama series Brief&nbsp;Encounters. It is the story of the first generation of <a href="" title="">Ann Summers</a> party hosts, a pioneering set of dildo-wielding women out to empower themselves and enrich Jacqueline Gold via the medium of split-crotch panties and other mild and mildly thrush-inducing perversions. Stephanie (Sophie Rundle) tells her mother she has a job “in sales”. “You need something about you to do that,” sniffs her mother. Did I mention we were up north? We are.</p><p>We’re also in 1982, although until someone shouted “This is 1982 and we are women in the throes of a sexual awakening!” I wasn’t sure. Apart from Nita (Angela Griffin) being permanently clad in a snow-wash denim jacket, there wasn’t much in the way of period detail.

Which mattered, because without a firm&nbsp;setting in the pre-internet era, everyone’s conniptions at the idea of selling a few vibrators looked simply demented instead of quaint, and left the viewer discombobulated, rather than nodding wryly and whispering “O&nbsp;tempora! O mores! O that looks painful!” at the screen.</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Television Prof Brian Cox: ‘Being anti-expert – that’s the way back to the cave’ <p>He says anyone can understand his shows, but he quite likes it when they can’t. As he moves to BBC1, TV’s favourite particle physicist talks about his deep belief in public service broadcasting – and why fame doesn’t make him less of a scientist</p><p>You can guess how Professor Brian Cox feels about our referendum result from his opinion of <a href="">the current anti-expert mood</a>. We met three days before the referendum vote, and throughout the interview his famous perma-grin faltered only when the subject of public cynicism towards professional expertise came up.</p><p>“It’s entirely wrong, and it’s the road back to the cave.

The way we got out of the caves and into modern civilisation is through the process of understanding and thinking. Those things were not done by gut instinct. Being an expert does not mean that you are someone with a vested interest in something; it means you spend your life studying something.

You’re not necessarily right – but you’re more likely to be right than someone who’s not spent their life studying it.”</p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">Prof Brian Cox criticises ‘nonsensical’ university speaking bans</a> </p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Science and nature TV Prof Brian Cox criticises ‘nonsensical’ university speaking bans <p>Scientist and presenter attacks ‘growing intolerance’, no-platforming and ‘deeply flawed’ national conversation</p><p>The BBC’s best-known science presenter, Prof Brian Cox, has criticised the “growing intolerance” of no-platform speaking bans at universities and colleges, describing them as “nonsensical”.</p><p>The Wonders of the Universe presenter also attacked the “deeply flawed … national conversation” which he said meant people were unwilling or unable to change their minds on issues such as the European Union.</p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">Campuses are places for open minds – not where debate is closed down | Jonathan Haidt</a> </p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Radio Times Totally cosmic science festival for blue-s

ky thinkers Brian Eno and Underworld are just two of the highlights of Bluedot, a festival of discovery at Jodrell Bank, also featuring an Observer science and tech stage<p>The <em>Observer</em> is to host a stage at a brand new festival – <a href="" title="">Bluedot –</a> in July.

Taking place at the <a href="" title="">Jodrell Bank</a> observatory in Cheshire, Bluedot is a three-day festival of discovery that aims to fuse a complex mix of music, artists, speakers, scientists and performers into a unique event.</p><p><a href="" title="">Jean-Michel Jarre</a>, <a href="" title="">Underworld</a> and <a href="" title="">Caribou</a> will headline three days of music, featuring diverse acts from <a href="" title="">DJ Shadow</a> to <a href="" title="">Mercury Rev</a>.</p><p>Brian Eno has created a new installation, Zenith, which will project on to the Lovell Telescope</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Festivals Actors criticise new GCSE drama courses that cut out live theatre <p>David Harewood, Zoe Wanamaker and others attack new syllabuses that let pupils analyse a digital recording instead</p><p>Some of Britain’s top actors have attacked new GCSE drama courses that do not require students to watch a live theatre performance.</p><p>David Harewood, Brian Cox, Zoe Wanamaker

 and Sheila Hancock are among those criticising new syllabuses from AQA and Oxford Cambridge and RSA Examinations (OCR) for allowing pupils to analyse a digital recording instead of going to the theatre in person.<br> <br>They joined Hermione Norris, Meera Syal, Robert Lindsay and Tim Pigott-Smith in signing a letter to the Sunday Times warning of a “real concern” that the change, coupled with tight school budgets, could see teachers stop organising theatre trips.<br> <br>Homeland star Harewood told the paper: “Giving kids the chance to see live theatre should not just be free, it should be compulsory.”</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Drama and dance 'Can you grow potatoes on Mars?’: Brian Cox and Robin Ince answer your questions <p>The presenters of Radio 4’s comic science show The Infinite Monkey Cage help our readers grapple with cosmic microwave background radiation, the linear superposition of winning the lottery and why Jedi knights are rubbish</p><p>When I arrive at a large country house in Cheshire to meet Brian Cox and Robin Ince, I am directed to the library, a large chilly room notable for containing not a single book.

The rows of heaving bookshelves behind Cox’s overstuffed chair turn out, on closer inspection, to be wallpaper.</p><p>Professor Cox, advanced fellow of particle physics at the University of Manchester and <a href="">former D:Ream keyboardist</a>, spent the previous evening presenting <a href="">Stargazing Live</a> with Dara O Briain, and will shortly depart for a script meeting.</p><p>There is an optimum level to acquire knowledge to grow the economy. We’re making lives worse by not investing enough</p><p>I think a Jedi cold make a spindle rotate and that's the best he could do</p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Science Got a question for Brian Cox and Robin Ince? We want to hear it <p>This week we’ll be speaking to the physicist and the comedian ahead of the latest series of The Infinite Monkey Cage and we want to ask them your questions</p><p>How big is the universe? What causes supernovas? What’s the food like in the BBC canteen? How much does Things Can Only Get Better earn in royalties each year?

</p><p>These are the mysteries you can finally get to the bottom of with our readers’ Q&amp;A with Brian Cox and Robin Ince, co-presenters of Radio 4’s award-winning science and comedy show The Infinite Monkey Cage. </p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Radio 4 Five of the best comedy gigs for Christmas 2015 <p>Sara Pascoe, Margaret Cho, Brian Cox and Kevin Bridges are among those promising better laughs than you’ll get from your Christmas crackers</p><p>The leftfield comedy club Weirdos stages the fourth of its now well-loved alt.pantos.

<a href="">Edinburgh comedy award winner John Kearns</a> and ace clown duo LetLuce star; the show (all proceeds to charity) is called Weirdos for Christmas Number 1.</p><p> <span>Related: </span><a href="">Shaved and savage: has comedian Margaret Cho finally gone too far?</a> </p> <a href="">Continue reading...</a> Comedy BBC Knowledge | Channels | BBC Worldwide New Zealand Our Passionate Personalities Sir David Attenborough Born in London in 1926, David Attenborough is regarded as the global godfather of natural history film and television. He joined the BBC as a trainee producer in 1952. While working on the Zoo Quest series (1954-64), he gained his first opportunity to undertake expeditions to remote parts of the globe to capture intimate footage of rare wildlife in its natural habitat. He moved into management as Controller of BBC2 in 1965, during which time he introduced colour television to Britain, and then served as Director of Programmes for the organisation from 1969 to 1972.

In 1973, he abandoned administration altogether to return his great passion – making natural history documentaries. His stable of landmark BBC series include Life on Earth (1979), The Living Planet (1984), The Trials of Life (1990), The Private Life of Plants (1995), Life of Birds (1998), Life of Mammals (2002), Life in the Undergrowth (2005), Life in Cold Blood (2008) and First Life (2010). Michael Mosley Born in India in 1957, Michael initially studied philosophy, politics and economics at Oxford University and worked as a London banker before training to become a doctor at London’s Royal Free Hospital. He then swapped hands-on medicine for journalism, joining the BBC as an assistant trainee producer and cutting his TV teeth working behind the scenes on such popular shows as Newsnight, Tomorrow's World and Horizon. He has since produced a wide range of science-based shows, including The Human Face with John Cleese, three series with Professor Robert Winston, and Jeremy Clarkson's Inventions that Changed the World.

In front of camera, he has become a household name as a regular medic on the daily BBC topical magazine programme, The One Show. His other presenting credits include Make Me, 10 Things You Never Knew about Losing Weight and the surgery series Blood and Guts. Michael has also fronted Medical Mavericks (looking at those behind the great developments in medicine), Inside the Human Body (examining all the workings of the body), and Frontline Medicine (highlighting the innovative and vital link between warfare and medicine). Michael's programmes on exercise (The Truth About Exercise) and diet (Eat, Fast & Live Longer – which led to the 5:2 diet) have produced much popular and media discussion as he examined the benefits of short, high-intensity exercise and fasting for two days a week. Brian Cox Born in Oldham in 1968 to banker parents, Brian’s first foray into the public spotlight was as the keyboardist of the British pop band D:Ream, who scored a number one hit with Things Can Only Get Better in the 1990s. After D:Ream disbanded, Brian turned his attention to science academia, completing his Doctor of Philosophy in high energy particle physics at the University of Manchester.

Brian now divides his time between being a Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council (PPARC) Advanced Fellow at Manchester University, working on the prolific ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Switzerland and as being a leading TV and radio broadcaster popularising astronomy and physics. His most notable TV credits include fronting such award-winning BBC series as Wonders of the Solar System, Wonders of the Universe, Wonders of Life and Human Universe. Louis Theroux Born in Singapore in 1970, Louis is the son of travel writer and novelist Paul Theroux, brother of novelist Marcel Theroux and cousin of American actor and screenwriter Justin Theroux of Mulholland Drive and Iron Man 2 fame. After gaining a first class degree in history at Oxford University, Louis cut his professional journalistic teeth as a writer for the alternative magazine Metro Silicon Valley in San Jose and for the satirical magazine Spy in New York. He gained his TV break as a correspondent on Michael Moore’s TV Nation series, presenting such curious and contentious cultural features as Avon selling products to native woman in the Amazon and the Ku Klux Klan’s drive to market itself a civil rights movement.

Louis’ flair for investigating fascinating worlds and compelling lifestyles sparked the interest of the BBC, and he was offered a development deal in 1995. The result of which was the hit series Weird Weekends, in which he shadowed all manner of American subcultures. He has continued to shine a light on some of the world’s most intriguing beliefs, behaviours, and institutions ever since, using his persuasive and affable character to get to know the people at the heart of them – from officers and inmates at San Quentin prison for his Behind Bars special, to extreme believers of the Westboro Baptist Church for his The Most Hated Family in America special. No controversial topic is left unturned with Louis on the case, whether it be mental illness for his Extreme Love: Autism and Extreme Love: Dementia specials, or sexual predators for his LA Stories: Among the Sex Offenders special.

The wonder of humans, especially my burglar battering wife: Brian Cox on his new show, why he's a reluctant celebrity and the day his other half punched a thief | Daily Mail Online The wonder of humans, especially my burglar battering wife: Brian Cox on his new show, why he's a reluctant celebrity and the day his other half punched a thief comments How many mountains can a man wander around before you call him a walking, talking TV cliché? Professor Brian Cox hasn’t quantified that one (although I imagine he could come up with an equation to work it out if you gave him a minute) but he’s pretty sure that in his relatively short TV career he’s reached maximum mountain capacity. His high-altitude ruminations about the solar system, the universe and all other things epic in his previous shows have been infectious and turned him almost overnight into the most glittering of stars (of the celeb variety). But, as all the big presenters of his ilk have found, a distinctive TV style does lend itself to parody. ‘It does become a cliché, doesn’t it, the wandering-around-a-mountain thing,’ he says. ‘It’s the problem with my sort of TV programmes.

Brian Cox stars in a new show about mankind called Human Universe TV’s a visual medium. When you’re talking about something as big as the universe, you have to show something – and the easiest thing to show is me, on a mountain, talking about it. But that becomes the cliché. You can’t avoid it. 'I’ve had the mickey taken out of me enough for staring at the sky while delivering a profound voice-over to know that we’d reached that point. You watch other people do it and think, “Gosh, that is what I do.”’ How to change that, though, for his latest TV extravaganza? The answer he came up with will be a bit shocking to Brian Cox fans. Not as shocking as some of the stuff he says (that the world might end tomorrow if an asteroid hits is one of his latest theories), but it will still feel like a bit of an earth-wobble for some. He says that the solution is not just less mountains – but less Brian Cox in general. ‘I wanted to be in this one less,’ he admits. ‘I never wanted the TV stuff to be about me.’ Is there less smiling too (his high-wattage grin was the main attraction for many)?

‘I’m not sure. There may be a little less. I smiled a lot in the earlier ones because I was nervous. I’m a bit more relaxed now, so maybe the grin isn’t quite as pronounced.’ Brian with his wife Gia who recently beat up a burglar He says this while grinning, obviously. I’m not sure he knows he’s doing it. He’s just eternally sunny. The BBC should have him on a retainer to come on and break the news if an asteroid is about to hit. I’d rather hear it from him than Fiona Bruce. On one level, this new series, called Human Universe, covers similar ground to Wonders Of The Solar System and Wonders Of The Universe (there’s much that will make you go ‘Wow!’ and wish you’d paid attention more at school), but on another level, it’s very different: It’s about people as much as planets. Brian describes it as a ‘love letter to humanity’. The man himself says it’s a departure for him. ‘We don’t just ask questions like, “How did we get here?”, but “Why are we here?”. The previous shows I’ve done tended to ask questions I knew the answer to.

With this one, we ask the biggies – that I can’t answer. No one can. I’m doing a book too that goes even further, and when you do that you need to defer to the theologians, the philosophers, the novelists, artists – they’re the people who assimilate scientific discoveries. Scientists can tell you the hows, not necessarily the whys.’ It’s a stunning series, a cinematic triumph of the sort the BBC does so well. He notched up some air miles making it too, given that once he’s explained how a ‘conscious civilisation’ emerged from a universe of stars and rocks, he heads off to Ethiopia to track our ancient ancestors, then to Jordan and Kazakhstan. He fits in a visit to NASA, then trains with Russian cosmonauts (‘Which is the boyhood dream, isn’t it?’) and meets a team returning to Earth from the International Space Station. In terms of ground covered it’s extraordinary. The most moving parts, though, are when his crew simply point the camera at actual people and ask them why they think they’re here. ‘We didn’t design it like that. It just happened.

We had this cameraman whose background wasn’t actually these big science series, and he was fascinated by the idea of doing portraits of these amazing people we met, in Russia, in India, all over. We just asked them what it was all about, and the answers we got were stunning. 'I remember this one man in the most desolate place on Earth coming out with this amazing stuff about, “Your ears have your father’s age, and your eyes have your own, your ears for the past and your eyes in the present.” It was incredible.’ So meteoric has Brian’s TV rise been (he used to be in the pop band D:Ream and the combination of pop star looks and boffin brains made him hot TV property) that it’s quite amazing he seems to have held onto his roots. He still lectures (in particle physics) at Manchester University, and has thus far refused to stray too far into general TV work. He does the odd panel show, and has had a guest appearance on Doctor Who (‘Well, I couldn’t turn that down’), but he hasn’t gone down the say-yes-to-anything route. Why hasn’t he been on Strictly yet?

‘Because I don’t want to be on the telly! I’ve no desire to do anything unless it’s science-related. Physics is my thing, it’s what I’m passionate about. I’m not massively interested in being a TV presenter, and I never was. I’m an academic.’ Brian in Ethiopia for his new show He published a research paper this year and very sweetly tries to explain what it was about. ‘It was on Quantum Field Theory,’ Er... ‘Foundational stuff in quantum mechanics.’ His undergraduates have grown up with seeing him on TV, though. Is that apparent? ‘If it is, it’s only for ten minutes, then they’re asking me to explain something again or complaining that they can’t read my handwriting.’ If they are attracted to science degrees because they’ve seen him on TV though, he thinks it’s a good thing. Actually he’s quite evangelical about it. He says he went into the science world because watching people like David Attenborough whetted his appetite. ‘That’s why public service broadcasting is so important – because it’s so influential. If people do end up doing a science degree because of me that’s great. It’s what doing these shows is about.

It isn’t about teaching anyone physics or astronomy or whatever. It’s about developing that curiosity, making people see possibilities.’ He works a lot in schools, trying to attract kids into science. Don’t they all want to be Rio Ferdinand or Rihanna these days, rather than Brian Cox? Surprisingly, he thinks not, although his reply won’t please Simon Cowell. ‘You hear all these stories about kids watching The X Factor and wanting to be pop stars, but that’s not true, not as far as I can see. You know they might fall into that, because there aren’t any opportunities left, so they think, “The only thing I’ve got left is to audition for The X Factor.” But that’s not a choice, really. What they really want – I find, anyway – is knowledge. It’s only when they’re not able to get it that they start deciding, “Well, I’ll just go and be a footballer.”’ Gia Milinovich (right) in her self defence training His own son George is five now, and at the age of endless questions. Is he better placed to answer them than the rest of us? ‘Well, we haven’t started on quantum physics yet.

But he can count backwards from 100.’ Joking aside, he says fatherhood does make you ponder the world, and your place in it, just that little bit more. ‘There’s a reason to care even more about the future – a personal reason,’ he says. His home life (he married Gia Milinovich, a TV presenter and writer, in 2003) has always been quite low-key, but earlier this year it became the stuff of headlines after his wife attacked an intruder in their London home. It’s a story that lends itself to dramatic retelling – she was woken by a sound in the middle of the night, thought it was her eldest son from an earlier relationship but instead it was a burglar, and launched herself at him – but that’s not Brian’s thing. He was away working in Manchester at the time. ‘Yeah, she phoned me and said, “A burglar came in the house. I punched him, and he’s been arrested,”’ he says, quite coolly. His immediate reaction? ‘Well, it was, “How did they get in our house?” The answer was that she’d left the back door open.

She won’t do that again.’ As anyone who’s been burgled will know, it’s a distressing experience. But she didn't feel she had a bad reaction to it, because she got all the anger out by smacking the guy in the face. His wife is a formidable talent in her own right. A digital media expert who’s worked on shows including Sky Sport Live, Channel 4’s The Cinema Show and BBC4 documentary Electric Dreams, she writes an excellent and sometimes controversial blog in which she often jokes about being Mrs Brian Cox. But after the incident she gave an interview to the Daily Mail, which he says was quite a departure for her. ‘She doesn’t like the limelight but she just felt very strongly that she’d learned a personal lesson, which is that some form of self-defence training for women is important. There are some people who disagree with that, but the reality is that she did know how to punch [Gia’s had three years of boxing training] and when someone came in the house, she punched them – and she punched them hard enough that they didn’t get very far, and they got arrested and ended up in jail.

So that’s not a bad outcome really.’ He’s clearly terribly proud of her, not in a gushy way, but in a quiet way. Was he surprised she punched a burglar? It doesn’t sound like it. ‘She’s forthright,’ he grins. Was she shaken up by it? ‘Well, as anyone who’s been burgled will know, it’s a distressing experience. But she didn’t feel she had a bad reaction to it, because she got all the anger out by smacking the guy in the face.’ Since we’ve been talking about the wonders of humanity, I ask if an ugly incident like this soured his view of this human nature he has been cheering. Any hopes of a terribly sage soundbite disappear fast, though. ‘I’m sure there are deeper lessons, but the first one should be, “Lock your doors!”’ n Human Universe starts on Tuesday 7 October, 9pm, BBC2. The book Human Universe by Brian Cox and Andrew Cohen is published by William Collins on 9 October, £25.

Question: Brian Cox, who is known among other things for presenting science TV programmes in the UK, is a professor at the University of Manchester in what field?
Answer: Particle Physics