One Strange Rock

For the privileged few who have looked down at the Earth from space, the planet's thin blue line sets it apart from any other.

Earth is born in a cosmic storm and shaped by violence; the planet exists as a result of random collisions in a dangerous cosmos, constructed from the rubble of the early solar system.

The epic story of Earth's battle with the sun and how life thrives against all odds; hurling devastating particles and deadly radiation at Earth, the sun is the big boss of the solar system; without several shields, life on Earth wouldn't survive.

Our rock is special — it’s alive. Though the building blocks of life are common across the universe, life is rare. So what is it about planet Earth that sets it apart? This is the story of dynamic forces and crazy coincidences that took a bunch of dead ingredients and transformed them into something as wondrously intricate as life. And if it happened here, could it happen elsewhere?

It’s not enough for Earth to be habitable, it also has to be lethal for life to thrive. Death is hardwired into everything from our cells to the planet itself. Global mass extinctions create the opportunities that evolution seizes, boosting biodiversity. At the heart of this story is a biological superpower – sex, life’s trade-off with death to survive in a restless world.

Astronaut Chris Hadfield has left the planet three times already. Now he wants to do more. After seeing the bullet holes left by asteroids on our planet’s surface, he believes our only chance of survival is to escape Earth and build a colony off-world. But it will be the toughest journey humanity has ever faced: space radiation, microgravity and the bacteria inside us will conspire against us. Could we earthlings ever survive off our one strange rock?