What happens behind the scenes at the Museum? Why is it important to preserve the 70 million specimens in the collections? And how relevant is the research of Museum scientists to today’s challenges, like biodiversity loss and the spread of tropical disease? The BBC documentary, Museum of Life, will answer these questions, and many more.

Museum of Life gives viewers an inside look at the Natural History Museum and some of the 300 or more scientists who work here.
Cameras follow them on collecting expeditions around the world, as they hunt for dinosaur fossils and study the biodiversity of remote areas. But there are also plenty of discoveries to be made at the Museum itself, including hidden store rooms full of specimens, and high tech science facilities, such as the DNA labs. Find out about the huge variety of plants and animals that scientists study here, and why they are important for conservation efforts today.

As a young man, Jimmy Doherty (Jimmy’s Farm, Jimmy Doherty in Darwin’s Garden, Jimmy’s Global Harvest) worked as a volunteer at the Natural History Museum in South Kensington. Now he returns to join the Museum scientists and find out how much has changed.
He is joined by engineer Kate Bellingham (Tomorrow’s World), doctor of tropical medicine Chris van Tulleken (Medicine Men), conservationist Liz Bonnin (Bang Goes the Theory) and zoologist Mark Carwardine (Last Chance to See).

Jimmy Doherty goes behind the scenes at the Natural History Museum to discover the lengths people go to to add new and rarely studied species to the collection. A colossal squid turns up at the museum, a team of scientists push through unexplored jungle in Panama and a pioneering project finds a new species at the bottom of the sea off the coast of Sweden.