This ten part history of mathematics from Newton to the present day, reveals the personalities behind the calculations: the passions and rivalries of mathematicians struggling to get their ideas heard. Professor Marcus du Sautoy shows how these masters of abstraction find a role in the real world and proves that mathematics is the driving force behind modern science.

Today how the mathematics of the French revolutionary, Evariste Galois, has proved invaluable to particle physicists working today. The mathematics that Galois began, over two hundred years ago, now absolutely describes the fundamental particles that make up our universe.

Producer: Anna Buckley.