The 2003 BBC documentary "The World's First Time Machine", directed by Ben Bowie and featuring Ronald Mallett, premiered in the USA on The Learning Channel on December 3, 2003. This documentary features some of Dr. Mallett's current time travel research. It has since been shown numerous times on The Science Channel.
Ronald L. Mallett, PhD is a professor of theoretical physics at the University of Connecticut. He discovered a possible way to travel in time by applying Einstein's theory of relativity to laser light moving in a circle. The program uses CGI to illustrate his theories. Mallett was one of the first African-Americans to obtain a PhD in theoretical physics. He was inspired to do so because he wished to travel back in time to visit his dead father, who died when Mallett was ten.
HG Wells did it by means of an armchair and a cut lead crystal handle. The Starship Enterprise does it by unfeasibly powerful engines. And Doctor Who managed it in a 1960s police box, of all things. But just what is the truth behind time travel -- does modern day physics allow such a venture?
"When I became convinced that the universe is natural, that all the ghosts and gods are myths, there entered into my brain, into my soul, into every drop of my blood the sense, the feeling, the joy of freedom. The walls of my prison crumbled and fell. The dungeon was flooded with light and all the bolts and bars and manacles became dust. I was no longer a servant, a serf, or a slave. There was for me no master in all the wide world, not even in infinite space. I was free--free to think, to express my thoughts--free to live my own ideal, free to live for myself and those I loved, free to use all my faculties, all my senses, free to spread imagination's wings, free to investigate, to guess and dream and hope, free to judge and determine for myself . . . I was free! I stood erect and fearlessly, joyously faced all worlds."