The weather on brown dwarfs, and worlds on the eve of destruction
Astrophysicists Sam Grunblatt and Johanna Vos are colleagues at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Sam’s team has discovered giant worlds that are about to be devoured by their expand...
9 Feb 202251min
Space Policy Edition: JWST and the politics of mega-science (with Robert Smith)
Robert Smith shares the story of how the astronomical community decided upon the JWST as the follow-up to the Hubble Space Telescope, the coalition politics required for mega-projects like Hubble and ...
4 Feb 20221h 20min
Nobel laureate John Mather: The promise of the James Webb Space Telescope
The JWST’s instruments have been turned on. Now begins the months-long preparation for observations that will reveal our universe as never before. 2006 Nobel Prize for Physics laureate John Mather is ...
2 Feb 20221h 3min
Worlds of snow and ice
From Venus to Pluto, our solar system contains a myriad of planets, moons and other bodies whose surfaces are covered in snow and ice made of water and other exotic stuff. Saturn’s moon Enceladus is a...
26 Jan 202250min
Curiosity rolls on: Mars Science Laboratory project scientist Ashwin Vasavada
We are approaching the 10th anniversary of Curiosity’s arrival in the Red Planet’s Gale crater. The rolling laboratory is still making profound discoveries as it reveals beautiful vistas and closeups....
19 Jan 202251min
We have touched the Sun: The Parker Solar Probe’s triumph
The Parker Solar Probe dipped within the corona on its eighth encounter with our star. It found phenomena that have surprised and delighted heliophysicists, and it captured a movie that is one of the ...
12 Jan 20221h 1min
Space Policy Edition: What We're Watching in 2022
New rockets, new legislation, and a new direction for planetary exploration are just some of the major events happening in space in the coming year. D.C. Operations Chief Brendan Curry returns to the ...
7 Jan 20221h 3min
Return to the Moon: Spacesuits and preparing for splashdown in the Pacific
NASA’s Artemis program aims to return humans to the Moon for the first time since 1972. We visit Naval Base San Diego to board the USS John P. Murtha, the ship that may recover the uncrewed Artemis 1 ...
5 Jan 20221h 5min
