Universe Today Podcast

Michael Amato is an engineer at NASA and has been a member of the team behind NASA's DAVINCI spacecraft which will be launching to Venus in 2029. The spacecraft will be exploring the atmosphere of Venus with more clarity and detail than has ever been seen before, giving us a better sense about how the world became so different from Earth.

Edward Balaban is a research scientist at NASA Ames and the principal investigator of the Fluidic Telescope Experiment, or FLUTE. The idea is to create a giant lens in space out of a fluid that could maintain its shape in microgravity. The technology was recently tested during the Axiom-1 mission to the International Space Station.

Dr. Kevin Cannon is an assistant professor of geology and geological engineering at the Colorado School of Mines. Dr. Cannon has been studying the properties of lunar regolith, developing techniques that could help to mitigate its dangers during long-duration lunar exploration missions.

My guest today is Dr. Sam Howell, a planetary scientist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Sam studies the interiors of icy worlds, like Europa and Enceladus and is pioneering methods to explore their subsurface oceans.

In this week's Questions and Answers show, I explain why James Web still can't see the Big Bang, if black holes can "unblack hole" later in life and what is the cutest nebula in the Universe?

Every day about 100 tonnes of space dust strikes the Earth's atmosphere. Most of these space rocks vaporize, but some fall to the Earth at meteorites. Did you know that there are particles from space falling on the roof of your house? My guest today is Scott Peterson. Scott collects micrometeorites from his house and takes pictures of them using a microscope. We'll talk about how to find them, identify them and photograph them for yourself.

My guest today is Dr. Franck Marchis, a senior planetary astronomer and chair of the exoplanet group at the Carl Sagan Center of the SETI Institute and Chief Scientific Officer and Founder at Unistellar. Franck helps develop adaptive optics systems for research observatories and helped develop the fully automated eVscope telescope which helps amateurs do astrophotography and contribute to astronomical research.

My guest today is Dr. Renu Malhotra, a planetary scientist who specializes in planetary migration and orbital mechanics. Dr. Malhotra and her team have discovered that Pluto's orbit is surprisingly chaotic at small timescales and yet surprisingly stable at larger timescale. We'll talk about her research and the science of orbital mechanics that led to the current orbits of the planets in the Solar System.

My guest today is Dr. Slava Turyshev, a physicist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He helped to solve the Pioneer Anomaly, and is developing a mission that could use the Sun's gravity as a natural lens to focus the light from distant objects.

My guest today is Celeste Keith, a graduate student at the University of Chicago. Celeste and her team are searching for ways to detect the presence of primordial black holes, leftover from the Big Bang. These could be an explanation for dark matter and other phenomena in the Universe.