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  • #73 NASA’s Project Mercury Monument has turned 60! It’s a tribute to America's first attempt at human space flight. The monument has a time capsule that is scheduled to stay sealed for 500 years! Let’s check out what's inside.

    #73 NASA’s Project Mercury Monument has turned 60! It’s a tribute to America's first attempt at human space flight. The monument has a time capsule that is scheduled to stay sealed for 500 years! Let’s check out what's inside.
    2024/11/30

    Project Mercury was NASA’s first attempt at human crewed space flight. It sent Alan Shepard into space, and John Glenn into orbit, among four other landmark flights over 5 years. By 1963 it was done, and NASA was ready to launch Gemini, its next project. But being such a groundbreaking project, in 1964 NASA paid tribute to Mercury with a four metre high stainless steel monument with a time capsule that would remain sealed beneath it until the year 2464, five centuries later.

    What was so significant about Mercury? And what’s inside this time capsule? We could wait another 440 years, or just listen!


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    6 分
  • #72 The space pioneers from Earth weren’t humans, what? That’s right, long before humans launched into space, there were a whole team of dogs, monkeys, chimps, insects and more, who rode rockets to space. All in the name of research.

    #72 The space pioneers from Earth weren’t humans, what? That’s right, long before humans launched into space, there were a whole team of dogs, monkeys, chimps, insects and more, who rode rockets to space. All in the name of research.
    2024/10/31

    When Yuri Gagarin blasted into orbit in 1961 to become the first human in space, he was already 14 years behind the first animals from Earth. The fruit flies that were flew to space in 1947 were just the first of many different animals in the decade and a half before Gagarin’s orbital flight that were used to test equipment and living things’ capacity to survive and work in weightlessness. There were primates, dogs, mice and rabbits that crewed orbital and suborbital test flights. And the animal parade didn’t end when humans launched themselves to space, frogs, fish, spiders, chimpanzees, a cat and of course guinea pigs all played a role in advancing the space program.

    One very famous space animal has her own statue.


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    9 分
  • #71 Earth has a new moon! For about the next 8 weeks... Asteroid 2024 PT5 will be captured by Earth's gravity before returning to its normal solar orbit.

    #71 Earth has a new moon! For about the next 8 weeks... Asteroid 2024 PT5 will be captured by Earth's gravity before returning to its normal solar orbit.
    2024/09/30

    Earth has a new moon! well, for about 8 weeks anyway. Asteroid 2024 PT5 has been captured by Earth’s gravity and will be in orbit until late November 2024. This is really unusual and there have only been a few confirmed mini moons in the past. Our new temporary neighbour is only about 11 metres across and won’t be visible to anyone who doesn’t have a professional large-scale telescope, but we’ll know it’s there! and although it will only stay for about 2 months, 2024 PT5 will be back again in 2055.

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    6 分
  • #70 The Boeing Starliner capsule's first crewed test flight has left two astronauts stranded on the International Space Station. What went wrong, and how are they going to get home?

    #70 The Boeing Starliner capsule's first crewed test flight has left two astronauts stranded on the International Space Station. What went wrong, and how are they going to get home?
    2024/08/31

    Boeing’s Starliner space capsule blasted off for its first crewed test flight in early June. Great news right? Turns out, no. After arriving at the International Space Station, some technical problems meant that it couldn’t be used to take its crew of Barry ‘Butch’ Wilmore and Suni Williams back to Earth. The two astronauts were left with no way to get home.

    The two capsules already docked at the space station couldn’t be used, so the astronauts were stranded.

    Let’s find out what happened to Starliner, why couldn’t the other capsules be used, and how are the Starliner crew going to get home?

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    7 分
  • #69 NASA's Curiosity rover has just made the most incredible discovery of its 12 years on Mars. By running over a rock!

    #69 NASA's Curiosity rover has just made the most incredible discovery of its 12 years on Mars. By running over a rock!
    2024/07/31

    NASA's Curiosity rover touched down on Mars in August 2012, and it's been exploring the Red Planet all that time. There have been some amazing discoveries and it's travelled over 30km but it has just made the most scientifically significant discovery of its 12 year career, and did it simply by running over a rock! One of Curiosity's wheels crushed a rock. It had looked just like any other orange martian rock, but when it shattered under Curiosity's wheels, it revealed breathtaking yellowish green crystals inside, that turned out to pure sulphur. Unheard of on the Red Planet. Let's check it out!

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    8 分
  • #68 A piece of space history was written this month, a sample from the far side of the moon! Let's check out the Chang'e 6 lunar lander and it's history-making mission.

    #68 A piece of space history was written this month, a sample from the far side of the moon! Let's check out the Chang'e 6 lunar lander and it's history-making mission.
    2024/06/30

    As I write this, just a couple of days have passed since the Chang'e 6 sample return capsule touched down with its historic payload. The first sample of rock and soil from the far side of the moon touched down on Earth. This has the potential to unlock some of the secrets from the side of the moon that we never see from Earth, why is the lunar crust thicker? Why are there fewer 'seas' on the far side? And what lies beneath the lunar crust?
    All of this against the background of a surface operation out of direct communication from Earth. Incredible!

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    7 分
  • #67 OSIRIS-REx NASA mission scientist Greg Brennecka brings us up to date on the incredible early findings from the Bennu asteroid sample.

    #67 OSIRIS-REx NASA mission scientist Greg Brennecka brings us up to date on the incredible early findings from the Bennu asteroid sample.
    2024/05/31

    In September 2023, Greg Brennecka stopped by to preview the return to Earth of the OSIRI-REx asteroid Bennu sample return capsule. The sample landed safely and the mission scientists like Greg Brennecka have started their analysis. Some of our toughest questions are being answered by the data already. How old is Bennu? Is there organic material? Where was the asteroid formed? Is Bennu different from what we expected?
    But hasn't been all smooth sailing. The mission team had to go into full innovation mode to overcome some early difficulties.
    And we've only just begun!
    Listen in to this fascinating chat with Greg.

    Check out Greg's book Impact here.

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    18 分
  • #66 Saturn’s largest moon Titan is an incredible place, but could anything live there? Canadian Astrobiologist Dr Catherine Neish led a study on Titan’s habitability. She joins us for a fascinating chat about what she found.

    #66 Saturn’s largest moon Titan is an incredible place, but could anything live there? Canadian Astrobiologist Dr Catherine Neish led a study on Titan’s habitability. She joins us for a fascinating chat about what she found.
    2024/04/30

    Titan. The largest moon in the Saturnian system has been a candidate as a habitable world ever since NASA’s Cassini mission sent back the first radar images of its surface in 2004. Astrobiologist Dr. Catherine Neish of Western University in Canada has spent years studying Titan, and has just published a study on the habitability of Titan. Catherine joins us to step through the findings, what is needed for life? Is there enough of it on Titan? And does it all come together?

    Read Ralph Lorez's paper Titan Under a Red Giant Sun: Anew Kind of Habitable Moon

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    24 分