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PODCAST

This Week in Space (Audio)

The new space age is upon us, and This Week in Space leaves no topic untouched. Every Friday, join Editor-in-Chief of Ad Astra magazine, Rod Pyle and Managing Editor of Space.com, Tariq Malik as they explore everything related to the cosmos. You can join Club TWiT for $10 per month and get ad-free audio and video feeds for all our shows plus everything else the club offers...or get just this podcast ad-free for $5 per month. New episodes posted every Friday.

science astronomy

All Episodes

1:11:03

TWiS 121: An Exploding Star Near You! - A Nova is...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/07/26

A nova is a star that periodically sheds mass in a huge flare-up of light and energy. This week, astrophysicist Dr. Carlos Badenes from the University of Pittsburgh joins us to discuss a star that should be going nova in the next few weeks--and will be visible in the night sky for about 6-7 days! T Corona Borealis (TCrB) is a binary system comprising two stars in the constellation Corona Borealis that bursts into magnitude 2 (as seen from Earth) about every 80 years--and should do so again by

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1:03:27

TWiS 119: Junkyard in Space - The Dangers of Orbital...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/07/12

If you saw the movie "Gravity," you have a sense of the dangers of orbital debris—and the risk is very real. More than 25,000 objects over four inches in diameter are tracked by the US Space Force, and millions of others are smaller or untracked—everything from derelict satellites to dead rocket stages to bits of shrapnel and even just chunks of frozen rocket fuel is there. And even something the size and mass of a paint chip, traveling at orbital speeds, can take out a window of a spacecraft

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1:07:30

TWiS 115: Our Friendly Mr. Sun - Mr. Sun: Friend or...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/06/14

We see the sun every day as it rises and sets... it's one of the few constants in life. But it's a very dynamic body, throwing minor temper tantrums regularly. As it happens, we're at the peak of its 11-year cycle of activity and there's a lot going on! Dr. Alex Young, the Associate Director for Science in the Heliophysics Science Division at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, joins us to talk about the sun, solar activity cycles, the recent solar storms that have given us auroras and some

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1:16:30

TWiS 114: Starliners & Starships - Boeing's...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/06/07

Well, we waited, we waffled, and we joked... but Boeing's Starliner finally made good! Seven or so years after their projected crewed flight date, the second provider of crew delivery to the International Space Station finally succeeded in sending two astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams, to the ISS. Despite a few problems with (sigh) valves, helium tanks, and thrusters, the mission appears to be going swimmingly. Then, just a day later, SpaceX launched a Starship on a fourth test flight

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1:07:34

TWiS 112: Mars on Pause? - With JPL Chief Engineer...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/05/24

This week we've invited JPL's Chief Engineer Emeritus, Rob Manning, back to discuss Mars exploration and, in particular, Mars Sample Return. As we discussed in episode 107, that project is in a bit of trouble. Rob was the Chief Engineer of every Mars rover up through Perseverance and the overall Chief Engineer on Perseverance, and he has some unique insights on how we have explored Mars, why it matters, and what the future holds... especially with regard to returning samples to Earth. Join us

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1:05:42

TWiS 111: The Big Glass Wars - Inside the Race to...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/05/17

Welcome to the Big Glass Wars! That's right, just when you thought you'd heard it all, turns out there's hot competition among a few countries to stay on the cutting edge of optical astronomy, and to do that, you need a great big hunk of glass to gather light from distant galaxies and stellar systems. Enter the Carnegie Observatories and their partners on the Thirty Meter Telescope and the Giant Magellan Telescope. Both are currently under construction, and both are threatened by budget parsimony

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1:09:00

TWiS 110: Voyager 1's Brush with Silence - Saving an...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/05/10

The Voyager probes have been transiting space since 1977, and they're still at it 46 years later. But late in 2023, Voyager 1, now 15 billion miles distant, started sending what the flight controllers called "gibberish" back to Earth---uncoordinated ones and zeros and a heartbeat tone. They knew it was still alive, but something had gone wrong. The small team of software wizards at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory got to work and came up with a workaround... but due to the age of the program, did not

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1:12:01

TWiS 107: Mars Sample Return Blues - Setbacks,...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/04/19

Unless you've been living under a big red Martian rock, you've likely heard that NASA's Mars Sample Return mission is in trouble. The robotic program has its roots in the 1960s, when NASA started thinking about sending robots to fetch Mars soil even before Mariner 4's first flyby of the planet. The Russians pondered it as well, as the Chinese and Japanese are today. The problem? It's really hard, with multiple spacecraft, possibly on different launches, rendezvousing around the Red Planet to

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1:06:11

TWiS 103: Starship's Orbital Feat - SpaceX's 3rd Test...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/03/22

Last week's test flight of SpaceX's Starship--its third so far--was a mixed bag. The successful launch, ascent, staging, and testing of propellant transfer and the cargo bay door were all brilliant, yet both vehicles were destroyed before completing their planned trajectories, and the upper stage didn't make it into orbit (though it did reach "orbital velocity," according to Elon). So what's the real story on this test flight? When will the next one be? How close is SpaceX to routine launches of

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59:56

TWiS 102: A New Volcano on Mars! - Dr. Pascal Lee's...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/03/15

Thought you knew all about Mars? Think again. Despite thousands of people poring through thousands of images from a flock of Mars orbiters over the decades, Dr. Pascal Lee and his associates found intriguing features in a region of complex terrain between Mars' Olympus Mons, the largest volcano in the solar system, and the western extent of Valles Marineris, the largest canyon. First, he spotted a relict glacier, covered with volcanic ash, and in a single day, realized he'd found a recently active

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49:34

TWiS 101: Nukes in Space - Starship's Next Launch...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/03/08

Russia is building a secret nuclear-powered space weapon, but what does that mean for the rest of us? In this episode, Tariq Malik is joined by Space.com's Brett Tingley to discuss the recent reports and delve into the history of nuclear weapons and reactors in space, the existing international treaties governing weapons of mass destruction in orbit, and the growing militarization of space by Russia, China, and the United States. Malik and Tingley also cover the week's top headlines, including

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1:05:38

TWiS 96: It's Space TV! - With William Shatner's...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/02/02

Space and science TV has come a long way since the old-time staples like Mr. Wizard and the original Bille Nye, The Science Guy. On this episode of This Week in Space, History Channel producer Jeff Stepp joins us to talk about his work on "The UnXplained: With William Shatner" and other science shows—how are they conceived, what is production like, and what is the future of space and science-oriented media? We know Jeff to be a fine writer and responsible gatekeeper for high-quality, responsible

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1:06:26

TWiS 95: Clean Energy From Space With John Mankins -...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/01/26

Climate change has become a top priority for all of us, including NASA. Space solar power—beaming energy from space 24 hours per day—has become a real possibility and is being studied internationally by the US, Europe, Japan, and China. It promises to provide a zero-emissions, zero-carbon source of energy worldwide—but it will take significant investment, development, and commitment. A recent NASA-backed study was positive but careful with its conclusions, and John Mankins, one of the first

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1:04:23

TWiS 94: Space in 2024 - A Preview of the Global...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/01/19

2024 looks to be another exciting year in spaceflight! Despite the delay of the Artemis crewed lunar program, a number of exciting missions are queued up this year, among them the launch of Europa Clipper, ESA's HERA mission to Didymos, the first flight of Blue Origin's mammoth New Glenn rocket, and the first crewed flight of India's new spacecraft, the Gagaanyan capsule. We'll dive into these and more on this episode of This Week in Space! Headlines: Japan became the 5th country to successfully

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1:10:36

TWiS 93: Does America Really Want to Go Back to the...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/01/12

America's heading back to the Moon, but what does the public really think? This week, we talk with former NASA Chief Historian and Smithsonian Curator Dr. Roger Launius, who has studied, among many other things, public perceptions of NASA and spaceflight. Some spoilers: no, there was no "Golden Age" in the 1960s when the public was hugely behind the Apollo Moon landings; being a space historian is a lot of fun; and it probably doesn't really matter if China lands people on the Moon before the US

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1:07:16

TWiS 92: The Saga of the Seven Sisters - Navigating...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2024/01/05

Spend some time in a dark location and you'll see the night sky in all its glory. If you pick a night with no moon, the effect triples. Steve Fentress, recently retired director of the Strasenburgh Planetarium in New York, is our guide to the night sky this week. He'll enlighten us about the lore of the Pleiades, also known as the Seven Sisters, one of the more remarkable constellations in the sky, as well as a general tour of other notable constellations and their stories across the ages. And..

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0:47

TWiS: Happy Holidays From Rod & Tariq - We Return...

This Week in Space (Audio) ·

2023/12/22

Happy holidays! Rod and Tariq are taking the next two weeks off but will be back with our regularly scheduled programming on January 5th. Host: Rod Pyle Download or subscribe to this show at https://twit.tv/shows/this-week-in-space. Get episodes ad-free with Club TWiT at https://twit.tv/clubtwit

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