The Pale Red Dot: A Planet Called Proxima b

The announcement was made just days ago. Co-discoverer Michael Endl tells us about the discovery of a roughly Earth-mass planet orbiting in the habitable zone of the closest star to our own. Juno has made its first science flyby of Jupiter. Emily Lakdawalla gives us an early report. Are you ready for the first interplanetary Olympics? Bruce and Mat review the listener-submitted out-of-this-world sports on What’s Up. Bill Nye is away this week.

Related Links:

• Planet Found in Habitable Zone Around Nearest Star
• Juno’s First Jupiter Close Approach Successful
• Superman in the Interplanetary Olympics
• Chris McKay on swimming in the methane seas of Titan

This week's prizes are a gorgeous Planetary Society rubber asteroid and a 200-point iTelescope.net astronomy account.

This week's question:

Which Space Shuttle Orbiter was the only one to have traveled by land, sea and air? (Slightly tricky!)

To submit your answer:

Complete the contest entry form at http://planetary.org/radiocontest or write to us at [email protected] no later than Tuesday, September 6th at 8am Pacific Time. Be sure to include your name and mailing address.

Last week's question:

What is the apparent brightness ranking of the Scorpius star Antares in the night sky?

Answer:

The answer will be revealed next week.

Question from the week before:

If you designed an Olympic event for another world in our solar system, what would it be and where would it be? Mat and Bruce will very subjectively judge the coolness and/or humor of responses.

Answer:

Our winners proposed wonderful events for the Interplanetary Olympics. Listen to them on the show.