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Since 2002, Planetary Radio has visited with a scientist, engineer, project manager, advocate, or writer who provides a unique perspective on the quest for knowledge about our solar system and beyond. The full show archive is available for free.
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JPL engineer Gregory Villar prepares us for the perilous descent and landing of the 2020 Mars rover on February 18th.
Composer Amanda Lee Falkenberg is joined by Cassini project scientist Linda Spilker and retired astronaut Nicole Stott as she shares excerpts from The Moons Symphony.
NASA has given the green light to Principal Investigator Les Johnson and his team for construction of a solar sail that dwarfs all that have come before.
In spite of everything, 2020 was a good year for space exploration according to five of The Planetary Society’s experts.
18 astronauts on the Artemis Team have a shot at walking on the Moon, and Stephanie Wilson is one of them.
Making oxygen from the Martian atmosphere will be essential if humans are ever to visit and work on the Red Planet, and the MOXIE experiment will soon show us how.
Bill Nye helps us welcome the Planetary Society’s new president who also leads a new Moon mission, while China’s lunar sample return spacecraft is headed home.
Space historian Teasel Muir-Harmony argues in her fascinating new book that the Apollo lunar program was promoted as a triumph of, not for, all mankind.
Host Mat Kaplan talked with the Arecibo Observatory director just hours before the giant radio telescope came crashing down.
Astronomer Jane Greaves returns with an update on the phosphine gas floating above Venus, before Casey Honnibal takes us through her team’s discovery of water right out under the Sun on Earth’s Moon.
Two pioneering Mars orbiters are still doing great work above the Red Planet, while the first operational Crew Dragon spaceship has delivered four astronauts to the International Space Station.
With the United States election over, Casey Dreier and Mat Kaplan welcome back Planetary Society Chief of D.C. Operations Brendan Curry for a review of what may be in store for the U.S. space program.
A distant, lonely planet has been discovered as it wanders the galaxy, while Bill Nye helps us celebrate selection of a radically-simple sample collection system for trips to the Moon and Mars’ moon Phobos.
Joel Sercel believes we are entering an era in which asteroid mining and other commercial development of space are imminent, but he’s concerned about how we will avoid the mistakes of past eras of human expansion.
The leader of the OSIRIS REx asteroid sample return mission shares more details of last week’s encounter in an exclusive interview, while we also learn about the proposed mission to look for life on Saturn’s moon Enceladus.
Creators of an outstanding new collection of poems about spaceflight and exploration join Mat Kaplan to talk about the book as Bill Nye and other notables read selections.
NASA’s planetary protection officer joined Mat Kaplan’s Humans to Mars summit panel for a great conversation about protecting worlds throughout the solar system from what could be devastating contamination.
Where would a Biden Administration take US space policy and NASA? Casey Dreier and space journalist Jeff Foust synthesize a best guess based on the available evidence.
Astronomer and planetary scientist Heidi Hammel’s AURA shines bright across our solar system and beyond.
Planetary Society Solar System Specialist Emily Lakdawalla makes a big announcement, and shares stories from her long history with the organization.