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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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Director of Canadensys West Peter Visscher fills us in on the upcoming Canadian lunar rover. Visscher has been working on the rover for years.
Dr. Matt Daniels of the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy joins the show to discuss the White House’s new cislunar space strategy, its ambitions, and implications for the future of lunar exploration and development.
Jeremy Graeber, the assistant launch director at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, joins Planetary Radio to recount his experience on the night of Artemis I’s historic launch.
The former director of NASA’s Planetary Science division, Jim Green, retired as the agency’s chief scientist in January. This episode opens with a special announcement from host Mat Kaplan.
Join us for Planetary Radio Live at Imperial College London!
Fred Haise takes us on board the mission that almost didn’t make it home from the Moon and shares many other stories.
Building the next spacesuit for Moon walkers, and a shipboard update on how the Artemis 1 Orion capsule will be recovered from the Pacific Ocean.
Here’s our sampling of the leading edge research presented by NIAC Fellows at NASA’s 2021 virtual gathering.
Space historian and author of A Man on the Moon Andy Chaikin returns as we celebrate Apollo 15’s 50th anniversary.
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.
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.
China has big plans for a space station, exploration of the Moon and Mars, and possibly a mission that will follow Voyager beyond the edge of the solar system.
Philosopher James Schwartz shares his thoughts about the ethics of space exploration, commercialization, and settlement.
Six scientists give us a preview of where planetary science may be taken in the next 10 years by a new NASA decadal survey.
Astrophysicist Javier Peralta, a team member on Japan's Akatsuki mission, takes us deep into Venus's thick, fast-moving clouds.
Astrobotic is one of several companies that are building small, robotic landers to take commercial payloads to the surface of the Moon. With a new contract from NASA to support his company’s work, CEO John Thornton looks forward to touching down in 2021. Senior editor Emily Lakdawalla can’t wait for the Europa Clipper to reach Europa, one of Jupiter’s ocean moons. Who doesn’t want more cow bell? Chief scientist Bruce Betts gets his share as he helps us explore the current night sky in What’s Up.
Host Mat Kaplan in a long and fascinating conversation with Nicholas de Monchaux, author of Spacesuit: Fashioning Apollo. This great book is about much more than creation of the suits that allowed humans to walk and work on the Moon. Jason Davis shares pointers on looking for LightSail 2 overhead, while Bruce Betts provides a solar sail update in this week’s What’s Up. And you might win a Planetary Radio t-shirt!
Poppy Northcutt was a pioneer—the first woman to work as an engineer in Apollo Mission Control. The program she helped to create got the astronauts back to Earth. Fifty years later, she sits down with Mat Kaplan for a look back.
Space historian Dr. Roger Launius joins the show to explain why Apollo happened the way it did, how a moonshot briefly became a solution to a national security problem, and why it is unlikely to happen again.
Thirty years ago, Dr. Mark Albrecht led the National Space Council when President George H.W. Bush announced the Space Exploration Initiative, an ambitious effort to send humans to the Moon and then on to Mars.