Imagine being an astronaut and planning for a space mission you know you have no chance of joining; a journey that won’t even happen in your lifetime, or possibly even your children’s. We meet the long-term thinkers and planners – the space visionaries not afraid to think outside the square.
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/futuretense/interstellar-travel/4527070
Tagged with space interstellar science
Ann Druyan is an author and television and film writer & producer whose work is largely concerned with the effects of science and technology on our civilization. She was co-writer with Carl Sagan and Steven Soter of the Emmy and Peabody Award winning television series COSMOS, and as the founder and CEO of COSMOS STUDIOS, she is currently working on a reboot of that series. Ann Druyan served as Creative Director of the NASA Voyager Interstellar Record Project to design a complex message, including music and images, for possible alien civilizations. These golden phonograph records affixed to the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft, the fastest moving vehicles ever created by the human species, are now beyond the outermost planets of the solar system on their way to interstellar space. They have a projected shelf life of one billion years. She is the author or co-author of several books, including Comet, which was on the New York Times best seller list for two months. Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, written with Carl Sagan, was another New York Times best seller. She is also a credited contributor to the best-selling books Contact, Pale Blue Dot, The Demon-Haunted World and Billions & Billions by Carl Sagan. She was the co-producer and co-creator of Contact, a Warner Brothers motion picture, based on the story she co-wrote with Carl Sagan. Directed by Bob Zemeckis and starring Jodie Foster, Contact was released July 1997. Ann Druyan was married for nearly two decades to Carl Sagan, until his death in December 1996, and subsequently she was the Founder of The Carl Sagan Foundation.
http://www.sidrodrigues.com/2013/03/little-atoms-269-ann-druyan-voyager-cosmos-and-carl-sagan/
Tagged with little atoms science interview nasa space book:author=ann druyan
As senior astronomer of the S.E.T.I. Institute in California tells Dick he has no doubt life exists in other parts of the universe, and believes scientists are getting closer to finding it â itâs just a matter of time.
http://www.thestory.org/stories/2012-03/scanning-alien-signal
With the end of the shuttle program and an International Space Station still in need of supplies, the aerospace industry is working the kinks of out of a century-old idea to build a service elevator from Earth to outer space.
Tagged with space elevator engineering space
As the space shuttle programme draws to a close, Piers Sellers and Scott Altman describe what it was like to fly on the shuttle — and we recreate the sounds
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/audio/2011/jul/12/science-weekly-podcast-space-shuttle
Tagged with space shuttle nasa sound science
Although you can’t hear anything in space, scientists can still use sound to understand the solar system by turning data collected by NASA satellites into sounds and music. Listen to how one sonification specialist creates music out of eruptions on the sun.
In his new novel 2312, legendary science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson focuses on outer space and humans’ place in it.
As you probably guessed from the title, the story is set three centuries in the future. It hinges on “the idea that the solar system is our neighborhood, and could be inhabited,” Robinson tells Wired Senior Editor Adam Rogers in this episode of the Storyboard podcast.
In the book, which hits stores May 22, humans live not just on other planets, but also in miniature biomes in hollowed-out asteroids. Robinson’s oeuvre includes the Hugo-winning Mars trilogy and the global warming-focused Forty Signs of Rain. In the podcast, he talks about time travel, trips to Antarctica and the future of humanity.
http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/05/storyboard-kim-stanley-robinson-2312/
James Fallows of The Atlantic met Neil Armstrong at a gathering of some of America’s greatest aviators and astronauts, and even in that crowd, Armstrong stood out. Saturday, the astronaut’s family announced he had died at the age of 82. Guest host Laura Sullivan speaks with Fallows about Armstrong’s legacy.
http://www.npr.org/2012/08/25/160046602/neil-armstrong-an-exemplary-life
Tagged with neil armstrong moon moon landing space
Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, died over the weekend at the age of 82. Steve Inskeep talks to Neil Degrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium in New York, about Armstrong’s impact on space exploration.
http://www.npr.org/2012/08/27/160095721/remembering-astronaut-neil-armstrong
Tagged with neil armstrong neil degrasse tyson moon space
Our science team takes stock of the textbook landing of Nasa’s Curiosity rover on Mars. Plus, we discuss why science in film works – and why it sometimes doesn’t.
This week we’ve assembled a panel of experts to feed your appetite for information about Nasa’s new star, the Mars Curiosity rover.
The plucky robot landed on the red planet at 6:14am UK time and immediately sent back images of its surroundings. Guardian science correspondent Ian Sample takes us through the complex landing procedure; planetary scientist Geraint Jones from University College London tells us what it’s like to be in the control room back on Earth when your lander reaches another planet; and our new astronomy blogger, Stuart Clark, walks us through Curiosity’s scientific goals.
Talking of alien worlds, science fans will be pleased to know that the Wellcome Trust has launched a new prize to encourage the production of high-quality feature films inspired by biology and medicine: from genetics and infectious diseases to consciousness and mental health.
Here to discuss good and bad science on the big and small screen are the Wellcome Trust media fellow and podcast regular, Kevin Fong, and the Wellcome Trust’s games and film expert Iain Dodgeon.
We also have the space junkie and self-confessed geek Helen Keen on the show. She’s hoping to win audiences at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe festival with a show that exposes her love for all things robotic. We’ll talk to her about her new show – Robot Woman of Tomorrow – and get her thoughts on the Curiosity rover too.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/audio/2012/aug/06/science-weekly-podcast-curiostiy-rover-mars
Page 1 of 6Older