Weekly Space Hangout

This week we are very excited to welcome Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein to the Weekly Space Hangout. Chanda is an assistant professor of physics and astronomy and core faculty in women’s and gender studies at the University of New Hampshire. She is also a columnist for New Scientist and Physics World. In her first book, THE DISORDERED COSMOS: A Journey into Dark Matter, Spacetime, and Dreams Deferred (Bold Type Books), Chandra brings readers into the world of particle physics and the cosmos — all while making an urgent call for a more just and inclusive practice of science that expands our understanding of the universe and our place in it. Chanda's research in theoretical physics focuses on cosmology, neutron stars, and dark matter, and she is active in Black feminist science, technology, and society studies. Essence magazine recognized her as one of “15 Black Women Who Are Paving the Way in STEM and Breaking Barriers.” She has been profiled in several venues, including TechCrunch, Ms. Magazine, Huffington Post, Gizmodo, Nylon, and the African American Intellectual History Society’s Black Perspectives. A cofounder of the Particles for Justice movement, Chanda has received the 2017 LGBT+ Physicists Acknowledgement of Excellence Award for her contributions to improving conditions for marginalized people in physics, as well as the 2021 American Physical Society Edward A. Bouchet Award for her contributions to particle cosmology. Be sure to visit Chanda's website: http://www.cprescodweinstein.com/ and follow her on Twitter (https://twitter.com/ibjiyongi), LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/chandaprescodweinstein), and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/chandapw/). To learn more about The Disordered Cosmos, including where to get your copy, visit: ► In the US: https://www.boldtypebooks.com/titles/chanda-prescod-weinstein/the-disordered-cosmos/9781541724709/ ► In the UK: https://www.hachette.co.uk/titles/chanda-prescod-weinstein/the-disordered-cosmos/9781541724709/ **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

Yup - another week with no guest scheduled (we are working on it though, I promise) but fear not - I know the team will fill the hour with a slew of amazing stories!! **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

This week we are pleased to welcome Dr. Casey Honniball to the WSH. Casey is a NASA Postdoctoral Program (NPP) Fellow at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and has extensive experience in observing, instrumentation, and telescope operation. As an undergraduate at the University of Arizona, she aided in the development of a submillimeter instruments that she would later help deploy to Mt. Graham and Llano de Chajnantor Observatories and to Antarctica. As a graduate student at the University of Hawai'i she was responsible for assembly, test, and deployment of a 3-5 µm imaging interferometer (MIDAS, Mid infrared detector of atmospheric species) used for volcanological studies and as a prototype for a small satellite instrument. She co-led a large-scale survey of the mid-IR hydration properties of lunar surface using the SpeX cross-dispersed spectrograph at the NASA InfraRed Telescope Facility (IRTF). Dr. Honniball originated the project to use the NASA/DLR Stratospheric Observatory For Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) to search for the 6 µm molecular water signature on the lunar surface and has had two observing runs on SOFIA with 20 more hours planned. As a postdoc fellow, Dr. Honniball continues lunar observations with the IRTF and SOFIA and works to connect the 3 and 6 µm hydration bands on the Moon. Be sure to follow Casey on Twitter (@CaseyHonniball) to stay up to date with her research. **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

No guest is scheduled for this week yet (although we are still trying to line up someone awesome,) but there is nothing at all wrong with spending the hour catching up on the news! **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

This week we are extremely pleased to welcome Dr. David Kipping, Assistant Professor of Astronomy at Columbia University, to the WSH. David researches extrasolar planets and moons, including their impact on the origins of our solar system and beyond. At Columbia, he leads the Cool Worlds Lab where he and his team study extrasolar planetary systems with a particular focus on the detection and analysis of worlds found at longer orbital periods. David is also principal investigator of The Hunt for Exomoons with the Kepler (HEK) project, in addition to being active in science outreach, including operating a YouTube channel called Cool Worlds, which, with more than 100,000 subscribers, serves as an international platform to discuss his group’s research and related science. David earned his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees at the University of Cambridge and received his Ph.D. in Astrophysics from University College London. He spent time doing postdoctoral work at Harvard University before joining Columbia University in 2015, and has authored more than 90 scientific publications. We here at the WSH also have a personal connection with David: he is/was Graduate Advisor to two of our current Journalists: Dr. Alex Teachey and (soon to be Dr.) Moiya McTier. You can learn more about the Cool Worlds Lab by visiting http://coolworlds.astro.columbia.edu/ and heading over to their YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/c/coolworldslab To learn more about David, please visit his website at http://www.davidkipping.co.uk/ **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

This week we are excited to welcome Dr. Nicholas Castle from the MSL/Curiosity Mission Science Team to the WSH. Nick has been a rock-collector and space enthusiast for as long as he can remember. He is currently an active member of the Mars Science Laboratory (Curiosity Rover) mission operations team, where he helps coordinate activities for the Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) X-ray diffraction instrument. Outside of mission operations his research focuses on meteorites, especially those from Mars. He is a bit of an instrumentation junkie who works with electron microscopes, mass spectrometers, X-ray diffractometers, high-temperature furnaces, and the occasional laser. As an associate research scientist at the Planetary Science Institute, Nick is interested in communicating research results with the general public and promoting science literacy. A graduate of Lehigh University, the University of Washington, and the University of Alberta, he loves fieldwork, camping, sailing, and good espresso. He currently resides in the Arizona desert. **************************************** As part of his science outreach activities, Nick is partnering with CosmoQuest as we relaunch our CosmoAcademy series of educational programming. Our first program (which Nick will be teaching,) "Mars 101: How to Live on Mars (and Not Die)," begins on Saturday, March 20. For complete information, including cost and how to register, go to https://www.eventbrite.com/e/mars-101-how-to-live-on-mars-and-not-die-tickets-141371715607. **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

We record the Weekly Space Hangout every Wednesday at 5:00 pm Pacific / 8:00 pm Eastern. You can watch us live on Universe Today or the Weekly Space Hangout YouTube page. This week we are very pleased to be airing Fraser's pre-recorded interview with Melissa Thorpe, Interim Head of Spaceport Cornwall. Melissa is the main liaison for industry, military, Government, media, public, and schools for Spaceport Cornwall, the UK’s first horizontal launch site. Together with launch partner, Virgin Orbit, this ambitious project will offer dedicated and responsive access to space by 2022 from an existing civilian airport. Melissa works across the launch environment to efficiently secure investment and infrastructure required to launch, whilst communicating the space story to the local community. Originally from Canada, Melissa moved to the UK to attend the London School of Economics in 2010. Since then, she has worked on several aerospace development projects, and has been part of the Spaceport Cornwall team since its inception in 2014. **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

We record the Weekly Space Hangout every Wednesday at 5:00 pm Pacific / 8:00 pm Eastern. You can watch us live on Universe Today or the Weekly Space Hangout YouTube page. This week we are excited to welcome Joseph Mallozzi to the Weekly Space Hangout. Although you may not know his name, most of us certainly recognize — and love — many of the television shows Joe has produced, written, and/or showran. Joseph Mallozzi is a Canadian writer, showrunner, and producer with over 20 years experience in the television industry. He has over 350 hours of produced television to his credit in addition to 100+ hours as both a writer and a showrunner. Joe has worked primarily in the genre field, most notably on the Stargate franchise (SG-1, Atlantis, Universe,) Dark Matter (a show he created and showran for three seasons,) and, most recently, Utopia Falls for Hulu. **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

We record the Weekly Space Hangout every Wednesday at 5:00 pm Pacific / 8:00 pm Eastern. You can watch us live on Universe Today or the Weekly Space Hangout YouTube page. This week we are joined by Dr. Jani Radebaugh, Planetary Scientist from Brigham Young University. Jani's field work specializes in finding analogues to other planets here on Earth. She is a Science Team Member for the newly selected NASA Dragonfly rotorcraft lander mission to Saturn’s moon Titan. She was also involved in the Cassini and Galileo Missions, the Io Volcano Observer mission proposal, and the Median project for Mars. Professor Radebaugh travels far and wide with her Brigham Young University students to find and study unique landscapes to better understand other planets. She explores the big deserts of the world, such as the Saharan, Arabian, and Namib deserts, as well as the Argentinian Altiplano and Iran’s Lut desert to study giant sand dunes and wind-carved ridges similar to those on Titan, Mars, Venus, and Pluto. She studies lakes of lava in the Ethiopian Afar valley and Vanuatu in the southwest Pacific to compare them with active lava lakes of Jupiter’s moon Io. Jani is a regular presence on the Science/Discovery program "How the Universe Works," the NASA "Unexplained Files," as well as many BBC and Nova programs. She has been an invited speaker for the U.S. State Department, the Spacefest Convention, TedX, a BYU Forum, and New York City’s Hayden Planetarium. She has spoken at many universities, astronomy organizations, and regularly visit the Traverse Mountain 6th grade. Be sure to follow Jani on Twitter (@radjanirad) and Instagram (@radjanirad). Learn more about the upcoming Dragonfly Mission by visiting https://dragonfly.jhuapl.edu/index.php **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

We record the Weekly Space Hangout every Wednesday at 5:00 pm Pacific / 8:00 pm Eastern. You can watch us live on Universe Today or the Weekly Space Hangout YouTube page. This week we are excited to welcome Dr. Aaron Rosengren and Di Wu, with Dr. Nataša Todorović in the chat, to the Weekly Space Hangout. Their research team recently identified gravitational interactions which have produced a superhighway network of sorts within the Solar System. This network can reduce transport times for objects traveling between Jupiter and Neptune to decades rather than hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of years. Long-term, this network may potentially be used for human exploration, but in the short-term, it could assist in the study of comets and asteroids. Aaron J. Rosengren received his Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering Sciences from the University of Colorado, Boulder in 2014. He served as a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellow for the European Union Asteroid and Space Debris Network, Stardust, from 2014 to 2016, at the Institute of Applied Physics Nello Carrara of the Italian National Research Council. In 2017, Dr. Rosengren worked at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece in the Department of Physics, as part of the EU H2020 Project ReDSHIFT. He was an Assistant Professor at the University of Arizona (2017-2020) prior to his appointment at UC San Diego in July 2020. He received the "COSPAR Outstanding Paper Award for Young Scientists" on three separate occasions and has held invited visiting researcher positions in Australia, Israel, Italy, and Serbia. Di Wu is a 3rd year PhD student of UC, San Diego. His research focuses on space situational awareness, astrodynamics, solar system dynamics, and machine learning. Recognized by the International Astronautical Federation, he was awarded the Future Space Leader for his research that bridges space debris characterization and asteroid dynamics. Di was also invited to attend the space generation congress and was involved in making policy suggestions to the UN about space sustainability. You can read the team's paper, The Arches of Chaos in the Solar System, on the AAAS site: https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/48/eabd1313 You can learn more about the team's research on the ScienceAlert website: https://www.sciencealert.com/solar-system-arches-of-chaos-create-cosmic-fast-travel-superhighways/amp **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

We record the Weekly Space Hangout every Wednesday at 5:00 pm Pacific / 8:00 pm Eastern. You can watch us live on Universe Today or the Weekly Space Hangout YouTube page. This week we are excited to welcome Alberto Caballero, host of the Exoplanets YouTube channel, to the Weekly Space Hangout. In November 2020, arXiv published his (non-peer reviewed) paper in which Alberto indicates he has narrowed down the source of the August 1977 WOW! signal, and has potentially identified the star where it originated. Alberto Caballero is a science communicator and host of The Exoplanets Channel (https://www.youtube.com/theexoplanetschannel). He also coordinates the Habitable Exoplanet Hunting Project (https://exoplanetschannel.wixsite.com/home/setiproject), a program intended to find habitable exoplanets, and the SETI Project, aimed at finding extraterrestrial intelligence. You can read Alberto's paper on arXiv here: https://arxiv.org/abs/2011.06090 and/or read more about his work in this December 2, 2020, EarthSky.com story: https://earthsky.org/space/source-of-wow-signal-in-1977-sunlike-star-2mass-19281982-2640123 **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - http://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us… all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

Tonight we are very excited to welcome Dr. Ann Marie Cody from the SETI Institute to the WSH. In her own words, Ann Marie searches for "the weird." Young stars exhibit some pretty bizarre behaviors, all of which have astrophysical explanations. However, there may be even stranger things out there, ready to be discovered with space telescopes. Her upcoming project will be searching for "alien megastructures" using the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). Ann Marie Cody is a Principal Investigator with the SETI Institute's Carl Sagan Center. She has also worked at NASA Ames since 2014, first as a NASA Postdoctoral Program fellow and subsequently as a research support scientist for the Kepler and K2 Missions. Dr. Cody uses ground-based telescopes and space observatories to explore the diversity of variability behavior in young stars. She uses this variability to learn about the dynamics of gas and dust associated with newborn stars and their planet-forming disks. Her time domain research involves high-precision optical and infrared photometry, as well as spectroscopy. In her spare time, Dr. Cody enjoys creating scientific cartoons to illustrate topics in astronomical research. You can learn more about Ann Marie and her research by visiting her website, http://annmariecody.com/Home.html , and reading this NASA interview, In Conversation: Dr. Ann Marie Cody [https://www.nasa.gov/feature/in-conversation-dr-ann-marie-cody] Be sure to follow Ann Marie on Twitter [https://twitter.com/astronomcody], and check out her artwork/cartoons on Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/annmariecody_art/]. **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - https://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us... all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

Please welcome our guest tonight, John Powell, President of JP Aerospace (http://www.jpaerospace.com), a nonprofit that launches student designed PongSats (i.e., experiments that fit inside of a ping pong ball,) and other experiments to the edge of space using balloons. To date, over 80,000 students have participated in this program with plans to expand it even further. John Powell, or JP as he is known, is a man in the middle. To the space community he’s “That crazy balloon guy”; to the balloon community he’s “That crazy space guy”. The reality is that he is both. For the past 42 years JP has been the President of JP Aerospace, America’s OTHER Space Program. JPA specializes in high altitude airships, balloons and manned artificial intelligence submarines. All of this is part of their principle project, the airship to Orbit program. JPA has flown nearly two hundred missions from rockets to airships. John holds the patent for the Airship to Orbit concept airship and has designed, built and tested one of the very few propellers that function at 100,000 feet. He started the PongSat student flight program, now having flown over 18,000 student experiments to 100,000 feet involving more than 80,000 students. He is the recipient of the 2006 Benjamin Franklin Award. JP is a father, pilot, and rides unicycles and plays violin when not building spaceships. Learn more about PongSats: https://www.pongsat.org/ You can follow John on Twitter (@JohnMPowell1), YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/user/johnmpowell/videos), and LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-powell-0354a023/). Be sure to follow JP Aerospace on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jpaerospace/ **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - https://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us... all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

This week we are excited to welcome Dr. Alan Stern, Principal Investigator from the New Horizons Mission, back to the WSH. In October, it was announced that Alan will be the first NASA-funded commercial space crewmember aboard a Virgin Galactic suborbital space mission. The flight is expected to take place in 2022; there he will perform astronomical and space physiology experiments. Alan is a planetary scientist, space program executive, aerospace consultant, and author. He leads NASA’s New Horizons mission to the Pluto system and the Kuiper Belt. In both 2007 and 2016, he was named to the Time 100. In 2007, he was appointed NASA’s chief of all science missions. Since 2009, he has been an Associate Vice President and Special Assistant to the President at the Southwest Research Institute. Additionally, from 2008-2012 he served on the board of directors of the Challenger Center for Space Science Education, and as the Chief Scientist and Mission Architect for Moon Express from 2010-2013. From 2011- 2013, he served as the Director of the Florida Space Institute. Alan's career has taken him to numerous astronomical observatories, to the South Pole, and to the upper atmosphere aboard various high performance NASA aircraft including F/A-18 Hornets, F-104 Starfighters, KC-135 Zero-G, and WB-57 Canberras. He has been involved as a researcher in 24 suborbital, orbital, and planetary space missions, including 9 for which he was the mission principle investigator; and he has led the development of 8 scientific instruments for NASA space missions. In 1995, he was selected as a space shuttle mission specialist finalist, and in 1996 he was a candidate space shuttle payload specialist. In 2010, he became a suborbital payload specialist trainee, and is expected to fly several space missions aboard XCOR and Virgin Galactic vehicles in 2016-2017. Before receiving his doctorate from the University of Colorado in 1989, Alan completed twin master's degrees in aerospace engineering and atmospheric sciences (1980 and 1981), and then spent six years as an aerospace systems engineer, concentrating on spacecraft and payload systems at the NASA Johnson Space Center, Martin Marietta Aerospace, and the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado. His two undergraduate degrees are in physics and astronomy from the University of Texas (1978 and 1980). His academic research has focused on studies of our solar system's Kuiper Belt and Oort cloud, comets, the satellites of the outer planets, the Pluto system, and the search for evidence of solar systems around other stars. He has also worked on spacecraft rendezvous theory, terrestrial polar mesospheric clouds, galactic astrophysics, and studies of tenuous satellite atmospheres, including the atmosphere of the moon. Alan is a fellow of the AAAS, the Royal Astronomical Society, and is a member of the AIAA, AAS, IAF, and the AGU; he was elected incoming chair of the Division of Planetary Sciences in 2006. He has been awarded the Von Braun Aerospace Achievement Award of the National Space Society, the 2007 University of Colorado George Norlin Distinguished Alumnus Award, the 2009 St. Mark’s Preparatory School Distinguished Alumnus Award, Smithsonian Magazine’s 2015 American Ingenuity Award, and the 2016 Sagan Memorial Award of the American Astronautical Society. In his free time, Alan enjoys running, hiking, camping, and writing. He is an instrument-rated commercial pilot and flight instructor, with both powered and sailplane ratings. He and his wife Carole have two daughters and a son; they make their home near Boulder, Colorado. You can learn more about Alan and stay up to date with him by visiting his website: https://alanstern.space/ You can stay up to date with New Horizons by visiting the Mission's Webpage: http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/ **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - https://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us... all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

We are pleased to once again welcome Casey Dreier from the Planetary Society to the WSH. Casey will update us (as much as possible) about Space Policy changes that may occur once the new American Presidential administration takes office on January 20, 2021. As Chief Advocate, Casey is the public face of The Planetary Society's efforts to advance planetary exploration, planetary defense, and the search for life. He educates and empowers the organization's members to take political action. He writes, teaches, and speaks to The Society's members, the public, and policymakers to impress upon them the importance, relevancy, and excitement of space exploration. Casey is committed to demystifying the politics and policy process behind space exploration for all audiences. He is a trusted source for journalists and has been featured in many publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Scientific American, Vox, and The Verge, to name a few. He also has appeared as an expert on BBC News and both seasons of National Geographic's MARS series as a "MARS Big Thinker". As Senior Space Policy Adviser Casey helps lead the strategic planning of The Society's policy and advocacy efforts. He works closely with The Society's leadership, its Board of Directors, and other policy experts to craft the organizational positions and goals regarding the future of space exploration. He provides trusted analysis of the budgetary, political, and policy decisions relating to space, pursues original research, and works collaboratively to generate policy ideas and guidance for the U.S. space program. Casey is a regular contributor to The Planetary Report, co-hosts the monthly Space Policy Edition podcast of Planetary Radio, and regularly publishes space policy analysis and insights on planetary.org. Be sure to tune in to Planetary Radio: Space Policy Edition (https://www.planetary.org/planetary-radio/space-policy-edition) to stay up to date with space policy around the world. **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - https://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us... all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

This week we are joined by Dr. Ingrid Daubar, Planetary Scientist from Brown University studying impact cratering within our solar system. Dr. Daubar is part of a team that has been using a new AI classification tool to identify geologic features on planetary surfaces, such as Mars. Ingrid has been involved in planetary science for more than two decades. Her research interests include impact craters and other time-varying phenomena on terrestrial planets. She has participated in science and operations on multiple missions including MRO, InSight, Europa Clipper, and Juno. Dr. Daubar’s research on small, recent impact craters on Mars and the Moon has allowed us to better understand the impact flux in the inner solar system, the chronology of recent events and timescales of geologic processes on these bodies, and the processes involved in modern-day cratering and modification over time of planetary surfaces. You can learn more about Ingrid by visiting https://vivo.brown.edu/display/idaubar#All. To read more about how this new AI tool is helping scientists, go to https://earthsky.org/space/nasa-artifical-intelligence-spots-craters-on-mars **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - https://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us... all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

This week we are airing Fraser's pre-recorded interview with Dr. Olivier Witasse, Project Scientist on the JUICE mission. Olivier studied fundamental physics and astrophysics at the universities of Paris XI (Orsay) and Lyon between 1990 and 1996. He obtained a PhD at the University of Grenoble in 2000. In 1995, he successfully completed the exams to become a teacher of Physics and Chemistry. He taught physics during his military service, and during his PhD at the university. He joined ESA as a staff member in 2003, after a two-year research fellowship at ESTEC and a four-month post doc at the Royal Observatory of Belgium. In 2015, Olivier joined the JUICE project. **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - https://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us... all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

This week we are airing Fraser's pre-recorded interview with Dr. Ralph Lorenz, planetary scientist and aerospace engineer from the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory. Ralph is the Mission Architect for the upcoming Dragonfly mission, and the author of the new book, "Saturn's Moon Titan Owners' Workshop Manual". Ralph was a member of the Cassini Radar team, and helped to develop the Huygens Surface Science Package. He has played a major role in the definition of a range of US and European Titan mission concepts, from airships and hot-air balloons, through airplanes, landers and even a submarine. Thomson–Reuters Sciencewatch in 2011 named Ralph Lorenz as one of the world's top planetary scientists by impact. He is currently working on a design study adopted by NASA for a quadcopter probe named 'Dragonfly', designed to explore Titan. Ralph's latest book is Saturn's Moon Titan Owners' Workshop Manual (Haynes, 2020) which is available on Amazon and directly through Haynes (https://haynes.com/en-gb/saturns-moon-titan-owners-workshop-manual). **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - https://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us... all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

This week we are excited to welcome Amy Ross, NASA Space Suit Engineer, to the WSH. Amy is the team lead for the Exploration Extra-vehicular Mobility Unit (xEMU) Pressure Garment Subsystem (PGS) as well as Space Suit Pressure Garment Technology Development. The team's primary focus is the design, fabrication, qualification testing, and flight hardware delivery of the xEMU PGS in 2023. As part of her duties with NASA, Amy has, among other things, qualified suits in the Neutral Buoyancy Lab, flown on the Vomit Comet (experiencing zero, Lunar, and Mars gravities), been trained in Space Shuttle Launch pad mode II/IV egress procedures, and served as a Space suit test subject for 12 different space suit design configurations. In 2013, she underwent an Astronaut interview. Amy earned her Bachelors and Masters degrees in Mechanical Engineering from Purdue University. She went on to earn a Masters in Space Studies from the University of North Dakota. Trivia tidbit: Amy is the daughter of astronaut Jerry Ross, who has flown in space seven times and conducted nine spacewalks, setting two U.S. records. You can read more about Amy and her work by visiting https://www.nasa.gov/audience/foreducators/spacesuits/careercorner/amy-ross.html You can stay up to date with NASA's space suit design by visiting the EVA website at https://www.nasa.gov/suitup **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - https://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us... all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.

This week we are excited to welcome Pranvera Hyseni (Pran) to the Weekly Space Hangout. Pran is a celebrated science popularizer and the founder of “Astronomy Outreach of Kosovo” (AOK). She completed her B.A. in geography in 2019 at the University of Pristina, and now she’s pursuing her Master’s in Planetary Science at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Pran started showing an interest in astronomy at the early age of three, while Kosovo was still entangled in the Serbian conflict of the late 90’s. She grew up on a farm with access to clear night skies, a sight that early-on drew her to astronomy. She single-handedly brought science to her community by developing a very powerful astronomy outreach organization, “Astronomy Outreach of Kosovo.” Pran established a large, world-wide network of both professional and amateur astronomers who support her initiative with equipment and other resources. She uses this support to provide activities throughout the country of Kosovo. AOK became internationally recognized following invitations for Pran to be a keynote speaker at some of the world’s largest astronomy conventions and gatherings. Her visits to top observatories, universities, and NASA centers have broadened her experience in both observing and in taking data. Her public education activities were further expanded when she worked in various projects with the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology of Kosovo, as well as other government institutions. Pran wishes to help rebuild her nation by leveraging the public’s interest in astronomy. The AOK team now comprises two hundred volunteers. Pran been honored by the International Astronomical Union and the Minor Planet Center with the naming of an asteroid, 45687 Pranverahyseni. The Municipal Assembly of Vushtrri (Kosovo) named her a distinguished student, and she was also honored with the 24Under24 award by the Mars Generation as a young leader in STEM education. She received the “Master Outreach” award from the Astronomy League, and was named as Slooh’s Space Ambassador by Slooh. Pran was selected as one of the five most influential women in Kosovo. Her current project is to develop and build the first observatory and planetarium in Kosovo. Be sure to follow Pran on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/pranvera.hyseni.9 , and like the Astronomy Outreach of Kosovo Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/pg/Astronomy-Outreach-of-Kosovo-1403858876575289 **************************************** The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are some specific ways you can help: ► Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest ► Subscribe to our podcasts Astronomy Cast and Daily Space where ever you get your podcasts! ► Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe! ► Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx ► Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast ► Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx ► Join our Discord server for CosmoQuest - https://discord.gg/X8rw4vv ► Join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew! - https://www.wshcrew.space/ Don't forget to like and subscribe! Plus we love being shared out to new people, so tweet, comment, review us... all the free things you can do to help bring science into people's lives.