Weekly Space Hangout

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. Dr. Emily Holt is an Environmental Archaeologist and Anthropologist who is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor at Miami University of Ohio. Emily's research focuses on human-environment dynamics in the Nuragic Culture of Bronze Age Sardinia. She directs the Pran’e Siddi Landscape Project (PSLP), an archaeological survey in south-central Sardinia, which is examining the long-term changes in settlement patterns, water use, and the socio-cultural interpretation of natural resources. Emily is also the president of the non-profit organization Public Scholar Outreach whose mission is to support, produce, promote, and disseminate high-quality public scholarship, especially public scholarship that is peer-reviewed and public scholarship with relevance to contemporary issues. PSO's primary initiative is to establish Dirt & Words: an online, open access channel of peer-reviewed public scholarship about the human past. Today, Emily and Fraser will be discussing how ancient cultures understood astronomy, a topic she recently discussed with Paul Sutter on his Space Radio broadcast. You can follow Emily on Twitter: @Emily_M_Holt To learn more about her ongoing research, be sure to visit her website ERRANT: letters from an itinerant archaeologist here: https://errant.live/ The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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. Luciano Iess, professor of Aerospace Engineering at Sapienza University of Rome, is a member of the Cassini radio science team that recently determined, after analyzing gravity science data collected during the final orbits of Cassini around Saturn, that its iconic rings are a relatively young feature of the planet. You can read more about this and the teams other exciting discoveries online at the following sites: ► https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/01/missions-expose-surprising-differences-interiors-saturn-and-jupiter ► https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7315 The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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. Tonight we welcome author Rod Pyle who will be discussing his new book, Space 2.0: How Private Spaceflight, a resurgent NASA, and International Partners Are Creating a New Space Age (BenBella Books, February 2019), written in collaboration with the National Space Society. Rod Pyle is a space author, historian, and journalist who works with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and previously at the Johnson Space Center. He has written 13 books on the history and technology of space exploration and science for major publishers in the US, UK, and Asia. As a journalist, Rod's work has appeared in Space.com, LiveScience.com, WIRED, Futurity, The Huffington Post, Popular Science, and many other print and online venues, and he is the senior editor of the quarterly print magazine Ad Astra. Rod has also produced documentary programming on spaceflight for The History Channel as well as Discovery Communications. He has written on spaceflight and science for NASA/JPL and Caltech, and authored a guide to executive education for the Johnson Space Center/The Conference Board's Apollo Leadership Experience. Rod speaks frequently on spaceflight and executive development, and has is a regularly scheduled radio guest on WGN/Chicago, KFI/Los Angeles and numerous syndicated radio programs, and hosts a weekly podcast on iHeart radio. He worked in visual effects on the TV series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and the new Battlestar Galactica, and spent a decade at the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles. Rod is a graduate of Stanford University and the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, and a member of the National Space Society, the Author's Guild, the National Association of Science Writers and a former member of the Director’s Guild of America, the Writer’s Guild of America and the Producer's Guild of America. The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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. The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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. Paul MacNeal, a mechanical systems engineer at JPL, created the Annual Invention Challenge twenty-one years ago after helping his son with an extra credit assignment. Since then, teams of high school students from around the world compete each year against JPL engineers to see who can design and build the smartest and most efficient machine. The objective of the 2018 Challenge, which took place on Friday, December 14th, was to ""to get a 24-inch length of two-inch PVC pipe from a horizontal position to an upright position on a platform using whatever device they could come up with, instructions not included."" To view the 2018 results – as well as those from the prior 20 challenges – visit the Invention Challenge website at https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/events/inventionchallenge/ The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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. Dr. Lucianne Walkowicz is an Astronomer at the Adler Planetarium. She studies stellar magnetic activity and how stars influence a planet's suitability as a host for alien life. She is also an artist and works in a variety of media, from oil paint to sound. Dr. Walkowicz holds a B.S. in Physics from Johns Hopkins University, and a M.S. and Ph. D. from University of Washington. She was the Kepler Fellow at UC Berkeley, and the Henry Norris Russell Fellow at Princeton University, before joining the Astronomy Department at Adler Planetarium in 2014. She is a 2012 TED Senior Fellow, a 2011 National Academy of Sciences Kavli Fellow, and has been internationally recognized for her advocacy for conservation of dark night skies. From October 2017 to October 2018, Dr. Walkowicz served as the fifth Baruch S. Blumberg NASA/Library of Congress Chair in Astrobiology in the John W. Kluge Center at the Library of Congress. Additionally, you may have seen in numerous episodes of the documentary The Universe, as well as the current National Geographic series, Mars. The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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 catch up with a roundup of news from the past 2 weeks! The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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 revisit the big stories of the year! The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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 catch up with a roundup of news from the past 2 weeks! The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Volunteer for our Hangout-a-thon either to promote, provide a giveaway, or to come on as a guest https://goo.gl/forms/XSm1yi0PKOM166m12 Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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. Dr. Pamela Gay is on again, to promote our CosmoQuest Hangout-a-thon coming on Dec 22! http://bit.ly/CQXHangout2018 Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Volunteer for our Hangout-a-thon either to promote, provide a giveaway, or to come on as a guest https://goo.gl/forms/XSm1yi0PKOM166m12 Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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 David Eicher, co-author with Dr. Brian May of Mission Moon 3-D: A New Perspective on the Space Race. During David's appearance, we will be giving away three copies of the book which is co-published with the MIT Press and the London Stereoscopic Association. David Eicher is one of the most widely recognized astronomy enthusiasts in the world. He has been Editor in Chief of Astronomy magazine for the past thirty-five years. Eicher is the author or editor of 21 books on science and history. In 2014, he wrote and edited, along with Brian May and astronomer Garik Israelian, Starmus: 50 Years of Man in Space, and in 2016 edited the follow-up volume, Starmus: Discovering the Universe. In 1990, the International Astronomical Union named a minor planet, 3617 Eicher, for Eicher in recognition of his service to astronomy. He has spoken to and inspired many science and business groups around the world, including at Harvard University, the Starmus Festival and the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Dave was president of the Astronomy Foundation, the telescope industry and astronomy outreach group, from 2011–2017. Want to help CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help: Donate! (Streamlabs link) https://streamlabs.com/cosmoquestx Buy stuff from our Redbubble https://www.redbubble.com/people/cosmoquestx Volunteer for our Hangout-a-thon either to promote, provide a giveaway, or to come on as a guest https://goo.gl/forms/XSm1yi0PKOM166m12 Help us find sponsors by sharing our program and fundraising efforts through your networks Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA A combination of the above!

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. Bruce Betts, Chief Scientist and LightSail Program Manager for The Planetary Society. Prior to working on the LightSail program, Dr. Betts managed a number of flight instrument projects at the Planetary Society, including silica glass DVDs on the Mars Exploration Rovers and Phoenix lander, the LIFE biology experiment that flew on the Russian Phobos sample return mission, and he led a NASA grant studying microrovers assisting human exploration. Dr. Betts new children's book, ""Astronomy for Kids: How to Observe Outer Space with a Telescope, Binoculars, or Just Your Eyes!"" is now available in time for holiday gift giving. Prior to joining the Planetary Society, Dr. Betts, a planetary scientist, studied planetary surfaces, including Mars, the Moon, and Jupiter’s moons, using infrared and other data, during his time at San Juan Institute/Planetary Science Institute. Additionally, Dr. Betts spent three years at NASA headquarters managing planetary instrument development programs to design spacecraft science instruments. You can learn more about Dr. Betts by visiting http://www.planetary.org/about/staff/bruce-betts.html. If you want to learn about his new book and how to order it, visit http://www.planetary.org/blogs/bruce-betts/astronomy-for-kids.html"

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. Dr. Paul M. Sutter, astrophysicist and science educator - and now AUTHOR - is no stranger to the regular viewers of the WSH - but in case you missed it, and for anyone new to the WSH, Paul earned his Bachelor of Science in Physics from California Polytechnic State University in 2005 and his PhD in Physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2011. By day, Paul is a Cosmological Researcher & Community Outreach Coordinator with the Department of Astronomy at Ohio State University. But Paul is probably best known and loved by everyone here at the WSH as one of our four co-hosts, his weekly show Space Radio, and of course, let's not forget his podcast Ask a Spaceman! This week, we turn the tables on Paul (at least briefly!) as he joins us as our special guest to discuss his first book Your Place in the Universe. You can learn more about Paul and his research by visiting his website, http://www.pmsutter.com. You can learn where to tune in each week to Space Radio by going to http://www.pmsutter.com/shows/spaceradio/ You can watch episodes of Ask A Spaceman! here: http://www.pmsutter.com/shows/askaspaceman/ And last, but now least, you can learn more about Paul's book by visiting http://www.pmsutter.com/book.

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. "Tonight Fraser interviews Colin Stuart, author of How to Live in Space, which is available now. Visit https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/580109/how-to-live-in-space-by-colin-stuart/9781588346384/ for information about buying your own copy. Colin is a science speaker and author, as well as a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society. He has written articles for the London Mathematical Society and the Institute for Mathematics and its Applications, and has spoken to more than 250k people about the wonders of the universe in which we live. You can learn more about Colin by visiting his website at http://www.colinstuart.net/"

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.

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. Dr. Sabine Hossenfelder is a blogger and Theoretical Physicist who researches quantum gravity. She is a Research Fellow at the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies where she leads the Analog Systems for Gravity Duals group. Dr. Hossenfelder just finished writing her first book "Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray" which is available on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Lost-Math-Beauty-Physics-Astray/dp/0465094252

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. Paul Geithner, Deputy Project Manager - Technical for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center where he focuses on technical oversight, and the resolution and verification of technical issues. Paul last visited us on October 7, 2017, almost two years ago to the day, and tonight joins us to give us an update about JWST. You can learn more about Paul by visiting https://jwst.nasa.gov/meet-geithner.html

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. Dr. Sean Carroll is a blogger, author, and theoretical physicist at Caltech where he investigates dark matter/dark energy, modified gravity, and multiple other topics in cosmology, field theory, and gravitation. In addition to having written several books (most recently "The Big Picture" https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/bigpicture/), Sean has recorded lecture courses for The Great Courses, as well as producing many other online video and audio lectures. In 2004, Sean launched his blog (https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/) and in July, 2018, announced his newest venture, his Mindscape Podcast (https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/) You can lean more about Sean on his webpage: https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/

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. Dr. David Warmflash is an astrobiologist and science writer. He received his M.D. from Tel Aviv University Sackler School of Medicine, and has done post doctoral work at Brandeis University, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Johnson Space Center, where he was a NASA astrobiology training fellow. He has been involved in science outreach for more than a decade, including having collaborated with The Planetary Society on studying the effects of the space environment on small organisms. As a prolific freelance science communicator, David has had numerous articles published, his most recent being ""Should the Moon be Quarantined?"" which appears in the current issue of Scientific American (https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/should-the-moon-be-quarantined/). You can find David on Twitter (@CosmicEvolution)

This week we have a Special Live Edition of Weekly Space Hangout from the AC500 Weekend, with Fraser, Kimberly, Morgan, and Pamela in front of a live audience at Recess Brewing in Edwardsville, IL.

This is the version we streamed live - it has some buffering. Check out link here for version recorded on site, which is better - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAGQ45mp5BA This week we have a Special Live Edition of Weekly Space Hangout from the AC500 Weekend, with Fraser, Kimberly, Morgan, and Pamela in front of a live audience at Recess Brewing in Edwardsville, IL. 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.

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.

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 welcome Dr. Jillian Scudder who will be telling us about her new book, Astroquizzical (Icon, June 2018) in which she takes us on an enthralling cosmic journey through space and time and locates our home planet within its own "family tree." Our parent the Earth and its sibling planets in our solar system formed within the same gas cloud. Without our grandparent the Sun, we would not exist, and the Sun in turn relies on the Milky Way as its home. The Milky Way rests in a larger web of galaxies that traces its origins right back to tiny fluctuations in the very early Universe. Jillian Scudder is an astrophysicist and assistant professor at Oberlin College. Her writing has also been published in Forbes, Quartz, Medium, and The Conversation. She was born in Sarasota, Florida, and has been on the move ever since. She completed her undergraduate degree at Macalester College in 2009, taking the unusual double major of Physics & French. She completed her Ph.D in astrophysics at the University of Victoria, in British Columbia. In her spare time, she enjoys origami, coloring books, and video games. You can order Astroquizzical here: https://www.amazon.com/Astroquizzical-Curious-Journey-Through-Cosmic/dp/1785783343 You can find out more about Dr. Scudder at her website: https://www.jillianscudder.com/

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. Stella Kafka is the Director of the American Association of Variable Star Observers.

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. Jean-Pierre Grootaerd and Guy Wauters discuss their project "Stars Shine for Everyone". We forgot to include the interview in the livestream - you can watch it here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIzwFyaODrA&t=22s

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 Skylias, aka ""Sky"" to the Weekly Space Hangout. Sky is a science communicator on Twitch.tv. She discovered her passion for live streaming science, mainly astronomy/physics on Twitch.tv, while working towards her own science degree. Sky graduated magna cum laude from Regis University with a B.S. in Computer Science. While not in front of the camera or working on future live stream content, Sky enjoys stargazing, learning more about science and history, and spending time with her 5 year old daughter who is known as ""MiniSky."" Be sure to check out Sky on Twitch here: https://www.twitch.tv/skylias

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 extremely excited to welcome former NASA Astronaut Mike Massimino back to the Weekly Space Hangout in a segment he pre-recorded with Fraser back in April of this year. Mike, the first person ever to send a tweet from space, joins a group of eight elite astronauts to tell Earth’s extraordinary story in National Geographic’s new series, ONE STRANGE ROCK, executive produced by Darren Aronofsky’s Protozoa Pictures and Jane Root’s Nutopia. Having viewed Earth from space, Mike conveys his personal experiences of our planet and underscores how there really is no place like home. Mike served as an astronaut from 1996 to 2014. He is a veteran of two space flights: STS-109 in March 2002 and STS-125 in May 2009 – the final two Hubble Space Telescope servicing missions. He was the last person to work inside of Hubble and set a team record with his crewmates for the most cumulative spacewalking time in a single space shuttle mission. He has logged a total of 571 hours and 47 minutes in space and 30 hours and 4 minutes of spacewalking. Mike received his Bachelor of Science degree from Columbia University and two Master of Science degrees and a Ph.D. from MIT. He has received a number of awards including two NASA Space Flight Medals, the NASA Distinguished Service Medal and the American Astronautical Society’s 2009 Flight Achievement Award. Additionally, he is the holder of two patents and author of many engineering research papers. Mike lives in New York City, where he is an engineering professor at Columbia University and the senior advisor for space programs at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum. He is author of the New York Times Bestseller Spaceman: An Astronaut’s Unlikely Journey to Unlock the Secrets of the Universe and has made numerous television appearances, including National Geographic’s late-night talk show StarTalk and had a six-time recurring role as himself on the CBS sitcom The Big Bang Theory. You can watch full episodes of One Strange Rock online at the Nat Geo website (http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/one-strange-rock/) including Episode 7, Terraform, featuring this week's guest, Mike Massimino.

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. "Ethan Siegel is the author of the new book, Treknology: The Science of Star Trek from Tricorders to Warp Drive. In his book, Ethan examines over 25 items from the Star Trek universe, describes their underlying science, and lets his readers know how close we are to having many of these iconic items today. Ethan is a PhD astrophysicist and science communicator known for his award winning blog, Starts with a Bang, and his regular online contributions to Forbes (you can find his writings here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/ethansiegel/#71d3966e683e ) Both Treknology and Ethan's first book, Beyond the Galaxy: How humanity looked beyond our Milky Way and discovered the entire Universe, are available on Amazon."

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. Dr. David Weintraub is the author of the new book, "Life on Mars: What to Know Before We Go," in which he provides a history of our fascination with the Red Planet, as well as describes the the various moral issues that surround our desire to go there. Dr. Weintraub is a Professor of Astronomy at Vanderbilt University where he serves as the Director of Undergraduate Studies, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Director of Communication of Science & Technology Program, and Co-Director of Scientific Computing Program. In addition to his new book, Dr. Weintruab is the Co-series Editor, Springer, Springer Briefs in Astronomy and Undergraduate Lecture Notes in Physics, as well as the author of numerous other books, including "Religions and Extraterrestrial Life: How Will We Deal With It?," "How Old is the Universe?," and "Is Pluto a Planet?" You can find out more about Dr. Weintraub on his webpage, https://my.vanderbilt.edu/davidweintraub/

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. Carolyn Collins Petersen is no stranger to the Weekly Space Hangout, having been a regular journalist during previous seasons. We are excited to welcome Carolyn back to the show this week, this time as our Special Guest, to discuss her newest book, Space Exploration: Past, Present, Future, which was released in the US on April 1. In it, Carolyn discusses the earliest space pioneers and their work, the WW1 technological advances which formed the basis of today's Space Age, the increasing corporate interest in space, and theorizes about what the future may hold. You can learn more about/order Carolyn's latest book here: https://www.amazon.com/Space-Exploration-Past-Present-Future/dp/1445656035

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 Emily Lakdawalla, Senior Editor and Planetary Evangelist at The Planetary Society, back to the Weekly Space Hangout. On May 14th, Emily's new book, "The Design and Engineering of Curiosity: How the Mars Rover Performs Its Job," will be released. It in, Emily describes the engineering that went into each instrument and piece of machinery incorporated into Curiosity's systems. You can learn more about the book and Emily's planned followup book on her blog here: http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2017/0831-book-update.html

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. Mathew Anderson, author and good friend of the Weekly Space Hangout, joins us again this week to discuss his newest book, "Habitable Exoplanets: Red Dwarf Systems Like TRAPPIST-1," in which he focuses on exoplanet properties and the chances for habitable planets around Red Dwarf stars. As he did with his two prior books, "Our Cosmic Story" and its followup "Is Anyone Out There," Mathew will be offering a free e-copy of "Habitable Planets: Red Dwarf Systems Like TRAPPIST-1" to viewers of the Weekly Space Hangout, so be sure to tune in this week to find out how to get your free copy of this fascinating book.

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 Austin Wintory and Anthony Lund to discuss their new collaborative Kickstarter campaign, A Light in the Void, a live concert experience that will tell the story of science through live music, scientists' live presentations, video, animations, and more. Austin Wintory is a Grammy-nominated and two-time BAFTA-winning composer who has scored almost 50 feature films in addition to composing and appearing in concerts worldwide, as well as creating the scores for a long list of videogames, including Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed Syndicate for which he wrote and produced the score. Anthony Lund is a three-time Emmy nominated writer, producer, and director who focuses his work on both science fiction and science fact. He is known for his work on Through the Wormhole as well as NatGeo's Breakthrough. You can find out more about Austin by visiting his website: https://www.austinwintory.com You can find out more about Anthony by visiting his LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tony-lund-8247057/ Want to support the ""A Light in the Void"" Kickstarter? You can do so by visiting the webpage for the campaign: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/litvconcert/a-light-in-the-void-live-concert-and-broadcast-eve?wsh"

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. Marian Call is a singer/songwriter from Juneau, Alaska. She was our Special Guest performer (accompanied by Seth Boyer,) at Astronomy Cast's Eclipse Escape Weekend in St. Louis last August, where she completely engaged the crowd and debuted Good Night Moon, a song she wrote specifically for, and debuted at, the event. You can view their debut performance here: https://youtu.be/O0yOCWIbnjY

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. In his current position as Visiting Vehicles Officer in Mission Control at JSC, Ethan Good supports cargo and (eventually) commercial crew flights to/from the International Space Station. Previously, Ethan completed three summer-winter contracts as a Research Scientist at Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, as well as served as commander of a four-person crew during a two-week HERA study in 2015.

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. Yoav Landsman is a System Engineer at the Israeli nonprofit organization, SpaceIL, which is trying to land the first Israeli spacecraft on the Moon as part of the Google Lunar XPrize competition. Previously, Yoav, a founding member of the WSH Crew, joined us to tell us about SpaceIL's plans. Today, Yoav again joins us to provide an update on the status of their program.

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. Will Kalif is the author of the new amateur astronomy book titled See it With a Small Telescope.

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. Dr. Jessie Christiansen is a Caltech staff scientist and co-founder (with UC Santa Cruz astronomer Dr. Ian Crossfield) of the citizen-scientist project Exoplanet Explorers which examines data from the Kepler K2 mission. In April, 2017, Exoplanet Explorers detected a 5-planet system with the potential for 6th planet as well. This system, named K2-138, is unique because it is the first multi-planet system to be discovered entirely by a group of citizen scientists. A paper titled The K2-138 System: A Near-resonant Chain of Five Sub-Neptune Planets Discovered by Citizen Scientists has been accepted for publication in The Astronomical Journal. You can access the published version of the article here: https://authors.library.caltech.edu/84280/1/Christiansen_2018_AJ_155_57.pdf You can also learn more about Dr. Christiansen by visiting her webpage: http://web.ipac.caltech.edu/staff/christia/

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. Joe Pappalardo is the author of the new popular science and technology book, Spaceport Earth: The Reinvention of Spaceflight (The Overlook Press; Available Now). In it, Pappalardo "tackles the ever-changing, 21st-century space industry and what privately funded projects like Elon Musk's SpaceX mean for the future of space travel." (Foreign Policy) Spaceport Earth takes readers on a tour of these high-stakes sites as Pappalardo examines how private companies are reshaping the way we use, intend to use, and view space travel, not solely for scientific exploration but for increasingly more general travel. Visiting every working spaceport in the United States and rocket launches around the world, Pappalardo presents a travelogue and modern history of spaceflight — where the industry is now and what's on the horizon for explorers and consumers alike—in Spaceport Earth. Learn more about Spaceport Earth, including where to buy it, here: http://www.overlookpress.com/categories/spaceport-earth-the-reinvention-of-spaceflight.html We'll also have a prerecorded interview with Chris Prophet. The author of SpaceX From the Ground Up, joins us again to discuss with Fraser last week's Falcon Heavy success.

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. While Fraser and Paul are in Iceland watching auroras, Kimberly and Morgan cover the week's news in space!

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. Andrzej Stewart currently works in Mission Control at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. However, from 2015-2016, Andrzej acted as the Chief Engineering Officer during the year-long Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation (Hi-SEAS) IV Mars simulation mission on Mauna Loa. Prior to that he participated in NASA's Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA) simulation where he acted as the flight engineer. Aside from his mission-simulation participation, Andrzej has extensive design and engineering experience within the space program having worked on projects such as Spitzer, NASA's Deep Space Network, and the Orion spacecraft. You can read about Andrzej's time "on Mars" and learn more about him by visiting his blog, Surfing with the Aliens, here: https://hiseasandrzej.wordpress.com

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. Paul Hildelbrandt (director of the film Fight for Space) joins us again to discuss his newest project, a documentary which is an historical piece about the mission of Apollo 8 and it's crew, Borman, Anders, and Lovell. Titled "First to the Moon," the film covers the biographies of each astronaut and goes on to tell the story of the Apollo 8 flight using new animations and newly found archival footage. You can learn more about the film at his website http://www.firstmoonmovie.com"

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. Dr. Venemans is a research staff scientist working at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA) in Heidelberg, Germany. His research topics include the discovery of black holes in the early Universe, the characterisation of the galaxies hosting these distant black holes, the Epoch of Reionisation and the galaxy environment of active galaxies. Bram is a member of the team that recently discovered the most distant quasar currently known and its host galaxy. You can read about this discover here: http://www.mpia.de/news/science/2017-14-distant-quasar

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. Tim Dodd created the Everyday Astronaut project in 2013 when he found himself the lone bidder of a Russian flight suit. Tim is a professional photographer and space and science communicator based out of Cedar Falls, Iowa. His most recent works are in the spaceflight realm, shooting rockets at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center for www.SpaceFlightnow.com.

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. Dr. Jeyhan Kartaltepe is an Assistant Professor of Physics at Rochester Institute of Technology, and is the Deputy Director of the Laboratory for Multiwavelength Astrophysics. She is also a leading member of the Cosmic Evolution Early Release Science (CEERS) Survey team (https://jwst.stsci.edu/files/live/sites/jwst/files/home/news/_documents/ers-1345-finkelstein.pdf) that has been selected as part of the James Webb Space Telescope Director’s Discretionary Early Release Science Program. It is one of 13 science teams that will use the $8 billion telescope first, conducting experiments during its initial cycle and testing the instruments’ capabilities.

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.

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. Dr. Emilio Enriquez is a Post Doc at the Berkeley SETI Research Center and a member of the Breakthrough Listen Initiative (http://seti.berkeley.edu/listen/). Emilio is the lead author of two recent SETI Research Center publications about Ross 128 b, the nearby exoplanet that researchers feel may have conditions that are conducive to life. His expertise is in modelling of physical processes in galaxies, such as gas accretion onto galaxies, star formation, stellar feedback, gas accretion onto black holes, among other similar mechanisms. He also works with large multi-wavelength surveys of galaxies to study the connection between galaxies and their central super-massive black holes.

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. Regular viewers of the Weekly Space Hangout will remember Brian as one of our regular weekly contributors. Today he joins us as our Special Guest to discuss an exciting new television project he is working on, Big Science, in conjunction with Full Kilt Pursuits. Per their website, ""BIG SCIENCE is a proposed television series about pioneering research sites around the world. More importantly, it’s about the diverse team of people who make science happen."" You can learn more about Big Science on their webpage (https://bigscience.ca/) and Full Kilt pursuits on their webpage (https://www.fullkiltpursuits.com/)

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. Dean Regas is the Astronomer for the Cincinnati Observatory and co-host of the PBS series Star Gazers with James Albury. Viewers may remember that last November, Dean was a guest on the WSH during which he told us about his first book, "Facts From Space!" We are once again pleased to welcome Dean back to the WSH, this time to discuss his newest book, "100 Things to See in the Night Sky." And don't forget, we have two copies of Dean's book to give away at random to those viewers who submitted an entry. Stay tuned to find out who our lucky winners are!

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 SUPER excited to welcome author Andy Weir (The Martian,) back to the show to chat with us about his new book, ARTEMIS. Viewers who have seen Andy's first appearance on our show on January 9, 2015, (https://youtu.be/oSuLB3hYbmc) will remember just how awesome he is as a guest - and why we can't wait to catch up with him this week. Andy began his career as a software engineer but wrote science fiction stories in his spare time. His novel, THE MARTIAN, was a blockbuster success which has allowed him to pursue his writing full-time. He is a lifelong space nerd and a devoted hobbyist of subjects such as relativistic physics, orbital mechanics, and the history of manned spaceflight. You can learn more about Andy and his books on his website (http://andyweirauthor.com)!