Fraser Cain
Universe Today
Dr. Pamela Gay
CosmoQuest
In 2017, astronomers detected the gravitational waves and electromagnetic radiation from colliding neutron stars. This had been long theorized as one of the causes of a certain type of gamma-ray burst. By studying the event and its afterglow, astronomers have learned a tremendous amount about the formation of the heaviest elements in the Universe.
Last week we talked about rogue stars. This week we’re going to take things up a notch and talk about an even more extreme event. Rogue black holes. Astronomers recently discovered a supermassive black hole on an escape trajectory, leaving newly forming stars in its wake. It’s wonderful, terrible, nightmare fuel.
Most stars in the Milky Way are trapped in here with us, doomed to orbit around and around and around. But a few have found a way out, an escape into the freedom of intergalactic space. How do stars reach escape velocity, never to return?
Okay sci-fi writers, today we’re going to give you a guided tour of building planets. How they form, how they grow, and how things can go horribly horribly wrong.
Recent Episodes
2018 was an incredible year in space news. Rockets launched, landers landed, spacecraft were born and died. We learned tremendous new things about Universe around us, and today we're here to look back fondly over the last 12 months to review the year in space that...
After many years as a finalist, Astronomy Cast has finally won in the Fact Behind the Fiction category of the 2018 Parsec Awards, joining the ranks of other fantastic podcasts such as Talk Nerdy with Cara Santa Maria, HubbleCast, the Planetary Society'sPlanetary...
The technology of 3D printing is taking off. From tiny home-based 3D printers to larger manufacturing. And of course, 3D printing is going to space with the International Space Station and beyond. We usually record Astronomy Cast every Friday at 3:00 pm EDT / 12:00 pm...
We did it, we made it to the end of another year. Once again it's time to wonder what gifts to get your beloved space nerds. We've got some suggestions. Some are brand new this year, others are classics that we just can't help but continue to suggest. Let's get into...
Ion engines are a mainstay of science fiction, featured in both Star Trek and Wars. But this is a very real technology, successfully used on several missions out there in the Solar System right now. How do they work and what are the limits? We usually record Astronomy...
There was no live video for this one, so here's the audio! The Full Raw version isn't much different this week - it just lacks the music and intro! Did you hear that astronomers from Harvard think that the interstellar asteroid Oumuamua was actually an alien solar...
We're always interested in the surface features of the planets and moons in the Solar System, but that's only skin deep. It turns out, these worlds have an interesting inner life too. Thanks to the science of seismology, we can peer into our planet and learn how it...
To really study something, you want to reach out and touch it. But what can you do if you're separated by a huge distance? You reach out with electromagnetic or sound waves and watch how they bounce back. Thanks to radar, sonar and lidar. We usually record Astronomy...
The Earth looks like a perfect sphere, but down here on the surface we see that there are mountains, rivers, oceans, glaciers, all kinds of features with different densities and shapes. Scientists can map this produce a highly detailed gravity map of our planet. And...
How do you know what something is made of if you can't reach out and touch it? How do we know what planets lights years away have in their atmosphere? What about the rocks all around Curiosity? Or the geysers coming out of Europa and Enceladus? Scientists have a few...
We're not learning that the vast majority of potentially habitable worlds out there are actually icy moons like Europa and Enceladus. Good news, there are hundreds, if not thousands of times more of them than worlds like Earth. Bad news, they're locked in ice. What...
Welcome to episode 500 of Astronomy Cast. To celebrate this momentous occasion, we're going to look back 500 years into the past to see what we learned about the Universe. And then we're going to look 500 years into the future. Astronomy Cast celebrated their 500th...
We started out Astronomy Cast with the controversial decision to de-planet Pluto. And here we are, more than a decade later, at the brink of recording our 500th episode when another big decision is coming down from the IAU: whose name goes on the concept that our...
The 2018 Hall of Fame inductees will be inducted on July 24 at the Academy of Podcasters' Hall of Fame Ceremony, during the Podcast Movement Conference in Philadelphia. CosmoQuest's own principal investigator Dr. Pamela Gay will be inducted for her work over the past...
Astronomy Cast will be on hiatus for July and August. Don't worry, we'll be back in September, and will be gearing up for our 500th episode! Astronomy Cast will be celebrating their 500th episode the weekend of Sept 15-16, 2018. Want to join us in Edwardsville, Il?...
The Milky Way has gobbled up dozens of dwarf galaxies and added them to its structure. Today we're going to look at the ongoing hunt for the wreckage of past mergers. And what we've discovered about dwarf galaxies in general. Welcome to our last episode before our...
Is it globular clusters or is it globular clusters? It doesn't matter, they're awesome and we're here to update you on them. Astronomy Cast will be celebrating their 500th episode the weekend of Sept 15-16, 2018. Want to join us in Edwardsville, Il? Check out our...
Another update show, this time on the various generations of stars, let's get into it. Astronomy Cast will be celebrating their 500th episode the weekend of Sept 15-16, 2018. Want to join us in Edwardsville, Il? Check out our AC500 site here to find out how! We...
Our knowledge of space is starting to match up with our ability to get out there an explore it. There are several companies working on missions and techniques to harvest minerals from asteroids. What other resources are out there that we can use? Astronomy Cast will...
Thanks to Cassini and other spacecraft, we've learned a tremendous amount about the icy worlds in the Solar System, from Jupiter's Europa to Saturn's Enceladus, to Pluto's Charon. Geysers, food for bacteria, potential oceans under the ice and more. What new things...