AWESOME ASTRONOMY

This month excitement builds for the predicted Nova outburst in Corona Borealis as well as looking forward to China launching a sample return mission to the far side of the Moon. We have our usual skyguide and chat about upcoming missions and some fun insights into the methane on Mars.

This month Dr Jen is off to the US for the Solar Eclipse while Paul is just back from Goonhilly Earth Station. We chat about the imminent demise of the Chandra Space Telescope, more news on the Hubble tension, and of course the Great North American Eclipse.  Chinese Lunar ambitions, Starship making it to space and the first Boeing Starliner crew make the news while in this months history moment we...

This podcast extra is our full length interview with Dr Helen Sharman, Britain's First astronaut and the first woman to visit the Russian Mir Space Station in 1991. 

This month our intrepid crew of the good ship Awesome investigate sub surface oceans on the moons of the solar system, smoking stars, distant blackholes, oversized structures and of course tippy over lunar landers. There is also the monthly skyguide and a look at the astro history of March!

This month Dr Jen talks to Dr Phil! Dr Phil Metzger, 30 years at NASA where he has worked on various missions and programmes including the ISS snd Space Shuttle, while more recently he has been investigating how rocket efflux interacts with soil and what this will mean for future landings on the Moon and Mars…

This month we explore the exciting announcements from the European Space Agency as they outline their new missions for the 2030s. LISA, a space based gravitational wave detector and EnVision, a Venus mission that will map the surface and under-surface of that planet in unprecedented detail.  We have the usual skyguide, chat about recent lunar missions and emails from the listeners.

This episode, it's Jen and a special guest exploring the inexplicable Big Ring, the first proof connecting supernovae to black holes and neutron stars, cyclones on a far-away world, dazzling images of Io, and the true colour of Neptune. We also take a deep dive into humanity's efforts to explore the Moon – the failing Peregrine lander and Artemis pushbacks.  There's also a sky guide for the second...

Festive silliness (bit naughty!), a review of the Space and astronomy year and a look ahead to what 2024 has in store for us. Not forgetting the outakes!

This month we explore what might have happened to the Planet Theia after it hit the Earth, what Lucy saw on its first asteroid encounter, the mystery of a new double crater on the Moon and what the first images from the Elucid telescope show.  We have our monthly skyguide, launch round up and emails and questions from listeners. Produced by Paul, Jen, John, Damien & Dustin

This month Jeni talks to Paul. No not our Paul  Paul Cornish, planetarium and science outreach extraordinaire at Bristols We the Curious. They chat about one of our favourite topics on Awesome, constellation Mythology and this time it has a very Welsh flavour...enjoy!

This month we talk about what might have been in the Arthur C Clarke Awards, the latest weird discovery from JWST, the most detailed simulation of the Universe yet, British space plans, giggle at a Space Force painting, and have a look at what you can see in the sky this month.   Produced by Paul, Jen, John, Damien & Dustin

This month we give you a recording of our live panel show from AstroCamp, held in September. The team answer questions and comments from the public about a range of space and astronomy topics.

This month Paul and Dr Jen talk about the recent astrocamp where yet more Aurora was seen. Later there is a guide to seeing Aurora at lower latitudes. JWST is at it again with a possible detection of biological signals on an exoplanet, AND breaking and rewriting galaxy morphology history. There is an autumnal sky guide and the low down on the Bennu return mission OSIRIS-REx.  

This months interview looks at that stunning imagery that JWST took of the Ring Nebula - that familiar Messier planterary nebula in Lyra and favourite of star parties. This new study has revealed new and unexpected details and once again demonstrated the brilliant science of our golden wonder telescope in space. Dr Jeni talks to Dr Robert Wessen, Research Associate at Cardiff University who has wo...

This month we are joined by special guest Neill Sanders from Go Stargazing who is making a special announcement about astronomy cruise Holidays. We have news of a new type of star, mud on Mars and JWST breaking cosmology once again. After our skyguide we chat about the recent Indian and Russian moon missions.  In our discussion topic we have a Battle of the Planets as we decide which should get in...

For this podcast extra, we return to NAM 2023, this year held at Cardiff University. We're delighted to bring you the conversational style of Dr Stephen Wilkins, public engagement extraordinaire. Dr Stephen is an STFC Public Engagement Fellow (so you know this talk will be just brilliant) and serves as a Director of Outreach and Public Engagement for the School of Mathematical and Physical Science...

This month we have a packed show, with stories about the European space agency launching a new space telescope to study The Dark Universe. India going to the moon with Chandrayaan-3, astereroid boulders, a key ingredient for life just 1 billion years into the Universe's history, measuring a crater with highway seismology, hot lava piles on the moon, and a farewell to Ariane 5. We discuss observing...

Once a year, astronomers descend upon an unsuspecting UK city in the greatest gathering of astronomically curious minds: the National Astronomy Meeting, otherwise known as NAM (no, not that 'Nam, though it is quite the battle of the minds). Jen was lucky enough to attend this year and this episode is the first in a series of talks recorded at NAM 2023.  We're delighted to bring you the expertise o...

It's a summer vacation special with Jeni in the mountains of South America astronomising at altitude and visiting the Vera C Rubin telescope as well as obstech.   We have an interview with a Vera Rubin Observatory astronomer as well as a skyguide and an astronomy news round up.

We chat to Dr Kathy Thornton, nuclear physicist turned NASA astronaut who went on to fly on four Space Shuttle missions. Dr Thornton flew for over 40 days and completed over 21 hours of EVA, including the famous operation to fix the blurry Hubble Space Telescope. We talk about her life as an astronaut, the Hubble fix and that fateful day in mission-control on Columbia's last re-entry.

This month Jeni and Paul talk about the recent supernova in galaxy M101; volcanic exoplanets; the growing observational evidence putting the current Big Bang theory under strain and the history of water on both Earth and Mars. There is discussions on alien contact; exoplanet detection and how long it would take to accelerate to the speed of light. Paul does a summer reading book review with three...

To celebrate the Skylab 50th anniversary here is one our favourite astronaut chats from 2012 where we caught up with Skylab 3 and STS-3 astronaut, Jack Lousma. Jack was also capcom during Apollo 13 and he tells us about taking that ominous 'Houston, we've had a problem' call and how they solved each life-threatening issue in sequence to get the astronauts back alive. He talks about missing out on...

This month Paul and Jeni in astronomy news talk about new data on the M87 blackhole, the architecture of planetary systems, the hottest stars, an impact crater in France and how Mars might not have been oxygen rich. In exploration news there is the latest on  JUICE and they welcome an old friend back to the show to talk about Starship. There is a review of the recent AstroCamp where the team witne...

Jeni visits Space Forge for an update on their mission to build reusable satellites to manufacture materials that that are impossible on the ground. She talks to CEO Joshua Western about that fateful launch from Cornwall on Virgin's Cosmic Girl, how they are getting ready for their next test aboard a Falcon 9, their re-entry tech nicknamed 'Mary Poppins in Space' and the company's future plans to...

In this episode Jeni and Paul talk about exoplanet atmospheres, the latest thinking on solar system visitor Oumuamua, Vigin Orbit's woes, Relativity's 3D success, and the oldest orbiting satellite. There is the sky guide for April, a discussion about what new telescope Jeni should buy and listener emails, as well as Paul's miserable weather and Jeni's gala dinner talk for International Women's Day...