NASA on Soundcloud

Episode 45 features Annette Moore, the Director of our Information Resources Director and the Chief Information Officer at the Johnson Space Center, who tells us about data and information in space as well as the tech we use for human spaceflight operations, including space station imagery and how it's changed over time. Moore discusses how the Johnson Space Center is handling the multiple petabyt...

Episode 44 features Jeff Fox, Chief Engineer of the Rapid Prototype Lab at the Johnson Space Center, who tells the history and evolution of displays and controls in the space shuttle. Fox reveals details behind some of the new displays that are being designed to fly on the Orion spacecraft. This episode was recorded on March 21, 2018.

Dr. Scott Smith, NASA nutritionist and the manager for nutritional biochemistry, discusses some pretty significant differences in the way astronauts have to eat in space versus the way we eat here on Earth. This episode was recorded on February 16, 2018.

What lurks beneath Mars’s surface? How did the rocky, Red Planet form? What can Mars teach us about our own planet Earth? Soon, these questions will start getting answered by NASA’s newest Mars lander, the Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy, and Heat Transport, or InSight. With its seismometer and heat probe instruments, InSight will investigate the deep dynamics of Mars, h...

Paul Bookout and David Smith talk about the most powerful rocket since the Saturn V: The Space Launch System. The experts discuss the construction, testing, evolution and potential of the skyscraper-sized launch vehicle. This episode was recorded on March 20, 2018.

Paul Bookout and David Smith talk about the most powerful rocket since the Saturn V: The Space Launch System. The experts discuss what the rocket is made of, where it will go, and what will be inside. This episode was recorded on March 20, 2018.

Episode 40 features Colonel TJ Creamer who shares his story from humble beginnings in the military to tweeting from the International Space Station. Creamer describes his transition as the first and only individual to be both an astronaut and a flight director. This episode was recorded on March 29, 2018

On Monday, April 16th, NASA is scheduled to launch its newest exoplanet hunter: the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). In this episode of Gravity Assist, Jim Green talks with Martin Still, the TESS Program Scientist, about how TESS works and how it will help us discover new worlds.

Episode 39 features Rajib Dasgupta and Gerard Valle who talk about the commercial test module currently attached to the International Space Station called the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM). The respective former and current project managers for BEAM discuss the history and future of expandable spacecraft. This episode was recorded on February 8 and February 20, 2018

For Women's History Month we brought in 4 women in leadership at the Johnson Space Center to share their stories of persevering through challenges and rising through the ranks. We speak with leaders of the International Space Station Program, Flight Operations, Engineering, and Human Health and Performance. This episode was recorded throughout March 2018.

Episode 37 features Dr. Tina Holden, Human Factors Technical Fellow with Leidos, who talks about the challenges that astronauts may face when interacting with computers. Holden discusses some of the research that has been done on the space station to investigate these issues. This episode was recorded on February 27, 2018.

Jeff Fox, Chief Engineer of the Rapid Prototype Lab, talks about some of the testing and training for Orion. Fox brings the actual audio from inside the Orion capsule during its first flight so you, the listener, can experience what it would be like to ride inside the spacecraft. This episode was recorded on February 7, 2018.

NASA’s Jim Green and bestselling author Andy Weir explore the fascinating intersection of science and science fiction.

After making history by flying by Pluto in 2015, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft is speeding toward a New Year’s Day 2019 flyby of a mysterious world in the outer realm of the solar system. In this episode of Gravity Assist, Jim Green talks with New Horizons Principal Investigator Alan Stern about what we’ve learned about Kuiper Belt object 2014 MU69 and the remarkable story of how -- against all o...

Pluto -- which is smaller than Earth’s Moon -- has a heart-shaped glacier that’s the size of Texas and Oklahoma. Fascinating Pluto also has blue skies, spinning moons, mountains as high as the Rockies, and it snows—but the snow is red! In this episode of Gravity Assist, Jim Green talks with New Horizons Principal Investigator Alan Stern of the Southwest Research Institute about what the July 2015...

Beyond Saturn are two of the most misunderstood and bizarre planets in our solar system—the “ice giants” Uranus and Neptune. Did you know that Uranus has rings and appears to spin on its side? And that windy and intensely blue Neptune once had an Earth-sized Great Dark Spot? In this episode of Gravity Assist, NASA’s Jim Green and Amy Simon discuss Uranus, Neptune, and Neptune’s intriguing moon – T...

With me today is Dr. Linda Spilker from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She's the project scientist for our Cassini Mission, which as everyone knows, had a recent spectacular finale at Saturn.

With Jim Green today is the “man about Mars,” Bruce Jakosky from the University of Colorado. Bruce is the principal investigator of NASA's MAVEN mission. Joining them is Michael Meyer the lead Mars scientist at NASA Headquarters.

Did you know the Moon is slowly moving away from Earth and that the Moon has water? Jim Green is joined by lunar expert Sarah Noble to discuss how the Moon was formed, lava tubes and moonquakes, the “dark side of the Moon,” and mysteries we have yet to solve about Earth’s nearest neighbor.

NASA not only seeks to unravel the secrets of the solar system and the universe, we have a robust program to better understand how Earth works as a system, how it’s changing, and to assist when natural disasters like hurricanes and earthquakes occur.

The next stop on our virtual tour is Venus, the closest planet to Earth and the hottest planet in our solar system, with surface temperatures scorching enough to melt lead.

Our virtual tour of the solar system continues with Mercury, the closest planet to the Sun. Since it’s tough to observe Mercury except at dawn or twilight, most of what we know about Mercury is from NASA’s Mariner 10 and MESSENGER missions.

We start our “Gravity Assist” virtual tour of the solar system with – where else – the Sun! How hot is the Sun, what are solar flares, and how does space weather affect us here in Earth? Jim is joined by Project Scientist Dr. Nicky Fox of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab to talk about our fascinating star and NASA’s upcoming Parker Solar Probe—a mission to “touch the Sun.”

Gravity Assist Podcast Debuts Nov 15 by NASA

NASA’s Juno spacecraft has observed plasma wave signals from Jupiter’s ionosphere. This display is a frequency-time spectrogram. The results in this figure show an increasing plasma density as Juno descended into Jupiter’s ionosphere during its close pass by Jupiter on February 2, 2017. The intensity, or amplitude, of the waves is displayed based on the color scale shown on the right. The actual o...