NASA on Soundcloud

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...

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Best wishes to you all."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Good health to you now and forever."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Sincerely send you our friendly greetings."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Peace on you. We the inhabitants of this earth send our greetings to you."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "We are sending greetings from our world, wishing you happiness, goodness, good health and many years."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Dear Turkish-speaking friends, may the honors of the morning be upon your heads."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "We in this world send you our good will"

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Greetings. Best wishes from Telugu-speaking people."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Greetings from a computer programmer in the little university town of Ithaca on the planet Earth"

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "May all be well."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Hello and greetings to all."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "We greet you, O great ones."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Wish You a Long Life."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "We wish you everything good from our planet."

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Greetings! I Welcome You!"

This is a greeting to the universe that was electronically placed on the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. English Translation: "Greetings to everybody."