The Wow! Signal Podcast

Released: 16 November 2017 Duration: 48 minutes, 5 seconds   Host Paul Carr talks to Douglas Vakoch of METI.org about a recent transmission using a powerful radar transmitter to the star GJ 273, which has a super-Earth planet circling it in the habitable zone.   Links: GJ 273 on SIMBAD The HARPS search for southern extra-solar planets XLI. A dozen planets around the M dwarfs GJ 3138, GJ 3323, GJ 2...

Released: 14 November 2017 A short note from Paul Carr to please stay tuned for more content. Sorry for the lull, but we are not fading - we wouldn't do that to you. Meanwhile, if you haven't already, check out the Unseen Podcast .

Released: 3 September 2017 Duration: 62 minutes, 37 seconds   Host Daniela De Paulis along with Paul Carr in conversation with artist Jon Lomborg , designer of Carl Sagan's Voyager Golden Record , on his new crowdfunded project, the One Earth Message .   Links: The One Earth Message Kickstarter The New Horizons Mission The Voyager Golden Record Lincos Credits: Host and co-producer: Daniela De Paul...

Released: 5 June 2017 Duration: 18 minutes 33 seconds   Paul Carr talks with Tabetha Boyajian about the flurry of observations of KIC 8462852 conducted when the star dipped in brightness last month, and what might happen in the near future.   Links:  /r/KIC8462852 The Subreddit FAQ Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr Music: Jason Robinson

Released: 19 May 2017 Duration: 12 minutes 57 seconds   Host Paul Carr provides some brief remarks and one or two speculations about the dimming of Tabby's Star that began today.   Links: The Reddit Discussion Forum Jason Wright's Video Tabby's Star for the Perplexed Part 1   The Wow! Signal podcast is distributed under the Creative Commons/Attribution Share-Alike license.

Released: 13 February 2017 Duration:90 minutes, 38 seconds   In this episode we explore Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence, or METI, with METI.org President Douglas Vakoch and interdisciplinary artist Daniela de Paulis. Nick Nielsen joins us for a discussion of Daniela's new project Cogito - how do we send our thoughts into the cosmos?   Links: The Pioneer Plaques The Drake Arecibo Message Th...

Released: 2 January 2017 Duration: 15 minutes, 37 seconds   Based upon a  Dream of the Open Channel blog entry , we discuss why there may not be any galaxy-scale megastructures, but what sort of stellar class megastructures could we possibly observe out there. Please visit  wowsignalpodcast.com  for more information about this podcast.   Links: Why Search? The Jaws of Darkness Glimpsing Heat from...

Released: 28 November 2016 Duration: 59 minutes, 2 seconds   Astrobiologist and Author David Grinspoon joins us to talk about his new book, Earth in Human Hands - Shaping Our Planet's Future . Following all the great demotions, humanity is about to get a great promotion - and we're not ready for it, but we have no choice.   Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr Announcer: Erin Carr Music: DJ Spook...

Recorded: 14 September 2016 Released: 14 September 2016 Duration:22 minutes, 22 seconds   Astronomer Tabetha "Tabby" Boyajian joined Paul Carr, Roger Wehbe, and Rusty Schweikart in a Google Hangout to talk about the implications of the Gaia Data Release 1 for a better understanding of KIC 8462852.   Links:  Gaia Parallax for KIC 8462852 is 2.554887 mas Jason Wright: What Could be Going on with Boy...

Released: 8 August 2016 Duration:47 minutes 44 seconds   Host Paul Carr talks to CalTech astronomer Ben Montet,who has, with his colleague Joshua Simon, just published the result that Tabby's Star (KIC 8462852) dimmed considerably over the four year course of the Kepler Space Telescope prime mission.   Links: Montet and Simon, KIC 8462852 Faded Throughout the Kepler Mission Interview with Bradley...

Released: 31 July 2016 Duration: 24 minutes, 11 seconds   Host Paul Carr discusses the recent paper " Our Sky Now and Then " with lead author and astronomer Beatriz Villarroel,a PhD student at the University of Upsalla in Sweden , Ms. Villarroel's team was undertaking an alternative approach to SETI, looking for evidence of effects in astronomical data that could not be due to natural effects.   L...

Released: 28 July 2016 Duration: 43 minutes, 45 seconds   James Garrison speaks with latest holder of the Library of Congress Baruch Blumberg chair of astrobiology , Nathaniel Comfort. His current book project is the biography of DNA.   Links: Mike Russell New Study Outlines "Water World" Theory of the Origin of Life Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Dr. Barbara McClintock Steven Benner   Credits: Hos...

Released: 4 July 2016 Duration: 20 minutes, 41 seconds SETI research is much like the traditional task of a tracker, who seeks the spoor of elusive quarry through a wilderness. In the search for life, intelligence, and exocivilizations we find ourselves in the position of seeking the spoor of these higher emergent complexities in the cosmological wilderness. Links: SETI as a Process of Elimiation...

Released: 22 June 2016 Duration: 41 minutes, 19 seconds   Daniela De Paulis hosts a conversation with the team producing the crowdfunded feature-length SETI documentary Earthlings Quest , and one of the scientists profiled in the film, Douglas Vakoch . We urge you to consider contributing to the Kickstarter for this film.   opening Paulina's intro introduction to the Earthling's Quest team: Alexan...

Released: 27 May 2016 Duration: 67 minutes, 16 seconds   We interview LSU astronomer Bradley Schaefer about why is sticking to his guns about the century-long dimming of Tabby's Star (KIC 8462952), why some popular explanations fail, and what can be done to further explore the reason that this star's behavior is so behavior. In particular, Brad wants to encourage us to contribute to Tabetha Boyaji...

Released: 18 May 2016 Durations: 3 minutes, 33 seconds   A short Burst to briefly explain today's development and to ask listeners to seriously consider donating to the new Kickstarter to monitor KIC 8462852 with a network of telescopes using standardized photometry. The hope is that we will reliably catch the star in the act of dimming. Please share this and the link to the kickstarter widely. To...

Released: 3 May 2016 Duration: 35 minutes, 43 seconds   Stella Kafka, director of the American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) tells us about how her organization observes variable stars and how they hope to catch Tabby's Star (KIC 8462852) in the act of dimming. Also, a brief update on Bradley Schaefer's work. Intro music: Dark Skies by DJ Spooky Intro announcement Welcome and quic...

Released: 6 April 2016 Duration: 43 minutes, 45 seconds Thread : Astronomy and Astrophysics   In Tabbys' Star for the Perplexed Part 1 , we explained why this is puzzling star. In Part 2 , we talked about some of the explanations put forth and their weaknesses. In the third and last (for now) part of the series, we talk to Tabby herself, and she answers several reasonably informed questions about...

Released: 31 March 2016 Duration: 13 minutes, 21 seconds   Paul Carr continues with our series explaining just what is so puzzling about Tabby's Star, aka KIC 8462852. In this part we talk about some of the candidate explanations, including alien megastructures, including a Dyson Swarm.   Links Please see wowsignalpodcast.com The Slow and Fast Dimming of Tabby's Star AstroWright   Credits: Written...

Released: 16 March 2016 Duration: 13 minutes, 25 seconds   Science does not occur in a vacuum, and this is doubly true in the case of SETI, which is said to suffer from a "giggle factor." How does social context shape the scientific research program of SETI? The public at times shows great interest in SETI, but this attention can cut two ways, both benefiting and harming the discipline. Nowhere is...

Released: 14 March 2016 Duration:22 minutes, 55 seconds   We talk to Netherlands astronomer Jason Hessels, corresponding author on a recent paper in Nature describing a repeating fast radio burst. For more information please visit wowsignalpodcast.com   Links: A Repeating Fast Radio Burst The Unseen Podcast Discussion of FRBs Credits: Host and Producer: Paul Carr Music: Jason Robinson

Released: 10 March 2016 Duration: 18 minutes, 1 second   In Part 1, Paul Carr provides a non-technical explanation of why the star informally known as Tabby's Star (KIC 8462852) is so perplexing after all. What was observed, and why doesn't it fit a conventional explanation? Please see our companion blog post at Dream of the Open Channel.   Written, Produced and Read by Paul Carr Music by Jason Ro...

Released: 13 February 2016 Duration:20 minutes, 35 seconds   Nick Nielsens's show notes: In so far as SETI is a science -- and it  aspires  to be a science even as its critics argue that it falls short -- should its emphasis fall upon confirmation or disconfirmation? I argue that the falsification of narrowly formulated hypotheses about exocivilizations can both demonstrate the scientificity of SE...

Released: 6 February 2016 Duration: 22 minutes, 18 seconds An edited interview with Dr. Josh Grindlay concerning the use of measurements of star brightness from the Digital Access to a Sky Century @HArvard to measure the dimming (or not) of Tabby's Star over a Century. Grandly critiques Hippke's paper that found dimming in several stars in the DASCH data, and also Schaefer's claim that Tabby's Sta...

Released: 14 January 2016 Duration: 62 minutes 4 seconds   Host Paul Carr talks to Dr. Bradley Schaefer about his research showing a dramatic dimming of Tabby's Star over a century. This all but rules out any explanation anyone has put forth so far for the short term dimming of the star found in the Kepler data by Boyajian, et. al.   Links KIC 8462852 Faded at an Average Rate of 0.165+-0.013 Magni...