THE STARTALKER NEWSLETTER, ISSUE 58, DECEMBER 12, 2013

This Week's New Podcast Season 4 Time Capsule (Part 1)  December 15, 2013, 7:00pm ET/4:00pm PT     Presenting your favorite episodes from Season 4: 1. StarTalk Live at Town Hall with Buzz Aldrin (Part 1)  2. StarTalk Live! Satisfying our Curiosity about Mars  3. StarTalk Live! Exploring Our Funky Solar System 4. The Joe Rogan Experience  5. Eureka! Asteroid Mining  Not the entire episodes, mind you. Just the tastiest morsels, the juiciest jokes, and the most savory scientific snippets. Next week, in Part 2, we’ll focus on your favorite Cosmic Queries. But for this week, sit back and join us as we take one last look at Buzz Aldrin, John Oliver, Joe Rogan, the Curiosity Rover, Dr. Funkyspoon, and so much more. The podcast will be available Sunday, December 15th at 7:00 PM ET on our website, iTunes, Stitcher and SoundCloud. Photo Credit: © 2013 Daniel Johnson. Catch Up on Last Week's Podcast Cosmic Queries: Science Fiction December 8, 2013     This week, science fiction meets science fact, and, not surprisingly, the facts win. Join astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson and comic co-host Eugene Mirman as they explore force fields, transporter beams, artificial gravity and anti-matter reactions. Time travel is on the table, too, from the mechanics of tachyon fields and the Flux Capacitor to Star Trek's warp drive and faster-than-light travel in Star Wars. Neil ponders whether time is static, as in 12 Monkeys and The Time Machine, or malleable, as in Back To The Future. Neil and Eugene discuss Sliders’ depiction of parallel universes and whether mathematical equations can predict the future like in Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series. Listen now. Photo Credit: © LucasFilm Limited. Best of the Blog Saving the best for last? Watch the Geminids this Friday night! Posted December 11, 2013   Could the last major meteor shower of 2013, the Geminids, be the best? We’ll find out Friday night! The Geminids peak on the night of Dec 13 through the morning of December 14th. There is reason to hope, in spite of the possibility of clouds and the presence of a waxing gibbous moon, three days from full. According to Universe Today, “In the 21st century, rates for the Geminids have stayed above a ZHR (Zenithal Hourly Rate) of 120, currently the highest of any annual shower. It’s worth noting that an extrapolated ZHR of almost 200 were seen in 2011 when the Moon was at an equally unfavorable waning gibbous phase! The Geminids always produce lots of fireballs, capable of being seen even under moonlit skies.” Read more. Photo Credit: Stellarium (Courtesy of Universe Today). Keep In Touch! Facebook Google +  Twitter  YouTube  Pinterest Homepage  iTunes  Soundcloud Show RSS Blog RSS Join Our Cosmic Community If you represent an academic or scientific organization that would like to join our Cosmic Community, just click on the following link to complete and submit a short application form and we'll be in touch. Cosmic Community Sign-Up Become a StarTalk Satellite Add the StarTalk Radio widget to your website or blog and let your friends listen to the show right from your site. Get the widget now. StarTalk Radio Now Accepting Corporate Sponsors If your company shares our mission and would like to support StarTalk Radio, please email: Laura Berland

Have You Seen Our New "Behind the Scenes" Video? Neil deGrasse Tyson on Adding Oxygen to the Atmosphere       A fan wants to know what would happen if we added frozen oxygen from space to Earth’s atmosphere like in an episode of Buck Rogers. Once Neil deGrasse Tyson and Eugene Mirman stop laughing, Neil explains why adding oxygen would be a bad idea (imagine the Apollo 1 capsule fire on a much larger scale), why it’s not necessary but how we could easily get oxygen should we need it, and explains why the word “Spaceberg” makes as little sense as the idea the Buck Rogers writers came up with. Watch now.

NEWSLETTER: STARTALKER, ISSUE 53, OCTOBER 31, 2013

Issue 53, October 31, 2013

Meet Neil deGrasse Tyson Backstage at StarTalk Live Town Hall, NYC Nov. 4th at 8 PM     Neil deGrasse Tyson and Eugene Mirman have been joined on the stage at StarTalk Live by moonwalkers, physicists, musicians, actors and comedians. But now you have a chance to make StarTalk Live history and be the first StarTalk Radio fan to ask Neil a question from the audience and then meet Neil backstage after the show. And how will we decide which audience member gets a once-in-a-lifetime meet and greet with everyone’s own personal astrophysicist? Actually, your fate is in your own hands. All you have to do is... Read more.    Photo Credit: © 2013 Jeffrey Simons. All rights reserved.  This Week's New Podcast Cosmic Queries: UFOs    November 3, 2013, 7:00pm ET/4:00pm PT     This week Neil deGrasse Tyson and Eugene Mirman turn a scientific eye on UFOs. Find out why the laws of physics and the conservation of angular momentum make the spinning flying saucers from old Sci-Fi movies a bad idea, and how aerodynamic drag and weight considerations influence the design of real spaceships. Neil speculates on what we might learn from UFOs if we ever found one, like alien technology, new materials made from undiscovered elements, and how they keep their anti-matter from annihilating their matter if they use antimatter drives. Plus organic biological spaceships, aliens made of pure light, transporters, and aliens from the future or other dimensions. Listen Sunday, Nov. 3rd at 7:00pm ET on our website, iTunes, SoundCloud and Stitcher.    Catch Up on Last Week's Podcast A Conversation with Dan Aykroyd (Part 2)    October 27, 2013    In the conclusion of their conversation, Neil and Dan use movies – Ghostbusters, The Coneheads, and The Blues Brothers – for a sober, grounded discussion about ghosts, aliens and cars on “a mission from God.” Dan, who attended family séances as a kid but has never seen a ghost, describes how an article about quantum physics and parapsychology led to Ghostbusters. He tells the story of the Ghost of Flight 401, after which Neil and co-host astrophysicist Charles Liu discuss psychological research into group hallucinations and physical causes of paranormal events. One thing they agree on: the best way to approach the supernatural is through the lens of scientific experimentation. Listen now. Photo Credit: Columbia Pictures. All rights reserved.  Best of the Blog Revisiting Storms of Our Century a Year After Sandy    Posted October 30, 2013      One year ago, here in the Northeast we woke up to the devastation that Sandy left in its wake. Most of the StarTalk team live in and around NYC. We woke up without power, without water, without heat, and, for some of our neighbors, without our homes. In the aftermath of Sandy, many of us felt powerless and vulnerable, with many questions to be answered. Could this happen again? Did global warming cause Sandy, or was it just the luck of the draw that had high tide hit at the peak of the massive, hurricane driven storm surge during the highest tides of the month? Was this the start of a new normal? Read more. Photo Credit: NASA/NOAA Suomi NPP/University of Wisconsin-Madison.  Have You Seen Our New "Behind the Scenes" Video?    Neil deGrasse Tyson: How to Blow Up a Planet      When a fan asks Neil deGrasse Tyson what would happen if the Death Star from Star Wars blew up Mars, Neil explains to Eugene Mirman the physics of how you might actually go about blowing up a planet. (If you're an evil genius, you may want to take notes.) Watch now. Don't miss any of our StarTalk Radio videos on YouTube. Subscribe to the StarTalk Radio YouTube Channel.  Keep in touch Facebook Twitter YouTube Google + Pinterest Homepage iTunes Shows (RSS) Blog (RSS) Subscribe to The StarTalker - click here! Join Our Cosmic Community! If you represent an academic or scientific organization that would like to join our Cosmic Community, just click on the following link to complete and submit a short application form and we'll be in touch. Cosmic Community Sign-Up Become a StarTalk Satellite! Add the StarTalk Radio widget to your website or blog and let your friends listen to the show right from your site. Get the widget now. StarTalk Radio is now accepting corporate sponsors.If your company shares our mission and would like to support StarTalk Radio, please email: Laura Berland

The StarTalk Team StarTalkTeam@startalkradio.net www.startalkradio.net Hear us on iTunes Follow us on Twitter Find us on Facebook

FROM NEWSLETTER: THE STARTALKER, ISSUE 46

Issue 46, September 12, 2013

Breaking News: StarTalk Live at Town Hall NYC Exclusive Fan Pre-Sale Date Show: Monday, November 4, 2013, 8 PM ET Fan Presale: Friday, September 13, Noon, ET Public Sale: Tuesday, September 17, Noon ET   This Friday the 13th is your lucky day! Exclusive fan presale begins tomorrow at 12:00 Noon ET and runs until Tuesday, 9/17 at noon, when tickets go on sale for the general public. To get your tickets, click on the following link, which won't be live until noon tomorrow: http://www.ticketmaster.com/event/03004B297C507B29 The code to purchase tickets for the presale is: COSMIC. See you all at Town Hall, NYC, on November 4th! Photo Credit: © 2013 Elliot Severn. All rights reserved.  This Week's New Podcast StarTalk Live at Town Hall with Buzz Aldrin (Part 1) September 15, 2013, 7:00pm ET/4:00pm PT     For StarTalk’s first mission to Town Hall in NYC, Commander Neil deGrasse Tyson and Co-Pilot Eugene Mirman recruited a crack crew: astronaut Buzz Aldrin, the second man to walk on the moon, Andrew Chaikin, author of A Man on the Moon, and, in the spirit of international cooperation, a little known British comedian named John Oliver. The team explored why we went to the moon, what it was like once we got there, and why conspiracy theorists who say we never actually went are full of… dust. The most surprising discovery of the evening was that the guy who got the most laughs that night wasn’t Eugene or John, but Buzz Aldrin himself. Listen to Part 1 on our website Sunday, September 15 at 7:00pm ET and on iTunes, SoundCloud and Stitcher by 7:30pm ET.    Photo Credit: © 2013 Elliot Severn. All rights reserved.  Catch Up on Last Week's Podcast Cosmic Queries: The Sun and Other Stars September 8, 2013      The Sun is the star as astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson and comic co-host Chuck Nice answer fan questions in this solar edition of Cosmic Queries. Learn how a gas cloud condensed to form our Sun, and how we can keep it from expanding and burning out. Find out what Immanuel Kant’s Nebular Hypothesis is, what electron degeneracy pressure does, how neutron stars form, whether dust clouds around stars cause electrical storms, and if the Sun will die before we collide with the Andromeda galaxy. It’s filled with rogue stars, thermonuclear fusion, emotionally conflicted planets, pigeons and Mexican food. Listen now. Photo Credit: Credit: ESO / L. Calçada.   Best of the Blog Revisiting Our Special Episode about 9/11 Posted September 11, 2013      “…I lived three and a half blocks from what would later be known as Ground Zero. I was home that morning, and the entire series of events unfolded outside my dining room window… I don’t want to retell that now. What I’d rather try to do is measure the magnitude of the events of that morning…”  Twelve years ago, Neil deGrasse Tyson witnessed the events of 9/11 at close range. Two years ago, on the tenth anniversary, StarTalk Radio produced a special episode about that day, 9/11 Memorial. If you haven’t heard the episode yet, and with so many new fans that’s likely, I recommend you listen now... Read more. Have You Seen Our New "Behind the Scenes" Video? Neil deGrasse Tyson Explores the Vacuum of Space      Could you capture the vacuum of space and bring it back to Earth? What would happen? And if “nature abhors a vacuum,” why doesn’t Earth’s atmosphere go rushing out into space? Watch Neil deGrasse Tyson fill the informational void as he answers this Cosmic Query with Eugene Mirman, then rethinks and clarifies that answer. Watch now. Don't miss any of our StarTalk Radio videos on YouTube. Subscribe to the StarTalk Radio YouTube Channel.    Keep in touch Facebook Twitter YouTube Google + Pinterest Homepage  iTunes Shows (RSS) Blog (RSS) Subscribe to The StarTalker - click here!  Join Our Cosmic Community! If you represent an academic or scientific organization that would like to join our Cosmic Community, just click on the following link to complete and submit a short application form and we'll be in touch. Cosmic Community Sign-Up Become a StarTalk Satellite! Add the StarTalk Radio widget to your website or blog and let your friends listen to the show right from your site. Get the widget now. StarTalk Radio is now accepting corporate sponsors. If your company shares our mission and would like to support StarTalk Radio, please email: Laura Berland

The StarTalk Team StarTalkTeam@startalkradio.net www.startalkradio.net Hear us on iTunes Follow us on Twitter Find us on Facebook