Show Notes
The asteroid belt is portrayed in movies as a crowded place with massive rocks bouncing each other like pool balls, capable of sending a mile-wide missile hurtling toward Earth at any moment. The reality is much more fascinating.
Host Dr. Michelle Thaller speaks with Dr. Lucy McFadden, Co-Investigator of NASA’s Dawn Mission to orbit the asteroids Vesta and Ceres. She shares what they’ve learned by traveling 130 million miles to visit places we’ve always viewed from afar.
Episode Extras
This image of asteroid Vesta is one of many images taken by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft to create an animation showing the diversity of minerals through color representation.
This view from NASA’s Dawn spacecraft shows a fresh crater among older terrain on Ceres.
Learn more about Dawn and see even more amazing photos right here.
Orbital Path is produced by Justin O’Neill and hosted by Michelle Thaller.
More from Orbital Path
All things in the cosmos have a lifespan, from the smallest particles to the most ancient suns. Everything has its season. Every season must come to an end.
Asteroids, as the dinosaurs found out, can have big effects on life on Earth.
To make a black hole, you need to think big. Really big.
On September 15, 2018, the last Delta II rocket lifted off from Vandenberg Air Force base, in California. It carried into orbit IceSat-2 — a satellite equipped with perhaps the most sophisticated space laser ever built.
We live our lives in three dimensions. But we also walk those three dimensions along a fourth dimension: time.