Astronomy Minute
Learn the basics of astronomy in one-to-two minute packets of concise information about specific topics. You are a busy person with a short attention span, and you want to learn about astronomical topics in a short amount of time. Your host Professor Ata is a PhD research astronomer and astrophysicist and a noted authority on stellar and galactic astronomy. I welcome your feedback at ata.sarajedini@gmail.com. See the web site astronomyminute.org for more. The podcast logo is courtesy of Zachary Greathouse and shows a globular cluster photo taken by the author with the Hubble Space Telescope.Podcasts
What is an Astronomical Observatory?
Published: July 20, 2023, 8:32 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 44 seconds
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What is Occam's Razor?
Published: July 19, 2023, 2:12 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 50 seconds
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Why is the Webb Telescope Optimized to Observe Infrared Light?
Published: Jan. 4, 2023, 4:18 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes
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What are the Main Science Goals of the Webb Telescope?
Published: Jan. 4, 2023, 4:03 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 18 seconds
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What is the James Webb Space Telescope?
Published: Dec. 20, 2022, 12:54 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 35 seconds
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What is the Hubble Space Telescope?
Published: Dec. 14, 2022, 10:05 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 38 seconds
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Why Do We Put Telescopes in Space?
Published: Dec. 14, 2022, 4:20 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 27 seconds
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What is Meant by Spiral Nebula?
Published: June 19, 2022, 10:09 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 8 seconds
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What is the Big Crunch?
Published: May 31, 2022, 6:54 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 38 seconds
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What are the Basic Properties of Astronomical Objects?
Published: May 18, 2022, 8:25 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 15 seconds
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What is the Local Group of Galaxies?
Published: May 10, 2022, 3:06 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 18 seconds
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What Does it Mean to “Know” Something in Science?
Published: April 10, 2022, 7:44 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 58 seconds
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How Can Atoms and Thus Matter be Mostly Empty Space?
Published: April 8, 2022, 8:56 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 57 seconds
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What are Interacting Galaxies?
Published: March 9, 2022, 9:49 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 35 seconds
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How do the Sun and Other Stars Shine?
Published: March 9, 2022, 7:55 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 50 seconds
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What are Giant Molecular Clouds?
Published: Feb. 25, 2022, 3:06 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 8 seconds
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How do We Know that the Milky Way Galaxy is Spiral in Shape?
Published: Feb. 24, 2022, 9:25 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 17 seconds
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What is Meant by the 21 Centimeter Radiation of Hydrogen?
Published: Feb. 4, 2022, 8:59 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 27 seconds
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How are Neutron Stars and Pulsars Related?
Published: Dec. 18, 2021, 11:54 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 44 seconds
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What is a Neutron Star?
Published: Aug. 3, 2021, 12:51 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 58 seconds
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What is a White Dwarf Star?
Published: July 28, 2021, 4:06 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 50 seconds
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How do We Know the Ages of Stars?
Published: June 23, 2021, 3:28 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 51 seconds
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What is Seeing and the Resolving Power of a Telescope?
Published: June 18, 2021, 3:52 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 57 seconds
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Are Black Holes Cosmic Vacuum Cleaners?
Published: June 14, 2021, 7:44 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 47 seconds
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What Was Here Before the Big Bang?
Published: June 11, 2021, 5:25 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 41 seconds
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Are UFOs Aliens From Outer Space?
Published: June 9, 2021, 2:55 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 15 seconds
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What is the Milky Way Galaxy?
Published: June 6, 2021, 4:49 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 27 seconds
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What is the Hubble Law?
Published: June 2, 2021, 6:11 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 8 seconds
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What are Starburst Galaxies?
Published: June 1, 2021, 7:33 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 9 seconds
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Is Science Absolute?
Published: May 26, 2021, 5:18 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 42 seconds
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What is Meant by Dimensional Analysis?
Published: May 17, 2021, 7:37 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 22 seconds
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What are Sunspots and the Sunspot Cycle?
Published: May 11, 2021, 4:23 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 30 seconds
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What is Meant by Einstein’s Theory of Relativity?
Published: May 11, 2021, 11:29 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 35 seconds
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A Description of the Mathematical Basis of Cause-and-Effect
Published: May 2, 2021, 3:49 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 56 seconds
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How do Lunar and Solar Eclipses Happen?
Published: April 12, 2021, 12:52 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 48 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About Planet Earth?
Published: April 7, 2021, 4:25 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 42 seconds
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So You Want to be a Professional Astronomer?
Published: March 30, 2021, 3:34 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 53 seconds
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How do Atoms Absorb and Emit Light?
Published: March 24, 2021, 7:45 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 22 seconds
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What are Some Well-Known Deep Sky Objects?
Published: March 15, 2021, 2:49 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 1 second
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What is Meant by the Retrograde Motion of the Planets?
Published: March 12, 2021, 7:29 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 53 seconds
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What Professional Organizations Support the Work of Astronomers?
Published: March 10, 2021, 6:13 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 36 seconds
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How do Astronomers Obtain Their Observations of the Sky?
Published: March 9, 2021, 8:41 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 39 seconds
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How do Astronomers Disseminate Their Scientific Research Results?
Published: March 3, 2021, 4:27 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 15 seconds
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What is Meant by Metal Abundance or Metallicity?
Published: Feb. 24, 2021, 4:45 a.m.Duration: 2 minutes 3 seconds
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What is Meant by Light Pollution?
Published: Feb. 24, 2021, 4:04 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 23 seconds
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Is Science the Only Path to the Truth?
Published: Feb. 19, 2021, 3:49 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 23 seconds
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The Many Facets of Astronomy and the Lure of the Night Sky
Published: Jan. 29, 2021, 4:54 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 7 seconds
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What is the Relation Between Local Sidereal Time and Local Time?
Published: Jan. 28, 2021, 9:14 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 42 seconds
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What is the Equation of Time?
Published: Jan. 26, 2021, 8:51 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 15 seconds
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What is Meant by Local Apparent Time?
Published: Jan. 26, 2021, 7:54 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 9 seconds
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What is Meant by Local Sidereal Time?
Published: Jan. 23, 2021, 7:40 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 36 seconds
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What is Meant by Galactic Coordinate System?
Published: Jan. 22, 2021, 2:14 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 11 seconds
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What is Meant by Altazimuth Coordinate System?
Published: Jan. 22, 2021, 1:43 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 2 seconds
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What is Meant by Altitude and Azimuth?
Published: Jan. 22, 2021, 1:20 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 23 seconds
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What is Meant by Equatorial Coordinate System?
Published: Jan. 22, 2021, 1:02 p.m.Duration: 59 seconds
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What is Meant by Quantum Mechanics?
Published: Jan. 17, 2021, 8:22 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 35 seconds
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How do We Know the Age of the Universe?
Published: Jan. 17, 2021, 3:56 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 48 seconds
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Which Notable Objects are in the Constellation of Andromeda?
Published: Dec. 18, 2020, 5:10 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 12 seconds
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What is Meant by a Deep Sky Object?
Published: Dec. 18, 2020, 4:54 p.m.Duration: 49 seconds
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What is an Asterism?
Published: Dec. 16, 2020, 7:08 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 32 seconds
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Why do We Study Astronomy?
Published: Dec. 16, 2020, 3:25 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 33 seconds
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The Universe as a Time Machine
Published: Dec. 11, 2020, 7:26 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 48 seconds
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How Old is the Universe, the Sun, and the Earth?
Published: Dec. 11, 2020, 6:56 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 48 seconds
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What is a Light Year?
Published: Dec. 9, 2020, 1:09 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 8 seconds
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What is Electromagnetic Radiation?
Published: Dec. 4, 2020, 8:49 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 7 seconds
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What is Meant by the Hubble Flow?
Published: Dec. 4, 2020, 4:25 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 42 seconds
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What is a Blackbody Curve or Planck Curve?
Published: Nov. 29, 2020, 2:44 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 25 seconds
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What is Precession of the Equinoxes?
Published: Nov. 29, 2020, 1:48 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 36 seconds
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What is Meant by the Signs of the Zodiac?
Published: Nov. 24, 2020, 11:33 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 38 seconds
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Is There Life Elsewhere in the Universe?
Published: Nov. 22, 2020, 4:27 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 44 seconds
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How Old is the Solar System?
Published: Nov. 17, 2020, 4:21 a.m.Duration: 2 minutes 10 seconds
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How Did Our Galaxy Form?
Published: Nov. 14, 2020, 9:21 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 53 seconds
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Is There Such a Thing as THE Dark Side of the Moon?
Published: Nov. 6, 2020, 10:09 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 12 seconds
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What is Meant by Taxonomy in Science?
Published: Nov. 6, 2020, 9:35 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 14 seconds
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What are the Magellanic Clouds?
Published: Nov. 6, 2020, 9:19 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 58 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About Isaac Newton?
Published: Oct. 29, 2020, 7:05 p.m.Duration: 49 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About Galileo?
Published: Oct. 28, 2020, 6:57 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 5 seconds
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The Clockwork of the Universe
Published: Oct. 28, 2020, 5:01 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes
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What do I Need to Know About Johannes Kepler?
Published: Oct. 28, 2020, 2:30 p.m.Duration: 38 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About Tycho Brahe?
Published: Oct. 26, 2020, 10:49 p.m.Duration: 53 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About Nicolaus Copernicus?
Published: Oct. 26, 2020, 10:41 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 9 seconds
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How do We Know There are Planets Around Other Stars?
Published: Oct. 20, 2020, 10:28 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 36 seconds
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What is Meant by a Bell Curve?
Published: Oct. 16, 2020, 5:47 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 25 seconds
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What are Right Ascension and Declination?
Published: Oct. 16, 2020, 3:43 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 58 seconds
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What Causes the Phases of the Moon?
Published: Oct. 5, 2020, 6:52 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 58 seconds
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What Causes the Seasons on the Earth?
Published: Sept. 29, 2020, 4:28 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 51 seconds
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What is the Difference Between Precision and Accuracy?
Published: Sept. 27, 2020, 12:57 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 53 seconds
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What is Meant by an Order of Magnitude and a Logarithmic Scale?
Published: Sept. 16, 2020, 6:10 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 1 second
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Where are the Sun's Siblings?
Published: Sept. 14, 2020, 9:13 p.m.Duration: 55 seconds
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What is the Difference Between Random Errors and Systematic Errors?
Published: Sept. 9, 2020, 6:01 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 41 seconds
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What is Meant by the Magnitude System?
Published: Sept. 4, 2020, 3:23 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 55 seconds
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What is the Kelvin Temperature Scale?
Published: Sept. 1, 2020, 3:16 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 21 seconds
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What are Comets and Meteor Showers?
Published: Sept. 1, 2020, 2:51 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 21 seconds
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What is the Cosmic Microwave Background?
Published: Aug. 27, 2020, 9:37 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 39 seconds
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How Do We Classify Stars?
Published: Aug. 25, 2020, 2:03 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 3 seconds
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What is Meant by Hierarchical Clustering in Astronomy?
Published: Aug. 23, 2020, 2:55 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 53 seconds
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What is the Interstellar Medium?
Published: Aug. 22, 2020, 10:36 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 44 seconds
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What is Meant by Tidal Forces?
Published: Aug. 21, 2020, 6:09 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 9 seconds
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What is Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation?
Published: Aug. 21, 2020, 2:12 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 38 seconds
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What is the Copernican Principle?
Published: Aug. 21, 2020, 1:25 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 14 seconds
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What is Dark Energy?
Published: Aug. 18, 2020, 4:23 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 9 seconds
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What is Gravitational Lensing?
Published: Aug. 13, 2020, 6:13 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 33 seconds
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How Do We Classify Galaxies?
Published: Aug. 13, 2020, 3:36 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 45 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About the Planet Neptune?
Published: Aug. 11, 2020, 4:15 p.m.Duration: 58 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About the Planet Uranus?
Published: Aug. 11, 2020, 3:41 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 2 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About the Planet Saturn?
Published: Aug. 11, 2020, 3:30 a.m.Duration: 50 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About the Planet Jupiter?
Published: Aug. 11, 2020, 2:12 a.m.Duration: 58 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About the Planet Mars?
Published: Aug. 9, 2020, 5:15 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 3 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About the Planet Venus?
Published: Aug. 9, 2020, 2:18 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 5 seconds
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What do I Need to Know About the Planet Mercury?
Published: Aug. 9, 2020, 1:08 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 2 seconds
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What are the Different Types of Telescopes?
Published: July 30, 2020, 3:09 a.m.Duration: 2 minutes 24 seconds
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Why is the Sky Blue?
Published: July 29, 2020, 7:28 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 41 seconds
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What are Interstellar Reddening and Extinction?
Published: July 29, 2020, 5:08 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 55 seconds
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How Did the Earth's Moon Form?
Published: July 29, 2020, 1:08 a.m.Duration: 49 seconds
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What do we Know About the Sun?
Published: July 28, 2020, 3:51 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 39 seconds
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What is Conservation of Angular Momentum?
Published: July 28, 2020, 3:37 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 50 seconds
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What is the HR Diagram and the Main Sequence?
Published: July 27, 2020, 5:18 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 47 seconds
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What is the Doppler Effect and Redshift?
Published: July 24, 2020, 9:21 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 57 seconds
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What is the Inverse Square Law of Light?
Published: July 24, 2020, 3:19 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 53 seconds
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What are Newton's Laws of Motion?
Published: July 24, 2020, 1:34 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 9 seconds
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Can the Millennium Falcon Really do the Kessel run in 12 parsecs?
Published: July 23, 2020, 6:57 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 16 seconds
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Does Science Prove Things?
Published: July 23, 2020, 3:59 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 15 seconds
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How do we know there is a black hole at the center of our galaxy?
Published: July 23, 2020, 2:50 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 42 seconds
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What are Kepler's Laws?
Published: July 23, 2020, 1:12 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 36 seconds
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What are Active Galaxies?
Published: July 22, 2020, 2:09 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 21 seconds
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How Did the Solar System Form?
Published: July 21, 2020, 2:33 a.m.Duration: 2 minutes
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Why Did I Create These Podcasts?
Published: July 21, 2020, 1:23 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 14 seconds
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Will Polaris Always be the North Star?
Published: July 19, 2020, 7:09 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 4 seconds
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What Happened to Pluto Formerly Known as a Planet?
Published: July 19, 2020, 6:19 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 58 seconds
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How Do We Name Stars?
Published: July 17, 2020, 6:12 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 33 seconds
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What is a Constellation?
Published: July 17, 2020, 5:11 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 17 seconds
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What are Variable Stars?
Published: July 17, 2020, 2:31 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 14 seconds
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What is Helioseismology?
Published: July 15, 2020, 2:42 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 35 seconds
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What do Astronomers do?
Published: July 14, 2020, 8:49 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 41 seconds
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What is the Difference Between Astronomy and Astrophysics?
Published: July 14, 2020, 4:59 p.m.Duration: 47 seconds
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How do we use Light to Study the Universe?
Published: July 14, 2020, 1:08 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 39 seconds
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What is the Solar System?
Published: July 14, 2020, 2:48 a.m.Duration: 2 minutes 10 seconds
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What is Cosmology?
Published: July 14, 2020, 1:11 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 33 seconds
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What is the Big Bang?
Published: July 12, 2020, 6:41 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 45 seconds
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What is Dark Matter?
Published: July 10, 2020, 9:25 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 48 seconds
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What are M-numbers and NGC-numbers?
Published: July 10, 2020, 7:59 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 12 seconds
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What is a Galaxy?
Published: July 10, 2020, 5:57 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 15 seconds
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What is a Nebula?
Published: July 10, 2020, 5:26 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 6 seconds
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What is a Star Cluster?
Published: July 10, 2020, 3:43 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes 3 seconds
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How do Stars Form?
Published: July 10, 2020, 2:33 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 50 seconds
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Where do the Chemical Elements Come From?
Published: July 10, 2020, 1:58 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 48 seconds
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What is a Brown Dwarf?
Published: July 9, 2020, 8:25 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 47 seconds
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What is Science?
Published: July 9, 2020, 7:17 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 57 seconds
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How do we measure distances in Astronomy?
Published: July 9, 2020, 4:32 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 27 seconds
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What is a Quasar?
Published: July 9, 2020, 4:13 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 39 seconds
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Astronomy is a Science of Extremes
Published: July 8, 2020, 1:34 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 44 seconds
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What is the Celestial Sphere?
Published: July 7, 2020, 6:32 p.m.Duration: 2 minutes
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What is a Black Hole?
Published: July 6, 2020, 2:45 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 21 seconds
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What is a Pulsar?
Published: July 6, 2020, 2:26 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 26 seconds
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How do Stars Die?
Published: July 3, 2020, 6:26 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 33 seconds
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How do Stars Evolve?
Published: July 3, 2020, 6:07 p.m.Duration: 1 minute 26 seconds
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What is a Supernova?
Published: July 3, 2020, 3:55 a.m.Duration: 1 minute 14 seconds
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What is Astronomical Vocabulary?
Published: July 3, 2020, 3:31 a.m.Duration: 2 minutes 13 seconds
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