The Jodcast

We're back from our August break with a bumper show for you. We talk to Professor Gregor Morfill about the ability of dust to form amazing shapes in space. We also have the first of a three part interview with Jodrell Bank founder Sir Bernard Lovell. As usual we also get the latest news from Megan and Ian Morison tells us what we can see in the night sky this month.

Dave and Nick are here for the mid-July show. We present part two of our Harry Potter-style intros (The Chamber of Anti-Science) with a special cameo appearance from The Bad Astronomer, Phil Plait. Nick finds out all about white dwarf stars and planets from Matt Burleigh and then stands in for Tim in Ask an Astronomer. We also have reviews from listeners and a preview of the next show featuring galaxy evolution and the Galaxy Zoo.

Nick, Dave and Stuart are all in the same room to record this mid-month Jodcast. We talk to Benoit Famaey about possible corrections to Newton's famous laws of gravitation, we kick-off a new 60-second astro society segment with the Macclesfield Astronomical Society and we get your questions answered by Ian Morison.

This is the first of our new mid-month shows. First we get some breaking news from the Hubble Space Telescope, we listen to the second half of our interview with Carole Mundell about active galactic nuclei and supermassive black holes, and we put your questions to Tim in the Ask an Astronomer segment. For the extra shows we won't be having the normal format intros and outros but we still won't take them too seriously. As a start we work out how many rice crispies you could fit in the 76m diameter Lovell Telescope. Can you work it out?

We're on the road in Preston at the UK's National Astronomy Meeting. Our first special show describes what NAM is and what happened on the first day. In our second show we catch up with Chris Wareing who announced results about the wakes left by dying sun-like stars as they pass through the interstellar medium. On the third day David Boyce (University of Leicester) and Paul Steele (University of Leicester) join us to chat about the various sessions that took place. We find out about the organisation of the conference from Dr Stewart Eyres, chat to Dr Monica Grady and find out about the International Heliophysical Year from Dr Lucie Green. On day four Neil Phillips (University of Edinburgh) joins us in our attempt to coherently link interviews about the dangers of solar ejections to astronauts, the possibility of making force-fields to protect them, the Hubble Space Telescope repair mission, the Herschel Mission, the fiftieth anniversary of the Sky At Night and exoplanets. The last day of the NAM sees us talking to Dr Chris Davis about the STEREO mission, Dr Helen Walker about Mars Express and Prof Mike Bode about RS Ophiuchi.

This month we took our brand new recording kit to Astronomy Now's Astrofest 2007 to talk to some of the exhibitors and visitors. Back at base, Nick catches up with Ciska Markwick-Kemper to talk about dust in space. As always we ask Tim your questions, get the latest astronomy news from Megan, Stuart gives us a round up of other astronomy podcasts and Ian tells us what we can see in the night sky during March. We also get an alert about a total lunar eclipse taking place on 3rd March 2007 (check out the links in the show notes for more details).

Happy New Year and welcome to the first Jodcast of 2007. We start, as always, with a round up of the past month in astronomy. We talk to Martin Hardcastle about active galactic nuclei and radio galaxies (see the fantastic cover art by Aurore Simonnet for an idea of what they look like). We also gate-crashed a recent meeting about the proposed Square Kilometre Array (SKA) to find out what it is as well as finding out about the two proposed sites. We have no ask an astronomer this month but Ian is here to tell us what we can see in January's night sky. We also get a round up of interesting astronomy podcasts and set our first ever competition. You'll have to listen to find out what the question is!

We have another packed show for you this month. Megan tells us the latest news in astronomy including exciting news about the STEREO mission, the Nobel Prize for physics 2006, ice on the Moon, extrasolar planets, damage to the Faulkes Telescopes, the re-opening of Mt Stromlo and the future of the Hubble Space Telescope. Nick and Stuart talk to Robert Nemiroff about the great internet resource that is astronomy picture of the day. We find out about an exciting ESA/NASA mission that will attempt to detect waves in space-time (gravitational waves) using three spacecraft named LISA. We also get a spooky edition of Ask an Astronomer where Tim O'Brien tells Nick about the variable star Algol and Ian Morison tells us what we can see in the November night sky.

This month, after all the excitement of the IAU General Assembly planet definition, we stay a bit closer to home and have a tour of the Jodrell Bank Control Room. We find out about the Lovell Telescope winning the BBC unsung landmarks vote and plans for our new Visitor Centre. We get the latest astronomy news which includes geysers on Mars, the impact of ESA's SMART-1 on the Moon and the outcome of the IAU's planet definition. As always we find out what we can see in the night sky this month and Nick and Tim discuss the Moon receding from the Earth and they work out how many stars are larger and smaller than the Sun.

We get our very own Ian Morison to tell us about the history of SETI and how it will develop in the future plus we talk to the Chairman of Macclesfield Astronomical Society about his interest in astronomy. Tim and Ian answer questions that you've sent in and Ian tells us what we can see in the night sky during July.

In this month's show we talk to Ralph Spencer and Matt Strong about eVLBI, find out about the Southern Skywatch website and get a review of a Celestron NexStar 130SLT telescope (sub GBP300/$550) by Ian Morison. We try to get answers to questions you've sent in, find out what you can see in the night sky during May* and get a round-up of all the latest news.

In this month's show we have three interviews where we talk to Helen Mason about the SOHO spacecraft, Nick Rattenbury about a newly discovered exoplanet and Mario di Maggio about the Thinktank planetarium. We pose all your difficult questions to Tim O'Brien and find out what you can see in the night sky during March*. We also get a round up of all the latest news in the Universe!

In this month's show we go on a sound seeing tour of the Lovell Telescope during the winter solstice. On the way we discover why two pulsars orbiting each other is a good thing and what we can see in the night sky this month. Also the latest news on the Stardust mission.