Astro Ben Podcast

In episode 32 Ben chats to Dr Paul Bate, the CEO of the UK Space Agency who leads a team of more than 250 people, who provide technical advice on the UK government's space strategy, and guide the UK space sector to deliver the government's vision. They discuss the National Space Strategy, the UK's future launch capabilities and the importance of championing space and it's benefits in our every day lives.

00:19 Intro to Paul Bate 01:12 What are the UK doing in space? (here) 02:51 Learning on the job 04:48 The UK's launch facility - go to place in Europe for satellite launches? 06:25 Virgin Orbit https://virginorbit.com/ 07:50 UK uniquely positioned for launches? 08:57 Timeline to see launches in UK 09:36 How did Paul's role in healthcare prepare Paul for leading the UK Space Agency? 12:14 How Paul tool on leadership from Graham Turnock 16:50 Tim Peake and future UK astronauts as source of inspiration 19:30 Government department (or arms length body) 21:17 How governments prioritise space in their manifestos 23:13 Pauls aspirations for agency - what can UK be the leader in? 26:00 Excitement for UK Space Agency's future (and collaborations such as Rosalind Franklin Rover, James Webb Telescope) 28:24 Has Brexit effected how the UK interacts in space? 30:48 Pauls dream job (and perfect time to do it) 31:52 Pauls personal life 33:13 Wrap up and social medias Social Media Twitter: https://twitter.com/spacegovuk & https://twitter.com/paul_bate

Website: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/uk-space-agency

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Pulsar Fusion strives to be the preeminent force in the European nuclear fusion technology sector, by leveraging scientific advances into commercial innovations across aerospace and energy. The wider societal shifts towards renewable energy and deep space exploration favour the application of nuclear fusion.

Pulsar Fusion intends to capitalise upon these changes by building the infrastructure and systems to enable them. In this episode Ben speaks to the Richard Dinan (the founder of Pulsar) about fusion technology and what he is looking to do in space and why!

00:19 Introduction to episode 31 - Pulsar Fusion and founder Richard Dinan

01:21 Bringing on Richard - was he "Made in Chelsea"?

02:10 Live from the rocket factory!

03:35 Pulsar Fusion origin https://pulsarfusion.com/

06:30 Richard explains fusion

11:45 Propulsion

15:35 Start-up mentality and investment?

18:33 Importance of patents

19:54 ITER https://www.iter.org/ (building a star)

23:07 Made in Chelsea - why Richard got involved

26:14 Key takeaways from Made in Chelsea

27:50 Reality TV stars turn to science?

28:55 Bens reality TV idea

29:07 Timeline for Pulsar

32:03 Pulsars eureka moment?

39:06 Would Richard go to space?

41:04 Outro and socials

Social Media

Twitter: https://twitter.com/richarddinan?lang=en

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/richarddinan/?hl=en

LinkedIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richard-dinan-808a835a/?originalSubdomain=uk

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Jeff Foust is a senior staff writer for SpaceNews, joining the publication in 2014. He covers civil and commercial space topics, ranging from NASA programs to developments in the entrepreneurial NewSpace field. He has more than a decade of experience writing about space policy, commercial space, and related topics. In 2003, he started The Space Review, a weekly publication of longform articles and commentary on a wide range of space topics that continues to operate to this day.

He earned a Ph.D. in planetary sciences from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1999 and a B.S. with honors in geophysics and planetary science from the California Institute of Technology in 1993. He received the Press Award from the National Space Club and Foundation in 2018.

In this episode Ben chats to Jeff about his career, Space News, journalism and what the headline might be when humanity gets back to the moon!

00:18 Episode 30: Jeff Foust

02:07 What is Space News?

02:40 Focus of Space News

04:01 Demographic of readers

05:00 Future of printed media

06:31 How do stories get picked?

07:57 Overlap of stories ie Starlink

09:40 Handling of good and bad news

12:50 Anything Jeff wouldn't publish?

15:00 Academic background enhance journalism?

15:55 Jeff's passion for space

17:22 Space Tourism

20:21 Keeping public engaged

22:50 What has Jeff learned about Space industry over his career

25:10 Jeff's moon landing headline?

26:50 Space Review

28:38 Productivity

29:34 What's going on in news?

31:28 Wrap Up and Social Media's

Social Media

www.spacenews.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Jeff_Foust

@jeff_foust

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Dr. Shawna Pandya is a Canadian physician, scientist-astronaut candidate program graduate with the International Institute for Astronautical Sciences (IIAS) and Project PoSSUM, aquanaut, speaker, martial artist, advanced diver, skydiver, pilot-in-training, VP Immersive Medicine with Luxsonic Technologies and Fellow of the Explorers' Club. She is also Director of the IIAS/PoSSUM Space Medicine Group, Chief Instructor of the IIAS/PoSSUM Operational Space Medicine course, Director of Medical Research at Orbital Assembly Corporation.

In this episode, Ben chats to Dr Shawna about her journey to get to the stars, the importance of psychological resilience and why she is a fan of doing things "same, same but different"!

00:18 Episode 29: Dr Shawna Pandya - Ben more than impressed with her CV (won't be the last time he mentions it)

01:43 Ben brings on Dr Shawna

02:00 What is a citizen astronaut candidate?

04:07 Why is Dr Shawna considering the alternative route to space?

06:46 Favourite astronaut training activity?

11:50 What did Dr Shawna learn about herself?

15:27 Rural emergency medicine

16:18 Ben attempts to talk about learnings from Covid in respect to space. Dr Shawna's thoughts on covid response.

20:12 Does Mars simulation experience help with covid?

22:52 Strategy to become astronaut

22:40 Game-plan to get to space?

26:34 What research would Dr Shawna do in LEO?

28:12 What is Orbital and what is the timeline? https://orbitalassembly.com/

29:44 What advice for young women entering the STEM world?

30:20 Dr Shawna's love of Taekwondo

33:04 Outro and wrap up

Social Media

Twitter/Instagram: https://twitter.com/shawnapandya?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/shawnapandya/?hl=en

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shawnapandyaofficial/about

LinkedIn:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/shawnapandya/?originalSubdomain=ca

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Use #Astroben across various social media platforms to engage with us!

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/astrobenpodcast/

Website (coming soon): www.astroben.com

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Astralytical is a space consulting firm focusing on space science, space industry, and space policy analysis. Their specialty is high-quality big-picture outlook and multidisciplinary space trends in the aerospace sector, particularly the emerging space economy.

In this episode, Ben chats to Laura (the founder of Astralytical) about her career, how she has carved out a niche for herself, overcome challenges and discriminations in the workplace and her new book "Becoming Off-Worldly".

00:18 intro to episode 28 - Laura Forczyk

01:22 Space Twitter - importance of connection with community

03:00 Laura's background and career to date

07:24 How did Astralytical come about?

11:31 Who are the startups that come to Laura and why

14:51 Importance of data

16:02 "Becoming Off-Worldly" out now! Order here

22:02 Space tourism experiences differ - i.e Chris Boshuizen

23:08 "To the Moon?'

24:36 Being a feminist in the Space industry

29:39 What can men do to speak up against sexism in the space industry?

32:46 Brooke Owens Fellowship

36:45 Hardest part of starting Astralytical?

39:18 Bens wrap up

40:28 Social Media's

Social Media

Website: https://www.astralytical.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Astralytical

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/astralytical/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Astralytical/

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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/astrobenpodcast/

Website (coming soon): www.astroben.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/gambleonit?lang=en

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John Bicknell is a national security thought leader and passionate analytics visionary. He has written extensively on national security matters related to information warfare, critical infrastructure defense, and space situational awareness. John leads software and business development efforts for More Cowbell Unlimited.

More Cowbell Unlimited uses patented process technologies to predict near-term outcomes of commercial and national security interest. In this episode Ben speaks to John (or "The Happy Warrior") about Space Domain Awareness, what his company do with the United States Space Force and why "freedom is not free."

0:16 Intro to ep27 and John Bicknell

01:34 Fellow podcast nerves

02:13 Where John lives and why everyone should visit!

04:00 John's military background and how that effected his love of space.

08:32 Importance of lifelong learning

09:25 What is more cowbell unlimited

11:30 What cowbell are modelling?

19:25 Is SDA one of the USAF top priorities?

21:35 What happens if two satellites collide

26:00 Importance of flight safety flying

28:00 Discuss "ITU's" International Telecommunication Union that assignments every satellite an orbital slot

30:45 Work life balance - does it exist?

32:15 The Information Professionals Association (IPA)

33:35 The Cognitive Crucible Podcast

34:33 John's hope and vision for the Space industry

37:35 Outro and socials

Social media

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnbicknell/

Twitter: @morecowbellultd

Website: www.morewcowbellunlimited.com

More Cowbell Unlimited - the SNL skit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVsQLlk-T0s

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Website (coming soon): www.astroben.com

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Mo Islam is the co-founder and CEO of Payload, a space media company that covers the business and politics of space. Prior to Payload, Mo Islam was a senior member of Deutsche Bank and J.P. Morgan's institutional asset platform, where he raised over $250 million in strategic capital for growth-stage technology companies.

Payload has received a seed round of $650,000, primarily from Winklevoss Capital, the venture firm led by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, as well as Andy Weissman and Sam McIngvale. In this episode, Ben and Mo talk about the parallels between crypto and a space startup, and how the space industry is growing faster than ever.

00:18 Welcome to episode 26 - Mo Islam & Payload

01:20 Bringing on Mo

02:00 What's been going on for Mo

02:52 What is Payload?

04:25 Who is the target market for Payload?

07:34 How did Mo meet Ari?

09:50 Synergies between Crypto and a Space Start up?

13:10 Payloads investor group

16:15 How Payload plan on growing?

19:40 Payload website strategy

22:34 Types of media - where does Payload sit?

28:00 Where do's Mo see Payload going in 5-7 years?

30:38 What Mo does in his spare time

33:00 Wrap Up/Outro

Social Media

Subscribe to: https://payloadspace.com/news/

Twitter:https://twitter.com/payloadspace

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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/astrobenpodcast/

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Dr. Chris Boshuizen is an Australian scientist, explorer, entrepreneur, investor, educator, musician and astronaut. Currently a Partner at DCVC, a deep tech investment company in San Francisco where he focuses on funding cutting edge space companies. Boshuizen completed his PhD in physics at The University of Sydney before accepting a position at the NASA Ames Research Center in California. After leaving NASA he co-founded Planet Labs, which operates the largest fleet of Earth-observing satellites and maps the entire surface of the Earth daily, enabling key insights into our changing world that were previously unobtainable. Dr Boshuizen also flew to space as a passenger on Blue Origin's New Shepard NS-18 mission on October 13 2021.

00:20 Bio for Dr Chris Boshuizen

02:24 Introducing Chris

02:50 Music and Space

03:25 Chris's experience on Blue Origin's New Shepard NS-18 mission on October 13 2021

05:08 William Shatner as crew mate - what was it like?

05:30 Pre flight training - what's involved?

08:13 Zero G flight

09:40 What was Chris's thoughts on the launchpad?

11:30 Shatner's experience/reaction compared to Chris's

14:40 Exploration and time line for truly accessible access to space

18:00 Planet Labs - how did it come about?

22:15 From Planet to DCVC, investing in companies like Rocket Lab

23:00 Entrepreneurial takeaways - a technologist approach to business

25:30 Chris's advice for new space entrepreneurs starting out

29:15 Chris's projections for space industry

31:40 Dr Chrispy!

35:30 Ben's theory about sending Will-I-am or Kanye West to space

36:20 Chris's biggest bit of advice to space entrepreneurs

39:15 Ben asks the most obvious question

40:05 Planet go's public and Chris's socials

Social Media

Follow Chris's journey to space at https://drchrispy.com

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/drchrispymusic

Twitter: https://twitter.com/cboshuizen & https://twitter.com/drchrispymusic

Dr Chrispy Music: https://drchrispy.com/spotify

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Website (coming soon): www.astroben.com

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Eric Berger is a senior space editor at Ars Technica, covering all things astronomy, private spaceflight, and the politics of NASA. He is the author of the bestselling book Liftoff about the rise of SpaceX. Eric Berger has a degree in astronomy from the University of Texas and a master's degree in journalism from the University of Missouri. In this episode, Ben here's more about SpaceX and why Eric is so fascinated with their journey! 00:19 Episode 24: Eric Berger 01:12 Bringing on Eric 02:45 Eric's interest in space 03:25 What is Ars Technica 04:14 Astronomy and journalism collide 05:11 What his job involves 06:04 Journalist independence 06:54 What is going on in the Space Industry? 10:01 Lift Off: Journey of SpaceX (early days) 11:04 Why was the 4th flight so significant early on? 13:42 Research on Lift Off 16:15 Experience with Elon Musk 20:05 Starbase 22:05 Where is the Space Industry is heading? 24:23 The Hype around SpaceX 26:24 Is the Space Industry immune to fake news? 28:26 Where does Lift Off end? 29:30 Will Elon get to Mars? 34:00 Eric's personal life 35:12 Wrap Up Social Media/Contact Details

Twitter: @SciGuySpace

You can buy Liftoff here: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/liftoff-eric-berger?variant=32126620205090&utm_source=Eric+Berger&utm_medium=athrtwttr&utm_campaign=Liftoff+Announcement

Ars Technica: www.arstechnica.com

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Dr Beth Healey is an Emergency Medicine doctor who has worked for several years in the NHS and oversea's. As part of medical and logistical support teams she has worked in a number of extreme and remote environments including Svalbard, Siberia, Greenland and the North Pole. As research MD for the European Space Agency she overwintered in Antarctica at spaceflight analogue 'Concordia', otherwise know as 'White Mars'. There, she researched the effects of isolation and extreme environment on the physiology and psychology of the crew.

00:20 introduction to episode 23: Dr Beth Healey.

01:14 Welcoming Bath

01:42 Where has Beth been the past week? Spoiler alert - astronaut application.

03:30 Beths thoughts on civilian space flight

07:40 Beths career to date

11:22 What is extreme environment physiology

13:33 Ben brings up Covid - but in a relevant way.

14:40 Beths experience on Concordia in Antarctica.

16:40 similarities between Concordia and long space missions.

18:12 Effect on mental health during long isolation missions.

23:40 Artemis Generation

25:00 Being part of the journey!

28:15 Ben mentions 'first man', but means "Ad Astra".

28:40 Private space companies. Collaborating or competing?

29:45 Beths Hobbies

31:51 Wrap Up

Social Media

Website: https://www.northbanktalent.com/clients/science-psychology/dr-beth-healey/

Twitter/Instagram: @bethahealey

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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/astrobenpodcast/

Website (coming soon): www.astroben.com

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