As we quickly learn with water, matter can be in distinct phases: solid, liquid, gas and plasma; it all depends on temperature. But why do different materials require different temperatures? And what's actually happening to the atoms themselves as the material switches phases?

It’s mind bending to think about this, but the light in your house, and the house itself are really the same thing. Matter and energy are interchangeable. This was the amazing revelation made by Albert Einstein, with his famous formula: E=mc^2. This is the process that the Sun uses to turn hydrogen into radiation through fusion, and the terrible damage from a nuclear weapon.

Everyone is always predicting the end of the world. Someone’s going to tell you that this the year that it’s all going to end… the end of planet Earth… and they’re always wrong. But, someone will eventually be right. Planet Earth is doomed, lets figure out how.

Have you checked out the internet lately? Apparently there is some kind of rogue planet causing pole alignment and a killer solar flare that will set off a chain reaction turning the whole universe into strange-matter……. after an alien invasion.

AstroCast 281: Explosions in Space, by Fraser Cain & Dr. Pamela Gay

AstronomyCast 280: The Cosmological Constant, by Fraser Cain & Dr. Pamela Gay

Astronomy depends on bullying light. We reflect it, refract it, bend it, and near it through complex manipulations of light. Though optics we bring we bring the distant universe to our eyepiece.

AstronomyCast 279: The Hubble Constant, by Fraser Cain & Dr. Pamela Gay

Our Universe appears timeless and unchanging, the stars taking their nightly flight across the sky. But over long periods of time, you realize that our local region, and even the entire Milky Way is in constant motion. The constellations we see today would be very different millions or even thousands of years ago. Today we'll discuss stellar motion, how astronomers detect it and how it's useful.

Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter. These are the seasons we experience here on Earth as our planet completes an orbit around the Sun. But what’s going on? Why do we experience such different temperatures and weather over the course of 365 days? Do other planets experience the seasons like we do?