Stay tuned in to our local news coverage: Listen to 90.7 WMFE on your FM or HD radio, the WMFE mobile app or your smart speaker — say “Alexa, play NPR” and you’ll be connected.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS | Subscribe to This Podcast

OSIRIS-REx is zooming towards the asteroid Bennu. It’s on a mission to collect a sample of asteroid “dirt” and send it back to Earth. Scientists hope to uncover the building blocks of life in the solar system. The spacecraft launched last summer, so what’s it up to these days?

The mission’s principle investigator Dante Lauretta joins the podcast to update us on the mission so far, tell us what’s ahead this summer for OSIRIS-REx and explains how social media and board games are building interest for planetary science.