I've got a hole in my universe this week on

I've got a hole in my universe this week on planetary radio. Radio. Hi everyone, welcome to Public Radio's travel show that takes you to the final

frontier.

I'm Matt Kaplan. We mentioned last week that a team of

astronomers has found what appears to be a gigantic hole in the universe.

Or more strictly speaking, a billion billion light year wide void containing well nothing.

This week we'll talk to Lawrence Rudnick, the discoverer of this vast expanse of NADA. he and his colleagues at the University of Minnesota

will soon have their paper published by the Astrophysical Journal.

Later today Bruce Betts will report on the night sky from the annual convention of the Mars Society

and he'll have lots of red planet trivia for us including a spanking new contest.

We turn to news from around the solar system.

If Mars Exploration Rover's spirit and opportunity could sing, they would certainly be singing,

I can see clearly now the dust is gone.

We've been following the planet encircling dust storm on Mars for weeks.

It turned day and tonight above the rovers, putting them in serious risk of running out of solar power.

The storm has finally dissipated and both mirrors are back to normal, doing science, taking pictures

and talking to Earth. Opportunity is once again on the verge of descending into Victoria Crater, an adventure that is likely

to be its most dangerous ever.

You can read much more at planetary.org.

That's also where you can learn how an Arctic test of new rover instruments was temporarily interrupted by a polar bear.

Still more from Mars.

Take a look at Emily's August 30 blog entry for a fascinating follow-up to the story about

...