Return From Ryugu: The Hayabusa2 Leader on His Mission’s Success

Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science

The Planetary Society

Science, Technology

4.8 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 17 March 2021

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Hayabusa2 project manager Yuichi Tsuda and his team learned a lot from Hayabusa1, Japan’s troubled-though-successful mission that returned a sample from asteroid Itokawa. Now they are celebrating the recovery of a much larger sample from a different world: asteroid Ryugu. Dr. Tsuda joins Mat Kaplan for a fascinating, exclusive conversation about the mission’s 5-billion-kilometer journey and the great science to come. There’s more to discover at https://www.planetary.org/planetary-radio/yuichi-tsuda-hayabusa2

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	5 billion kilometers to Earth this week on Planetary Radio
0:10.0	Welcome, I'm Matt Kaplan of the Planetary Society with more of the human adventure across our solar system and beyond.
0:18.0	Some of you got that science fiction reference, right?
0:21.0	We're not talking about oldie but goodie British sci-fi films.
0:25.0	Our topic is the gloriously successful asteroid sample return accomplished by Hayabusa 2.
0:32.0	The Japanese mission that is now voyaging to two other asteroids.
0:37.0	Hayabusa 2 project manager Yuyuchi Tsuda is here to tell us about his spacecraft and the great science it has enabled.
0:45.0	Then we'll travel even further across the void to Saturn for the answer to this week's space trivia contest courtesy of Bruce Betts.
0:53.0	Bruce will also give us another WhatsApp review of the night sky.
0:57.0	I can't feel much better than I do when I see fresh wheel tracks on the red planet.
1:03.0	So I'm a happy Mars camper looking at this week's edition of the downlink.
1:08.0	It's topped by an image taken by the perseverance rover of its own mark on Mars.
1:13.0	Just below are these headlines beginning with a big sigh of relief.
1:18.0	The 30-year-old Hubble Space Telescope is back in full operation after a software glitch put it in safe mode for a few days.
1:27.0	Hang on, old friend. The JWST is coming soon.
1:31.0	Speaking of old friends, NASA's Sophia Observatory, the big infrared telescope carried by a 747, has discovered carbon in a comet.
1:42.0	If you're going to have carbon-based life forms, you probably need several good helpings of element number 6, and there seems to be plenty out there.
1:51.0	Northrop Grumman will be developing the small two-stage rocket that will carry samples of Mars back to Earth.
1:58.0	The NASA contract is another step in the sample return process begun by perseverance.
2:04.0	Want more? You'll find it every week at planetary.org slash downlink.
2:10.0	There are only a few days left to become part of the planetary society's 2021 virtual day of action.
2:17.0	Chief Advocate Casey Dreyer needs everyone on board before the online training session on March 28th.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Planetary Society, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Planetary Society and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.