Why we need missions to Earth this week on planetary radio. Hi everyone, welcome to Public Radio's travel show that takes you to the final frontier.

I'm Matt Kaplan. We've had a lot of distinguished guests on this show,

but we haven't had a Nobel Peace Prize winner till now. Dr. Barry and Moore shared that

honor last year as part of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

We'll talk with him about the importance of Earth observation, perhaps for our very survival.

Bill Nye, the Science Guy, flies in with a message about the discovery of water at Mercury.

Emily Lochuwalah returns to Q&A with a guide to proper exposure wherever you're taking pictures in the solar system and Bruce Betts joins me for

burgers fries and a look at the night skies in this week's what's up. For the

latest news from out there you can cruise over to planetary.org where Emily's blog can also be found.

Barry and Morris right around the corner here's Bill.

Hey Bill Nye the planetary guy here, Vice President of the planetary society, very excited about a message

from the inner solar system. I refer of course to the messenger spacecraft named after Mercury the God who delivered messages in theoretical ancient times.

Anyway Mercury goes around the sun so close to the sun.

The sun's solar wind has created what is generally called an

exosphere. This wouldn't quite be an atmosphere. This is getting little

pieces of mercury up in, if you will, the Mercurian sky.

As the messenger spacecraft went flying by Mercury,

it scooped up what is essentially some of the Mercurian surface.

And get this, my my friends it has the signature the atomic

signature of water water somewhere perhaps in the very dark shadowed craters on the planet Mercury that ends up in its

exosphere and the messenger spacecraft detected it and we know about it out here on

the third rock from the sun. This is so very exciting because once again it gives

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