The James Webb Space Telescope can peer into alien skies like never before. With six potentially habitable planets within its sights, astronomers are entering a new era in the search for biology beyond our solar system
The age at which you are considered an adult differs around the world, but emerging research into the developing brain suggests we may have got the concept of adulthood all wrong. When do we really become a grown-up?
The thought of finding alien life has fascinated people since the time of the ancient Greeks—but developments in astrobiology could be about to turn this possibility into reality. How do you hunt for life beyond Earth—and might this be the decade when we find it?
Chapters: 00:00 – Is there life beyond Earth? 00:56 – How has the search for life evolved? 02:36 – What signs of life are scientists looking for? 03:48 – What are biosignatures? 04:28 – How to find intelligent life 06:03 – How telescopes today have improved our search 07:52 – Expanding the search beyond Earth
Read more of Alok Sharma’s coverage on the search for life in space: https://econ.st/3zw1Hxt
First up this week, Senior Correspondent Daniel Clery talks with host Sarah Crespi about how Breakthrough Listen—a privately funded initiative that aims to spend $100 million over 10 years to find extraterrestrial intelligent life—has changed the hunt for alien intelligence.
And as part of a special issue on the Genotype-Tissue Expression (GTEx) project, Brandon Pierce, a professor in the Departments of Public Health Sciences and Human Genetics at the University of Chicago, joins Sarah to discuss his group’s work on variation in the protective caps at the end of our chromosomes. The gradual shortening of these caps, also known as telomeres, has been associated with aging. Read more from the GTEx special issue.
On this week’s show, Online News Editor David Grimm joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss how dogs’ cold noses may be able to sense warm bodies. Read the research. International News Editor Martin Enserink shares the latest from our reporters covering coronavirus.
And finally, from a recording made at this year’s AAAS annual meeting, host Meagan Cantwell talks with Jill Tarter, chair emeritus at the SETI Institute, about the newest technologies being used to search for alien life, what a positive signal would look like, and how to inform the public if extraterrestrial life ever were detected.
News, Views and Reviews For The Intellectually Curious
On this week’s show, Online News Editor David Grimm joins host Sarah Crespi to discuss how 
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