Episode 1 Stargazing Live

The skies are clear, the stars are out and juptever -- Jupiter is

shining in the sky. I'm Brian Cox. He's Dara O Briain and this is

Welcome to a, well, slightly cold, but generally brilliantly clear,

crisp evening here in Macclesfield. It's what you need, Jupiter shining

crystal clear. It's beautiful. We're at the Jodrell Bank

Observatory in Cheshire. This is one of the historic instruments of

space exploration and astronomy. Here it is, 90 metres high, and 75

metres in diameter. This was the only telescope of its time when it

could detect Sputnik and it was used in the Apollo missions.

back, relax and be amazed by what is above your heads. Over the next

three nights we're going to be exploring the universe, looking at

everything from the most distant stars and galaxies to our closest

neighbour, the moon. We'll tackle the big questions like how do you

find new planets outside of our solar system, and what would we say

if we actually made contact with aliens? And there will be some very

special guests, starting tonight with the last man to walk on the

moon, Captain Eugene Cernan. And we're asking you to help find a

planet. And we want you to turn off all the lights in this town, live

on air. And we'll be showing you what kit you need to get started in

star gazing. And we'll tell you what to see over the next three

nights. Talking to Captain Eugene certainon. The Apollo missions are

the greatest achievements in history. They just are. We've not

even had a debate, don't e-mail in. You'll get no short change, they

are. And we're talking to the last man on the moon. I can't wait.

want to hear your questions for the Captain. E-mail them to us, or

tweet. Jodrell Bank remains one of the

most act ive astronomical research centres in the universe. This is a

working observatory and Dr Tim O'Brien has joined us again. If you

remember him from last year. And this telescope is working now.

looking at an object somewhere over there about 4,500 light years away

and rejoices in the name PO88 minus 1. What it is? It's the remains of

a star that exploded some years go and as it spins it producers radio

waves that have been travelling for thousands of years and are being

picked up by that telescope. Now, you don't need a telescope like

this to appreciate the night sky, there is plenty to see as Mark will

show us now. I'm here with the members of the South Cheshire and

Macclesfield astronomy group. We have a great group of people from

beginners to experience people and people who have no equipment at all

through binoculars and computers and telescopes with complex drive

systems. The skies are still clear and we had fantastic views of Venus

as it was setting in the west. And behind me we have Orion in the top,

left corner. Hopefully the skies will stay clear. Check back later

and we'll let you know how we're getting on. And the final member of

our team, Liz Bonnin has travelled all the way to South Africa for us.

But it's not as clear as this. love that. We were surrounded by

rip-roaring storms later on, but thankfully they have appeased. We

are here because of that. The Southern African Large Telescope,

or SALT. We are operating on specialist star-light cameras so we

don't interfere with their work. But you don't need a telescope like

that to observe these beautiful skies. We used this telescope to

get these pictures. Incredible images of the moon there. The moon

is the only place that we have ever set foot apart from earth. And

although it is familiar in our night sky it remains the most

fascinating. The moon has been our closest

celestial companion for almost the whole of our planet's history. But

we've always speculated about where it came from and what it is made of.

The moon started when the Earth was just a huge lump of rock and iron

4.5 billion years ago. The environment in which the early

earth existed was chaotic. In all that confusion it was hit by a

smaller, rocky world. The collision almost broke both planets apart,

but instead the two bodies began to merge.

Some debris from the impact was flung into orbit around the earth.

Gravity caused this mostly rocky material to come together, forming

our moon. Back then, it was much closer to our world and would have

looked spectacular, cooling on the horizon, the hot surface of earth.

Over the next two billion years the earth and the moon exerted their

gavtationial forces on each other. The rotation of the earth slowed.

The moon's orbital speed stkreefed and it moved away from us. It now

takes just over 37 days for it to orbit the earth. And today it is

225,000 miles away. It is still drifting away at a rate of 3.87

centimetres per year. When it is fool, the moon is the brightest

thing in the night sky but through the month, its relation to the

earth changes and we witness the shadow of lunar night-time passing

over the surface. When it is in complete shadow, it is called a new

moon. These different appearances are called the phases of the moon.

Whenever we look up at it, we always see the same side staring

back at us. Not surprisingly, astronomers have speculated about

what the far side was like. We never saw it until a Russian probe

went round the far side in 19 59. These are the images it sent back,

rough and grainy, less than ten years later, the Apollo astronauts

were the first to see the far side of the moon with the naked eye.

They witnessed a cratered landscape. In the beginning God created the

heaven and the earth and the earth was without form and void. Less

than a year later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin took their first

steps on the moon. One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.

There's no atmosphere to speak of there and the gravity is one sixth

of the earth so the heavy space suits weighed less making it easy

for them to bounce around on the moon's surface. When the rock

samples were studied they were found to contain minute rals like

magnesium, iron and iron. The temperature is 133 degrees

centigrade. But some craters contain permanently shadowed

regions that have not seen sunlight for billions as year and can get so

cold that they are the coldest places in the solar system we know

of. Most of our knowledge of the moon has been gained in the last 50

years and we're still learning. Just two years ago, we discovered

traces of water, frozen in the lunar soil. An intriguing discovery

that adds to the mystery of our closest neighbour.

Now, those of you watching last year will remember we had this high

tech touch screen. No-one believed it was real. So we traded it in and

we have this one, controlled by this. So if I press that...there we

are! There we G I want to talk a little bit about current research

into the moon. This is the face of the moon that we're all familiar

with. You see the seas and the craters. And there are big

questions about how the moon evolved and why it looks the way it

does. We know these maria or seas are volcanic. They're a new surface

so they're younger than the craters. And some of the uplands are higher

than Everest. It's a remarkable feature. And there's a contrast

with the side we don't see. This is the so-called dark side. But it

isn't dark, it's just away from us. And that's completely different.

You don't see the seas. And there's a new therapy, well, the old theory

is that the moon formed in some kind of collision. But the new

theory is that there was another collision with another moon. So

four billion years ago, the earth had two moons and there was another

collision. So you're seeing the debris of one moon on one or the

other side. Yes, and that's a new theory. There is a video I want to

show you. This is current research. We're still sending probes up, like

the lunar reconnaissance. And this is from that now. This is only 600

metres across. So you're seeing structure on the moon, things just

a few metres across. A question we're asked a lot is could we see

from earth through any kind of telescope the debris left behind by

the Apollo missions? The answer is know. These are the landing sites

of the Apollo missions. That is where Eugene certainon landed, you

can't see that from the earth. You'd need a telescope the size of

Manchester. But you can see it from the probe. This is a picture of the

Apollo XI landing site. And what is interesting is how much more

confident they were with time about staying on the moon. That is the

footprint, just a few months ago, a picture of a foot print from Apollo

14. 40 years ago! And this is remarkable. That is the moon buggy.

The lunar rover and Challenger, Captain certainon's spacecraft. The

bottom of it, the bit that didn't move off. Why did they park there

and walk off. Is there a reason for that? I think we should ask him.

And they have not eroded because there's no atmosphere. No wind or

rain to erode them. That's right. It's a fossil. It's deep frozen.

The formation of our solar system is written there and has been for

billions of years. We can't tell you how proud we are, joining us

live, from Houston in Texas, the Commander of Apollo 17, Captain

Eugene certainon. Thank you very much for joining us. It's a

pleasure to be with you. I'm just disappointed that I'm not with you.

The description of the moon and what you're seeing there has to be

unbelievable and I'm very proud to be with you today. Thank you very

much. We're talking about 1961 when Kennedy made that speech" we choose

to go to the moon" and he set America on a path to the moon

within ten years. And you joined NASA in 1963. When you heard that

visionon for American space exploration, did you immediately

think, "I will apply to the astronaut programme?" Those were

the days. The space speech SF Kennedy gave was about three weeks

after there was the first flight. I wasn't even in the space programme.

I was just a young, naval aviator and I kept thinking, "By the time I

get good enough it will all be done" but the President himself was

asking us to do what most thought couldn't be done, to do was most

thought was probably impossible, go to the moon. I mean, think about

that. We were not too many years after Sputnik. The earth was

orbited about a month earlier and just put yourself back in into

environment. It was an incredible challenge to mankind at that point

in time, and particularly to the American people to even think about

doing it. Can I ask about one trip you made before Apollo 17. You were

on Apollo 10, because the whole programme advanced in successful

steps and in Apollo 10 you took the lander within eight miles of

landing on the moon and then came back again. What was that like?

Well, you know, we were the second flight to ever go to the moon.

Apollo 8 were the first human beings who left the confines of

Earth to circle and orbit another planet. Well, I call the moon

another planet so I take some licence. We were going to take the

lunar module, the vehicle that was eventually going to take us down,

and by the way, there was much talk that if we put ourselves in harm's

way and go all that distance, maybe we ought to go all the way down.

The decision was made "let's do everything but land" we painted a

white line in the sky so the next lot wouldn't have to get lost and

all they had to do was cover the last eight miles. But it was an

incredible experience for me. I had no idea I would have a chance to go

back. But just being a quarter of a million miles from home and here I

was flying in and out of the shadows of another body out there

in this universe of others. It was 200 light years and to be able just

to look back at the Earth is a memory, I think, most of us can

never forget. And Captain certainon, just under two years later you

spent three days on the moon. How was that and what did you feel when

you left the moon? The last man to stand on the moon, so far? Well,

somewhat nostalgic, obviously. And those pictures you've been looking

at are phenomenal. For me, it's the first time I've seen where we ent

went, from that point of view, when I saw those pictures and I saw the

tracks and where we walked. And I know exactly where I parked the

lunar module because I put it there specifically so the television

camera could get a picture of our lift off. Somebody asked, "Do you

know what direction you pointed the front wheels?" and I said, "I think

I pointed them a little to the left" and he said, "You're right."

I don't know how you can see that from here, it's phenomenal. But I

guess someone will go back and survey those sites and get a better

picture than now. But it was mixed feelings. We'd come all that way.

We wanted to stay longer. We knew we couldn't. We knew we were part

of something significantly bigger than us, a great technologyy

adventure. But here we are, half a century later and I still wonder

what it means and what will it mean in the future? We will come back to

you and we will talk about the future of space travel. Thank you

very much for joining us for now. Now we're going back into the field

to see what is right now. The skies are still clear for us.

We have the constellations shining brightly over head. Gemini is

shining brightly. And castor and poll yock are there. The guys have

been picking up crazy things through the telescope. We've seen

M31, the most distant object you can see with the naked eye. We're

just keeping our fingers crossed that the skies will remain clear.

Last year you sent thousands and thousands of photographs in and we

want you to do the same this year, but we want to show you a few

you've already sent in. If you want to send them in go to the website,

bbc.co.uk/stargazing. Let's see a couple that we've seen

because they are genuinely spectacular.

This is remarkable. This is M42 and M43. It looks like a genuine

professional photograph taken through a big telescope. This is

what is happening above the skies in Wigan right now. These are star

formations in Orion. Clouds of dust and gas? Will they event coaless

into stars? Yes. This is from Mike in Swindon. OK, we'll be getting

more as the show goes on and go on to the website if you want to join

in the generally discussion about it. Take a look at this. This is

what the full moon looks like in this country. The picture of the

left. And on the right the moon was taken from South Africa last night.

What is the difference? Obviously they are the other way round and

Liz will explain. Thank you very much. I'm inside. More on that

fantastic mirror later on. Now, imagine my face is the moon, no

jokes please. If you stand on the northern hemisphere you're going to

see me the right way up, but if I'm on the Southern hemisphere you'll

see me upside down. It's not difficult. Last night I was

watching the stars with somebody who has been studying the skies for

ever ten years. Petris, we get a fantastic view of the Milky Way

down here what else can't we see from the Northern hemisphere?

Southern Cross. Four bright stars within the plain of the Milky Way

ever there. And close by are alpha Centauri; And where Now, how do you

navigate in the Southern hemisphere? Yes, there is no

Southern Cross. But you do it by taking the long diagonal of the

cross and follow the line through the sky and take a pointer

perpendicular to them and where the lines cross, that is exactly where

the South Pole is. And what else can we see down here? OmegaCentarri.

It's a cluster of stars, many of them just outside the Milky Way.

10,000 light years away. How many stars in that cluster? About 10

million and it's the brightest of the clusters associated with the

Milky Way. And one of the things I was looking forward to see with my

own eyes are the imagine lenic clouds. That is the -- --

magellanic clouds. That is the pack pap of them there. And that is the

tarantula nebular taken by this telescope in the Karoo Desert.

We'll find out more tomorrow but come back to me tonight to find out

how that mirror works. Now, there's a slight twist in this, we keep

telling you, look at the moon. But there is no moon out yet. No, the

moon doesn't rise until 2am. So we want people to enjoy it after the

show. What are you looking at now? This is the Orion Nablus. Stars are

forming. Look at that cloud of gas. You can really see it. Yes, you can

see the glowing gas. And the greater the telescope the more

detail you'll see. Let me introduce you to Helen. Hello. Helen, how

long have you been interested in astronomy? Well, I got a telescope

for Christmas and I've always been interested, but I wanted to see it

with a bigger eye, hence the telescope. And it's only a few

months you've been interested in it? Well, a few weeks, because it

was Christmas. But I've learnt so much tonight. And what have you

seen? The lines around Jupiter. And the other day I saw the moon and

the craters, which was amazing. All of it is very, very exciting.

you're enjoying it? I love it. year, we were asked what kind of

equipment you need to get into astronomy. So we've put together a

guide and what better place to start that where Captain certainon

went to 40 years ago. The moon is a constant presence.

It's close to the earth but visible nearly every day. While stars and

planets come and go, our closest neighbour is with us throughout the

year. These characteristics mean the moon is a fantastic object to

focus on if you want to learn more about looking at the night sky. And

the great thing is that observing the moon is really easy to do. Even

just using your naked eye you can pick out markings on the moon's

surface. And if you're inspired to take a closer look, it won't break

the bank. You can even try it from your own back garden.

A great way to begin observing the night sky is through a pair of

binoculars. You can use any pair, but these are good for astronomy.

They're known as 15X70. Which means they magnify 15 times and the lens

is 70mm across. And I have them on a tripod to keep them steady. A

zefpbt pair of binoculars will cost �30. You can find craters along the

line of shadow between light and dark.

And see the Sea of Tranquillity where the first men to land on the

moon touched down. But that's just the be beginning.

If you find yourself getting hooked, you might want to try using a

telescope. I remember the first time I looked luing a telescope. I

was ten years old and I was blown away by what I saw. And no matter

how many pictures of space you look at, there's nothing that quite

beats seeing it with your own eyes. The telescope will allow you to

explore great, flat lunar plains at the top of the moon and mountain

regions running between them. The surface appears to ripple because

we're looking through the earth's atmosphere. You can see a rugged

landscape marked by thousands of impacts over billions of years.

Optical telescopes come in a range of sizes. A good amateur one costs

between �150 and �300. The wider the apature the more you'll be able

to see. A good starting apature is between three and six inches. And

how much a telescope will magnify an object is determined by the

length of the telescope and the length of the eye piece, which

slots into the telescope. This is a crater known as

Copernicus which has been magnified around 50 times and this is it with

100 times mag fiction.Le it is the same telescope, but a more powerful

eye piece. There are two basic types of telescope and which one

you want depends partly on what you want to see. If you want to get the

best view of bright objects, like the parents and the moon then a

telescope with a refractor in it could be best for you, and you look

along the tufpblt but if you're particular interested in looking

for faint objects, like galaxies or nebulae, you need a reflective

telescope. And you look through a tube at the top because you're

looking at reflected light through the mirror. Both types will give

you a good view, but reflecting telescopes tend to be big er. If

you wanted really easy and you have more cash to spare, you might think

about this. This is a kuperised telescope. They -- computerised

telescope. They cost around �300 and if they are set up correctly

they will get you looking at what you want. So if I want to look at

Jupiter I set "Jupiter" into this hand set and the telescope will

swing around to get a good view. The telescope is attached to this

laptop computer. And there it is! Any good amateur telescope will

allow you to explore the solar system with your own eyes. You can

find the moons that orbit Jupiter. View the planet Saturn, with its

icy rings. And even make out the red glow of one of the smallest

planets, Mars. And the best thing is that it is a

real, live view. With a bit of research and some patience, there's

nothing that beats looking up and realising that what you can see

really is there, hanging in space, millions of miles away.

Now, one other thing to think about, of course, is telescope mounts. You

need to make sure that whatever mount you get is solid because the

telescope needs to be held firmly to get a good image. If you're not

sure go to the shop and they'll be able to help you out. We've put a

guide on the website. On the website you'll also be able

to download this year's Starguide which has a whole section dedicated

to the moon. And there will be the Open University's virtual

microscope. And you'll see a video explaining some of the myths, like,

how the moon turns men into werewolfs. Stop it!

Bbc.co.uk/stargazing is where you G and we'll be back for more

discussion in Stargazing Liveback to earth immediately after this

show. What star sign are you? don't know. Now, this is not the

biggest moon in the solar system. This is Jupiter and we are fairly

sure that that point of light is Ganymeade which is bigger than the

planet Mercury. If that is Ganymeade that could harbour life

because it's so big and it has tidal influences so it may have a

liquid ocean beneath its surface. That tells you about the magic of

astronomy. Because our moon is so big in relation to the earth it has

profound effects, not least in the way it controls the movements of

our oceans. Have you ever wondered what causes

the tides? Well, of course, it's got something to do with the moon

but what exactly is it that causes the ocean to roll up the beach and

roll back again twice a day? The tides are caused mainly by the

gravitational pull of the moon. So here is the earth and here is the

moon. Now, the gravitational force on any point on the earth depends

on the distance between that point and the moon. That's Newton's law

of gravity. Imagine the ocean surrounding the earth and take a

point on the ocean. What you have to do to calculate the

gravitational pull would be to work out what that distance is. Or say

that point. It's further away from the moon so the gravitational pull

of the moon will be less. So we have to calculate that distance. So

you can see that the gravitational pull on the moon on the water

changes depending on where you are. Both the direction changes and the

strength of the pull. The up shot of all that is that the ocean gets

deformed. The shape of the water gets pulled and squashed into a

kind of rugby-ball shape. So you get a bulge of water facing the

moon. And, because of the way the difference in gravitational pull

works, you get a bulge of water on the opposite side of the earth to

the moon and these bulges here, are the high tides. So, today, the moon

is just over there, actually, somewhere close to the sun. So

we're in this position, almost directly beneath the moon so that

means we're beneath this tidal bulge and that is why on this beach,

at this moment, there is a high tide. But what about a low tide?

Why does the water go back out again? Well, the tide goes out

because the earth is rotating. You see, at high tide then I am

standing here, on the beach beneath the tidal bulge. And the moon is

just positioned in the sky over there. But if I wait six hours,

give or take a bit of movement of the moon, then the earth will have

rotated. So this beach will have moved. I'll be stood here. That is

low tide. So it's tempting to think that it's the water that is moving.

You know, it's in the language, the sea is going out. Well, it's not

the sea going out. The tidal bulge is in the same place, what is

happening rather than the water going away from me, I am going away

from it. Water is fluid, it moves and flows.

So it's easy for the moon to distort the shape of our oceans.

But the moon's gravity doesn't just pull on the oceans it pulls on our

entire planet. Now, at high tide I'm next to that bulge of water.

But I'm also on a bulge of solid rock. The whole earth is being

stretched and squashed by the gravitational pull of the moon. So

at the same time as the oceans, the whole earth is being stretched into

a rugby-ball shape by the moon. But it's much harder for the moon to

distort the shape of solid rock than water, so the distortion is

tiny. We don't even realise it's happening. But it is a different

story for the moon. Because just as the moon raises tides on the earth,

the earth raises tides on the moon. Ever since it was first formed,

over four billion years ago, the solid body of the moon has been

skreched and squashed by the tidal forces of the earth. If I was able

to stand on the lunar surface four billion years ago, and looking up

at the earth, I would see a giant rock tide raised by the earth's

gravity on the surface of the moon. It would have been about seven

metres high. And as the moon rotated, that bulge of rock would

sweep across the surface of the moon, just as the oceans sweep I

cross the surface of our planet. So the earth raises that tidal bulge

on the moon but because of the moon's rotation, that bulge is

always slightly ahead of where the earth is. So that meant the earth's

gravity acted like a brake. It pulled on the bulge to slow the

rotation of the moon down. Now, over time, millions, billions of

years, that meant that the moon's rotation rate slowed. And in turn,

that meant that the moon drifted further and further away, until you

get to the situation we have today, where the moon has slowed so much,

the time it takes to complete one orbit is almost exactly the same as

the time it takes to rotate once on its axis. So the moon's rotations

have become sychronised so one face of the moon is always pointing to

the earth and that's why we only see one face when we look up into

the night's sky. Tides are caused but one of the

fundamental forces of the universe, gravity. And they bend and stretch

rocks as well as oceans. Tides distort the shape of our entire

planet and they've slowed down the rotation of our moon. So tides are

much more than just the gentle roll of water up and down the beaches of

the world. Now you can see the effects of tides all over the solar

system. In 1979, the Voyager spacecraft showed graphically the

power of tides. This is the inner of the moons of Jupiter, called Io,

and it's the most volcanic place in the solar system. So it's not like

a volcano we would have on earth. It's not molten rock bursting

through the surface? No, but it is molten rock. And Io is maintained

in an elliptical orbit around the other planets, it passes close to

the planet and far away, close and far away, and that means it gets

skreched and squashed and heated by the immense fors of Jupiter and Io

can turn itself inside out. So its rocks are constantly spilling out

on to the surface. Yes, and it's kept in orbit by the interaction of

the other moons. It's so complex but it shows the power of tides.

We've had a number of questions coming through. Shaun in Tipperary

asks why is the moon slowly moving away from earth. In physicals

language it's called the conservation of angular momentum.

The reason is because there's a fixed amount of speed in the

earth's-moon system. And, as we spoke about in the film, the moon

is slowing down and the spin has to go somewhere, so the moon moves

further away and that takes the spin that is lost. And why does the

moon look like it's made from uniform dusty rock, while the earth

is made from red rock and yellow rock, et cetera. Well, the red is

caused by rust, so you need atmosphere. And there's no oxygen,

so it's unchanging. That's it. And the oxygen in our atmosphere came

from life. It isn't there naturally. Now, Liz is in South Africa, which

has one of the finest collection of telescopes.

I'm still inside the SALT telescope and tonight, light from millions of

light years away will be filtering down on to this mirror. Downstairs

astronomers are gearing up for a night of star gazing. But how did

the telescope end up in the middle of the desert and what is it

looking at? This is where modern astronomy began in South Africa.

The first Royal Observatory was built in Cape Town in 1820 and for

the next 150 years it's where stargazers from all over Africa

came for the best view of the night sky. But eventually the night sky

got drowned out by the cities and they had to look for somewhere more

remote. And it doesn't get much more remote than this. Over 200

miles north-east of Cape Town, the Karoo Desert is one of the most

inhospitable places in Africa, but almost a mile above sea level and

with unpolluted skies it is almost the perfect place for an

observatory. That is why hundreds of people come here. It is a global

operation. Astronomers from all over the world use the ISS

telescope. They peer through the Milky Way to gain a new view of our

galaxy. These telescopes are run from Poland and they're looking for

planets outside of our solar system. This extremely little telescope run

by America surveyed large parts of the sky, and it is quite possibly

the smallest professional telescope in the world. This is the 1.9m

telescope, a pineer is helping us to understand the centre of our

galaxy. At one point this was the largest telescope in the Southern

hemisphere. But now...they've got this.

A telescope with the ability to look much deeper into our universe.

One of the biggest telescopes on earth the Southern African Large

Telescope or SALT. David Buckley is in charge of what has been

nicknamed Africa's giant eye. the largest telescope in the

Southern hepls fare. It consists of 91 mirrors held in precise

alignment it allows us to look at objects one billion times fainter

than you can detect with the human eye. That means you can look at

objects on the very edge of the universe. The very first things to

emerge after the Big Bang. So how do you analyse it? We have a fancy

digital camera that takes a picture of a part of the sky. For example,

this is an image of what is called a Gamma Ray Burst. That is a very

distant energetic object that suddenly exploded. Looking at that

image on its own tells you have little, but when you disperse the

light with a spectrograph you get this sort of picture and this tells

me immediately that this is a very distant galaxy and the spectrum

tells us what is absorbing the light between it and us and how

fast it is moving. So you need a great camera and something that

splits up the light to learn more about the properties of the object?

Indeed. What are you looking at now? Everything from the closest

objects, near-earth objects, which are asteroids that possibly could

threaten the earth in the future. We're even discovering planets

around other stars. And the nearest neighbouring galaxies to the Milky

Way, so the magellanic clouds. They're particularly interesting.

There is just a whole zoo of different types of galaxies that

interest astronomers in many different ways.

And that huge mirror is above us. This is the control room where all

that light is processed. David, you observe the night skies for many

institutions all over the planet, is that right? That's right. We

observe ten proposals a night. are you looking at tonight and for

whom? Tonight we're looking at one of the distant galaxies that formed

after the Big Bang and that's for The University of Nottingham.

That's great. And you take images of all sorts of things. This is

beautiful. This is the lagoon Nablus and it's a big cloud of gas

in our Milky Way which is embedded with hot stars which have a lot of

ultraviolent light which cause all that colouration. And this is the

other end of the spectrum. Some stars go through a period in which

they expel a huge amount of their material into a sort of shell but

the whole star doesn't disintegrate. In the centre of the Nablus is the

object. Is that the dwarf star? a compact object like a dwarf star.

And what is this? This is NGC 1365. A snappy name! It has a spiral very

similar to our Milky Way galaxy. Fantastic. And we'll be talking

about galaxies tomorrow night. I will see you then. Thank you very

much. And I'm delighted to say that Captain certainon is still with us.

You referred to you earlier on as the last man to walk on the moon

and that was 40 years later. Are you disappointed that you are still

the last man to walk on the moon? Well, I'd like to think of myself

as the last man of the 20th century. We're going to go back, curiosity

will take us. I'm listening to your show and I'm trying to visualise

what you're saying, and the universe is so full of things we

want to know something about and, you know, going back to the moon is

just the first next step. I think we'll go from there without

question, tomorrow. So we ask ourselves who are we? Where are we?

Where did we come from? How did we get here? Is there life in outer

space? And you could find life as we know it, or maybe there's some

other definition of life, I do not know. But there is no question that

mankind will continue to explore and move out of his universe. And

there's no end, from my point of view, so this could go on for ever,

how ever long forever is. There was a confirmation last year called the

1hunhunyaer starship confirmation. And the -- 100 year star stip

conference. So what can we do to make human society come together to

make those grand leaps into the unknown, in the way that building a

cathedral was 1,000 years ago? know, if you look back at what

space has done, it has brought human society as we know it here on

earth much closer together. I mean, we can share everything, like

athletic events so disasters that occur on this earth almost

instantaneous. We can share the enjoyment and the challenge already.

And we will go to Mars and where we go, I think it will certainly be an

international adventure, with a combination of our intelligent, our

capabilities put together in one pot and that's just the very next

"near step" it might be a generation away, but that's not

that far. We've had questions from viewers coming in. And this one

says, "When I go to start my car in the morning, there's always a

moment when I think it's not going to start. Did Captain certainon

have any thoughts like that when he was on the moon?" That's a good

question. I grew up in Chicago where the weather gets pretty cold

and you go to start the car in the morning and you're not sure it will

turn over. You know, if you worry about that, you worry about it

before and if it really bothers you, you don't G but once you're there,

you've bit the bullet. Enjoy it, enjoy the three days, make the most

of it and get as much done as you can, and of course we'd built

redundancy into the spacecraft and there's only one engine and things

have to work right. I never, ever went to the moon not to come home.

Did I ever think about it? Yes. But what would I have done if when you

turn the key it didn't start, frankly, I don't know and I'm glad

I didn't have to answer that question. We've run out of time,

but it's been a pleasure to talk to you. 2457 you very much for joining

Well, it's a pleasure. I really feel like I missed the best part of

the show by not being there with you because I was listening and I'm

fascinated by what you're talking about. The element of time in our

lack of understanding of time is so important to what we see out there.

So, you know, open it up to these young kids. Inspire them to dream

the impossible and the impossible will happen. Thank you very much,

Captain Eugene certainon joining us from Texas. How is it holding up

outside here? High I'm here with Andrew Green who is the Chair of

the astronomy society. What do you get out of the society? It's just

great to bring lots of people together under the stars and the

planets, as we're doing now and just experience the camaraderie.

It's exciting, enjoyable. Just get out there and do it. And you can

learn so much from each other. We've seen some brilliant sights in

the skies tonight and if you want to know what is going on, tune into

the show that follows immediately after this, and I have some special

guides for what to look out on. But, as always, it's reliant on whether

as always, it's reliant on whether we get clear skies. So here's the

weather Thank you very much. It's pretty clear out there, country-

wide at the moment. I'm going to show you the picture from space

down to the UK this afternoon. It shows largely clear skies, however,

this line of white is cloud spilling into parts of Northern

Ireland and western Scotland so here conditions are far from

perfect. But across the bulk of England, Wales and much of skhral

Scotland there are clear -- central Scotland there are clear skies. But

that means it's also pretty cold right now. So if you are heading

out after the show, put some layers on. Tomorrow night is nowhere near

as cold, but unfortunately that is because there will be much more

cloud in the sky. Eastern areas could have clear skies for a time,

but overall, exact it to be cloudy. And that blue means rain. Perfect

conditions tonight, though. Thanks, Alex. Now, as we mentioned

at the start of the show, this year we want to try something very

special indeed. With your help we want to try and find our own exo-

planet, that's a planet around a distant star. To do this, we've

joined up with the Planet Hunters joined up with the Planet Hunters

project. What are you trying to do? We have to look at the brightness

of stars down to earth and we look at the data and look at the tiny

dips in the brightness when a planet goes in front of its star.

The obvious question is why are we doing it? Computers have a stab at

this data. But we know humans can find things computers can. We're

good at pattern recognition. Let's have a look at a pattern. It's dips

like that that you want to find. That's it. Each point is a

measurement of the star and a computer missed this one. But a

human found it. And what do the viewers have to do? Go to the

website. Six-year-olds can do this and just click. The more clicks you

have an opportunity to find your own planet and you will be a God!

We'll send you there, Dara. We need as many of you as possible to take

part. You don't have to register if you don't want to and you can spend

as little or as much time on there. Why wouldn't you want to spend a

little bit of time to find your own planets. Go to the website and

click on the box that says "find an exo-planet." Tomorrow night we're

back with John Caulshaw. He's getting better and better at an

impression of me. Now, get on to the website hunting for planets.

This is real science we can really add to the sum total of human