The asteroid belt is portrayed in movies as a crowded place with massive rocks bouncing each other like pool balls, capable of sending a mile-wide missile hurtling toward Earth at any moment. The reality is much more fascinating.

Host Dr. Michelle Thaller speaks with Dr. Lucy McFadden, Co-Investigator of NASA’s Dawn Mission to orbit the asteroids Vesta and Ceres. She shares what they’ve learned by traveling 130 million miles to visit places we’ve always viewed from afar.

Learn more about Orbital Path at orbital.prx.org.

Image of Vesta from: 
http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/images/image-detail.html?id=PIA15506

Episode 8: A Tale of Two Asteroids

I am a Buddhist and writer living in the heartland of America. I grew up on a farm and spent a large amount of time outside and in the woods, a childhood I would not trade for anything. I've been writing since I was 14 years old after a teacher encouraged me to never stop. I am inspired by the works of Thich Nhat Hanh, Walt Whitman, Robert Frost, Ralph Emerson, Henry Thoreau, Marcus Aurelius, Viktor Frankl, Carl Sagan, Jane Goodall, Kahlil Gibran, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and the list goes on. I read and write about various topics including Buddhism, religion, nature, astronomy, genealogy, behavioral health and psychology, politics, as well as some fictional writing.

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