Astronomy Cast is an educational nonprofit podcast discussing various topics in the field of astronomy. The specific subject matter of each episode shifts from week to week, ranging from planets and stars to cosmology and mythbusting. The show is co-hosted by the editor of the space and astronomy news site Universe Today Fraser Cain and Southern Illinois University Edwardsville astronomy professor Dr. Pamela L. Gay and premiered on September 10, 2006. Each show usually has a length of approximately 30 minutes and all shows, past and present, are accessible for download through the Astronomy Cast archive.
The Astronomy Cast official website also hosts the blog Astronomy Cast LIVE, which covers select astronomy meetings using various bloggers, including Fraser Cain, Dr. Pamela L. Gay, and Phil Plait as well as recent astronomy-related news and events. A public forum, the Astronomy Cast Forum, where registered members and site visitors may share and exchange valuable information can also be found on the website and is created under Bad Astronomer and Universe Today Forum.
This podcast has been continuously featured by iTunes in the Science & Medicine section for its high popularity as well as its excellent listener rating of 5 out of 5 possible stars and is currently ranked #6 in the Natural Sciences podcasts category. The renown of this series has grown rapidly in the past few months and the total number of its listeners stands around 30,000.
Read more about Astronomy Cast: Mission, Format, Audience, Milestones, International Year of Astronomy
Famous quotes containing the words astronomy and/or cast:
“Awareness of the stars and their light pervades the Koran, which reflects the brightness of the heavenly bodies in many verses. The blossoming of mathematics and astronomy was a natural consequence of this awareness. Understanding the cosmos and the movements of the stars means understanding the marvels created by Allah. There would be no persecuted Galileo in Islam, because Islam, unlike Christianity, did not force people to believe in a “fixed” heaven.”
—Fatima Mernissi, Moroccan sociologist. Islam and Democracy, ch. 9, Addison-Wesley Publishing Co. (Trans. 1992)
“For it is with the mysteries of our religion, as with wholesome pills for the sick, which swallowed whole, have the virtue to cure; but chewed, are for the most part cast up again without effect.”
—Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679)