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The Sky at Night
The Sky at Night Episodes
Ancestral Skies
This month, The Sky at Night teams up with BBC Ideas to discover the secrets of archaeology and astronomy and to reflect on our ancestral skies. \n\nThroughout history and acros ...
11-11-2024
BBC 4
Question Time Special
Get ready for The Sky at Night’s annual Question Time Special, where viewers get the opportunity to ask the questions they have always wanted answered about our universe.\ ...
08-10-2024
BBC 4
2075: Our Place In Space
The Sky at Night is embarking on a journey into the future as we explore how space will revolutionise life on Earth over the next 50 years. As humanity's reach extends into the ...
11-09-2024
BBC 4
Nicky, Nasa And The Next Frontier
In this Sky at Night special, the team talk to Dr Nicola Fox, NASA’s head of science, whose life began in the UK.\n\nPresenter Chris Lintott chats to Nicky about her early ...
15-08-2024
BBC 4
Webb Telescope: The Story So Far
In July 2022, the James Webb Space Telescope released its first images. They were visually stunning, and it was clear they provided more detail of stars, galaxies and planets th ...
11-07-2024
BBC 4
Cosmic Ghosts
This month, The Sky at Night has a spooky twist. Across the universe, there are hidden objects that we can’t see, but astronomers and scientists still believe they’r ...
13-06-2024
BBC 4
Hiding In Starlight
Total solar eclipses, like the one seen last month in North America, allow us to see details of the Sun that can’t be seen at any other time. So, this month, The Sky at Ni ...
16-05-2024
BBC 4
Space Rock Return
The Sky at Night is back for a brand new series, and this month it is delving into Nasa’s OSIRIS-REx mission, which last year brought back a sample from the near-Earth ast ...
11-04-2024
BBC 4
The Sky At Night Meets The Infinite Monkey Cage
In this special episode to mark the end of another season of The Sky at Night, we team up with Radio 4’s The Infinite Monkey Cage to talk all things amateur astronomy. Joi ...
16-11-2023
BBC 4
Question Time Special
A special Question Time edition of the programme, recorded at the University of Exeter as part of the British Science Association’s Science Festival.\n\nThe panel is chair ...
12-10-2023
BBC 4
The Very Large Telescope
The Very Large Telescope – or VLT – has been responsible for some of the greatest astronomical breakthroughs of all time, discoveries that have resulted in Nobel Pri ...
13-09-2023
BBC 4
Black Holes: Searching For The Unknown
There has never been a more exciting time to study one of the most mysterious phenomena in space. This month, The Sky at Night team investigate the science of black holes and di ...
17-08-2023
BBC 4
Is There Anybody Out There?
The Sky at Night team investigates the controversial world of alien communication. The search for life on other planets is one of the most fascinating subjects in science. But w ...
13-07-2023
BBC 4
The Uk Space Race
The Sky at Night team investigates the incredible science and engineering helping the UK to blast into space. We are now one of the biggest satellite building nations in the wor ...
15-06-2023
BBC 4
Will An Asteroid Destroy Earth?
The Sky at Night team explores the threat of an asteroid impact on earth. Around 2,300 asteroids have been identified as ‘potentially hazardous’, and it’s tho ...
18-05-2023
BBC 4
The Search For Alien Life
The Sky at Night team investigate the latest science in the hunt for extraterrestrial life. Scientists have never been more obsessed with finding aliens than they are right now. ...
13-04-2023
BBC 4
The Multiverse Of Mystery
The Sky at Night in the Multiverse of Mystery is a magical journey into the far-flung ideas at the very edge of scientific knowledge, exploring the concepts that today seem like ...
17-11-2022
BBC 4
Question Time
A special ‘Question Time’ edition of the programme, recorded at The Venue in De Montford University, Leicester, as part of the British Science Association’s an ...
12-10-2022
BBC 4
Photographing The Universe
For centuries, humans have been drawing what they see in the night sky through telescopes. But there is something about a photograph that can make you feel you are right there, ...
15-09-2022
BBC 4
The James Webb Road Trip
On 12 July 2022, the Sky at Night joined the rest of the world to watch as the James Webb Space Telescope released its long-awaited first images. And it didn’t disappoint. ...
17-08-2022
BBC 4
The Sky At Day
The British weather is often the enemy of stargazers up and down the country. A forecast of a couple of hours of cloud cover will disappoint even the most determined amateur ast ...
13-07-2022
BBC 4
The Astronomer Royal At 80
Martin Rees is perhaps Britain’s most renowned cosmologist. He was master of Trinity College, Cambridge, president of both the Royal Astronomical Society and the Institute ...
16-06-2022
BBC 4
Destination: Moon
2022 marks the fiftieth year since an astronaut last stepped on the moon’s surface. We look back at the legacy of the Apollo programme and forward to the future of lunar e ...
11-05-2022
BBC 4
Exoplanets And Antarctica
In a month when the tally of confirmed exoplanets passed 5,000, it’s astonishing to remember that just 30 years ago, the notion of planets outside our own solar system was ...
14-04-2022
BBC 4
Dark Skies
Dr Maggie Aderin-Pocock and Professor Chris Lintott visit the Van Gogh Immersive Experience to seek inspiration in one of the world’s most famous works of art, Starry Nigh ...
12-01-2022
BBC 4
Guides: 3. Stars
For as long as humans have walked the Earth, the stars have fascinated us. But we have come a long way since the earliest days of astronomy when we had nothing but our eyes to o ...
09-01-2022
BBC 4
Review Of The Year
Chris and Maggie look back at some of the stories they have covered in 2021 in the Sky at Night’s big review of the year.\n\nIn February, three missions arrived at Mars. A ...
16-12-2021
BBC 4
Telescopes Through Time
The Sky at Night team explore the history of the telescope – from Harriot and Galileo's lunar observations to the Hubble and James Webb space telescopes – revealing ...
18-11-2021
BBC 4
The Forgotten Solar System
Of the 100 probes that have been sent out into space, only one probe - Voyager 2 in 1989 - has ever sent back any information about the solar system's outer planets. From afar, ...
12-10-2021
BBC 4
Question Time
A special ‘Question Time’ edition of the programme, recorded at the Civic Theatre, Chelmsford, as part of the British Science Association’s annual science fest ...
22-09-2021
BBC 4
The Moon, The Mission And The Bbc
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo mission to put a man on the moon, The Sky at Night looks back through the archives to tell the story of how the BBC reported the ...
19-09-2021
BBC 4
Juno And Jupiter
August 2021 marks ten years since Nasa’s mission to Jupiter, Juno, was launched. The mission – to uncover the mysteries surrounding Jupiter’s formation – ...
11-08-2021
BBC 4
Et And The Bbc
Chris and Maggie dive into the archives to discover how the hunt for extra-terrestrial life in the universe has been reported by the BBC over six decades. Such luminaries as Pat ...
14-07-2021
BBC 4
Space Boom Britain
Britain’s space industry is booming. According to UK Space Agency, its annual income now stands at £16.4bn, and it employs over 45,000 people. Britain has always bee ...
17-06-2021
BBC 4
Mapping The Milky Way
The Gaia space telescope is not just create the ultimate star map of the Milky Way. It is also showing us our galaxy's past and how it will change in the future.\n\nThe Sky at N ...
12-05-2021
BBC 4
Mars And Meteorites
In February, orbiters from China and the UAE settled into their positions above Mars, and Nasa’s Perseverance rover touched down on its surface. Maggie Aderin-Pocock revie ...
15-04-2021
BBC 4
Pick Of The Year
Maggie Aderin-Pocock and Chris Lintott look back at some of the biggest stories featured on the programme in 2020, with the help of special guests who have chosen their favourit ...
20-01-2021
BBC 4
The State Of Astronomy
The Sky at Night looks back at the last ten years of astronomy and ponders the most significant milestones and revelations. With the help of six distinguished astronomers, Chris ...
13-12-2020
BBC 4
Beyond Venus
Chris and Maggie report on the reaction to the dramatic announcement of the discovery of phosphine gas in the clouds of Venus, a gas that could be a sign of life. Venus remains ...
11-11-2020
BBC 4
Beyond The Visible
The focus for this edition of The Sky at Night is on astronomical research that is beyond the scope of our eyes. \n\nWe think of astronomy as something we do primarily using our ...
15-10-2020
BBC 4
Guides: 2. Galaxies
Galaxies are the building blocks of the universe. Our solar system sits inside a huge galaxy that we call the Milky Way - home to as many as 300 billion stars. But the Milky Way ...
11-08-2019
BBC 4
Is Cosmology In Crisis?
Ever since we discovered that distant galaxies are racing away from us, there has been a heated debate over just how fast the Universe is expanding.\n\nAt the beginning of the 2 ...
14-02-2019
BBC 4
Beyond Pluto
On 1 January 2019, Nasa's New Horizons probe notched up another historic first: the first ever Kuiper belt fly-by. Its target was 2014 MU69, a chunk of ice and rock about four b ...
17-01-2019
BBC 4
Telescope On A Plane!
Telescope on a Plane!\n\nIn this special programme, the Sky at Night takes to the air on board the largest airborne observatory in the world – a specially modified jumbo j ...
09-12-2018
BBC 4
First Rock From The Sun
Documentary series. Mercury, unique amongst the planets, is shrinking. And that's only the beginning of how strange the solar system's smallest planet is. In October 2018 a new ...
22-11-2018
BBC 4
Space Britannia
The Sky at Night investigates Britain's attempt to become a major player in the modern space race. From Scotland's wild northern shore, where Britain's first spaceport is planne ...
18-10-2018
BBC 4
Death Star
One evening in early September 1859, a spectacular blood-red aurora borealis appeared across America. Earlier that same day, in a leafy garden in the UK, a gentleman astronomer ...
16-08-2018
BBC 4
Outback Astronomy
In February 2018, news broke that astronomers had seen the cosmic dawn - the moment when stars first formed, flooding the universe with light. What's remarkable is that this inc ...
12-07-2018
BBC 4
Jupiter: Up Close And Personal
Nasa's Juno spacecraft is currently making its 13th orbit of Jupiter on one of the most ambitious and risky space missions ever undertaken. The astonishing images it has capture ...
14-06-2018
BBC 4
Gaia: A Galactic Revolution
For past three and a half years, ESA's Gaia Space telescope has been mapping the heavens in unprecedented detail. At the end of April 2018 it released precise data on over 1.3 b ...
17-05-2018
BBC 4
Guides: 1. Planets
The planets have fascinated us for millennia, but over the past 60 years our understanding of them has been transformed. Using The Sky at Night archives, Maggie Aderin-Pocock ta ...
17-05-2018
BBC 4
Mars: Red And Dead?
Maggie Aderin-Pocock and Chris Lintott reveal the latest results from Nasa's Curiosity and Esa's ExoMars TGO missions that are attempting to find signs of life on Mars. Maggie v ...
12-04-2018
BBC 4
The Mystery Of 'oumuamua
In October 2017, astronomers made a spectacular discovery - they spotted the first ever object to visit our solar system from outer space. They gave it a suitably exotic name... ...
15-02-2018
BBC 4
The Invisible Universe
The Sky at Night reports on one of the most unnerving discoveries in space science - that most of the universe is missing.\n\nWe live in a material world, so instinctively we kn ...
18-01-2018
BBC 4
Wonders Of The Night Sky
The Sky at Night celebrates one of the most profound, moving and enjoyable activities there is - the ancient art of looking up, studying and marvelling at the night sky. The pro ...
10-12-2017
BBC 4
In The Blink Of An Eye
We're used to thinking that the universe operates on timescales of millions or even billions of years, where change happens with imperceptible slowness. But now we've discovered ...
16-11-2017
BBC 4
Telescope Takeover
The team travel to the island of La Palma in the Canary Islands where they take control of some of the world's largest telescopes to view the most spectacular sights in the nigh ...
12-02-2017
BBC 4
Second Earth?
As we close in on the discovery of the 2,000th planet outside our solar system, or exoplanet, the Sky at Night investigates the techniques that are revealing so much about these ...
08-11-2015
BBC 4
Cosmic Blasts
The Sky at Night team look at cosmic explosions. They explore the beautiful but potentially deadly outbursts of our very own star - the sun - and the most violent and energetic ...
09-08-2015
BBC 4
Hubble: The Five Greatest Images Of The Cosmos
For 25 years the Hubble Space Telescope has been showing us the cosmos as we've never seen it before. The team reveals the 'top five' greatest images Hubble has produced, images ...
12-04-2015
BBC 4
What Have Ufos Done For Us?
From unexplained flashes in the night sky to flying saucers, this episode delves into the mysterious world of UFOs. How our drive to explain these bizarre phenomena, and desire ...
08-02-2015
BBC 4
Ice Giants
The team explores the vast frozen worlds of Uranus and Neptune, while astro-photographer Damian Peach shares his tips for capturing these jewels of the night sky.
12-10-2014
BBC 4
The Hunt For Et
Are we alone? Geneticist Dr Adam Rutherford seeks to define what life is and Maggie Aderin-Pocock explores our chances of finding it in the universe.
14-09-2014
BBC 4
How To Catch A Comet
The team is at mission control as the Rosetta probe catches up with the comet it has been chasing across the solar system and prepares to send out a lander.
11-08-2014
BBC 4
The Brightest Star
The team explore stargazing in the daytime, show how seasons change on other planets across the solar system and examine what makes the sun special.
13-07-2014
BBC 4
Impacts
The team looks at the cosmic impacts which have shaped the universe around us, from asteroids crashing into the surface of the moon to galaxies colliding with each other.
15-06-2014
BBC 4
How Gravity Shapes The Universe
The team travels to the Brecon Beacons AstroCamp to see how gravity shapes the universe. Chris finds out about the newest moon in the solar system.
18-05-2014
BBC 4