The future of space travel

This week NASA proposed an ambitious plan, to build a moon base and a new spacecraft, one capable of travelling further and faster than ever before.

Show more

Are we, at last, getting the spacefaring future we were promised back in the 1960s? This week, NASA has been outlining ambitions for a base on the Moon and, perhaps more surprisingly, the development of a new class of spacecraft powered by nuclear electric propulsion. Dr Hannah Sargeant at the University of Leicester explains the potential of nuclear-powered space travel, how it could take us further into the solar system than ever before, and why it has taken decades for the technology to reach this point.

Meanwhile, a lorry carrying a very unusual cargo has been making careful laps around the campus of CERN in Switzerland. This week science reporter Caroline Steel has been enthralled by the controlled transportation of antimatter. With insights from Dr Harry Cliff at the University of Cambridge, explore why trapping and moving antimatter is such a milestone for physicists.

Plus, rising beaver populations in the UK and the science of brain preservation. Caroline Steel joins Tom for her pick of the week’s science news.

Presenter: Tom Whipple

Producer: Harrison Lewis and Katie Tomsett

Production co-ordinator: Jana Bennett-Holesworth

Editor: Martin Smith

Show less

Discover more fascinating science content with The Open University