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. Join Maggie, Chris and Pete, alongside Professor Brian Cox and comedians Robin Ince and Dara Ó Briain, in front of a live audience at the BBC’s Radio Theatre. Together they discuss their love of stargazing and share their top tips and favourite kit for looking up at the night sky.\n\nOutside the Radio Theatre, Pete hosts a Star Party. He joins fellow amateur astronomers hoping to get views of the Moon, as well as the giant planets Saturn and Jupiter, using binoculars, telescopes – and the naked eye. But will the clouds part for long enough?\n\nWe look back at 66 years of stargazing - and cloudy skies - with The Sky at Night, including some very familiar, but much younger, faces. And of course, Sir Patrick Moore.\n\nPete invites Professor Leigh Fletcher from the University of Leicester to the Star Party. Leigh explains how images from amateur astronomers on Earth have been used to direct the camera onboard Nasa’s Juno mission to Jupiter. And amateurs are playing a critical role in processing the data and images sent back from this gas giant.\n\nAnd Dr George Dransfield meets Dr Martin Archer from Imperial College London to discover how we can get involved with space science - even when it’s cloudy. Martin is involved in a Nasa project called Harp, which is asking citizen scientists to listen to outer space. Martin took inspiration from his previous career as a radio DJ to convert plasma waves that travel through space into sound waves. By analysing these sound waves, we can help scientists work out the impact these plasma waves might have on us here on Earth.
Source: BBC 4
The Expanding Universe
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BBC 4
Queen Of Pulsars
Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell is a discoverer and an explorer of the distant cosmos, and she has walked among the stars. She discovered the first pulsar in 1967 - a discovery so imp ...
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BBC 4
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BBC 4
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BBC 4
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BBC 4
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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.\ ...
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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 ...
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BBC 4
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BBC 4
The Expanding Universe
The team explores one of the greatest discoveries of modern astronomy - that our universe is expanding - and the new questions it raises about how the cosmos works.\n\nIn the 19 ...
10-09-2025
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
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
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
Queen Of Pulsars
Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell is a discoverer and an explorer of the distant cosmos, and she has walked among the stars. She discovered the first pulsar in 1967 - a discovery so imp ...
14-08-2025
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
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