Blue Dot

Series produced by North State Public Radio

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Conversations exploring where science and pop culture collide. Hosted by Dave Schlom with audio production by Matt Fidler.

Blue Dot, named after Carl Sagan's famous speech about our place in the universe, features interviews with guests from all over the regional, national and worldwide scientific communities. Host Dave Schlom leads discussions about the issues science is helping us address with experts who shed light on climate change, space exploration, astronomy, technology and much more. Dave asks us to remember: from deep space, we all live on a pale, blue dot.


202 Pieces

Order by: Newest First | Oldest First
BD: Marine Biology at Cal Poly Humboldt: plus, what's in a name (change?)
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Dave visits with folks from the newly renamed Cal Poly Humboldt about the marine biology programs there. WIth a long tradition of marine sciences t...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Sep 29, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - Kim Stanley Robinson and the High Sierra
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
Caption: Kim Stanley Robinson
Bestselling science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson joins Dave to talk about his latest book, a work of non fiction. The High Sierra: a Love St...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Sep 15, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - Lassen Park one year after the Dixie Fire and beyond
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
Caption: Dave look at the fire damage east of the Park Road
Dave is joined by Producer Matt Fidler as Blue Dot returns to Lassen Volcanic National Park one year after the massive Dixie Fire. Along the way th...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Sep 08, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - ECOSTRESS and Mono Lake
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Dave checks out the findings from a new NASA instrument flying aboard the International Space Station called ECOSTRESS. The instrument provides dat...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Sep 01, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - Celebrating 45 years of the epic Voyager missions
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Dave gets a chance to revisit one of his favorite topics -- the twin Voyager spacecraft that began their explorations of the outer solar system and...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Aug 25, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - NASA's MSI Accelerator Program and celebrating 25 year anniversary of Mars Pathfinder
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Dave visits with grant winners from a NASA program designed to boost and accelerate science and engineering programs with potential space applicati...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Aug 18, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD: First images and science from the James Webb Space Telescope
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Dave is joined once again by special co host Kendall Hall, astronomer and physics professor at California State University Chico as we dive into th...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach and WLPR


  • Added: Aug 11, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 2
BD - NASA's first nurse: a conversation with Dee O'Hara
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
Caption: Dee O'Hara
As part of our ongoing Apollo@50 series, Dave visits with Dee O'Hara, the "nurse to the astronauts." Hired by NASA in November 1959, Dee was a pivo...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Aug 11, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - NASA and Civil Rights: The complex story of racial justice and the space race
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Dave talks to three contributors to the book NASA and The Long Civil Rights Movement. Recently published for the first time as a paperback, the boo...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Jul 14, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - Science Diplomacy in the Persian Gulf and ENSO
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
Caption: The Persian Gulf from Orbit
Dave investigates an effort in the Persian Gulf to bring scientists together to protect and further study this politically and ecologically diverse...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach and WLPR


  • Added: Jul 07, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 2
Blue Dot - The mysteries of Mars: The Red Planet with author Simon Morden
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Blue Dot takes a trip to the Red Dot as Dave talks to British geologist/geophysicist and science fiction writer Simon Morden. In his new book, The ...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Jun 30, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
Blue Dot - Eclipse 2024 and more: Preparing for the next great American solar eclipse
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
Caption: Gordon Telepun
Dave is joined by eclipse guru Gordon Telepun to talk about the upcoming total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024. While that may seem a ways off, anyo...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Jun 23, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - Why Sharks Matter: a visit with marine conservation biologist David Shiffman
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Most folks who regularly swims in the ocean has some level of trepidation about sharks but in reality -- there are far more likely ways for you to ...

Bought by KAZU Seaside, Calif., KSPB Pebble Beach, and WLPR


  • Added: Jun 09, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 3
BD - Science and California's "last perfect place:" Point Conception
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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The Point Conception region just north of Santa Barbara is one of the last remaining wild portions of coastal ecosystems in Southern California. It...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Jun 02, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
Blue Dot - Fractions and understanding our world: a conversation with James Zimring
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Dave visits with James Zimring, Professor of Experimental Pathology at the University of Virginia. In a follow up to his seminal work, What Science...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: May 26, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - A History of the World in 100 Animals: a conversation with Simon Becker
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
Caption: Simon Barnes lion watching at Kafue N.P. Zambia
Dave visits with award winning journalist and author Simon Barnes. For decades Barnes was one of the main sports writers for the Times of London an...

  • Added: May 19, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
Blue Dot - Rocking out with geophysicist Mika McKinnon
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Dave is joined by Canadian geophysicist and fellow science communicator Mika McKinnon to talk about their mutual passion for the Earth Sciences, es...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: May 12, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
Blue Dot - A conversation with Frank Drake Award winning SETI astronomer Shelley Wright
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Dave visits with the 2022 recipient of the Frank Drake Award from the SETI Institute, Dr. Shelley Wright. Wright has pioneered instrumentation and ...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: May 06, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
BD - Apollo 16 Part 2: Mission to the lunar highlands
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
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Blue Dot's Apollo@50 series continues with part two of our look back at the flight of Apollo 16 in April of 1972. This ambitious mission to explore...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Apr 21, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1
Apollo @50 Part 1: The flight of Apollo 16 to the lunar highlands
From: North State Public Radio
Series: Blue Dot
Caption: Apollo 16 crew: Thomas K. Mattingly II, John W. Young, Charles M. Duke Jr.
Blue Dot's signature Apollo@50 series continues with the fifth lunar landing mission, Apollo 16. In April of 1972 the crew of Commander John Young,...

Bought by KSPB Pebble Beach


  • Added: Apr 14, 2022
  • Length: 59:00
  • Purchases: 1

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