Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science - A Toast to Alcohol in Space

Episode Date: December 4, 2019

They are not for everyone, but there’s no doubt that alcoholic beverages have been part of human culture for as long as there has been human culture. And there’s no reason to think booze won’t follow us across the solar system. Host Mat Kaplan talks with Chris Carberry about his comprehensive and eye-opening book, Alcohol in Space: Past, Present and Future. The December Solstice edition of The Planetary Report has just been published online. Editor-in-chief Emily Lakdawalla provides an enticing overview of its contents. We’ve also got headlines from The Downlink, and a glance at the crowded night sky in What’s Up. Learn more at: https://www.planetary.org/multimedia/planetary-radio/show/2019/1204-2019-chris-carberry-alcohol.htmlSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What? More beer in space? How about cognac? This week on Planetary Radio. Welcome. I'm Matt Kaplan of the Planetary Society, with more of the human adventure across our solar system and beyond. We humans have brought along our spirits, the liquid kind, wherever we have roamed. Chris Carberry says they will follow us across the final frontier. We'll talk with him about his new book called What Else? Alcohol in Space. It's about much more, including the embryonic attempts at space agriculture. You'll be glad to hear Emily Lochte-Wall is back with a brand new edition of the Planetary Report. And we'll have some fun later with the chief scientist.

Bruce Betts has another space trivia quiz have some fun later with the chief scientist. Bruce Fetz has another space trivia quiz in store, along with a meteor shower. We'll open with these sample headlines from the Downlink, presented by Planetary Society Editorial Director Jason Davis. There's no bigger news in this week's Downlink than the decisions made last week about funding for the European Space Agency. ESA will move forward with the HERA mission, a spacecraft that will visit asteroid Didymus in 2026, after it has been smacked by NASA's DART probe. The resulting data will provide invaluable guidance as we work toward the ability to deflect near-Earth objects.

guidance as we work toward the ability to deflect near-Earth objects. That same budget will pay for a Mars rover designed to retrieve the surface samples collected years earlier by NASA's 2020 rover, and then boost them toward a European orbiter that will return them to anxious scientists on Earth. And then there's the Moon. ESA will build two components of the Lunar Gateway, a refueling and communications module, and in collaboration with Japan, a habitat for visiting humans. The agency is also working on a large lunar lander. There's more waiting for you every Friday at planetary.org slash downlink. Here is the Planetary Society Senior Editor and Editor-in-Chief of its magazine, Emily Lakdawalla.

Emily, I have had a preview exposure to the December solstice edition of the Planetary Report. It is outstanding, once again, no less than I expected. And I'm glad that you're here to give us a little overview. Tell us about some of the highlights. Well, the main highlights for this issue are the feature articles we have contributed by Abigail Freeman and Javier Gomez-Elvira on what we learned looking back at the Mars Exploration Rover missions, and then looking forward at what we're going to do with the coming rover missions to further the search for life on Mars. Of course, Abigail is an old favorite of ours,

particularly talking about Spirit and Opportunity, but now she's part of the Curiosity mission, right? Absolutely. Yeah. Abigail, I first met when she was in high school. She was one of my Red Rover Goes to Mars student astronauts. She was lovely then and is lovely today. And I couldn't be prouder of the fact that she is now Deputy Project Scientist for the Mars Exploration Rover Missions. And like you say, very involved with the Curiosity mission. What a success story she has been. Can you tell us something about Javier? It is he who looks to the future of exploration on Mars. That's right. He for some time headed the Centro de Astrobiología in Spain, so the Center for Astrobiology. And astrobiology is obviously the main topic if you're looking for life on Mars. So I asked him in particular to look forward

because ExoMars is a mission that's really hoping to advance the search for life on Mars today with its deep drill. So it has a drill that can get down about two meters beneath the surface. In Javier's article, he explains the different kinds of signs of life, mostly evidence of past life

that we're looking for in the rocks that ExoMars will be able to drill. You've got all the other usual features in the magazine. There's lots more to look forward to. Absolutely. There's a whole lot going on across the solar system. You get that in the where we are feature that I put in. And we also kind of come back to Earth a little bit with Frank Marchese, for instance, about why we explore the solar system and with a neat little image feature on the way that we simulate Pluto in the laboratory here on Earth with Caitlin Ahrens. This edition of the Planetary Report also is sort of a rite of passage, I suppose. I'm not too sad to say that you're going to be moving on. I'm not

sad because of what you'll be returning to. I've helmed the Planetary Report for slightly less than two years. In that time, I've transformed it from the publication it was before. I've added a bunch of cool things, I think, including infographics and some new features featuring the kinds of people involved in space missions. I've changed the way we report the Planetary Society's activities. And I'm really proud of what I did with the magazine. But I found out being an editor wasn't really my bag. I want to write. I desperately want to write and I have not had time. So I am stepping aside from the editorship in order that I can get back to doing what I think I do best, which is to explain science and engineering to the public. And I'll be doing a lot more of that in the Planetary Report and on our website

going forward. I'm not actually completely stepping aside. I'll still be involved in helping to find great authors for the feature articles. I'll still be writing the snapshots from space and working on a couple of the other more educational content features there, but I'll have a lot more time to write from now on. In that case, we'll get the best of both worlds, or considering who we are, the best of all worlds. Thank you, Emily. You're welcome, Matt. That's Emily Lakdawalla, Senior Editor at the Planetary Society, and at least still for the moment, Editor-in-Chief of the Planetary Report, where she has done outstanding work. And you can read that edition, that December solstice edition of the Planetary Report at planetary.org. Of course, our members will be

getting the printed copy. It's the holiday season here in the U.S. and across much of the world. That means our thoughts turn to loved ones, cherished memories, and hope for a better future. ones, cherished memories, and hope for a better future. That future is likely to find some of us in Earth orbit and beyond. Even after nearly 60 years of human space travel, there are huge questions that must be answered if we are to become a spacefaring species. Making or drinking alcoholic beverages in space might not be at the top of many lists, but there is history here, and there are efforts underway that might result in far more than the ability to enjoy a cold one on Mars.

These topics and much more are in the new book by Chris Carberry. Chris is the co-founder and CEO of Explore Mars Incorporated and has written extensively about space topics, but this is his first book. Chris, thanks so much for joining me on Planetary Radio, actually rejoining me because this is far from the first time we've talked. There are all those times we've spoken at the Humans to Mars Summit that you run on behalf of Explore Mars, where you are the CEO. And maybe we'll be able to talk about what's coming up for the 2020 Summit in Washington, D.C. toward the end of today's conversation.

Of course, the major topic is this book that I've enjoyed reading, Alcohol in Space, Past, Present and Future. It's out now from McFarland and Company. I enjoyed it enormously. Thanks for this, Chris. Well, thank you, Matt. It was a lot of fun writing it. An unusual topic, but a very real topic, as you saw. And it's based on a lot of research and a lot of interesting stories and a fascinating number of organizations actually trying to figure out if alcohol can be manufactured in space. ground here. Now, if somebody was just to look at the fairly fanciful cover, which has this astronaut in full EVA regalia holding a frosty glass of something with another one in the

background sidling up to a, it looks like a bar maybe in low Earth orbit. Between these and Andy Weir, author Andy Weir is very entertaining forward. People might think that this is just for laughs, but you clearly did a lot of research putting this together. Absolutely. As you mentioned, yeah, the cover is a bit, you know, comical. But the topic, while I do try to keep it lighthearted, is very real. And it's based on a lot of research. As you may know, actually, I come from a research background.

Actually, I come from a research background. Before my career in space exploration, I actually was a research historian, an archivist, and I did a lot of research helping authors writing biographies and histories. So I put that same sort of discipline into writing this book and trying to get as much firsthand information as possible. And I interviewed probably 50 or 60 experts in various fields, former astronauts, people from the alcohol industry, from the science fiction community, historians, technologists, and people, experts in agriculture as well, trying to put together a large picture to show not only why this is inevitable, there'll be alcohol in space and frankly already has been,

but why it's played such a prominent role in history and why it's likely to move forward. And among those people that you talked to, my boss, the CEO of the Planetary Society, Bill Nye, who I suspect would not refuse a nice glass of Bordeaux or, or some of the libation in space. Yeah, I suspect you're correct there. And I should note, it's very timely with the release in this book because 12 bottles of Bordeaux were launched to ISS just last month for an aging

experiment. So even since the book has come out, they have been additional alcohol-related experiments sent into space. So I'm glad you mentioned Bordeaux. Well, long before humans brought alcohol into space, alcohol was no stranger, was it, to the space between the stars? Yeah, that's very correct. We've discovered large, enormous clouds of ethanol and methanol in space, too far away for us to go. Not likely we could go and collect it and have a drink. But nonetheless, it has already been there, naturally occurring, obviously, for billions and billions of years. Maybe someday somebody will invent a Bussard ramjet to collect alcohol and bottle it in

the deep reaches of space. Maybe. It would be an interesting marketing thing. People are looking for some sort of market in space. If you could find a way of collecting that. I'm not going to hold my breath or my glass. You start with, much more recently, but a history, humanity's history with alcohol that goes back really far. I mean, it's a brief history.

You don't intend it to be exhaustive, but it does show that booze has accompanied us wherever we've gone. And it seems that you expect that it will follow us across the solar system. Well, absolutely. And I thought that chapter was extremely important. Without context, I think the book would be far less effective to show that alcohol has played an integral role in human culture from the very beginning. We have evidence of intentional fermentation way back over 10,000 years. It's been part of human culture. And there are many experts who believe that the desire for an alcoholic beverage actually may have played more of a role in

the development of early agriculture than the actual desire for food. And of course, agriculture was one of the enabling technologies for civilization. But throughout society, it's played a critical role. Not always a good one. There's no question that alcohol is a dark, there's a dark side to alcohol, but sometimes we ignore the very positive things, roles that alcohol has played throughout human civilization, whether it be in diplomacy, to social gatherings, religion, as I mentioned before, agriculture. It's been constantly a part of human culture all through history. And I don't expect that's going to stop once we start exploring space, particularly if we can finally get private sector space exploration or astronauts going into space, private tourists,

or if there are settlers going off to new worlds like the moon or Mars. So an almost certainty that they will actually want to drink, probably smuggle it along with them, but eventually start manufacturing their own alcohol in space. And Andy Weir, who we've already mentioned, wrote the foreword for the book. He says he fully agrees with you. And in fact, his most recent novel, Artemis, there is alcohol in that base on the moon. Oh, it's really a vacation community. Alcohol plays a pretty important part there.

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised that alcohol has been along for the ride almost from the beginning of space travel. Yeah, absolutely. At the beginning of the early part of the space program, alcohol was sent up a number of times as gags. Like, for instance, in Apollo 8, three bottles of brandy was sent up a number of times as gags. Like, for instance, in Apollo 8, three bottles of brandy were sent up. They didn't drink them, but, you know, they were sent up more

as a gag for their holiday meal, as you recall. It was around the Christmas time, holiday season, when Apollo 8 was up there. And, of course, in my book, I note Jim Lovell's bottle, obviously unconsumed, was auctioned off for a large amount. I can't remember off the top of my head what it was auctioned off for. But there are also other occurrences, like this has been a well-documented one. Buzz Aldrin performed a communion ceremony on the surface of the moon and consumed wine as part of it. To my knowledge, this is the only time in human history somebody has consumed wine or any other alcoholic beverage on another planetary body. But even more recently,

I think we've seen tales, we've heard about, heard the rumor about alcohol on the former Mir space station and on the International Space Station. Well, it has occurred. While people say there must be a lot of vodka up on Mir in the past or the Russian section of ISS, that's actually not entirely correct. Not vodka. The preferred drink in space has actually been cognac. And so cognac has been smuggled up over time, not in huge amounts. And this is where I think a lot of the misperceptions have taken place. It has taken place. People do consume alcohol in space,

but usually in small amounts, you know, small little shots hanging in the air, these little orbs of cognac, you know, in the air in microgravity. And I think it's served an interesting role. It's not just the Russians. They have, from the reports I've seen, they occasionally have these little receptions where you get the international crew together for special events, and they all come together and bond. And I actually think it's played an interesting and important diplomatic role to be able to bond the crews, these international crews, in sometimes a challenging situation. I have not encountered one report, and it doesn't mean it hasn't happened,

but I haven't encountered one report of overconsumption, inebriation in space. It sounds like it's all been quite responsible and in such small amounts that would not cause inebriation. More from Chris Carberry about alcohol in space is just ahead. I am very happy to once again welcome back The Great Courses Plus. It's the educational streaming service that makes learning very easy and accessible. And there are thousands of lectures on practically any topic that you can think of. With the best eye, and I am really serious here, I have never taken one of these courses or completed one of these courses that wasn't delivered by an absolutely fantastic professor.

And the one that I want to recommend this week, I've mentioned it before, it's Apollo 11, Lessons for All Time. Not one, four different professors, each of them exploring a different aspect of Apollo 11. It is an absolutely terrific course, and you can listen, you know, whenever it's convenient, your lunch break, at the gym, in the kitchen. They make it so easy to do this because it's all streamed directly to you. You can hear this course for free. Go to thegreatcoursesplus.com slash planetary for access to the full Great Courses Plus library for one month. That's thegreatcoursesplus.com slash planetary. Happy learning. We all know how alcohol can sometimes and maybe frequently lubricate social relationships. I was also, it was very interesting how you revealed how good Russian and other astronauts have gotten at hiding, secreting little packets of alcohol that they can, you know, they're not officially allowed

to bring up into space. But apparently the Russian officials kind of look the other way. I mean, some of them actually think it may be healthy for personally, not just for social lubrication. No, absolutely. While it is formally, officially prohibited within the Russian space program as well, it's not quite as strictly adhered to as it is with NASA. And so, yeah, there are a lot of quotes from various Russian officials and cosmonauts who think it's healthy for them to drink it, primarily just to something to help them relax after a hard day's work. And I don't disagree with that. But as you mentioned, now, I don't disagree with the official prohibition, but I think it has played an interesting, important role. And frankly, a healthy role in some regards. But as for the smuggling, yeah, they've come up with, from what I read,

some rastronauts and cosmonauts are allowed to bring up a certain amount of weight. Their weight carries some things along with them. Well, there were some reports of cosmonauts intentionally losing weight before their launch so they could bring up that amount of weight worth of cognac, you know, or hiding it, you know, in places like hollowed out books or other places like that. One of the places where they also would do this by sticking it in their suits, I deal with this in the book as well, kind of some of the interesting traditions, pre-flight traditions. The Russians have some extremely rigid pre-flight traditions based on what Yuri Gagarin did before his flight. And there's this famous story of Gagarin having to, well, urinate before getting to the rocket,

getting out of the bus and, you know, urinating on the back of the tire of the transport vehicle. So now everybody going up through the Russian space program, they go through this regimented process, get out of the bus, and either urinate on the back of the tire or pretend they're urinating on the back of the tire. That's also a place where a lot of people will, I've heard, occasionally find that opportunity to stick something in their spacesuits. And I will point out that this is not too sexist. The women who are going up on the Soyuz have been known to bring a small container of something that may or may not be urine and splash it against that tire. Well, yeah, I should have mentioned that.

Yeah, this is not just for men. You know, the women go through this tradition as well, but you obviously have to do it in a different way. Well, maybe we'll leave that topic alone for now and not pursue that. But you do have an entire chapter as well about the role of alcohol in science fiction. I just finished rereading a collection of Arthur C. Clarke's short stories. And as you know, there are some very fun ones that are set in this fictitious pub, the White Hart Pub. Yeah, yeah. And you give them honorable mention in this chapter. Yeah, I do. And I'd certainly, I probably missed a lot of, well, I know I missed a lot because I

intentionally did. I can't mention all of them. So people, I probably missed a lot of people's favorite alcohol stories in science fiction. But once again, it's been not, maybe not critical, but a really key part of a lot of different science fiction from practically the beginning, not even practically the beginning of science fiction. Yeah, Jules Verne had it and H.G. Wells talked about it. Moving forward in literature, you know, with Ray Bradbury, Martian Chronicles, there was wine, you know, available and they would make, you know, be able to make it. In television and movies, we certainly see a lot of it, you know, in Star Trek, we all

know about 10 Ford on the Enterprise or Simba Hall. I've had a Romulan ale or two. Hey, Romulan ale is even a science fiction bar, which I mentioned on Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood called the Scum and Villainy Cantina, obviously based on, modeled on the Star Wars bar. And they serve all these different science fiction themed drinks. Long, long story, still long. You know, I just go over this looking at the different television and movies and how all the different science fiction authors have incorporated. They just generally assume it's going to be part of life in the future in space because it's so natural. Such a key part of human civilization is not likely to go away. Sure seems that way.

Let's turn back to the factual side of alcohol in space. turn back to the factual side of alcohol in space. It was just last week we featured the work of this small company in Kentucky called Space Tango. And as you know, because you mentioned them in the book, they are working on many projects, but one of them is with Anheuser-Busch, which so many of us know is the creator of the quote quote, king of beers, unquote. Research that is exploring, if not the creation of beer in space, at least how conditions in space, and especially microgravity, might change the nature of beer's ingredients. And this is happening on the International Space Station.

But they're not alone, are they? No, they're not. As you mentioned, with Anheuser-Busch, Budweiser, they want to be the king of beers on Mars. They actually announced this at South by Southwest in 2017 that they wanted to be the first beer manufacturer on Mars. They have backed this up with actual real research. As you mentioned with Space Tango, they've sent up barley experiments to ISS, but they're not the only ones. Right now, there is still whiskey aging on board ISS through Suntory, the Japanese whiskey maker. They sent a couple of batches up several years ago. One batch came back already. The other is still aging up there. They've been pretty close-lipped.

They haven't been actually expressed too much in results, so we haven't heard much from Suntory. But one company we have heard from was the first company to do an aging experiment for whiskey in space. That was Ardbeg, a Scottish whiskey maker. They sent up a sample in 2011, came back 2015, I believe. And it was a quickly put together experiment. So they concede that. But the difference between the space-flowed one and the sample that was left on the ground was remarkable. It was a lot different. They report that it had kind of an antiseptic taste to it.

It was definitely a lot different than the ground sample. And so they're not sure if that was a result of the actual aging and microgravity or if it had to do with the not so gentle handling. You know, there's a lot of shaking on launching and landing. And so it may have been more a result of that than the actual aging in space. But last I heard, they were planning another experiment, taking all this into account and trying to do a more authentic aging experiment. There are a lot of other companies looking at other aspects as well. As I mentioned, there are the 12 bottles of Bordeaux that were launched up to ISS last month, an aging experiment for wine. There have also been companies not necessarily launching their stuff into space right now,

is not necessarily launching their stuff into space right now, but looking at can you create beverages that you can consume pleasurably in space? And I mean pleasurably because I'm talking about specifically alcoholic beverages that are carbonated. Yes. Carbonated beverages are a challenge in microgravity. As you all know, when you're drinking a carbonated beverage in 1G on the surface of Earth,

the gas rises up and disperses into the atmosphere. Well, it doesn't do that in space. It all goes to the center, congeals in the center, and it does that in your stomach as well. So astronauts who have consumed carbonated beverages have reported stomach cramps and wet burps, which is not a pleasurable drinking experience. There have been beer companies and actually a champagne company looking at this problem. Recently, the champagne company Maison Moum has been creating a champagne or utilizing one of their champagnes, but also created a bottle and a glass to try to dispense the champagne effectively, but also a glass where they could actually drink out of a little champagne glass in microgravity.

They said they wanted to enhance the conviviality of drinking champagne in space and then finding the right balance in their champagne so the carbonation didn't create problems. And they've tested this on the European version of the Vomit Comet. Another company on the beer side that created the beer Bostock, which was a collaborative between an aerospace company and a brewery in Australia, trying to create a beer that would actually have the right balance of carbonation, but also the right taste. Because another problem that they have astronauts have reported in space is their taste buds are impacted. A lot of astronauts feel as though it's like you have a head cold or something.

So it really diminishes your taste sensation. That's why a lot of astronauts like having hot, spicy food or bringing up hot sauce. That's why a lot of astronauts like having hot, spicy food or bringing up hot sauce. So Vostok created a beer utilizing a, using a stout beer with a strong taste, but finding the right balance of carbonation. And they've also tested that on a zero G flight here in the U.S. Trying to find to see if, first off, if you can drink it without feeling sick, but they're also trying to see how human bodies metabolize alcohol in space. But there are also companies working on different sort of glasses. There's a company, they're a group trying to create a scotch glass where you can sip scotch like you do on Earth without it floating out of the glass,

and also one for a cocktail glass. Who wants to drink a cocktail or scotch out of a plastic bag? I wouldn't. You know, really, these little things do make a lot of difference. And this is another area where this technology going into it goes well beyond the need and desire to have a drink and drink it authentically. These companies are looking at all sorts of fluid dynamics. And so this will have uses well beyond whether we can have our scotch or our cocktails

in a more authentic container in space. You know, this touches on, I think it may have been the last comment by Bill Nye that you quoted in the book, because he says it's so hard to tell where R&D is going to take us. Could be that research into space booze could pay off in entirely unexpected and seemingly unrelated ways. I mean, this is pretty much what we've seen, not just across space science, but across science. Yeah, that's absolutely correct. As I've mentioned earlier, this is actually probably the most interesting thing I found in the book and the most fascinating, just in the potential for secondary benefits. Yeah, I certainly want to be able to have a drink if I'm in space. No question. I like a drink, but it's just fascinating. All the innovation,

the technologies, the capabilities that are, well, what these companies are looking at in different organizations, whether it be creating these glasses or figuring out, like for instance, there are lots of groups around the world looking whether you can grow crops in lunar soil or Martian soil, simulated, of course, some of which, some of whom have actually done it for the very purpose to see if you could grow or manufacture beer on Mars, et cetera. So the more that we invest, you know, groups like this are investing in these technologies or looking at questions in a different way that the space program might not look at it. We might answer a lot of questions that might not have been answered or at least answered in the

same way if we had just looked at the same problem in the usual manner. I think this is a great thing, and it's not just alcohol. When more industries can start looking at different problems in space, I think that's only going to help us advance space exploration, space settlement, and create markets that were not there before. And I'm so glad that you went in this direction, particularly mentioning these experiments with space agriculture, because you devote a chapter toward the end of the book to this topic.

And the efforts that you describe, some of them are much farther along than I thought. Are there a couple of these projects that you're most impressed by? I was impressed by a lot of them. I thought this was another essential thing, kind of like the history of alcohol. Basically, it gave, once again, an overview of what's going on, what's happened in space agriculture, what's currently going on, and some speculation moving forward. And there are literally dozens, if not more, experiments going on around the world. There's some up on the International Space Station. There's a European experiment, a satellite. Yeah, the Acropsys mission is really fascinating. It was launched, I believe, in December last year. That's a satellite which

is simulating both lunar and Martian gravity by spinning. And so there's a greenhouse inside, I believe, with tomato seeds. And there are also some synthetic biology experiments on board that came from the United States. So they are experimenting on growing food, growing crops in various gravities. First, I believe the first one is just in microgravity without it spinning. That will go to spin up to one sixth gravity, lunar gravity. Then it'll start spinning a little bit more and go to one-third gravity, simulating Martian gravity. So this will be the first time, really, in this sort of sustainable way that we've been able to grow crops in these simulated gravities.

Very important. Has a lot of ramifications also for other kinds of biology, like our own. In many ways, this chapter about agriculture in space, perhaps because it's almost certain that some form of farming is going to be essential if we're going to both explore Mars and perhaps someday a few people settle there or at least open a research station there, we still know so little about how it might work. Yeah, it's one of these critical technologies we don't talk about as much.

Everybody always loves talking about which launch vehicle we're going to use, which crew vehicle, lander, et cetera. But if we want to create sustainability anywhere off Earth, we need to learn how to grow crops in space. Small scale experiments have been done on ISS and earlier space stations. There are a couple greenhouses up there right now, the Veggie Greenhouse, but also the LADA one, L-A-D-A, that have grown crops like lettuce and similar things like that in small quantities. and similar things like that in small quantities.

But there have also been a lot of experiments here on the surface, experimenting with growing crops in simulated lunar soil and simulated in more so, simulated Martian soil. But as I said, this is simulation. We can create simulations that approximate what the lunar or this Martian soil or regolith is like. For instance, on Mars, we know there are perchlorates in the soil. And so perchlorates are known to be toxic to humans.

Will that be a problem? If you're able to grow a crop inside that, will the actual vegetables or the plants absorb the toxins? So even if they grow, they're not going to be consumable by the crew. It's a good question. And or can we actually get rid of the perchlorates before growing crops in it? In the book, I mentioned a number of people say in the book

that you can get rid of perchlorate by burning it off or washing it off, or there are certain microbes you can bring that'll eat it away. So there are a lot of different questions, but many of these questions we're not going to know for sure until we actually get to Mars or the surface of the moon to see if we can actually grow things, grow crops in the soil. So we have a lot to learn. In your final thoughts in the book, you mentioned several apparent opportunities, including your suggestion that the time may have come for a professional association of some sort. What do you have in mind? Funny, that's going to be announced fairly soon.

Oh, no kidding. Yeah. So there'll be a certain organization probably early in 2020. We will be announcing a new organization focused on this very topic, not just from the more amusing end of just people having simulated space drinks, but looking like in the book, looking at all these key topics, looking at, you know, trying to highlight and help promote some of these companies, alcohol companies, trying to look into experiments, but also looking at the various technologies and capabilities like agriculture. So we'll be announcing something, as I said, hopefully within the next one to two months

on this new organization. Fascinating. Again, congratulations on that, Chris. I'm not surprised seeing this come from the guy who co-founded and is the CEO of the organization Explore Mars. I said that I'd give you a chance to say CEO of the organization Explore Mars. I said that I'd give you a chance to say something about the next Humans to Mars Summit. How's that coming along and when can we expect it? Oh, coming together extremely well. And the 2020 Humans to Mars Summit will be on May 12th through 14th, 2020, obviously, at the National Academy of Sciences building in Washington, D. DC, as it was earlier this year. Beautiful building. I think it definitely worth coming even if just to look at the building,

but I think anybody who's been to our conferences and of course you've been there the last few years, being playing an integral role in that, being our MC in the aisles, interviewing our speakers, we put together an extraordinary program and I expect this upcoming one is going to be the best one yet. We have built up a huge number of new partners. So we're working with a lot of different groups right now with some fascinating topics. And early registration is open right now. And we have some special deals and special incentives going on right now.

If they go to exploremars.org, you'll be able to take a look at how to register. But we expect to have updates on things like the 2020 rover, which is launching next year, and how that mission helps promote human missions to Mars. We'll also have updates on whether, you know, we know the current goal is to get humans back to the moon by 2024 and to Mars by 2033. We'll have mission architects talking about if this goal is feasible, but also really extraordinary STEM education discussions. We're going to have a panel on Mars design, architects working on different potential designs for Mars habitats, diplomacy in space, innovation in space, just a whole range of different topics. And we always have high-level speakers as the last several years, actually from the beginning, we've always had the administrator

of NASA speaking, but a lot of other luminaries as well. So it should be a great event. We hope you can come, but by all means, try to take advantage of the early bird rate, which will be available for the next several weeks. It is a great gathering, definitely one of my favorite highlights of the year, and I sure hope that I can join you again this coming May, Chris. Thank you very much for this, and also for this book, Alcohol in Space. It's great fun. I recommend it. Well, thank you, Matt. It was great being on and I look forward to seeing you at H2M as well. That's Chris Carberry, the CEO of Explore Mars Incorporated and the author of this new book, Alcohol in Space, which is available now from McFarland and Company. I'll be right back with

Bruce Betts and what's up. The Planetary Society is building the ultimate list of life goals for space fans, and we need your help. Hi, I'm Kate Howells, Community Engagement Leader for the Society. What's on your list? The must-see objects in the night sky, the most awe-inspiring destinations, the experiences of a lifetime. Tell us about them at planetary.org slash space goals. We'll share them with your space soulmates around the world. That's planetary.org slash space goals. Thanks. Time for What's Up on Planetary Radio.

Bruce Fetz is the chief scientist of the Planetary Society. He is back for this post-Thanksgiving edition of our segment that brings you the best of the night sky. Welcome. What's up? Yay. I got a bunch of best of the night sky. We'll start with a sad sky note, though. Jupiter dropping out of the evening sky. You still can catch it low in the west in the early evening, but good news, it'll be back in the morning soon. And better news, Venus is getting higher in the evening West, looking super bright. It is approaching Saturn, and they will be hanging out very close to each other, well, pretty close, on December 10th, when after that, Venus will be above Saturn in the evening

West. Morning also busy. Got Mars. Got more friends coming soon. But we got reddish Mars in the east in the pre-dawn. And to its upper right is the blue star Spica. And in the evening sky, we got Orion rising in the early evening now in the east. If you look in the south, the only bright star there in the early evening is Fomalhaut. I'm not sure that's really how you pronounce it, but that's how I pronounce it. Fomalhaut.

Fomalhaut. Oh, wait. And I know I forgot something. The Geminids meteor shower peaks December 13th and 14th, but a full moon at the peak will limit the number of meteors visible. But still, best meteor shower of the year traditionally, but the dimmer meteors will get washed out by the full moon this year. Well, shucks.

But I am happy to hear that Orion is making its annual winter appearance. It's always reassuring to see it up there. It is indeed. We move on to this week in space history. It is indeed. We move on to this week in space history. 1972, Apollo 17 launched the last of the Apollo missions to the moon. 1998, the first two modules were connected, forming the core of the International Space Station. Still overhead and continuously staffed by humans ever since. Actually, since a couple of years after that, since 2000. Ah, okay.

Two modules. Wasn't enough living space. They didn't have power or something, right? They had a bit of a pest problem, and it took them a couple years to get rid of it. Those pests can be really pesky. We move on to random space facts. You should have that taken care of. I'll be seeing someone soon.

The longest single spacewalk in history. So extravehicular activity. Single spacewalk in history. So extravehicular activity. Eight hours and 56 minutes, just shy of nine hours long, during STS-102 for an ISS construction mission in 2001 by NASA astronauts James Voss and Susan Helms. So nine hours, essentially, would be six orbits of the Earth. My gosh.

Yeah, or like three or four meals. Speaking for yourself, of course. Yes. Let's go on to the contest. All right. We asked you, what is the new name for the most distant object visited by a spacecraft as of now? How'd we do, Matt? Really nice response.

Although a lot of interesting opinions about this new name. First, let's get the name from our poet laureate, Dave Fairchild. Arrokoth is now the name on New Horizons' scheme, the farthest object visited by spacecraft we have seen. In Powhatan, it stands for sky, and Alan Stern can say, the inspiration of the world's beyond our own today. Thank you, Dave.

He's right, right? Yes, indeed. Our winner, somebody who's entered many times, long-time listener, but as far as I know, a first-time winner, Dustin Flom of Alexandria, Virginia. Dustin, your answer of Arakoth has won you that Ugin Tribe Light Sail Necklace and Earring Set. Interchangeable images for this necklace and earring with our own Light Sail 2. for this necklace and earring with our own LightSail 2.

You can check them out in the Planetary Society store, which is at chopshopstore.com, along with all of the rest of the great merchandise there. I've got a bunch of other stuff here. Like I said, there were a lot of disagreements over the name. Some people who loved it, some people not so much. This came from Mark Little in Northern Ireland, just quoting Alan Stern, who apparently is very happy with it. Alan, of course, the principal investigator of the New Horizons mission, which visited Arrokoth. The name Arrokoth

reflects the inspiration of looking to the skies and wondering about the stars and worlds beyond our own. That desire to learn is at the heart of the New Horizons mission. We're honored to join with the Pohatan community and people of Maryland in this celebration of discovery. Because I guess the Pohatan people, native peoples, are in that region where the Applied Physics Lab is in Maryland. As we know, the unofficial name of this object for quite a while was Ultima Thule. Anthony Donahue in Charlton, Massachusetts says,

so if we find another Thule floating out there further in space, what happens then? Does poor 486958 Arrokoth become Penultima Thule? Does the new object become Ultima Thule 2, Electric Boogaloo? I see no other alternatives. this is poetry week as well. We got some other entries, poetic entries that I won't read, but here is one. What is Orokoth? It is not star, nor planet, nor comet, nor moon, nor any other part belonging to the inner solar system. Oh, be some other name. What's in a name? That which we call a KBO by any other would be as frigid with apologies to the bard. And finally, this haiku from Sven Newhouse in Germany, as we leave our home pale blue dot in sea of dark,

new marvels abound. Whoa. I know heavy stuff. That's for you, Sven, direct from the chief scientist. Okay. What have you got for next time? What are the names of the first two modules connected to form the core of the International Space Station? We talked about it in the history.

Look back this week in space history. Now tell me what their names were. Go to planetary.org slash radio contest. Come on. You guys can come up with this one, right? You've got until Wednesday, December 11 at 8 a.m. Pacific time. And you might win yourself, oh, we'll say a Planetary Radio t-shirt from shopshopstore.com. But how about a copy of Chris Carberry's book that we talked about today, Alcohol in Space?

Might be yours if you get picked by Random.org and you have the right answer. With that, we're done. All right, everybody. Go out there, look up the night sky, and think about what is your favorite shaped leaf. Thank you. Good night. I guess because we just finished Thanksgiving and it's time to take the big table apart,

my favorite leaf is the rectangular one that goes in the table. He's Bruce Betts, the chief scientist of the Planetary Society, who joins us every week here for What's Up. Planetary Radio is produced by the Planetary Society in Pasadena, California, and is made possible by its members, to whom I raise a glass. Join them at planetary.org slash membership, and I'll toast you.

Mark Hilverde is our associate producer. Josh Doyle composed our theme, which is arranged and performed by Peter Schlosser. I'm Matt Kaplan, Ad Astra.