Live at the planetary defense conference this week on planetary radio. and this week to Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Arizona.

I'm at Kaplan of the Planetary Society

and last week I joined Bill Nye, Bruce Betts, and several hundred scientists

at the PDC, the biannual Planetary Defense Conference.

Today will begin two weeks of special coverage, beginning with excerpts of a panel discussion

I moderated in front of nearly 1,000

rabid fans of planetary science and Bill Nye. The hardest part of

creating our show each week is deciding what to leave out.

It was an especially difficult task this time, since I only have time to share about a quarter

of the outstanding discussion with Bill and four passionate scientists. You can hear and see much more, almost the

entire evening at planetary.org.

radio. We videotaped the event, which included not just the panel but special presentations by both Bill Nye and Jeffrey Notkin of the great meteorite men reality show on the science channel.

Our own Bruce Betts hosted the night and Bruce

announced the latest winners of Shoemaker and Near Earth Object grants from the

Planetary Society. You'll hear Bruce and me with an on-stage version of What's Up in a few minutes.

We weren't the only people on the road.

Let's check in with planetary evangelist Emily Lockdawala.

As you'll hear, we can only connect with Emily by cell phone this time.

Emily, I think we've caught you on your plane as it's just about to leave New York City.

Tell us about this press conference that you hosted this morning in New York?

Well, it's a group of dreamers who call themselves the Mars One Project.

They think they're going to get humans to land on Mars in 2023.

...