The spiders on Mars have been recreated in the lab.

This week on Planetary Radio.

I'm Sarah Al-Ahmad of the Planetary Society, with more of the human adventure across our solar system and beyond.

Nerdy question, but have you ever wondered what created the Martian or Oroniform

terrain or what some people like to call the spiders of Mars?

I know I have.

Lauren McKeown, a postdoctoral fellow at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, joins us to discuss

her experiences recreating this otherworldly geology in miniature

in the lab. But first, we'll give you an update on our recent collaboration with Radio Lab

and the International Astronomical Union. Latif Nasser, who's the co-host of Radio Lab, will

let you know how you can cast your vote to name a quasi-moon of Earth. Then Then Bruce Betts, our chief scientist, joins us for a look at a different type of seasonal

feature on Mars, recurring slope lineae, those pesky RSLs.

And just in case you're in a last-minute shopping flurry right now, I'll leave a link to

the Planetary Society's 2024 space gift guide on this episode page for Planetary Radio.

We've got some wonderful things for purchase there for the space fans in your life, but also

free links to cool space posters and the new NASA Tabletop RPG. That way you can print them

and make the holiday season extra spacey. If you love planetary radio and want to stay informed

about the latest space discoveries, make sure you hit that subscribe button on your favorite

podcasting platform. By subscribing, you'll never miss an episode filled with new and awe-inspiring

ways to know the cosmos and our place within it. In April 2024, I met Latif Nasser, the co-host of Radio Lab. Their podcast

uses investigative journalism to answer questions about deep topics, some of which are space-related.

My friendship with Latif began when a typo on a space poster in his child's bedroom led him

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