Br. Robert Macke is a Jesuit Astronomer at the Vatican Observatory and Curator of the Vatican Meteorite Collection. Br. Bob is the world expert on measuring physical properties of meteorites, including density, porosity, magnetic susceptibility, and thermal properties. He has been at the forefront of developing new methods, and improving old ones, to characterize meteorites and even lunar samples from the Apollo missions. For his expertise in meteorites, Br. Bob was recruited to NASA’s OSIRIS-REx, the first U.S. mission to collect a sample from an asteroid and return to Earth. The target was a near-Earth asteroid named Bennu, which is believed to contain evidence of the early history of our solar system, and possibly precursors to life on Earth. The OSIRIS-REx spacecraft recently returned home, and Br. Bob is gearing up to study the collected specimens. In this interview we talk about his work at the Vatican Observatory as well as the currently unfolding projects at NASA to study the Bennu samples. We learned a lot about meteorites and why they are important artifacts in studying the history of our planet, so we hope you enjoy this episode.
To learn more about Br. Bob’s work at the Vatican Observatory, you can check out his Youtube Channel @MackeMakerSpace.
Title music: World Is Holding Hands by WinnieTheMoog
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