The Art of Space

With Good Reason

As a visual effects artist for movies like Star Wars, Watchmen, and Jurassic Park, Matt Wallin (Virginia Commonwealth University) has built his career on melding art with science. At the prestigious MARS conference, hosted by Jeff Bezos, he spoke about how the arts inspire science and drive innovation. And: In the blockbuster hit, The Martian, Matt Damon escapes Mars by using a spacecraft based on real-life technology created years ago by Bob Ash (Old Dominion University). Now a smaller version of that same design, called MOXIE, is going to Mars in 2020. Later in the show: In his book Exoplanets: Diamond Worlds, Super Earths, Pulsar Planets, and the New Search for Life Beyond Our Solar System, astronomy professor and NASA scientist Michael Summers shares the latest research on planets beyond this solar system. Plus: What happens when science is brought to the stage? Denise Gillman directs plays that explore science themes and has created an online catalogue of science plays which includes: The Five Hysterical Girls Theorem, The Flue Ball, The Einstein Project, and Radiance: The Passion of Marie Curie.