{"podcast":{"title":"PBS Space Time","slug":"pbs-space-time-7778773","podcast_index_feed_id":7778773,"rss_url":"https://feeds.megaphone.fm/VG4094887262","website_url":null,"image_url":"https://megaphone.imgix.net/podcasts/f982ec76-1991-11f1-8531-1763dcadb313/image/9a88c1c5ae91e65f64e0c1324090ebb9.png?ixlib=rails-4.3.1&max-w=3000&max-h=3000&fit=crop&auto=format,compress","author":"PBS","episode_count":188,"summary":"Space Time explores the outer reaches of space, the craziness of astrophysics, the possibilities of sci-fi, and anything else you can think of beyond Planet Earth with our astrophysicist host: Matthew O’Dowd. For all business inquiries and sponsorship opportunities please reach out to: pbsspacetime@lighthouseagents.com Matt O'Dowd spends his time studying the universe, especially really far-away things like quasars, super-massive black holes, and evolving galaxies. He uses telescopes in space to do it. Matt completed his Ph.D. at NASA's Space Telescope Science Institute, followed by work at the University of Melbourne and Columbia University. He's now a professor at the City University of New York's Lehman College and an Associate at the American Museum of Natural History's Hayden Planetarium. Previous host Gabe Perez-Giz is an astrophysicist who studies black hole physics. He received his Ph.D. from Columbia University and also hosted PBS Infinite Series. patreon.com/pbsspacetime","last_synced_at":"2026-07-24T02:17:15.545680+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/pbs-space-time-7778773"},"episode":{"title":"What If Alien Life Ran on Silicon?","slug":"what-if-alien-life-were-silicon-composed","published_at":"2026-07-22T06:30:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/pbs-space-time-7778773/what-if-alien-life-were-silicon-composed","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/pbs-space-time-7778773","url":"https://traffic.megaphone.fm/VG7491918600.mp3","audio_url":"https://traffic.megaphone.fm/VG7491918600.mp3","summary":"Thank you to Brilliant for Supporting PBS. To learn more go to https://brilliant.org/SpaceTime/ PBS Member Stations rely on viewers like you. To support your local station, go to:http://to.pbs.org/DonateSPACE Sign Up on Patreon to get access to the Space Time Discord! https://www.patreon.com/pbsspacetime Life as we know it is carbon-based, but does it have to be this way? There’s another element on the periodic table that shares some of the key properties of carbon but is far more abundant on most planets. I’m talking about silicon. So is there silicon-based life out there? Check out the Space Time Merch Store https://www.pbsspacetime.com/shop Sign up for the mailing list to get episode notifications and hear special announcements! https://mailchi.mp/1a6eb8f2717d/spacetime Search the Entire Space Time Library Here: https://search.pbsspacetime.com/ Hosted by Matt O'Dowd Written by Fernando Franco Félix & Matt O'Dowd Post Production by Leonardo Scholzer, Yago Ballarini & Stephanie Faria Directed by Andrew Kornhaber Associate Producer: Bahar Gholipour Executive Producers: Eric Brown & Andrew Kornhaber Executive in Charge for PBS: Maribel Lopez Director of Programming for PBS: Gabrielle Ewing Assistant Director of Programming for PBS: John Campbell Spacetime is produced by Kornhaber Brown for PBS Digital Studios. This program is produced by Kornhaber Brown, which is solely responsible for its content. © 2023 PBS. All rights reserved. End Credits Music by J.R.S. Schattenberg: https://www.youtube.com/user/MultiDroideka Space Time was made possible in part by Our Patreon Supporters Big Bang Supporters Tim O’Rourke Steffen Bendel Bryce Fort Peter Barrett David Neumann Leo Koguan Sean Maddox Alexander Tamas Morgan Hough Juan Benet Vinnie Falco Fabrice Eap Mark Rosenthal Quasar…","meta_description":"Thank you to Brilliant for Supporting PBS. To learn more go to https://brilliant.org/SpaceTime/ PBS Member Stations rely on viewers like you. To support y…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":1781,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/pbs-space-time-7778773/episodes/what-if-alien-life-were-silicon-composed/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/pbs-space-time-7778773/what-if-alien-life-were-silicon-composed.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}