While it may not be simple or easy, these fascinating talks make aerospace engineering a little more accessible to the average person.

A manned mission to Mars has long captivated our collective imagination. Perhaps the most significant obstacle to achieving this mission is fueling a craft to and from Mars. Erika Debenedictis offers some compelling theories on how we can make it happen.

The answer is satellites, stars, planets, asteroids and maybe even aliens.

Long before we had rocket scientists, the idea of spaceflight traveled from mind to mind across generations. With great visuals, TED Fellow and NASA economist Alexander MacDonald shows how 300 years of sci-fi tales -- from Edgar Allan Poe to Jules Verne to H.G. Wells and beyond -- sparked a culture of space exploration. A fascinating look at how...

Our lives depend on a world we can't see: the satellite infrastructure we use every day for information, entertainment, communication and so much more. But Earth orbit isn't a limitless resource, and the problem of space debris will get worse without a significant change to our behavior. Natalie Panek challenges us to consider the environmental ...

What's up at SpaceX? Engineer Gwynne Shotwell was employee number seven at Elon Musk's pioneering aerospace company and is now its president. In conversation with TED curator Chris Anderson, she discusses SpaceX's race to put people into orbit and the organization's next big project, the BFR (ask her what it stands for). The new giant rocket is ...

Planet Krypton's leading scientific genius, Jor-El invented a widely used hovercraft and discovered a parallel world called the Phantom Zone.

Author George Dyson spins the story of Project Orion, a massive, nuclear-powered spacecraft that could have taken us to Saturn in five years. His insider’s perspective and a secret cache of documents bring an Atomic Age dream to life.

Ed Yong blogs with a mission: to ignite excitement for science in everyone, regardless of their education or background.

Moneyman Steve Jurvetson takes TEDsters inside his awesome hobby -- launching model rockets –- by sharing some gorgeous photos, his infectious glee and just a whiff of danger.

In May of 1945 the Third Reich was in chaos. Adolf Hitler was dead and German surrender was imminent. But while World War II was almost over, a new war was brewing. And the US was eager to recruit the smartest minds in Germany before the Soviets got the chance— regardless of their affiliation with the Nazis. This became known as Operation Paperc...

Every minute, 400 pounds of hydrogen and almost 7 pounds of helium escape from Earth's atmosphere into outer space. Astrophysicist Anjali Tripathi studies the phenomenon of atmospheric escape, and in this fascinating and accessible talk, she considers how this process might one day (a few billion years from now) turn our blue planet red.

Anjali Tripathi explores planets to uncover the processes that make and destroy them.

In this passionate talk, legendary spacecraft designer Burt Rutan lambasts the US government-funded space program for stagnating and asks entrepreneurs to pick up where NASA has left off.

In 2018, science writer Nathalia Holt wrote "Rise of the Rocket Girls," a riveting account of the women mathematicians who played a key role in launching America's space program in the 1950s. In this talk, she translates her historical research into evidence of the need for modern STEM workplace reform, sharing actionable lessons on how to recru...

As manager of the Rosetta mission, Fred Jansen was responsible for the successful 2014 landing of a probe on the comet known as 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. In this fascinating and funny talk, Jansen reveals some of the intricate calculations that went into landing the Philae probe on a comet 500 million kilometers from Earth -- and shares some in...

In 1961, Yuri Gagarin piloted a spacecraft in humanity's first manned space flight. A week later, Bell Aerosystems debuted a gas-powered rocket pack that could fly 35 meters in 13 seconds. Unfortunately, engineers knew this short flight was all the rocket pack could muster. So why was a massive spacecraft easier to send flying than a single pilo...

About this event: Reigniting is a spark, a catalytic chain reaction that incites new ideas and curiosity and potential. Reigniting enlivens, invigorates, inspires. Reigniting connects people through ideas. TEDxHuntsville 2012 will feature big data, rocket science, psychology, beer brewing, UAVs, startup culture and stories by people who have reignited their lives...

It sounds like science fiction, but journalist Stephen Petranek considers it fact: within 20 years, humans will live on Mars. In this provocative talk, Petranek makes the case that humans will become a spacefaring species and describes in fascinating detail how we'll make Mars our next home. "Humans will survive no matter what happens on Earth,"...

About this event: Join us this year at the beautiful, cozy Oglethorpe Auditorium at the Savannah International Trade & Convention Center. Fifteen speakers will engage your mind and enlighten your soul as they share talks ranging from rocket science and art, computer coding for 50 million, the success and legal issues around ancestry and adoption, becoming a J...

TED Fellow Moriba Jah studies and predicts the motion of objects in space in an effort to make space safe, secure and sustainable.

Each week, TEDx chooses four of our favorite talks, highlighting just a few of the enlightening speakers from the TEDx community, and its diverse constellation of ideas worth spreading. Below, give this week’s talks a listen. Fighting Duchenne muscular dystrophy: Dr. Benjy Seckler at TEDxBerkshires Potential medicines, especially for rare g...

SpaceX's Starship launch vehicle has the potential to explore the solar system in a bold, new -- and supersized -- way. Planetary scientist Jennifer Heldmann talks about how reusable, large-scale spacecraft like Starship could help humanity achieve its next galactic leaps and usher in a new era of space exploration, from investigating the solar ...

Joel Levine studies the atmospheres of Earth and Mars, looking at their origin, evolution, structure and chemistry and climate change. He's the principal investigator of the proposed ARES Mars Airplane Mission.

"What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?" asks Regina Dugan, then director of DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. In this breathtaking talk she describes some of the extraordinary projects -- a robotic hummingbird, a prosthetic arm controlled by thought, and, well, the internet -- that her agency has create...

Taylor Wilson has been called “The Boy Who Played With Fusion” by Popular Science magazine. At age 9, Wilson stunned tour guides at the U.S. Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, with his complex understanding of rocket science. At 12, he set out to make a “star in a jar.” By 14, Wilson had become the youngest person to achieve nuc...

Karen E. Willcox is director of the Oden Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences at The University of Texas at Austin.

This summer, the country that perfected soccer proved it’s just as formidable a foe off the pitch as it is on. On the first day of the 2014 World Cup, 29-year-old Juliano Pinto, paralyzed from his chest to his toes, did the seemingly impossible: He gave the opening kick just by thinking. Eighteen months earlier, Brazilian neuroscientist M...

Biochemist Kary Mullis talks about the basis of modern science: the experiment. Sharing tales from the 17th century and from his own backyard-rocketry days, Mullis celebrates the curiosity, inspiration and rigor of good science in all its forms.