A singing spaceman, a refugee who wants to beat gravity and a cosmonaut stuck in orbit. Three amazing stories from Outlook.Canadian astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield spent five months living on the International Space Station and won an online audience of millions with his tweets about daily life and his music recordings. Nujeen Mustafa was bo ...…

Governing moon miners, asteroid hunters and space junk sounds pretty tricky, but we better get our act together. This year the majority of space launches included commercial enterprises. Space is no longer just the playground of governments but companies; companies that want to mine the moon for water that they could sell as rocket fuel, compan ...…

If history had been kinder, aviator Wally Funk might have become the first woman on the Moon. In the early 1960s, she was one of 13 female pilots who passed the same physical tests as the Mercury 7 astronauts. Unfortunately her chance never came and no one has walked on the Moon since 1972, after the cancellation of the Apollo space programme. ...…

After 20 years in space, NASA’s Cassini-Huygens mission is coming to an end. But it will go out with one big bang. Launched in 1997 on a billion-mile trek to Saturn, Cassini has transformed our knowledge of the planet, its rings and more than sixty moons. The spacecraft has discovered plumes of water on the moon Enceladus and the European Huyge ...…

Voyager 1 and 2: Still operating after 40 years in the depths of space. Voyager 1 is currently some 20 billion kilometres from Earth travelling at 15.5 kilometres a second. It takes 19 hours for a signal from the spacecraft's 20 watt transmitter to reach home. Voyager 2 is 17 billion kilometres away and will soon leave the Solar System. Launche ...…

Extra-terrestrials or other signs of life - is there anybody beyond planet Earth? Are we alone in space? It wasn’t until the late 1960s that humans started an organised, systematic hunt for intelligent life. We have listened to radio waves, peered through the celestial dust and beamed The Beatles to distant planets. So how’s it going? Is there ...…

The plans to set up human colonies in space and spaceships that will take us to the stars. Richard Hollingham travels to the Tennessee Valley Interstellar Workshop in Chattanooga, Tennessee to meet scientists, engineers, doctors and anthropologists who are working on it.These are not dreamers - although they all have an ambitious dream - but we ...…

The official space agencies and programmes on the continent of Africa. Space scientist Maggie Aderin-Pocock visits Nigeria, her father's birthplace, and asks why African nations are apparently so keen to journey into the future as a space-going continent. She finds people there are excited about space exploration and discovers her roots in a to ...…

Why African nations are so keen to journey into the future as a space-going continent. Space scientist Maggie Aderin-Pocock visits Nigeria, the birthplace of her father, to explore the passionate desire among some to fly against the continent’s impoverished stereotype and join the space race. And, what of the financial commitment required to ac ...…

Nasa is planning a manned mission to Mars. But the challenges are enormous. Astronaut Scott Kelly has just returned to Earth after almost a year in space aboard the International Space Station. His mission was to understand what a long period in zero gravity does to the human body. The research is a vital part of preparing to send a manned miss ...…

The first footsteps on the Moon were one giant step for 'man', but from the early days of aeronautics women have also been involved in space travel. Presenter, pilot and aspiring astronaut Wally Funk pays tribute to the pioneers, meets some of those involved within today’s space industry, and hears from the woman who might be among the crew for ...…

On Christmas Day 2003, a British space craft was due to land on Mars and begin searching for signs of life. The late Professor Colin Pillinger describes the daring mission. Originally broadcast December 2015.

What does the future hold for human space exploration? With more countries getting involved and costs falling, ambitious projects are being proposed. Broadcast December 2015.

Mountains straight out of Tolkien, catastrophic floods and streams gushing with boiling and freezing water. Kevin Fong tours Mars. Originally broadcast 29 April 2013.

Kevin Fong visits landscapes that inspire scientists and artists to imagine, including volcanoes that dwarf Everest and extreme canyons. Originally broadcast 22 April 2013.

In 1979, the American space station, Skylab, re-entered the Earth's atmosphere. Large fragments hit SW Australia instead of the Indian Ocean. Originally broadcast 11 July 2013.

How science, engineering and medicine come together to get fragile human life safely into space. Where should our ambitions lie? Originally broadcast 31 December 2015.

How science, engineering and medicine are trying to understand the limits of human physiology to ensure survival in space. Originally broadcast 30 December 2015.

Commander Chris Hadfield, former commander of the International Space Station, chooses the eight discs he would take to a desert island. Originally broadcast 20 December 2015.

In 1970, three American astronauts were heading to the moon when disaster struck. Astronaut Fred Haise describes what happened. Originally broadcast 14 April 2010.

Why has the moon fascinated humans for so long? The moon in culture, how it affects life on Earth and what the moon is really like. Originally broadcast 21 July 2014.

A discussion on how our understanding of space has been forged both by art, film, music and science. Originally broadcast 22 December 2015.

What would it take to grow food extra-terrestrially? We explore the science that is being developed to grow food in space. Originally broadcast 8 November 2015

Take a sonic tour of the universe - this time, deep into the cosmos. Some sounds are recorded sound, others are data that have been sonified. Originally broadcast 7 July 2015.

Salute Soviet Cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova. In June 1963, she boarded Vostok 6 at Baikonur cosmodrome and went into orbit. Originally broadcast 21 June, 2013.

In 1990 the Hubble Telescope was launched into space, but the first pictures it sent back to earth were out of focus. Originally broadcast 23 April 2010.

War in space is not just Hollywood fantasy - it's a fast-approaching threat. Military minds believe wars will be fought on Earth - and above it. Broadcast on 19 December 2015.

The previously silent world of outer space is getting noisier. Listen in to sounds recorded on board spacecraft and sonifications of space data. Originally broadcast 30 June 2015.

The skin suit that combats the effects of microgravity, pushing human physiology and psychology to the limit, and the 'Overview' effect.Originally broadcast on 16 December 2015

Saturn’s moon Enceladus has giant geysers blasting water into space at supersonic speeds. Does it also harbour life beneath its crust? Originally broadcast on 14 Dec 2016.

The actor who plays the galaxy's most famous protocol droid remembers filming the first Star Wars movie in the mid-1970s. Originally broadcast 17 December 2015.

For the first time, America sends two monkeys into space and brings them back alive. It's a watershed moment for the US space agency, Nasa. Originally broadcast on 22 May, 2012.

Astronaut Luca Parmitano was performing maintenance on the International Space Station when he noticed water leaking into his helmet. Originally broadcast on 14 Dec 2015.

Astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti - back on Earth after 200 days in space - recalls life at the International Space Station.

Ben Hammersley meets creators and fans to investigate how extended fictional universes, from Harry Potter to Game of Thrones, took over global culture.