To check out all the Launch Pad posts so far, visit this link.

In response to a question from Ian Randal Strock, Mike Brotherton sent us this youtube video on the Origins of the Moon:

Last night, when Kevin R. Grazier’s lecture on the solar system and the cassini probe lasted three hours, an extra hour more than scheduled, Carrie Vaughn noted, “Back when I was in second grade, in the astronomy text book I loved so much, that whole lecture could only have lasted fifteen minutes. That’s how much more we know now.”

Which is pretty cool.