Running Out of Matter with Michelle Thaller

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (0:00)
Chuck, we finally got Michelle Thaller on StarTalk, a friend, a colleague and science educator. We love these folk.

**Chuck Nice** (0:08)
Oh, yeah.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (0:09)
She's fun. She's got the energy that we all want and seek of someone who's enthusiastic about the moving frontier of the universe.

**Chuck Nice** (0:17)
The energy of a neutron star in the compact form of an astrophysicist.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (0:24)
Ooh.

**Chuck Nice** (0:25)
That came out of the show. I got that from the show we just did.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (0:29)
That's the highest compliment I've ever heard anyone get who's an astrophysicist coming right up on StarTalk. Welcome to StarTalk, your place in the universe where science and pop culture collide. StarTalk begins right now.
This is StarTalk. Neil deGrasse Tyson, your personal astrophysicist. Got with me, Chuck Nice. How you doing, man?

**Chuck Nice** (0:56)
What's up, Neil?

**Michelle Thaller** (0:58)
All right.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (0:58)
We're doing Cosmic Queries today.

**Chuck Nice** (1:00)
Yes, we are.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (1:02)
With an old friend and colleague, Michelle Thaller. Michelle, welcome to StarTalk.

**Michelle Thaller** (1:10)
It is wonderful to be here. Great to be talking to you guys.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (1:13)
Yeah. So you're not only a fellow astrophysicist, you're a fellow science communicator. And we love that species of scientists.
You are recently of NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. But the last time you weren't recently of it, you were of it. So how recently have you no longer been part of them?

**Michelle Thaller** (1:37)
Yeah, retired in October. I think it was October 2024
So yeah, so I've been retired for a couple of years. I've been doing speaking. I've been doing a lot of lecturing with Smithsonian Journeys. That's been a lot of fun.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (1:50)
I know them, yes.

**Michelle Thaller** (1:52)
Yeah, just having fun being a freelance astrophysicist. There you go.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (1:56)
Nice. Astrophysicist at large.

**Chuck Nice** (1:59)
We got a personal astrophysicist and a freelance astrophysicist.

**Michelle Thaller** (2:05)
We can talk about whatever you want. I'm not working for anybody. So total on this here.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (2:09)
I'm not working for anybody. I like that. But let me just finish up with your CV here. You were research scientist with the Spitzer Space Telescope, one of the big, what do they call them, the grand...

**Michelle Thaller** (2:21)
The Great Observatories, yes.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (2:23)
Great Observatories. And that one was a band of the spectrum that Hubble did not cover. So that was infrared, right? The Spitzer Telescope.
Could you straighten us out here? Locally, we have the Goddard Institute for Space Studies who lost their lease with Columbia as it was removed by the White House. But that has the word Goddard in it. And then we have the Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland. They're both NASA. Could you just help us distinguish the two?

**Michelle Thaller** (2:50)
Well, yes. So the Goddard Institute for Space Studies has, for a long, long time, been the center for NASA, basically Earth science, climate science.
And so that was the thing. So they had a very close link to Columbia University. Columbia University leased this building to them. Famously, it's the building that, if you remember Seinfeld, the sitcom Seinfeld, is the cafe. That's that building. Yeah, that's right, the diner's in that building.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (3:15)
It just says restaurant on the front.

**Michelle Thaller** (3:16)
Yeah, absolutely.

**Chuck Nice** (3:17)
It's the greatest name for any eatery ever. It's just a diner.

**Michelle Thaller** (3:22)
Yeah, yeah.
So, I mean, absolute heroes of mine work there. I mean, these are the people that are doing, they're in the middle of Antarctica, ground-truthing measurements from satellites. They're making sure we understand what's going on with the atmosphere and the oceans and all of that.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (3:37)
You could say it, Michelle, you could say, they're doing God's work. You could say that.

**Michelle Thaller** (3:40)
They're doing God's work, yeah.

**Chuck Nice** (3:42)
Goddard's work.

**Michelle Thaller** (3:43)
Goddard's work. Doing Goddard's work.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (3:46)
Goddard's work. Okay, go on. Absolutely.

**Michelle Thaller** (3:49)
No, true heroes of mine. And yeah, it's been rough. It's been a rough couple of years for them.

**Neil deGrasse Tyson** (3:55)
Yeah, in fact, at the museum, we have a few refugees that have taken pitch tent within our facility, because we're just down the street a couple of miles from GISS, Goddard Institute for Space Studies, but they're homeless at this point. They're still all paid as scientists, but they're homeless. But it has the name Goddard in it, yet so did the Space Flight Center. So now we go to Maryland, and what happens there?