Blueshift - June 30, 2009: Astronomical Data's Long Road Home

It's easy to think of a satellite as a fancy digital camera - just point, shoot, and look at the pretty picture that emerges. But it's not that simple. Astronomical data has a far longer journey to make it from the satellite to end users. Bounced between satellites, sent to Earth, processed, networked, and archived... each observation has to pass through several steps before it can be analyzed by scientists. And that's not even considering the further effort required to make a pretty picture! This episode follows data from NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope on its odyssey from space to Earth, interviewing key personnel along the way.