Apart from the Earth, our solar system hosts a bunch of other rocky planets and planetary bodies. Some—like Venus—have a similar size and composition to the Earth, others—like Mars—are smaller. None of them exhibits active ocean-plate tectonics like the Earth does.

Here, we bring you face-to-face with Prof. Tilman Spohn from the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) in Germany. Tilman is a retired planetary scientist with an educational background in Geodynamics and a former Executive Director of ISSI.

Listen to Tilman as he talks about how he started his career, gives an overview over some of the exiting rocky planetary bodies and how we can and will better understand them, and whether he would actually fly to Mars—if he could.