BBC Inside Science examines whether life could exist beyond Earth and questions the traditional focus on the “Goldilocks zone”, where planets are neither too hot nor too cold. The discussion matters because discoveries about life in extreme environments on Earth may broaden how scientists search for possible alien organisms.

Recorded before a live audience at the Cheltenham Science Festival, the programme features MIT planetary scientist Sara Seager discussing the possibility of life in Venus’s clouds, above temperatures of up to 500°C and sulphuric-acid rain at the surface. Astrobiologist Lewis Dartnell explains how extremophiles on Earth challenge assumptions about habitable conditions, while the episode also considers missions searching for life on Mars.