The last chance for anyone living to witness one of the rarest, and most spectacular, astronomical events, a Transit of Venus, takes place next week.

The Today programme's Tom Feilden reports on how the two transits that took place in the middle of the 18th century helped shape today's scientific exploration.

Historian and author of Chasing Venus, Andrea Wulf, told Tom Feilden that "this is the foundation almost of modern science as we understand it".

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