Exploring the Night Sky and Beyond | S02E54

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Good day everybody, and welcome to
the Astronomy Daily podcast. Day the podcast

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will be your whole pome Now as
usual, I have Halle here in the

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studio with me. But before we
go over to Halle, I found an

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interesting local story here in the Rasad
that I believe deserves a bit of coverage,

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so here we go. A new
dark Sky Discovery hub has opened at

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a Somerset beauty spot. The new
hub is located at Wimball Lake, within

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Europe's first international Dark Sky remove is
a designated Dark Sky Discovery Suite. The

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project was made possible thanks to generous
thunding from Exmoor National Park Authority, Hinckley

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Tourism Action Partnership and local supporters.
The new hub has been built on grassland

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overlooking the lake. The structure has
low seating design for stargazers to lean back

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and experience views out over the lake
and the starry skies above, with a

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circular flat patio style platform in front
for the use of telescopes. The new

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facility open to its first visitors during
Xmore Dark Skies Festival. Neil Reeves from

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the Southwest Lake said looking out over
the lakes at night is a magical experience.

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We delighted that visitors can now use
this facility to rest, gaze upwards

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and watch the planets, spot constellations
or shooting stars. It's also a great

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location for astrophotography and to learn about
national wildlife oh sorry, nocturnal wildlife.

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We'll be developing a series of inspiring
and educational events to take place all year,

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and we're grateful for funding support from
Xmore National Park Authority and the Somerset

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Council through the Hintley Tourism Action Partnership
to help us develop the hub. It's

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a fantastic addition to the activities on
offer at the lake and for those staying

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at our campsite. The lake,
which is managed by environmental and recreational charity

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Southwest Lakes, attracted two hundred thousand
visitors every year, with both local residents

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and tourists visiting for on water activities, walking, cycling, angling and experiencing

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the great outdoors on the moor.
Facilities include ample outdoor space and parking,

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activity centre, cafe, campsite,
toilets and play area. Importantly, the

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lake and its surrounding land also provide
for a variety of wildlife and habitats.

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Katrina Monroe from the Exmoor National Park
Authority said, we delighted that this facility

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increases the opportunities for visitors and residents
to appreciate our dark skies. This will

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be our third Dark Sky Discovery Hub, joining those at North Maulton and Exford.

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Each herb is unique, offering different
opportunities to discover more. Along with

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our Dark Sky Discovery Trail, accredited
Dark Sky Friendly businesses and the annual Xmore

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Dark Skies Festival, everyone can now
enjoy our dark skies all year round,

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whether it's simply looking up and appreciating
the wonders of the staff filled sky,

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or learning more about the universe from
a stargazing guide. This is one of

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the special qualities of Xmore and something
to be celebrated. Now over to Halle

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for our Stories of the week.
Hi Tim, Here are my stories of

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the week. NASA's James Webspace Telescope
has helped astronomers determine the distance to nearly

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two hundred galaxies and galaxy clusters formed
in the universe's early days. One of

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the first publicly released images from the
James Webspace Telescope JWST or web release on

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July eleventh, twenty twenty two,
captured at least seven thousand galaxies in a

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sparkling deep field view. The image
is a rich hunting ground for astronomers seeking

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to learn more about how galaxies change
over time. A new Canadian led study

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is the first to measure galactic distances
in the image, showing huge collections of

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stars as far as ten billion light
years away from Earth. The universe itself

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is about thirteen point seven billion years
old. The clusters represent ideal targets for

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future studies to better understand how galaxies
and the clusters they inhabit have evolved.

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Research team members stated in a University
of Montreal press release from October thirty first,

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never before has a telescope been able
to create such razor sharp astronomical images

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across such a large patch of the
sky. On Tuesday, November seventh,

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ESA will release the first full color
images captured by its recently launched Euclid space

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telescope. These images form part of
the mission's early release observations, where Euclid

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was tasked with scrutinize using a set
of celestial targets chosen for their public appeal

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and scientific value. The five images
are full of cosmic secrets waiting to be

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revealed, and this is just the
beginning. During its six year mission,

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EUCLID will generate the equivalent of a
million DVDs of data. These detta will

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be used to create the biggest ever
three D map of the universe and uncover

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the secrets of dark matter and dark
energy. Watch the reveal of the images

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live through ESA web TV or YouTube
on seven November thirteen, fifteen Greenwich meantime

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fourteen fifteen Central European time. At
the same time, an ESA press release

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including all images will be published at
esay and slash EUCLID. Miss England took

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the controls of Boeing's new astronaut spaceship
simulator style Jessica Goggin crowned Miss England earlier

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this year, stopped by the Boeing
made Starliner simulator at NASA's Kennedy Space Center

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in Orlando. Boeing officials posted to
x formerly Twitter. Starliner is aiming to

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bring an astronaut crew on a test
mission to the International Space Station ISS no

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earlier than April twenty twenty four,
following several years of engineering delays. The

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tweet included a shout out to NASA
astronaut Sunny Williams, who will pilot the

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Boeing crew flight test of Starliner in
twenty twenty four alongside NASA Commander Barry Butch

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Wilmore. We think you might have
a new trainee, the post added,

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addressed to Williams. Just so you
know, folks, Jessica Goggin is an

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aerospace engineer. You go girl.
NASA's Office of the Inspector General OIG has

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issued its annual report for twenty twenty
three, highlighting the challenges that lie ahead

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for the US Space agency. The
report recognizes innovations made by NASA since its

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creation in nineteen fifty eight that have
made it a global space science leader,

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including programs such as Apollo, the
Space Shuttle, the James Webb Space Telescope

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JWST, and emerging technologies for sustainable
aviation. It also highlights substantial cost growth

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and lengthy scheduled delays as issue use
that continue to impact NASA programs ranging from

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spaceflight to major science and exploratory programs. A major factor in the OIG report

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is the planned return of humans to
the Moon as part of the Artemis program.

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And it also points to the forthcoming
retirement of the International Space Station ISS

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at the end of the decade and
the challenge this poses to NASA as it

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seeks to maintain an active human presence
in Low Earth orbit. The report is

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broken down into seven different challenges that
the OIG has identified as top challenges in

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relation to NASA's overall mission. NASA
Inspector General Paul kage Martin wrote in the

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report, these seven highlighted challenges are
not the only significant issues that confront NASA,

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and identification of an issue as a
top challenge does not denote a lack

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of attention on the agency's part.
Rather, most of these issues are long

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standing, difficult challenges central to NASA's
core missions and likely will remain top challenges

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for years to come. A team
of astronomers and astrophysicists affiliated with several instants

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tutions in China, working with one
colleague from Centro Research and Rico Fermi in

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Italy and another from the University of
Utah in the US, has found a

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link between star age and the frequency
of hot jupiters. In their study reported

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in Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences, The group characterized the ages of

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a large number of star systems that
have Jupiter like exoplanets and compared them.

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In this new effort, the research
team sought to learn more about star systems

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that host Jupiter sized exoplanets. More
specifically, they wanted to know if the

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age of a star system might be
related to its likelihood of hosting Jupiter sized

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planets that have an orbital period of
less than ten days. Such exoplanets have

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come to be known as hot Jupiter
exoplanets because they tend to orbit their stars

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closely. Prior research has suggested that
such exoplanets are hotter than others of similar

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makeup due to the heat they receive
from their star. Such exoplanets also have

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much stronger winds due to the extreme
temperature differences between the night and day sides

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of the planet. To learn more
about the association of hot jupiters and star

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age, the researchers collected and analyzed
data for three hundred and eighty three Jupiter

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sized planets that orbit stars that are
similar in size and characteristics to the Sun.

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They found that hot jupiters were more
likely to be found orbiting relatively young

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stars. They also found that the
number of hot Jupiter exoplanets declines as star

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systems grew older. They also noted
that they found no similar correlations between cold

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or warm jupiters. The research team
also found that the frequency of finding hot

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jupiters reduced as their orbits decayed,
likely due to a tidal impact. Such

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decays, it has been suggested,
likely lead to planet death. They found

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that the frequency of hot jupiters was
proportional to the amount of metal in the

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host star, a finding that helps
to explain discrepancies between the number of hot

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jupiters that have been found as calculated
using planetary transit versus exoplanet surveys based on

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radial velocity ys. For you,
Tim, I am ending this week's news

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headlines with a NASA joke. Why
did the astronaut break up with their computer

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because it had too many space issues? Astronomy Daily five cats thanks to that

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Hallie, great stories, terrible joke
as usual, They don't forget folks.

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You can get all of our past, current and future episodes at space dots

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dot ioanbites dot com with all show
from Steve on Mondays from New South Wales

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down Under and from myself Tim Gibbs
here in Zomerset. And also don't forget

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folks that you can join in the
conversation on our Facebook page, Space Nuts

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podcast group. Thanks for listening this
week, everybody, Bye for now. Astronomy Podcast