Aug. 11, 2024

#442: Dark Matter Explosions & Galactic Ecliptics

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Space Nuts Q&A:
Dark Matter Explosions, The Sun's Ecliptic, and Planetary RingsJoin Andrew...

Show Notes
Transcript

This episode is brought to you by Incogni. Protect your online data with Incogni. Get our special offer by visiting www.incogni.com/spacenuts.
Space Nuts Q&A:
Dark Matter Explosions, The Sun's Ecliptic, and Planetary RingsJoin Andrew Dunkley and Professor Fred Watson in this engaging Q&A episode of Space Nuts, where they delve into listener questions about some of the most fascinating topics in SpaceTime science.Episode Highlights:

Dark Matter and Explosions: Damien from the Gold Coast asks about the impact of a supernova explosion on dark matter. Fred Watson Watson explains why dark matter remains unaffected by such dramatic events, highlighting its unique properties and interactions.
- The Sun's Ecliptic: Ryan from Townsend, Delaware, wonders about the orientation of the sun's ecliptic as it orbits the galaxy. Fred Watson provides an insightful explanation about the sun's path and its angle relative to the Earth's equator.
- Planetary Rings: James from Greenfield inquires about the possibility of planets having multiple sets of rings with different orientations. Fred Watson discusses the nature of planetary rings and why they are typically confined to the equatorial plane.
- Solar Flares vs. Coronal Mass Ejections: Mark from Bloomington, Indiana, asks about the differences between solar flares and coronal mass ejections. Fred Watson clarifies the distinctions and the impact of these solar activities on electronics and aurorae.
- Red Dwarf Stars: Mark also queries why red dwarf stars are prone to outbursts that challenge the development of life. Fred Watson delves into the characteristics of red dwarfs and their massive star spots.
Don't forget to send us your questions via our website... spacenuts.io.
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WEBVTT

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Hi there, Welcome to a Q and A episode of

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Space Nuts. I'm Andrew Dunkley and it's good to have

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your company. As always, We've got a lot of questions today,

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but we're three. We might squeeze in an extra one

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time permitting. We'll just leave that one hanging in the

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ether for the moment. But what would be the effect

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on dark matter if something big exploded, like I don't

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know a star. That's a question that has come into us.

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Ryan wants to talk about the Sun's ecliptic. What does

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that mean? I have no idea, but we will will

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answer the question anyway by making something up. And we've

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got a question from James about planetary rings. That's all

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coming up on this Q and a episode of Space

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Nuts fifteen in.

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Channel ten nine ignition.

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Space Nuts or three two Space Nurtes.

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What it feels good? Yes?

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I feel good?

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He feels good. We all feel good?

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How do you feel freend.

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I feel terrible? Feel good to It's a feel good show?

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Is space so you can't do anything else?

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Well?

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The Q and A edition tends to go that way.

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We get all sorts.

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We even get genuine questions sometimes, which is always nice.

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Shall we just go straight for it.

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I think we should. I think that's a really good idea.

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And a big hesitation. I was a bit worried there

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for a minute. We'll we'll go to our first question.

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This comes from Damien on the Gold Coast. We're not

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talking about West Africa. We're talking about Southeast Queensland, because

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there's a Gold coast in both places. In regard to

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dark matter, if there's five times the amount of it

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to ordinary matter when Beetlejuice explodes, will the explosion blow

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will blow away the dark matter as well? Would this

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now make the neutron star one fifth of the mass

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until the dark matter returned. That's from Damien on the

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Gold Coast. Interesting question. We don't know much about dark matter,

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but could or would it be affected by something as

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dramatic as Beetlejuice or some other star exploding super novastyle.

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No Ah, that's interesting because I thought the answer would

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be yes.

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I thought you might think that yeah, and it's no.

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That's because dark matter does not interact with normal matter

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at all, except by gravitation, So an explosion blowing things

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away needs a physical push. It's usually a shock wave

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that passes through a medium, and yes, if dark matter

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responded that shock wave would compress the dark matter, you'd

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have all kinds of phenomena. But dark matter doesn't interact

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with normal matter, and so it ignores the explosion completely.

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We know this because of observations that have been made,

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and I think there's at least two examples of this, Andrew,

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where you've got clusters of galaxies which are colliding. Now,

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you can use clusters of galaxies to basically reveal where

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dark matter is in them, because you can look at

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the way the space around them is distorted by gravity

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and the dark matter contributes to that. And the way

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you investigate that distortion of space is by looking at

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distant galaxies beyond. You can look at their shapes and

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you know the extent to which they're twisted or their

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images are twisted, and figure out how much the space

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in front of them is being distorted. And that distortion

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comes from the matter of the galaxy clusters. So to

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come back to the point, as I said, there's at

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least a couple of examples of this where you've got

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two galaxy clusters that have collided and basically ground to

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a halt. Their hydrogen gas that the company's galaxy clusters

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has sort of compressed itself and is excited enough to

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emit radiation in the X rays. But you can sense

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where the dark matter clouds that originally accompanied these galaxy

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clusters have gone, and it turns out that they just

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carry on going without batting an eyelid. So what you've

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got is basically a cluster which is formed of two

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clusters coming into collision. On either side of it, you've

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got the dark matter cloud answer that were associated with

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the original galaxy clusters, which have just carried on going

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as though nothing had happened. And so that's an extraordinary

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example that illustrates very cogently that we don't see any

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interaction between normal matter and dark matter.

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Ah Okay, I'm surprised. I thought I thought the two

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potential answers were yes or we don't know.

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There's no.

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No.

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Yeah, yeah, it's pretty well known, and it's because you know,

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that's if there was a reaction. If something did happen,

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that will be great because we're able to detect the

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dark matter and have a much better idea of what

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it is than we have now. So, Damien, your question

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is a good one, but has perhaps a surprising answer.

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HM, okay, very interesting. All right, thanks Damien. Let's move

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on to a next question, which comes from Ryan.

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Hey guys, it's Ryan here from town in Delaware, voted

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Delaware's third most okay as town.

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I had a quick question for you.

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I was thinking about how the Sun revolves or orbits

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around our galaxy and granted takes, you know, millions, hundreds

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of millions of years to make it make a trip around,

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but I was wondering about our ecliptic in regards to

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how the Sun is moving around the galaxy. Are we

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orbiting the Sun like a you know, hoop around a

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dancer as they go around. Are we orbiting more like

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a halo around the Sun as we move around? What

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is our orientation of the ecliptic as it pertains to

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the Sun's orbit around our galaxy? Thanks a lot, guys,

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keep up the great work.

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Thank you, Rian, and I hope you're enjoying being number

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three most Okay town. I can tell you with absolutely

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certainly THEO wouldn't write in the top three of anything

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in this country. We cop a lot of stick from

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the media, probably because of the name of our town.

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It's very unfair and they're all wrong. But it's good

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to be number three. Now I might get here or

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explained for it, just to we sort of get our

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heads around it. Does How does the Sun's orbit work

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on a galactic level?

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Yeah, it's a great question and it's got a great

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answer as well, which is sixty two degrees thirty six minutes.

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Oh okay, yeah, So that's the angle that the Sun's

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path around the around the galaxy, around the center of

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the galaxy. That's the angle it makes with the equator,

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the equator of the Earth. So let me just step

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back a bit because that, you know, the end of

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Ryan's question was what's the orientation, and that's the answer,

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sixty two degrees thirty six minutes. But we don't call

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it the ecliptic for the galaxy. So remembering that the

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ecliptic as seen from the Earth, is the path of

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the Sun through the sky. It's tilted with respect to

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the equator, and that means that the Earth, you know,

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the Earth's axis of rotation is not perpendicular to the

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plane of its orbit. It's not standing upright in its

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orbit at twenty three and a half degrees. So that's

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the ecliptic, as we call it, and it's the apparent

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path of the Sun through the sky. Of course, it's

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the Earth actually moving around the Sun, but that's what

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we see now. In a similar fashion, we can think

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about the path of the galactic center through the sky

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as the Solar system moves around the center of our galaxy.

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The difficulty with this is that it takes two hundred

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million years to go around once, and so you don't

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see it every year like you do with the eclipsic,

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see the Sun going around every year. But we do

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know that the Sun's path is fairly near what we

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call the plane of the Milky Way galaxy, basically the disc,

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the plane in which the disc of the galaxy lies.

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The Sun's path is fairly close to that. It may

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wabble a little bit up and down as it goes

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around the galactic center. There may be disturbances caused by

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giant molecular clouds and things like that as it passes,

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but we know from the observations of the stars around

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us that those are not particularly high level disturbances. The

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thing is really going around mostly along the galactic plane,

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and so what that means is that you can define

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the angle that that makes with the equator of the Earth.

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And it's what I said, sixty two degrees thirty six minutes.

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So the Milky Way is tilted over at quite a

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high angle compared with the Ecliptic, which is tilted over

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at quite a small angle twenty three and a half degrees.

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And in a way, you know, if you imagine the

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way the Earth is the or sorry some and its

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family of planets as they progress around their path around

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the center of the galaxy, they're not lying in the

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same plane as that path. They're sort of tilted upwards

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to it at you know, quite quite a steep angle.

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And so that's how the Sun and its planets move

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around the center of the galaxy. It's not, as Ryan conjectured,

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is not sort of moving around the halo of the

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galaxy or anything like that. It is sitting firmly in

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the plane. It's just an ordinary star in the main

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part of the Milky.

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Way, and it's doing what billions of other stars are doing,

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and our planets are doing what billions upon billions of

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planets are doing throughout galaxy. And it's just going around

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and around. It's a slow motion dance that's happening fast

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more or less frost motion dance that's happening slowly, which

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could be both. It's all relative. Okay, thank you, Ryan.

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This is Space Nuts Andrew Dunkley here with Professor Fred Watson.

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Space Nuts. Now we've got a question from James Shalom Gents.

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He says, I've got a question regarding planets with rings.

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Could there be a planet with multiple sets of rings

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that are different to each other. I'm envisioning something like

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rings wrapping around an equator from gravity as per usual,

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but some other materials possibly being caught in the north

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to south magnetic field at a larger smaller diameter than

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the equatorial rings. Thanks for entertaining my nonsense, James Greenfield,

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It's not nonsense. It's a question and it deserves and answer. James.

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We're going to tackle that one right now. Most rings,

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like the ones around Saturn, which are the most prominent

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in our Solar system, are made up of dust and

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rocks and ice and bits and bobs. So what else

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could they be made off? For him?

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Well, yes, so it would be debris of some sort

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or other gas dust. I think James's question.

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I know the rings around Earth which are made of metal.

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Yeah, that's right, they are, and they go around the

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equator as well, like the rings of Saturn, like the

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rings of Uranus and Jupiter and Neptune. So I think

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James's question is, you know, could could there be rings

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that go at a different angle from the equator of

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other planet? And the answer is probably no, because this

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debris tends to be squashed down into a disc. In

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the case of Saturn, it is mostly ice, icy debris.

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A bit of rock in it as well, but mostly ice,

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and it's squashed down just by gravitational forces in connection

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with the rotation of the planet, So it tends to

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be forced into the equator of the planet. So a

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ring that's tilted at some jaunty angle a little bit

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like what we've just been talking about with the disc

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of the galaxy, that is I think highly unlikely to happen.

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Even if you envisiit ship being entrapped with magnetic fields

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and things of that sort. I think we'd be struggling

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to make a ring that would not be at the

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equator of a planetry body.

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Okay, so no one both counts. It's probably not going

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to ever be made of anything else. And it's probably

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not going to move beyond the.

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Equatorial Yeah, that's right, rotation an equatorial plane.

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Plane, that's the word I want to that's when you

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think of it. So yeah, sorry, James, good good idea,

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but not likely. Now have we got time for one more?

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I reckon we could squeeze one more in.

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Fred, Yes, yes, we can be quick on this one.

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Yeah, all right, let's be quick on this one. Hello,

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and best wishes to you both. A couple of questions

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about solar activity? One? What are the differences between solar

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flares and coronal mass ejections?

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Two?

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What predisposes red dwarf stars to the outbursts of solar

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activity that would seem to challenge development of life on

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planets in their solar systems. Thank you for the answers,

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and thanks for very much for a terrific podcast. You

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guys are stars. Bob Mark from Bloomington, Indie.

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And a.

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Question one, what's the difference between solar flares and coronal

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mass ejections?

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Thread, So it's mostly a much of degree, I think

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the you know, the physical processes are different. A solar

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flare is something that is generated by magnetic activity, tends

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to come from sun spot regions when you know there's

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a high level of magnetic activity there. And we think

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of the magnetic field lines stretching between sun spots which

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come in pairs, and one has a northern polarity and

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one has a southern magnetic polarity. So when they are

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particularly energetic, then you get solar flares. I think I'm

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right in saying that coronal mass ejections start off the

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same way. But if you get these magnetic field lines

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breaking so that there is a kind of magnetic twang,

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what you get is matter mass actually being expelled outwards

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at a great velocity. It's almost like an elastic and

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breaking on the gigantic scale, and that gives you a

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significant ejection of material. That's a significant rejection of the

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sub atomic particles which are there all the time in

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this in the excuse me, in the solar wind. But

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with a mass ejection, you're getting a very much enhanced

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level of this subatomic particle is being ejected from the Sun.

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And that's the thing that worries people around the world

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in terms of the interference with electronics, and of course

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the beautiful auror ray that we see in the north

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and south of the of the planet. There's pros and

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cons to coronal mass ejections, but with reliance on electronics,

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that's becoming an area of concern. Well, it's not becoming.

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It is an area of concern if we get hit

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directly by something super nasty like that for it.

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Yes, that's correct. So the second part of Mark's question

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is a good one, and it's right that red dwarfs

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are much more active on this sort of scale. We

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know that they are more you know, the outbursts of

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sub atomic particles are much more prevalent, and I think,

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thinking back to my studies of stellar evolution and things

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of that sort, these stars have star spots on them

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which are huge. They are very large compared with the

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star itself, and I think that might be the one

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of the reasons why you've got much more activity, because

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they have enormous star spots on them. And in fact,

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I was just talking only today to a couple of

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my colleagues who are the experts on exactly that in

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this country at the University of Southern Queensland, Brad Carter

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and Stephen Marsden. They did research on this and I've

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worked with him in the past on it. They can

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actually map where these star spots are on stars. They

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do it with a technique called ZAM and Doppler imaging,

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which is a fairly esoteric technique but allows you to

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make maps of the surface of stars, and their Red

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dwarfs have got very big star spots, which I'm sure

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is why you get big, big solar flares. Now, Mark's

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next question, if he was able to talk to us,

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will be why do they have such big star spots.

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The answer to that is, well, I'll go and ask

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my colleagues because I don't know the answer to that,

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but it's totally something in the evil.

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That bloke you were talking about, Samon Doppler, he might know.

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That's two blocks actually hair Doppler, And yeah, it would

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be hair as well as Emma was Dutch, So there

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you go.

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It was probably the big spot that are causing red

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doors to be so nasty, so their planets where it's

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very difficult to establish life. By the sound of it,

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We've talked about that before. That's probably what prompted the

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question from Mars. I'm sure a good question too. Thank you,

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Yes it is, Thank you Mark. Thank you to everyone

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who contributed. Don't forget to send your questions into us

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via our website, Space nuts podcast dot com, Space nuts

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dot io. Click on the AMA link at the top.

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It's right next to about and support, which you can

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00:19:31.039 --> 00:19:34.599
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As long as you've got a device with a microphone,

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are and where you're from and what your town's ranking is.

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We really want to know that in terms of libability.

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Maybe well, no, tell us something about where you live.

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We'd love to find out. It's always good to know.

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And don't forget to follow us on social media and

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thank you, Fred, we are done again.

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It sounds great and great to talk to you as always,

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Andrew look forward to the next time.

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Indeed, catch you soon, Fred, what's an astronomer at large?

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And thanks to Hugh in the studio who wasn't in

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the studio today. Thanks anyway, and from me Andrew Dunkley.

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Thanks for your company. We'll catch you next time on

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another edition of Space Nuts.

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By bye you best to the Space Nuts podcast, available

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#442: Dark Matter Explosions & Galactic Ecliptics

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