Sept. 26, 2024

#455: Starship to Mars, Expanding Galaxies & Starliner Returns

Show Notes
Transcript

Join Andrew Dunkley and Professor Fred Watson in this thrilling episode of Space Nuts, where they explore the latest in Space science and astronomy. From the return of the Starliner to groundbreaking missions to Mars, this episode is packed with fascinating insights and discoveries.
Episode Highlights:
- Starliner Success: The Boeing Starliner makes a flawless return to Earth, marking a significant achievement for Boeing's engineers and NASA. Discover the details of this textbook mission and the future prospects for the Starliner.
- SpaceX Mars Missions: SpaceX's Starship mega rocket is gearing up for missions to Mars in the next few years. Learn about Elon Musk's ambitious plan to build a self-sustaining city on Mars and the technological advancements making it possible.
- Galaxy Size Revelation: New research suggests our galaxies are much larger than previously thought. Find out how this discovery impacts our understanding of the Andromeda and Milky Way galaxies, and what it means for their impending merger.
- Stellar Disruption: A passing star may have caused significant disruptions in the outer solar system. Explore the implications of this event on trans-Neptunian objects and the potential existence of Planet Nine.00:00:00 - This is space nuts, where we talk astronomy and space science
00:01:15 - Professor Fred Watson says brush turkeys do serious damage to Australian gardens
00:03:31 - Boeing's Starliner spacecraft successfully returned to Earth last week
00:06:17 - SpaceX is developing a spacecraft called starship that will go to Mars
00:07:48 - Elon Musk tweets timelines for first space starship missions to Mars
00:14:15 - Professor Fred Watson says he has no problem with humans going to Mars
00:22:49 - Scientists say gas makes up 70 to 90% of normal matter in universe
00:25:30 - Scientists suggest disruption in solar system due to passing star billions of years ago
00:30:03 - Andrew Dunkley: Planet nine theory has been around since 2016
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Stay curious, keep looking up, and join us next time for more stellar insights and cosmic wonders. Until then, clear skies and happy stargazing.
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WEBVTT

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Hello again, thanks for joining us. This is Space Nuts,

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where we talk astronomy in space science.

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My name is Andrew Dunkley.

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Coming up, we are going to look at Starliner yet Agaenjie.

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It's getting a guernsey in just about every episode of

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late but well there's been plenty to talk about, let's

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face it. Also another spacecraft, which is the product of

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space X, looks like it's going to be doing missions

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to Mars in the not too distant future.

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What's that all about?

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Well, it's one of those great dreams of a great man,

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and we'll see what he's got in mind. There's also

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suggestions that our galaxies are bigger than we thought, much

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much bigger.

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Why how what's.

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It all mean?

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And a passing star might have been causing a little

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bit of disruption around that trans Neptunian area. We'll talk

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about all of that on this episode of Space Nuts.

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Intact and guided in Channel ten nine Ignition Space Nuts

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or three.

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Two more new ones Space Nuts and I've reported meals good.

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And here to discombuberate all of that and to brush

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off brush turkeys is Professor Fred what's an astronomer at

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large bread?

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Although Andrew yes, you've you've just touched on the on

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the nerve that's affecting us all at the moment in

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brush turkey egg laying season everywhere, so you've.

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Got you've got them scratch scratching around your backyard literally literally.

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Yes, they dig up everything to try and build a

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nest and it's uh, you know, there are protected species,

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they're probably endangered actually there so we're very fond of

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brush turkeys, but what they do to your garden is

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pretty serious stuff. So we just tried, I've actually tried

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contacting their solicitor and things of that, so just to

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see whether that has an effect.

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But we'll see.

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Yes, they're damn ugly though for it. I mean, they're

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endangered and they're protected and then Australian natives. But they

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look like a cross between a traditional turkey in a vulture.

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Yes, yeah, that's actually a really good description they do.

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And you know they've got the brain of an ant

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as well, so they're not you know, they're not gifted

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in I mean when you compare them with some of

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the other species that we have around here, particularly the

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self a crusted cockatoos, which have got the intelligence of

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a primate intelligence. Yeah, they are very extraordinary creatures. We've

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sent a note to them as well about leaving their

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droppings on our outdoor furniture, but that's still.

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A matter for the legal fraternity.

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Well, I'd be surprised if they haven't destroyed your furniture.

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They like chewing things.

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They do like chewing things. Yeah, but they've been o

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case I think that.

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Yeah, Yes, I love I love soulpha crested cockatoos. We've

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got squeeens of them out at the golf course. But

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they're not loved when you're just in the middle of

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your downswing and one of them.

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Goes, oh yeah, that did they go?

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If you're studying next one the nearly drive your ear

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drums out there, oh yeah, they're loud.

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They are super loud.

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Okay, Anyway, what wildlife issues aside. Let's let's talk about

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Starliner for a change.

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Some good news at last.

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Yeah. So, Starliner, the you know, the spacecraft that we've

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been talking about solidly for the last two and a

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half months, three months, actually years, has made a textbook

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return to Earth at the end of last week, disconnected

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from the International Space Station. All twenty seven of its

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thrusters worked perfectly because that was the big ticket item,

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whether the thrusters were reliable or not. Uh and yeah,

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backed away from the spacecraft, fired its rockets to re

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enter and touch down completely safely, exactly on target, in

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a huge vindication, as some of the media are reporting,

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a huge vindication for Boeing's engineers. And I think there's

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been a lot of back patting all around, which is great,

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including the two astronauts left behind on the space.

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Stations, Williams, and I feel I feel terrible for them.

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They were full of congratulations to the to the Boeing

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engineers who they've worked with very closely, obviously for a

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long period of time, not just while they've been in space.

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You know.

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They they they reconcile themselves to another however, many months

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cities in space, quite some time ago, and so they

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had already made peace with the whole issue. Yeah, they're

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full of congratulations a NASA too. You know, we had

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reports of a bit of friction between Boeing NASA about this,

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and certainly there was some robust discussion we believe, in meetings,

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but nothing like what might be blown out by the

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tabloid media. And so yeah, I think I think this

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congratulations all, yes, it is.

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Good news and push.

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The two star Liner astronauts are still on the ISS

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and will be there probably till early next year, and

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by the time this podcast is released, star Liner would

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have been on the ground for probably nearly a couple

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of weeks. But it's worth mentioning that they brought it

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back safely.

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All is well.

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It just didn't have any passengers. It was just auto

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auto piloted back to Earth, which is extraordinary in itself

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the way they do that these days, with all these

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different spacecraft. They don't need humans to make them go

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up and down, but they do need humans to push

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the magic buttons that are just there.

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For decoration, I think.

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But yeah, no, seriously, though it's good to have it back,

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there must be a collective sigh of relief. Okay, yes,

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let's move on to another spacecraft, and this one is

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the brainchild of space X, the Starship Mega Rocket, which

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they say in the next couple of years will be

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sending missions to Mars, initially unpersoned, but ultimately leading to

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people going to Mars. This is actually a plan that

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might we talked about before, and people are saying it's

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a bibe duram. It will never happen, but they're certainly

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looking seriously at elong Musk's plan of putting a city

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on Mars is still going there.

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Yes, so that's right.

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That's the whole motivation for developing Starship Andrew. And it's

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quite remarkable. It is remarkable hardware. So it's two parts

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to it. The first stage booster, which is called the

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super Heavy, and then the upper stage, which itself is

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fifty meters tall, and that's the second stage, known as Starship.

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And unlike most spacecraft and certainly the Falcon nine series

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that Elon has developed, which has a first stage and

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then a separate second stage and then the payload itself,

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with Starship, the payload is built into the second stage,

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and so it is really quite different sort of architecture

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for the spacecraft from others. So what we have is

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a tweet from a baby pardon a space X sorry

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an X whatever it's called message formerly known as a

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tweet from Elon Musk on on Saturday the last week,

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as we are speaking, a post, that's the word I

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want a post A post times. Yeah, And so what

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he's saying is what his target timelines are for the

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first space staff Starship missions to Mars, and it is

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two years. That is exactly as you've said, uncrewed missions

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to start with with trials to land on Mars, and

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he's talking about that happening in two years and then

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two years later. And you know, he's partly limited by

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the physics of getting to Mars, which you can only

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do every twenty six months. That's when the two or

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the orbits of the two planets bring them into the

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right kind of alignment, so that when you get to

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the other end of the trip, Mars is where you

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want it to be rather than somewhere else in its orbit.

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So that happens every twenty six months, so two years

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time and uncrude mission to Mars are perhaps several and

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then in four years time he's talking about sending people

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to Mars, and his quote is flight rate will grow

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exponentially from there, with the goal of building a self

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sustaining city in about twenty years. Being multiplanetary will vastly

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increase the probable lifespan of consciousness.

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As we will no longer have all our eggs.

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Literally and metaphorically actually says metabolically.

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On one planet that's got a boat.

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Look, it's elon Muscart is finest in terms of big

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vision stuff. I think the rest of the world is

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looking on and saying, in your dreams, because there's so

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many unknowns about getting humans to Mars. It's something that

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we are simply faced with, real, real difficulties that brute

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force and ignorance is just not going to cut it.

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So I think we'll see slippage perhaps from that. But

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what's interesting to us as space watchers, of course, is

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seeing that technology evolve. Just a final footnote about this, Andrew.

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The starship has had four flights so far, and the

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last one basically achieved all that was hoped to achieve,

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and the fifth one is being planned, and I think

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the fifth one is the crucial one because they will

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return the spacecraft, this starship back to Earth on a

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soft landing, rather than just losing it into the ocean,

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which is what's happened before.

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Yeah.

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Look, people might be laughing behind his back and saying

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this is just a pipe dream, But if you don't

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have people that dream big, you probably don't achieve things

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at the high end of the spectrum. I'm sure because

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you don't hear about it in the history books, but

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I'm sure people laughed at the right brothers and everyone

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else was attempting to fly.

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Back in those days, I probably thought it was a

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huge jack.

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You'll never do it.

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It's impossible.

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Yeah wow now lookers, Yeah, and you know I mean

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ten years as well.

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Maybe.

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Yeah, ten years ago it was thought to be impossible

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to reuse a booster your first stage rocket, and that

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is now totally routine. It was twenty fifteen, I think,

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the first successful booster landing. And you've only got to

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look at the track record with Tesla.

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Vehicles as well.

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This streaming big can achieve great things.

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Notwithstanding the one Tesla vehicle that's floating out there in space.

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Some Yeah, the one that was on its way to

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Mars but actually overshot and is knowing the ice as well.

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I think. So that's a salutary left of.

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The Yes, yes, it's probably looking for a parking space station.

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Well with a charger on it.

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With a charger, yes, that could be.

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It could be an issue.

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But look, I think Elon Musk is a remarkable man.

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I know he gets ridiculed and gets he cops a

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lot of flak, but he has done some incredible things

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in the space science world that probably wouldn't have been

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attempted this soon by many other people. I know that

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he's not the only one, but he's getting all the

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headlines and he certainly knows how to get the story

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out there and get the interest of the public. I

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don't doubt that he will ultimately achieve this. Maybe not

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this quickly, but how quickly has he perfected these rocks?

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But what I do? Whatever?

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What if he did?

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What if in four years time we're talking about people

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walking on Mars with a.

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Staffship parks in the background. It's not impossible.

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No, it really would be.

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It would probably be the achievement of the century because

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it would be twenty years ahead of when NASA plans

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to be there, at least ten years ahead, and it

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would be a private venture that would be even more remarkable. Yeah,

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I wish him well and I hope we get to

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see it. I think it would be fantastic, And yes,

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I wish him nothing but success. I'm sure most people do.

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And you've got to also think about the brave people

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that will be doing this, because it's not like you

229
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crossing the Atlantic for the first time, or crossing Bass

230
00:14:01.799 --> 00:14:04.279
straight for the first time, or any of those kinds

231
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of ventures that we heard about one hundred years ago.

232
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But it's.

233
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A giant leap, a much giant, a giant leap than

234
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the Moon, and that was a huge jump, So it's

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all very exciting.

236
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Maybe I can good go ahead and sorry.

237
00:14:23.600 --> 00:14:28.799
It will also reinvigorate interest in space science, so it'll

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breed a whole new generation of scientists, and then it

239
00:14:33.440 --> 00:14:34.279
will just keep going.

240
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I think the I mean the point where I think

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many space watchers and astronomers and philosophers, perhaps I can

242
00:14:46.919 --> 00:14:51.679
put it ethicists where they diverge from Elon is sentenced.

243
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The flight rate will grow exponentially from there, with a

244
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goal of building a self sustaining city in about twenty years.

245
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That I think transgress is what we the way we

246
00:15:03.639 --> 00:15:07.080
ought to think about the way we treat mathers, And

247
00:15:07.200 --> 00:15:11.639
it's part of Elon's philosophy of believing the Earth is

248
00:15:11.720 --> 00:15:14.840
doomed and that we need to, you know, have a

249
00:15:15.000 --> 00:15:19.600
have a lifeboat. Mars is not our lifeboat, and what

250
00:15:19.720 --> 00:15:21.559
we have to do is fix our planet, you know.

251
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And if you want to have a lifeboat, build it.

252
00:15:25.080 --> 00:15:29.519
You build a megastructure rather than going and trashing another planet.

253
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That's my all this Now, I know.

254
00:15:34.039 --> 00:15:39.919
You've got issue with with occupying other worlds, but you

255
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know the time will come where more powerful people probably

256
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end up making those kinds of decisions.

257
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And it sounds like Elon's made his decision.

258
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And mining on the Moon, whether you like it or not,

259
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that's probably going to happen too.

260
00:15:57.000 --> 00:15:59.320
Yeah, and that's I think a different issue I think

261
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you can argue for from an ethical point of view.

262
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I'm not sure about colonizing.

263
00:16:03.639 --> 00:16:07.960
Mars though, so, I mean, I have no problem with

264
00:16:08.360 --> 00:16:12.440
humans going to Mars, but the model I think we

265
00:16:12.480 --> 00:16:16.840
should adopt is a bit like Antarctica, where it's scientific

266
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and research purposes mainly rather.

267
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Than Yeah, but nobody, nobody can wholly own it or

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occupy it.

269
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Yeah, that's a fair point.

270
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Okay, Yes, very interesting story and if you want to

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read up on that, it's on the space dot com website.

272
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This is Space Nuts with Andrew Dunkley and Professor Fred Watson.

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Space Nuts.

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Now, Fred, we have talked quite a few times and

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received a lot of questions about the impending merger of

276
00:16:52.480 --> 00:16:57.399
the Andromeda and Milky Way galaxies, but now there's a

277
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story that suggests they are already touching each other due

278
00:17:04.599 --> 00:17:09.039
to this discovery that the galaxies are bigger than we thought.

279
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How so.

280
00:17:12.359 --> 00:17:15.359
So, and this is a great story because it's got

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a very strong Australian connection. Scientists from Swinburne University down

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there in Melbourne, and they it's interesting from a number

283
00:17:25.160 --> 00:17:28.599
of points of view. One is that swinburn University has

284
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a deal with the Keck Observatory in Hawaii. The two

285
00:17:34.839 --> 00:17:37.839
Keck telescopes are both ten meter telescopes are on Mona Kaya,

286
00:17:38.400 --> 00:17:41.640
the tallest mountain. It's not really a mountain, it's a

287
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shield volcano, but it's still one of the highest points

288
00:17:45.079 --> 00:17:48.319
on the planet Earth on the big island of Hawaii.

289
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Mount Oka. So the Keck telescope is.

290
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A ten meter telescope that has very very fine sensitivity.

291
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It can penetrate deep into the interspace, not just looking

292
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at very distant objects, but looking at fainter things in

293
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the you know, in the near field, things that are

294
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around our own galaxy, so other galaxies in the what

295
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you might call the middle distance.

296
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So what this team has done is they've.

297
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Used this sort of invested time on the one of

298
00:18:22.480 --> 00:18:29.480
the two Keck telescopes and looked at the gas that

299
00:18:29.759 --> 00:18:35.640
surrounds galaxies, and in particular a galaxy which rejoices in

300
00:18:35.720 --> 00:18:39.079
the name of Iras zero eight three three nine plus

301
00:18:39.119 --> 00:18:42.480
six five one seven. That's one of the galaxies that

302
00:18:42.640 --> 00:18:48.119
they've looked at, and what they've done is checked for

303
00:18:48.640 --> 00:18:52.359
glowing gas around the galaxy. So you know, we we

304
00:18:52.640 --> 00:18:55.279
when we look at galaxies look at pictures of galaxies,

305
00:18:55.279 --> 00:18:57.720
which many of us do all the time. What we're

306
00:18:57.759 --> 00:19:01.559
looking at mostly is the stars and often glowing gas

307
00:19:01.599 --> 00:19:04.039
as well. The pink blobs in the spiral arms of

308
00:19:04.119 --> 00:19:06.880
galaxies are pink clouds of glowing hydrogen.

309
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The old joke is that hydrogen.

310
00:19:10.079 --> 00:19:12.640
Is just like people, when it gets excited, it glows pink,

311
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but the mechanisms different. So they've instead looked at glowing

312
00:19:17.240 --> 00:19:21.000
oxygen and looked at it at very very great distances

313
00:19:21.240 --> 00:19:27.680
from the centers of these galaxies, and basically they find

314
00:19:27.880 --> 00:19:34.880
it goes much much further than anybody had expected. And

315
00:19:35.000 --> 00:19:37.880
this is a real achievement because this gas is ten

316
00:19:37.960 --> 00:19:41.480
thousand to one hundred thousand times fainter than the brighter

317
00:19:41.599 --> 00:19:45.880
parts of a galaxy, So you know, that's just penetrating

318
00:19:46.079 --> 00:19:50.880
really deep into the fainter regions of the universe and

319
00:19:51.079 --> 00:19:56.279
so yeah, so what they've discovered is that perhaps each

320
00:19:56.680 --> 00:20:01.920
each galaxy has this shroud of gas that extends maybe

321
00:20:01.960 --> 00:20:05.480
one hundred thousand light years into space. Now, one hundred

322
00:20:05.519 --> 00:20:07.960
thousand light years is what we usually think of as

323
00:20:08.000 --> 00:20:11.240
the diameter of the disc of our galaxy. So you know,

324
00:20:11.400 --> 00:20:17.599
if you basically double that in size, you've got the

325
00:20:17.680 --> 00:20:20.519
new version of what galaxies are, like how big they are,

326
00:20:20.680 --> 00:20:21.759
and they are colossal.

327
00:20:24.039 --> 00:20:28.440
And is it true that because of this, they believe

328
00:20:28.559 --> 00:20:33.839
that Andromeda and our galaxy are already touching technically.

329
00:20:33.440 --> 00:20:36.759
Speaking, yeah, they yes.

330
00:20:37.119 --> 00:20:40.160
I mean this Andromeda galaxy is about two and a

331
00:20:40.160 --> 00:20:44.279
half million light years away from hours. If you've got

332
00:20:45.200 --> 00:20:50.240
one hundred thousand light years of gas worth of gas

333
00:20:50.799 --> 00:20:54.200
in each of those galaxies, they're not actually touching, but

334
00:20:54.400 --> 00:20:59.759
they may well be interacting the you know, the extremities,

335
00:20:59.839 --> 00:21:03.319
because gravity operates over great distances, so they may be

336
00:21:03.480 --> 00:21:05.960
already tugging at one another, if I can put it

337
00:21:06.039 --> 00:21:07.759
that way, with these.

338
00:21:07.680 --> 00:21:08.519
Sailos of gas.

339
00:21:08.839 --> 00:21:11.200
So yeah, I think it's very a fair point to

340
00:21:11.240 --> 00:21:14.240
say that collision with Drumwind has already started.

341
00:21:14.319 --> 00:21:15.559
Hold onto your hearts, every.

342
00:21:15.400 --> 00:21:19.200
Wow, gosh, and we were sitting here, you know, we

343
00:21:19.279 --> 00:21:21.640
were going to wait that couple of billion years. Yeah,

344
00:21:21.799 --> 00:21:24.200
we thought were in the diary, but I don't have

345
00:21:24.319 --> 00:21:29.119
to now it's happening now. I know these gas surrounds

346
00:21:29.359 --> 00:21:33.319
have been previously discovered. We're talking, you know, seventy odd

347
00:21:33.400 --> 00:21:37.000
years ago that they were discovered, but it's only because

348
00:21:37.039 --> 00:21:39.039
of a new piece of equipment they've been able to

349
00:21:39.119 --> 00:21:40.680
really analyze them today.

350
00:21:41.000 --> 00:21:43.279
Is that accurately It's it's.

351
00:21:43.240 --> 00:21:47.319
Yes, it's one of the the Keck telescopes are equipped

352
00:21:47.359 --> 00:21:52.400
with very very fine auxiliary instrumentation and one of them

353
00:21:53.559 --> 00:21:54.920
is the instrument that's been.

354
00:21:54.880 --> 00:21:55.880
Used to do this.

355
00:21:56.759 --> 00:22:01.279
It's it's basically it's got what's called an image slice

356
00:22:01.559 --> 00:22:05.200
on it and that does exactly what the name applies.

357
00:22:05.279 --> 00:22:07.720
It takes an image, slices it up, but then for

358
00:22:07.799 --> 00:22:11.799
each slice you can get a separate spectrum. We in

359
00:22:12.079 --> 00:22:17.680
Australia have similar technologies on certainly the Angle Australian Telescope,

360
00:22:17.720 --> 00:22:20.079
but we don't use we don't slice the images. We

361
00:22:20.240 --> 00:22:23.039
break them up into pixels by using fiber optics. So

362
00:22:23.079 --> 00:22:25.960
it's a different technique that has the same basically the

363
00:22:26.039 --> 00:22:29.240
same outcome. But the thing about the image slicer is

364
00:22:29.279 --> 00:22:32.920
you can make them incredibly sensitive, and that's why they've

365
00:22:32.920 --> 00:22:35.920
been able to get the spectrum of oxygen out to

366
00:22:36.079 --> 00:22:43.240
these great distances from the galaxy at those incredibly faint levels. So, yes,

367
00:22:43.480 --> 00:22:46.799
it's all about the technology that is now available on

368
00:22:46.920 --> 00:22:50.000
these mouthless telescopes incredible.

369
00:22:50.160 --> 00:22:54.920
So beyond the extremities of the spiral arms of our

370
00:22:55.000 --> 00:22:59.480
galaxy and well other galaxies, even without those sorts of structures,

371
00:23:00.119 --> 00:23:03.400
there is a guess halo that stretches out that far. Again,

372
00:23:03.559 --> 00:23:05.720
is that basically that's correct?

373
00:23:05.799 --> 00:23:11.799
Yeah, And perhaps the most startling outcome of the research

374
00:23:12.039 --> 00:23:16.880
that these scientists have done on this is that those

375
00:23:17.000 --> 00:23:19.640
gas halos, when you add them up for all galaxies,

376
00:23:20.440 --> 00:23:24.319
they probably make up, they believe, between seventy and ninety

377
00:23:24.359 --> 00:23:28.880
percent of the normal matter in the universe. You know, Now,

378
00:23:29.400 --> 00:23:31.599
the normal matter is the stuff that's not dark matter

379
00:23:31.720 --> 00:23:35.240
or dark energy, and we you know, we know that

380
00:23:37.640 --> 00:23:40.279
we think of normal matter as being about five percent

381
00:23:40.400 --> 00:23:43.279
of the mass energy budget of the universe, and we

382
00:23:43.400 --> 00:23:46.440
usually think of that as being in stars, stars, of

383
00:23:46.480 --> 00:23:48.000
the glowing stuff, the stuff.

384
00:23:47.759 --> 00:23:48.279
You can see.

385
00:23:48.720 --> 00:23:51.079
But actually what they're saying is that much more of

386
00:23:51.160 --> 00:23:53.960
it is in these galaxy halos seventy to nine.

387
00:23:54.039 --> 00:23:56.960
So does that change the ratio? Does that change the

388
00:23:57.079 --> 00:23:58.039
formula of what.

389
00:23:59.640 --> 00:23:59.799
You know?

390
00:24:00.359 --> 00:24:01.079
No, it doesn't.

391
00:24:01.759 --> 00:24:05.920
What it changes is the ratio within that five percent,

392
00:24:06.559 --> 00:24:10.000
which is normal matter. So what we're saying is that

393
00:24:10.440 --> 00:24:12.400
rather than you know, half of it being stars, now

394
00:24:12.440 --> 00:24:15.759
for it being gas, most of it is gash. And

395
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that's a new aspect of this whole study.

396
00:24:22.079 --> 00:24:26.000

#455: Starship to Mars, Expanding Galaxies & Starliner Returns

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#455: Starship to Mars, Expanding Galaxies & Starliner Returns

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