Cosmic Detectives: Solving the Missing Matter Mystery & Exploring Earth's Magnetic Secrets

WEBVTT

0
00:00:00.320 --> 00:00:03.200
Heidi Campo: Welcome back to another exciting episode of Space

1
00:00:03.200 --> 00:00:05.840
Nuns. I'm your host for this season,

2
00:00:06.000 --> 00:00:08.960
Heidi Campo. And joining us is Professor Fred.

3
00:00:08.960 --> 00:00:11.280
Watch it. Fred Watson,

4
00:00:11.440 --> 00:00:12.960
astronomer at large.

5
00:00:13.600 --> 00:00:16.520
Professor Fred Watson: Actually, that's quite a nice, uh. It's quite a

6
00:00:16.520 --> 00:00:19.040
nice epithet. It should be Fred watching,

7
00:00:19.540 --> 00:00:22.320
uh, because I watched the universe. Fred watching

8
00:00:23.280 --> 00:00:25.960
here loud and clear. Looking forward to speaking

9
00:00:25.960 --> 00:00:27.120
again, Heidi.

10
00:00:27.920 --> 00:00:30.640
Heidi Campo: We, uh. We, uh. We're off to a great start. No,

11
00:00:30.640 --> 00:00:33.140
that's. That is fun. We are. We are. We are all

12
00:00:33.140 --> 00:00:35.740
observers in this universe. And you are

13
00:00:35.740 --> 00:00:37.820
listening to space nuts.

14
00:00:37.900 --> 00:00:40.380
Generic: 15 seconds. Guidance is internal.

15
00:00:40.620 --> 00:00:43.340
10, 9. Uh, ignition

16
00:00:43.340 --> 00:00:43.940
sequence.

17
00:00:43.940 --> 00:00:45.144
Professor Fred Watson: Star space nuts.

18
00:00:45.216 --> 00:00:48.024
Generic: 5, 4, 3, 2. 1, 2, 3, 4,

19
00:00:48.096 --> 00:00:50.700
5, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Space

20
00:00:50.860 --> 00:00:53.340
nuts. Astronauts report it feels good.

21
00:00:54.370 --> 00:00:57.260
Heidi Campo: Um, today we have some very interesting

22
00:00:57.260 --> 00:01:00.180
articles. Uh, we're. We're kind of kicking things off. It's a.

23
00:01:00.180 --> 00:01:02.970
It's kind of a mystery episode. I feel like this is a

24
00:01:02.970 --> 00:01:05.450
very, very detective heavy

25
00:01:05.450 --> 00:01:07.970
episode. We've got mysteries

26
00:01:08.290 --> 00:01:11.170
being solved, we have mysteries unsolved,

27
00:01:11.170 --> 00:01:13.170
and we have clues to mysteries.

28
00:01:13.970 --> 00:01:16.730
So our first article this week is we are

29
00:01:16.730 --> 00:01:18.610
talking about a mystery that,

30
00:01:19.710 --> 00:01:22.470
uh, might be solved. So this is, uh.

31
00:01:22.690 --> 00:01:25.490
We're looking at what this is, is the home

32
00:01:25.650 --> 00:01:28.050
address for some missing matter.

33
00:01:29.060 --> 00:01:31.820
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, that's right. Um, uh, it's a

34
00:01:31.820 --> 00:01:34.820
story that, um, I find really

35
00:01:34.820 --> 00:01:37.260
interesting because the

36
00:01:37.260 --> 00:01:40.100
groundwork for this work was laid down five years

37
00:01:40.100 --> 00:01:42.940
ago here in Australia, um,

38
00:01:42.940 --> 00:01:45.220
with, um, work that's

39
00:01:45.700 --> 00:01:48.260
been carried out on something you and I have spoken about

40
00:01:48.420 --> 00:01:51.420
before. Briefly. Uh. Briefly is the

41
00:01:51.420 --> 00:01:54.300
word, because we're talking here about fast radio

42
00:01:54.300 --> 00:01:57.120
bursts, uh, which are things that have

43
00:01:57.360 --> 00:02:00.240
only been known in the last. It's getting on for

44
00:02:00.240 --> 00:02:03.040
20 years now since the first observations were made. But,

45
00:02:03.520 --> 00:02:05.840
uh. But they're still relatively new

46
00:02:06.240 --> 00:02:08.720
in the armory that

47
00:02:08.720 --> 00:02:11.680
astronomers can bring to bear on the universe.

48
00:02:11.840 --> 00:02:14.800
And what they are is pretty well what

49
00:02:14.800 --> 00:02:17.480
the name says. They're bursts of radio

50
00:02:17.480 --> 00:02:20.480
radiation. These are detected with radio telescopes, not

51
00:02:20.480 --> 00:02:23.350
visible light telescopes. Uh, and they

52
00:02:23.350 --> 00:02:26.310
are. Fast, uh, is probably a misnomer.

53
00:02:26.610 --> 00:02:28.630
Uh, short would be a better word.

54
00:02:29.110 --> 00:02:32.030
Uh, but they, uh. Because they only last for

55
00:02:32.030 --> 00:02:34.870
typically a millionth of. Sorry, uh, a millisecond,

56
00:02:34.870 --> 00:02:37.350
a thousandth of a second, thereabouts, roughly.

57
00:02:37.910 --> 00:02:40.590
Often they've got structure in them as well, which is

58
00:02:40.590 --> 00:02:43.110
interesting when you look at the profile of the intensity

59
00:02:43.750 --> 00:02:46.710
of that millisecond burst spread out. If you

60
00:02:46.710 --> 00:02:49.350
can magnify the, uh, sort of time

61
00:02:49.350 --> 00:02:52.130
domain, you can see that there are features in that, uh,

62
00:02:52.130 --> 00:02:54.770
peaks and troughs, uh, squashed into that

63
00:02:54.770 --> 00:02:57.250
millisecond. So very, very

64
00:02:57.250 --> 00:03:00.210
fascinating objects. Their origin

65
00:03:00.370 --> 00:03:03.090
is still not certain. Um,

66
00:03:03.330 --> 00:03:06.130
I think the best guess of my colleagues who

67
00:03:06.130 --> 00:03:08.370
work on this kind of thing is that they are

68
00:03:09.010 --> 00:03:11.570
flares on magnetars. And

69
00:03:11.570 --> 00:03:14.290
magnetars are highly magnetized

70
00:03:14.290 --> 00:03:16.730
neutron stars. And these things

71
00:03:16.730 --> 00:03:19.610
apparently are able to have flares on their

72
00:03:19.610 --> 00:03:21.810
surface which can be very intense.

73
00:03:22.290 --> 00:03:24.610
These radio bursts are very, very bright

74
00:03:25.650 --> 00:03:28.130
in the radio spectrum. So that's

75
00:03:28.930 --> 00:03:29.370
one thing.

76
00:03:29.370 --> 00:03:30.450
Heidi Campo: Real quick, Fred. I'm sorry.

77
00:03:30.450 --> 00:03:31.010
Professor Fred Watson: No worries.

78
00:03:31.650 --> 00:03:34.490
Heidi Campo: I have noticed, um, based on the questions lately, that we are

79
00:03:34.490 --> 00:03:37.490
getting a lot of new listeners lately. Can you,

80
00:03:37.630 --> 00:03:40.530
um, maybe specify to some of our newer listeners the difference

81
00:03:40.530 --> 00:03:43.250
between a neutron star and

82
00:03:43.330 --> 00:03:44.530
perhaps our star?

83
00:03:45.410 --> 00:03:48.210
Professor Fred Watson: I can, um. Yeah, sorry. That's a really good

84
00:03:48.210 --> 00:03:50.990
question and a really good point to make. Um,

85
00:03:51.560 --> 00:03:53.810
so, um, neutron stars are, uh,

86
00:03:54.040 --> 00:03:56.960
stars that have reached the end of

87
00:03:56.960 --> 00:03:59.920
their life, their hydrogen fuel, which

88
00:03:59.920 --> 00:04:02.920
is what powers stars like our sun that's being

89
00:04:02.920 --> 00:04:05.080
powered by hydrogen fuel. As we speak.

90
00:04:06.280 --> 00:04:09.280
That fuel has run out on

91
00:04:09.280 --> 00:04:11.080
a neutron star. And

92
00:04:11.960 --> 00:04:14.760
the stars are really interesting because there's a

93
00:04:14.760 --> 00:04:17.000
constant battle going on between,

94
00:04:17.760 --> 00:04:20.660
uh, the radiation that is coming from

95
00:04:20.660 --> 00:04:23.500
these nuclear processes, which is pushing outwards, and

96
00:04:23.500 --> 00:04:26.360
gravity, which is pulling inwards and trying to compress, uh,

97
00:04:27.100 --> 00:04:30.000
a star like the sun. So it achieves a balance between,

98
00:04:30.000 --> 00:04:32.220
uh, radiation and gravitation.

99
00:04:32.780 --> 00:04:35.580
And so you can imagine what would happen if,

100
00:04:35.740 --> 00:04:38.460
at the end of a star's life, um, the

101
00:04:38.460 --> 00:04:41.020
radiation stops because the nuclear

102
00:04:41.020 --> 00:04:43.740
processes have actually changed. They don't stop, but they

103
00:04:43.740 --> 00:04:46.700
change. What's going to happen is gravitation wins

104
00:04:46.700 --> 00:04:49.540
and compresses, uh, the star down. And

105
00:04:49.540 --> 00:04:52.500
that, uh, sometimes happens explosively in

106
00:04:52.500 --> 00:04:55.500
the case of what we call a supernova, an exploding star. And

107
00:04:55.500 --> 00:04:58.300
so one possible remnant from

108
00:04:58.300 --> 00:05:00.860
such an event is a neutron star,

109
00:05:01.400 --> 00:05:03.900
uh, in which, uh, the

110
00:05:04.059 --> 00:05:06.900
thing has collapsed. And the only thing

111
00:05:06.900 --> 00:05:09.420
that's stopping that central

112
00:05:09.500 --> 00:05:12.060
core of the

113
00:05:12.620 --> 00:05:15.580
X star, the star that is now no longer a star.

114
00:05:15.820 --> 00:05:18.500
The only thing, um, that stops it

115
00:05:18.500 --> 00:05:21.390
collapsing completely to a black hole, uh,

116
00:05:21.390 --> 00:05:24.280
is the outward resistance of the neutrons

117
00:05:24.280 --> 00:05:26.960
within it. Um, and so those

118
00:05:26.960 --> 00:05:29.640
neutrons have an outward pressure, and that

119
00:05:29.640 --> 00:05:32.600
limits the collapse. Uh, so what you

120
00:05:32.600 --> 00:05:35.400
have is a star that used to be perhaps like our

121
00:05:35.400 --> 00:05:38.360
Sun. 1.3. Probably more actually, in the case of a

122
00:05:38.360 --> 00:05:40.600
neutron star, because they're bigger than the sun anyway.

123
00:05:40.680 --> 00:05:43.560
1.32 million kilometers

124
00:05:43.560 --> 00:05:46.440
across. Suddenly, uh, it's collapsed to something,

125
00:05:46.850 --> 00:05:49.770
um, 10 kilometers, 7 miles

126
00:05:49.770 --> 00:05:52.250
across, uh, but with

127
00:05:52.250 --> 00:05:55.130
incredibly high density. And all sorts

128
00:05:55.130 --> 00:05:57.890
of unusual phenomena take place in those stars. They

129
00:05:57.890 --> 00:06:00.770
are generally magnetized. Um, many of

130
00:06:00.770 --> 00:06:03.650
them squirt, um, beams of radiation

131
00:06:03.650 --> 00:06:06.530
out, um, and because they're rotating, those Beams

132
00:06:06.530 --> 00:06:09.290
have this sort of lighthouse effect that we see them

133
00:06:09.290 --> 00:06:12.210
flashing. Uh, but we believe as well

134
00:06:12.210 --> 00:06:14.890
some are so highly magnetized that they form a different

135
00:06:14.890 --> 00:06:17.840
species, though what are called magnetars. And

136
00:06:17.840 --> 00:06:20.840
apparently they have flares on them. Uh, and

137
00:06:20.840 --> 00:06:23.720
these flares are what we think gives rise to fast radio

138
00:06:23.720 --> 00:06:26.560
bursts. So that's

139
00:06:26.560 --> 00:06:28.700
where the science is. Uh,

140
00:06:28.720 --> 00:06:31.520
astronomers have been now observing these fast

141
00:06:31.520 --> 00:06:32.640
radio bursts for

142
00:06:34.400 --> 00:06:37.010
best part of a decade. Uh,

143
00:06:37.120 --> 00:06:39.760
and, uh, one or two of them repeat,

144
00:06:40.000 --> 00:06:43.000
which are a bit mysterious because it suggests that

145
00:06:43.000 --> 00:06:45.360
something's rotating because you get this repeating

146
00:06:45.680 --> 00:06:48.460
appearance of the burst. Uh, often

147
00:06:48.460 --> 00:06:51.460
though, they just come out of nowhere. Uh, and there

148
00:06:51.460 --> 00:06:54.300
are several radio telescopes in the world that are actively

149
00:06:54.300 --> 00:06:57.260
looking for these objects. One of them is

150
00:06:57.260 --> 00:06:59.420
down, uh, here in Australia,

151
00:07:00.210 --> 00:07:02.780
uh, the ascap, the Australian Square Kilometer Array

152
00:07:02.780 --> 00:07:05.460
Pathfinder. And that actually was one of the ones that

153
00:07:05.460 --> 00:07:08.340
contributed to the work that was carried out that I

154
00:07:08.340 --> 00:07:10.780
mentioned a minute ago, uh, about five years ago.

155
00:07:11.330 --> 00:07:14.140
Um, in looking at how

156
00:07:14.810 --> 00:07:17.770
what these fast radio bursts might tell us about

157
00:07:17.930 --> 00:07:20.650
not just magnetars, but about the

158
00:07:20.650 --> 00:07:23.210
space through which the bursts of radiation

159
00:07:23.210 --> 00:07:26.090
travel. Because we now know that

160
00:07:26.090 --> 00:07:28.730
most of these radio bursts take place in very distant

161
00:07:28.730 --> 00:07:31.370
galaxies. They're galaxies that are, ah, you know,

162
00:07:31.610 --> 00:07:34.330
where distances are measured in billions of light

163
00:07:34.330 --> 00:07:37.170
years. They're a long, long way off. And so the

164
00:07:37.170 --> 00:07:39.850
radio bursts have traveled through a lot of

165
00:07:40.090 --> 00:07:42.340
empty space. Apparently empty.

166
00:07:43.090 --> 00:07:45.780
Um, and so I'm getting near the story

167
00:07:45.780 --> 00:07:48.740
here. This is the introduction to the story. We're

168
00:07:48.740 --> 00:07:51.460
nearly there. Um, what we

169
00:07:51.620 --> 00:07:54.300
find with fast radio bursts is that the

170
00:07:54.300 --> 00:07:57.140
bursts are, ah, um, dispersed.

171
00:07:57.780 --> 00:08:00.780
That's the technical term, which is a little bit

172
00:08:00.780 --> 00:08:03.460
like the way a prism breaks up the light

173
00:08:03.860 --> 00:08:06.860
of the sun or a white light into a

174
00:08:06.860 --> 00:08:09.760
spectrum, spectrum of colors. The same

175
00:08:09.840 --> 00:08:12.680
sort of thing happens as radio waves travel

176
00:08:12.680 --> 00:08:15.520
through space. You've got this spike of radiation,

177
00:08:16.000 --> 00:08:18.280
but as it goes through space, this

178
00:08:18.280 --> 00:08:21.200
dispersion phenomenon takes place. And the result

179
00:08:21.200 --> 00:08:23.440
is, uh, that the different

180
00:08:23.519 --> 00:08:26.320
frequencies are spread out in time. So,

181
00:08:26.620 --> 00:08:29.440
um, if I remember rightly, I'm not a radio astronomer,

182
00:08:30.400 --> 00:08:33.160
the, um, short wave,

183
00:08:33.160 --> 00:08:35.640
the higher frequencies arrive before the lower

184
00:08:35.640 --> 00:08:38.230
frequencies. Is that right? I think that's right.

185
00:08:38.630 --> 00:08:41.590
Yes, it is. Um, and the

186
00:08:41.590 --> 00:08:44.150
high frequencies are high first. But this burst,

187
00:08:44.460 --> 00:08:47.110
um, in different frequencies, it's still a spike of

188
00:08:47.110 --> 00:08:49.870
radiation. But you're now looking at almost like

189
00:08:49.870 --> 00:08:51.390
you've dispersed it into a spectrum.

190
00:08:51.390 --> 00:08:53.190
You're looking at different frequencies.

191
00:08:54.470 --> 00:08:57.110
And so the lower frequencies arrive later.

192
00:08:57.350 --> 00:08:59.910
Now that tells you

193
00:09:00.310 --> 00:09:03.000
something about the space that the

194
00:09:03.000 --> 00:09:06.000
radio waves have been traveling through. Because there

195
00:09:06.000 --> 00:09:08.730
is what we call the intergalactic medium. Uh,

196
00:09:08.920 --> 00:09:11.800
and that is basically a very

197
00:09:11.800 --> 00:09:14.800
rarefied, um, gas, if

198
00:09:14.800 --> 00:09:17.680
you like. Although you're talking about one atom per cubic

199
00:09:17.680 --> 00:09:19.960
meter or thereabouts. It's that sort of

200
00:09:20.440 --> 00:09:23.400
rarefaction. Uh, but there's enough of it. Because

201
00:09:23.400 --> 00:09:26.200
you're coming through these great distances. There's enough of that

202
00:09:26.280 --> 00:09:29.280
gas to have the effect of dispersing this

203
00:09:29.280 --> 00:09:31.810
radiation. So the amount of dispersion

204
00:09:32.530 --> 00:09:35.490
tells you how much gas there is. That the

205
00:09:35.490 --> 00:09:38.330
radio waves have traveled through. And that was the

206
00:09:38.330 --> 00:09:41.210
breakthrough made about five years ago. By a

207
00:09:41.210 --> 00:09:44.130
team of Australian scientists. Led by

208
00:09:45.170 --> 00:09:47.810
a, um, fantastic young gentleman called

209
00:09:47.810 --> 00:09:50.770
J.P. marchant. I think it was Jean Pierre,

210
00:09:51.280 --> 00:09:54.250
um, uh. A wonderful radio

211
00:09:54.250 --> 00:09:56.770
astronomer in Western Australia. A young man,

212
00:09:57.300 --> 00:10:00.220
uh, two weeks after this breakthrough paper

213
00:10:00.220 --> 00:10:03.140
had been, uh, released, he died.

214
00:10:04.000 --> 00:10:06.660
Uh, an absolute tragedy, this huge

215
00:10:06.660 --> 00:10:09.660
breakthrough. Yeah. And uh, I think he had a heart

216
00:10:09.660 --> 00:10:11.060
attack, if I remember rightly.

217
00:10:11.380 --> 00:10:12.500
Heidi Campo: It, uh, was probably the paper.

218
00:10:13.859 --> 00:10:15.860
Professor Fred Watson: Whatever it was, um, it was.

219
00:10:16.580 --> 00:10:19.580
It absolutely rocked the Australian astronomical

220
00:10:19.580 --> 00:10:22.540
community. This new knowledge that had been created.

221
00:10:22.540 --> 00:10:25.540
And he was the lead author on the paper. Sadly, he

222
00:10:25.540 --> 00:10:28.300
died. Um, however, that

223
00:10:28.300 --> 00:10:30.300
work has now been carried on at other

224
00:10:31.900 --> 00:10:33.420
radio astronomy observatories.

225
00:10:33.420 --> 00:10:36.420
Which brings us to the story today. And

226
00:10:36.420 --> 00:10:39.080
this is a paper that has been released, um,

227
00:10:39.340 --> 00:10:41.580
by astronomers at the center for

228
00:10:41.660 --> 00:10:44.140
Astrophysics, uh, the Harvard

229
00:10:44.140 --> 00:10:47.080
Smithsonian center for Astrophysics, cfa. Uh,

230
00:10:47.080 --> 00:10:49.940
and what they've done is they've taken this work a step

231
00:10:49.940 --> 00:10:52.940
further. Because they've looked at many, many more fast

232
00:10:52.940 --> 00:10:55.340
radio bursts. As you'd expect, these things are coming,

233
00:10:56.120 --> 00:10:58.800
um, um, um, are being constantly

234
00:10:58.800 --> 00:11:01.520
observed. Um, and what they've done is

235
00:11:01.520 --> 00:11:04.400
they have looked again at, uh.

236
00:11:04.440 --> 00:11:06.920
The structure or the

237
00:11:06.920 --> 00:11:09.880
constituents of the intergalactic medium.

238
00:11:09.880 --> 00:11:12.800
The space between the galaxies. And exactly

239
00:11:12.800 --> 00:11:15.720
as the Maaschant, uh, uh, uh, work.

240
00:11:16.340 --> 00:11:19.320
Um, proposed five years ago. They're able

241
00:11:19.320 --> 00:11:21.960
to use this as a measure

242
00:11:22.120 --> 00:11:24.990
of just what the. What the contents of

243
00:11:24.990 --> 00:11:27.460
the intergalactic medium are. Ah,

244
00:11:28.190 --> 00:11:31.150
and they find that it is enough to account

245
00:11:31.390 --> 00:11:34.230
for what we call the missing matter. Now, this is

246
00:11:34.230 --> 00:11:36.830
not dark matter that we're talking about. This is normal matter.

247
00:11:37.220 --> 00:11:40.150
Um, protons, electrons. The normal

248
00:11:40.150 --> 00:11:42.990
stuff which we are familiar with. Which in fact,

249
00:11:43.180 --> 00:11:46.030
uh. Is only something like 20% of

250
00:11:46.030 --> 00:11:48.870
the amount of matter in the universe. The rest of it

251
00:11:48.870 --> 00:11:51.590
is the dark matter. That's something else. But

252
00:11:51.590 --> 00:11:54.470
even that normal matter that we know about. When we

253
00:11:54.470 --> 00:11:57.410
look at the calculations as to what should emerge

254
00:11:57.410 --> 00:12:00.250
from the Big Bang. The um, event in which the universe was

255
00:12:00.250 --> 00:12:02.730
formed, we can't find enough of it.

256
00:12:03.210 --> 00:12:06.210
That's why we call it the missing matter. But

257
00:12:06.210 --> 00:12:08.850
it now Turns out that this

258
00:12:08.850 --> 00:12:11.770
combined set of researchers looking at the

259
00:12:11.770 --> 00:12:14.730
intergalactic medium find that there is enough matter

260
00:12:14.730 --> 00:12:17.450
in the intergalactic medium to account for that

261
00:12:17.450 --> 00:12:20.370
missing matter. So this is a problem solved. As

262
00:12:20.370 --> 00:12:23.130
you said at the beginning. Yeah, the two

263
00:12:23.130 --> 00:12:26.010
things absolutely dovetail together. The predicted

264
00:12:26.010 --> 00:12:28.990
amount of matter in the universe is now exactly what

265
00:12:28.990 --> 00:12:31.790
we find when we include this intergalactic

266
00:12:31.790 --> 00:12:34.740
medium. So it's amazing research. It's,

267
00:12:34.740 --> 00:12:37.630
um, very fitting that it should be our lead story on

268
00:12:37.630 --> 00:12:40.630
this edition of Space Nuts, because, um, as I said, it's

269
00:12:40.630 --> 00:12:43.549
got an Australian content. The thrusters now moved to

270
00:12:43.549 --> 00:12:46.390
other observatories, but we have this global picture

271
00:12:46.390 --> 00:12:49.350
now, uh, of what dark matter can tell

272
00:12:49.350 --> 00:12:52.110
us. Sorry, what, uh, fast radio burst can tell

273
00:12:52.110 --> 00:12:55.070
us about. Not dark matter, but the missing matter of the

274
00:12:55.070 --> 00:12:55.510
universe.

275
00:12:56.310 --> 00:12:59.270
Heidi Campo: Oh, that's wonderful. Uh, this reminds me

276
00:12:59.510 --> 00:13:02.510
when I'm trying to do math unsuccessfully, and I'm

277
00:13:02.510 --> 00:13:05.430
trying to find why I can't get the right answer and I forgot to carry the

278
00:13:05.430 --> 00:13:07.830
one. It turns out it was there the whole time.

279
00:13:08.310 --> 00:13:11.030
The answer was right there. I just forgot to grab

280
00:13:11.030 --> 00:13:13.710
that one little piece to pull it in to get the correct

281
00:13:13.710 --> 00:13:16.630
answer. But they solved such a complex,

282
00:13:17.190 --> 00:13:19.990
uh, problem. And isn't that kind of funny

283
00:13:20.070 --> 00:13:22.390
sometimes the answers are right there in plain sight.

284
00:13:22.790 --> 00:13:24.390
Professor Fred Watson: Exactly. It's in plain sight.

285
00:13:25.350 --> 00:13:27.430
Heidi Campo: But it's like you said, one atom per.

286
00:13:28.290 --> 00:13:29.250
What did you say it was?

287
00:13:29.410 --> 00:13:32.410
Professor Fred Watson: 1 cubic meter? It's something like that. It's

288
00:13:32.410 --> 00:13:35.370
that kind of level. It's very. A few atoms per cubic

289
00:13:35.370 --> 00:13:38.000
meter, perhaps. Um, but yes, uh,

290
00:13:38.450 --> 00:13:40.370
it's in plain sight. But you need.

291
00:13:41.410 --> 00:13:44.330
The thing that's made this possible, this detection possible is

292
00:13:44.330 --> 00:13:47.250
the fact that these bursts of radiation are so short,

293
00:13:48.130 --> 00:13:50.970
they're milliseconds. And that means that as they're

294
00:13:50.970 --> 00:13:53.890
dispersed, uh, into different frequency bands

295
00:13:53.890 --> 00:13:56.890
as they pass through the, the, the universe, um, you still

296
00:13:56.890 --> 00:13:59.650
can, you can detect this dispersion of the

297
00:13:59.650 --> 00:14:02.450
frequency bands, whereas with a constant radio signal, you

298
00:14:02.450 --> 00:14:05.370
wouldn't, you wouldn't do that. Um, you know that you've

299
00:14:05.370 --> 00:14:08.290
just got us radiation coming all the

300
00:14:08.290 --> 00:14:10.970
time. There's nothing to tell you whether the, whether

301
00:14:10.970 --> 00:14:13.930
the, um, lower frequencies are slower than the

302
00:14:14.090 --> 00:14:16.330
faster frequencies. There's nothing to tell you that.

303
00:14:18.490 --> 00:14:20.840
Yeah. Wonderful detective work. Yeah.

304
00:14:21.070 --> 00:14:22.870
Heidi Campo: Oh, yeah, it's fantastic.

305
00:14:22.870 --> 00:14:25.390
So by these radio, uh, astronomers then.

306
00:14:26.830 --> 00:14:29.710
So they do radio astronomy. What is your specialty?

307
00:14:29.710 --> 00:14:32.630
And then if you're not. So I also, I also, I have to make

308
00:14:32.630 --> 00:14:35.550
a joke, you know, it's not Space nuts if there's not a few dad jokes. And I've

309
00:14:35.550 --> 00:14:38.310
Been. I have not been holding up my end of, um,

310
00:14:38.310 --> 00:14:41.190
filling Andrew's shoes. So you may not be a radio

311
00:14:41.190 --> 00:14:43.950
astronomer, but technically you are an astronomer on the

312
00:14:43.950 --> 00:14:44.350
radio.

313
00:14:45.230 --> 00:14:48.070
Professor Fred Watson: That's correct. Yeah. I like it. I

314
00:14:48.070 --> 00:14:50.510
like it. Yes. Your dad jokes will go far,

315
00:14:50.510 --> 00:14:53.360
Heidi. Um, uh, so

316
00:14:53.360 --> 00:14:56.160
my specialty, um, and

317
00:14:56.560 --> 00:14:59.480
really my work now is in sort of policy and things

318
00:14:59.480 --> 00:15:02.340
of that sort rather than observing. Uh,

319
00:15:02.400 --> 00:15:05.240
but yes, for 40 years I guess

320
00:15:05.240 --> 00:15:08.239
I was, um, in fact more than that, nearly 50 years, I

321
00:15:08.239 --> 00:15:10.720
was an optical astronomer. And that means I use

322
00:15:10.720 --> 00:15:13.340
telescopes that look at visible light, um,

323
00:15:13.680 --> 00:15:16.480
so giant telescopes that have a very

324
00:15:16.480 --> 00:15:19.480
shiny mirror at the base of them. In fact, the one I used

325
00:15:19.480 --> 00:15:21.980
principally was the, um, 3.9 meter

326
00:15:22.700 --> 00:15:25.460
Anglo Australian Telescope, uh, which we

327
00:15:25.460 --> 00:15:27.900
celebrated the 50th birthday on last year.

328
00:15:27.900 --> 00:15:30.140
Heidi Campo: Oh, happy, happy birthday, telescope.

329
00:15:32.460 --> 00:15:34.900
Professor Fred Watson: 0G and I feel fine space

330
00:15:34.900 --> 00:15:35.500
nuts.

331
00:15:35.580 --> 00:15:38.140
Heidi Campo: So with the, uh, ESA's Probe 3

332
00:15:38.220 --> 00:15:41.140
mission, that telescope, would that count as a big

333
00:15:41.140 --> 00:15:42.300
mirror telescope?

334
00:15:42.620 --> 00:15:45.580
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, um, it's a small mirror telescope.

335
00:15:46.220 --> 00:15:46.780
Heidi Campo: Okay.

336
00:15:46.790 --> 00:15:49.660
Professor Fred Watson: Um, but it is an optical telescope. That's right. So

337
00:15:49.660 --> 00:15:52.640
it's looking at visible light and lovely, uh, segment segue

338
00:15:52.640 --> 00:15:55.560
there to the next story, Heidi. Um, so

339
00:15:55.800 --> 00:15:58.280
this again, you know, needs a little bit of

340
00:15:58.280 --> 00:16:01.000
background to, uh, get over its

341
00:16:01.000 --> 00:16:03.240
significance. But this, I think is a

342
00:16:03.320 --> 00:16:05.720
fantastic story, uh, because,

343
00:16:06.070 --> 00:16:09.000
um, it kind of means, um, that

344
00:16:09.000 --> 00:16:11.720
you can make an eclipse of the sun anytime you like.

345
00:16:12.730 --> 00:16:15.720
Uh, as you know, eclipses, ah, are rare.

346
00:16:16.230 --> 00:16:19.160
Um, well, in any given place on the Earth,

347
00:16:19.160 --> 00:16:22.040
they're a rare phenomenon. Uh, that's to say

348
00:16:22.120 --> 00:16:24.960
when the moon exactly blots out the

349
00:16:24.960 --> 00:16:27.880
disk of the sun or blacks it out. Uh, that

350
00:16:27.880 --> 00:16:30.760
means the Moon's shadow on the Earth's, uh, surface passes

351
00:16:31.080 --> 00:16:33.920
over different places. Uh, we call it

352
00:16:33.920 --> 00:16:36.920
the path of totality because that's

353
00:16:36.920 --> 00:16:39.880
where you see a total eclipse. And that's only narrow. It's only

354
00:16:40.200 --> 00:16:43.200
50 to 100 kilometers wide, um, 30

355
00:16:43.200 --> 00:16:45.160
to 60 miles, I guess, something like that.

356
00:16:45.880 --> 00:16:47.370
So, uh, um,

357
00:16:48.960 --> 00:16:51.920
ah, it's a rare phenomenon at any one place. And

358
00:16:51.920 --> 00:16:54.600
that's why, uh, when eclipses come along, people

359
00:16:54.820 --> 00:16:57.620
chase all over the world. Uh, everybody here in Australia,

360
00:16:57.780 --> 00:17:00.740
or certainly the state I'm in, New South Wales,

361
00:17:01.220 --> 00:17:04.140
are, uh, looking forward to July 2028, when

362
00:17:04.140 --> 00:17:07.140
an eclipse, um, will be seen from this

363
00:17:07.140 --> 00:17:09.980
state. And in fact, the Moon's shadow will

364
00:17:09.980 --> 00:17:12.940
pass directly over Sydney. So Sydney's going to be

365
00:17:12.940 --> 00:17:15.540
the center of the world's astronomers for,

366
00:17:15.710 --> 00:17:18.660
um, a short time. In 2028 it is

367
00:17:18.660 --> 00:17:21.140
already, of course, but, uh, in a different sort of way.

368
00:17:21.380 --> 00:17:23.460
Anyway. One of the reasons why

369
00:17:23.780 --> 00:17:26.309
scientists Asked so keen

370
00:17:26.629 --> 00:17:29.229
on watching eclipses is because when the

371
00:17:29.229 --> 00:17:32.069
moon's disk blots out the visible

372
00:17:32.069 --> 00:17:34.989
disk of the sun, what you see is

373
00:17:34.989 --> 00:17:37.509
the sun's outer atmosphere. It's corona.

374
00:17:37.989 --> 00:17:40.229
And, uh, this is a, it's a almost

375
00:17:40.229 --> 00:17:43.109
ethereal glow around the sun

376
00:17:43.189 --> 00:17:45.709
which has got structure in it that comes from the

377
00:17:45.709 --> 00:17:48.429
magnetic field of the sun, uh, that

378
00:17:48.429 --> 00:17:51.189
dictates what the corona looks like. There are many

379
00:17:51.189 --> 00:17:54.149
mysteries, uh, that we don't understand about the

380
00:17:54.149 --> 00:17:57.019
corona. One is why its temperature is so high.

381
00:17:57.850 --> 00:18:00.210
Uh, the sun's surface temperature,

382
00:18:00.530 --> 00:18:03.010
around 5,500 degrees.

383
00:18:03.890 --> 00:18:06.810
This is degrees Celsius, the temperature

384
00:18:06.810 --> 00:18:09.490
of the corona, about 15 million degrees.

385
00:18:10.090 --> 00:18:13.010
Um, you're talking about this huge difference

386
00:18:13.170 --> 00:18:15.970
between the bit that we can

387
00:18:15.970 --> 00:18:18.930
see and the bit that is invisible

388
00:18:18.930 --> 00:18:21.810
except when you have an eclipse.

389
00:18:22.050 --> 00:18:24.950
That's because it's very faint compared with, you know,

390
00:18:24.950 --> 00:18:27.950
with the disk of the sun. Uh, and the mystery is, why

391
00:18:27.950 --> 00:18:30.910
is the corona so hot? So, uh, the corona.

392
00:18:30.910 --> 00:18:33.830
And it's thought to be. We actually think it's all about magnetic

393
00:18:33.830 --> 00:18:36.550
fields again. Anyway, the corona is an

394
00:18:36.550 --> 00:18:39.390
interesting area of study, but you

395
00:18:39.390 --> 00:18:41.710
can't see it unless you're in an eclipse.

396
00:18:42.110 --> 00:18:45.110
Now the problem, you might think, okay, well, why don't we make a

397
00:18:45.110 --> 00:18:48.110
telescope with a little disk that blots out the

398
00:18:48.110 --> 00:18:50.990
light of the sun so that you can see the corona

399
00:18:50.990 --> 00:18:53.790
around it. And there are such telescopes, they're called

400
00:18:53.790 --> 00:18:56.510
coronagraphs. That's the name,

401
00:18:56.510 --> 00:18:59.510
gives away what it's for. They only work

402
00:18:59.750 --> 00:19:02.470
where they really only work in a vacuum

403
00:19:02.870 --> 00:19:05.710
because the atmosphere tends to, um, scatter

404
00:19:05.710 --> 00:19:08.230
the light and blocks out the view of the

405
00:19:08.230 --> 00:19:11.070
corona. So one or two very high mountain

406
00:19:11.070 --> 00:19:14.030
sites have had coronagraphs used on them, and you can

407
00:19:14.030 --> 00:19:15.750
also use them in space. But

408
00:19:16.790 --> 00:19:18.150
they have their limitations.

409
00:19:18.470 --> 00:19:21.110
And this gets us to the story that you mentioned,

410
00:19:21.270 --> 00:19:24.150
Proba 3. This is actually two satellites

411
00:19:24.150 --> 00:19:26.700
which are operated by the European space agen.

412
00:19:27.790 --> 00:19:30.450
Um, and they are about, if I remember rightly,

413
00:19:30.450 --> 00:19:33.330
150 meters apart. Uh,

414
00:19:33.650 --> 00:19:36.210
they are arranged so that one

415
00:19:36.850 --> 00:19:39.770
has a sort of disk, one has

416
00:19:39.770 --> 00:19:42.770
got a disk on it. Um, it's disk shaped, if I can

417
00:19:42.770 --> 00:19:45.570
put it that way. And if you line that up with

418
00:19:45.570 --> 00:19:48.090
the sun as seen from the other

419
00:19:48.090 --> 00:19:50.970
spacecraft, which has a telescope on it, probably

420
00:19:50.970 --> 00:19:53.640
with a shiny mirror in there somewhere, um,

421
00:19:53.830 --> 00:19:56.550
and that lets you blot out the sun's

422
00:19:56.550 --> 00:19:59.190
disk. And it gives you the best view

423
00:19:59.510 --> 00:20:02.470
that we have outside a solar eclipse

424
00:20:02.790 --> 00:20:05.670
of the solar corona. Uh, and the reason

425
00:20:05.670 --> 00:20:08.430
why this is in the news at the moment is because

426
00:20:08.430 --> 00:20:11.150
we're just starting to see the first images from this

427
00:20:11.150 --> 00:20:13.990
Prober 3 mission. It's a European Space Agency

428
00:20:13.990 --> 00:20:16.910
mission, uh, and we can see the uh,

429
00:20:16.910 --> 00:20:19.830
corona, uh, of the sun in great

430
00:20:19.830 --> 00:20:22.480
detail, just as we would if we were

431
00:20:22.480 --> 00:20:25.470
watching an eclipse from the uh, Earth. Uh,

432
00:20:25.480 --> 00:20:28.480
and so this is a step forward. It's a new

433
00:20:28.480 --> 00:20:31.360
technology. Uh, it is going to allow us to

434
00:20:31.360 --> 00:20:33.640
monitor the Sun's corona um,

435
00:20:34.360 --> 00:20:37.120
in real time, uh, and for a long period. I think

436
00:20:37.120 --> 00:20:39.800
they're proposing, uh, is it 1000

437
00:20:39.800 --> 00:20:42.600
hours of observing of the Sun?

438
00:20:42.600 --> 00:20:45.520
Yes, it will create about 1,000 hours of

439
00:20:45.520 --> 00:20:48.420
images over its two year mission and anyone

440
00:20:48.420 --> 00:20:51.300
will be able to download the data. So it's

441
00:20:51.460 --> 00:20:54.380
a uh, really interesting step forward by the European

442
00:20:54.380 --> 00:20:57.340
Space Agency and the scientists who are working uh, on

443
00:20:57.340 --> 00:21:00.300
this piece, um, of equipment to let us see the Sun's

444
00:21:00.300 --> 00:21:02.980
corona over the next two years in great detail.

445
00:21:04.580 --> 00:21:07.380
Heidi Campo: It's fantastic. I'm looking at the images right now and

446
00:21:07.380 --> 00:21:10.340
I've got to say, um, some of

447
00:21:10.340 --> 00:21:12.980
you may get this reference. It looks just

448
00:21:12.980 --> 00:21:15.580
like the um, late 90s, early

449
00:21:15.580 --> 00:21:17.620
2000s Windows media player

450
00:21:18.020 --> 00:21:19.050
visualizers.

451
00:21:19.760 --> 00:21:20.160
Professor Fred Watson: Yes.

452
00:21:20.880 --> 00:21:23.120
Heidi Campo: Doesn't it? It's got such a,

453
00:21:23.520 --> 00:21:26.480
interesting hue to it. I feel like I could be listening to like

454
00:21:26.480 --> 00:21:29.120
early 2000s techno music with these images.

455
00:21:30.080 --> 00:21:32.080
Professor Fred Watson: We can probably provide that somewhere

456
00:21:33.120 --> 00:21:34.480
some space techno.

457
00:21:34.560 --> 00:21:37.400
Heidi Campo: My other question, since this will be um,

458
00:21:37.520 --> 00:21:40.000
available to the public, would this be a good

459
00:21:40.000 --> 00:21:42.640
opportunity for any citizen scientists

460
00:21:43.040 --> 00:21:46.040
to tap into and are there any programs that you know

461
00:21:46.040 --> 00:21:49.010
of that people may want to be paying attention to if they

462
00:21:49.010 --> 00:21:51.290
are interested in getting involved in citizen science?

463
00:21:51.690 --> 00:21:54.690
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, that's a great question. And um, you know there

464
00:21:54.690 --> 00:21:57.490
is a wonderful array of citizen

465
00:21:57.490 --> 00:22:00.210
science projects which are ah, related to

466
00:22:00.210 --> 00:22:01.010
astronomy, um,

467
00:22:03.560 --> 00:22:06.330
um, various ones. The zooniverse is the

468
00:22:06.330 --> 00:22:09.010
sort of, um, I guess you've probably heard of the

469
00:22:09.010 --> 00:22:11.810
zooniverse, which is a kind of cluster of

470
00:22:11.810 --> 00:22:14.420
citizen science projects, um,

471
00:22:14.590 --> 00:22:16.910
that um, brings to bear

472
00:22:18.110 --> 00:22:20.830
the resources of our citizen uh, science

473
00:22:20.990 --> 00:22:23.790
scientists, uh, to bear on astronomical

474
00:22:23.790 --> 00:22:26.710
data. And you can bet your life that there will be,

475
00:22:26.710 --> 00:22:29.670
I don't know, uh, particularly that this is the

476
00:22:29.670 --> 00:22:32.270
case, but you can bet your life that there will be people

477
00:22:32.510 --> 00:22:35.270
poring over these coronagraph Images from Probe

478
00:22:35.270 --> 00:22:38.270
3 looking uh, to see what we might discover

479
00:22:38.590 --> 00:22:41.390
about the solar corona. Um, it is

480
00:22:41.480 --> 00:22:43.710
uh, I think it's a, uh, really,

481
00:22:44.350 --> 00:22:47.070
if I can put it this way, it's a project that is ripe for

482
00:22:47.710 --> 00:22:49.710
exploitation with citizen science.

483
00:22:50.830 --> 00:22:53.830
Heidi Campo: Yeah, and I'm such a, you guys have probably heard me talk

484
00:22:53.830 --> 00:22:56.669
about citizen science programs on here before because I'm such a

485
00:22:56.669 --> 00:22:59.590
big advocate for everybody getting involved

486
00:22:59.590 --> 00:23:02.510
Because I, uh, you know, don't save it for the

487
00:23:02.750 --> 00:23:05.550
brilliant people with the PhDs. We love you, Fred. You're

488
00:23:05.550 --> 00:23:08.510
wonderful. But if we can export some of this work

489
00:23:08.510 --> 00:23:11.230
to the whole pool of talent, and

490
00:23:11.310 --> 00:23:14.170
I've always learned this, the more I get involved in the space industry

491
00:23:14.250 --> 00:23:17.210
is don't let. Don't let you know, don't be

492
00:23:17.210 --> 00:23:20.210
the person to tell yourself, no, I can't do that. Let somebody else

493
00:23:20.210 --> 00:23:22.770
tell you. Just start pursuing it. If you're

494
00:23:22.770 --> 00:23:25.530
interested in it, get involved. There's so many

495
00:23:25.530 --> 00:23:28.210
opportunities and there's so much to learn.

496
00:23:28.210 --> 00:23:31.170
We still have more questions than

497
00:23:31.170 --> 00:23:33.850
we have answers. So there is absolutely.

498
00:23:33.930 --> 00:23:36.890
Here's a pun. Here's another pun. I'm. I got two for them today.

499
00:23:36.890 --> 00:23:39.890
There's space for you. There's space for you to

500
00:23:39.890 --> 00:23:42.690
get involved in space. We need

501
00:23:42.690 --> 00:23:45.190
your help. So citizen science program programs,

502
00:23:45.610 --> 00:23:48.150
um, are a fantastic way

503
00:23:48.470 --> 00:23:51.390
to get involved. And I think this is

504
00:23:51.390 --> 00:23:54.190
a little bit more of my bumpier segue. Unless you had something you

505
00:23:54.190 --> 00:23:54.950
wanted to say, Fred.

506
00:23:54.950 --> 00:23:57.910
Professor Fred Watson: No, no, I'm just a big fan of cities and science as well. I

507
00:23:57.910 --> 00:24:00.470
think it's fabulous what is achieved by that.

508
00:24:00.770 --> 00:24:03.670
Um, and I wholeheartedly agree with your

509
00:24:03.670 --> 00:24:06.550
comments there, Heidi, but, yeah, ah, I think you had a

510
00:24:06.550 --> 00:24:09.030
nice segue coming up there, which I probably ruined now.

511
00:24:09.190 --> 00:24:11.790
Heidi Campo: Oh, no, I think it was going to be a pretty bumpy one. So this is.

512
00:24:11.790 --> 00:24:14.630
Okay. Um, I will say I do know that actually,

513
00:24:14.830 --> 00:24:17.580
um, some. I remember because I

514
00:24:17.580 --> 00:24:20.460
got some, um, they called it the NASA

515
00:24:20.460 --> 00:24:23.380
TOPS program. TOPS Standard for something.

516
00:24:23.620 --> 00:24:26.520
Open science repository, something like that. But it's,

517
00:24:26.520 --> 00:24:29.460
um, it's just a casual certification

518
00:24:29.460 --> 00:24:32.420
that you can get online from. It's an official NASA thing that

519
00:24:32.420 --> 00:24:35.380
you can get and just put it on your LinkedIn. But they just talked

520
00:24:35.380 --> 00:24:37.940
about a lot of different citizen science programs.

521
00:24:38.020 --> 00:24:41.020
And I believe I remember reading, if I, If I read

522
00:24:41.020 --> 00:24:43.860
this correctly, a, um. Lot of

523
00:24:43.940 --> 00:24:46.880
breakthroughs have happened with hurricane

524
00:24:46.880 --> 00:24:49.560
technology and, um, early

525
00:24:49.560 --> 00:24:52.520
detection of hurricanes through citizen science. Because

526
00:24:53.160 --> 00:24:56.000
that was one of the first places that we

527
00:24:56.000 --> 00:24:58.960
tapped into citizen science. Don't quote me

528
00:24:58.960 --> 00:25:01.720
on the decades. I'm terrible at my history. But the first,

529
00:25:02.700 --> 00:25:05.640
um, cited use of citizen

530
00:25:05.640 --> 00:25:08.200
science was the former

531
00:25:08.600 --> 00:25:11.400
belief was that wind

532
00:25:11.400 --> 00:25:14.100
always moved one direction because if you're

533
00:25:14.100 --> 00:25:16.980
standing in the wind, it's coming at you one direction. And

534
00:25:16.980 --> 00:25:19.940
this guy was the I. And I. I wish I had his name. I'm

535
00:25:19.940 --> 00:25:22.780
so sorry. But he was like, hey, I think wind moves

536
00:25:22.780 --> 00:25:25.580
in different patterns. And so what he did

537
00:25:25.580 --> 00:25:28.500
is he, um, had a weather event and he had

538
00:25:28.500 --> 00:25:31.100
People posted all over the place

539
00:25:31.500 --> 00:25:34.380
and he's like, tell me which direction the wind was moving.

540
00:25:34.940 --> 00:25:37.860
And they reported back to him and he discovered

541
00:25:37.860 --> 00:25:40.830
that yes, the weather was not always. The wind

542
00:25:40.830 --> 00:25:43.830
was not always moving one direction. So that was uh. I don't know if you

543
00:25:43.830 --> 00:25:44.790
know more about that story.

544
00:25:44.870 --> 00:25:47.810
Professor Fred Watson: I don't know that but that exactly. It's uh,

545
00:25:47.810 --> 00:25:50.670
you know, it, that's. It's wonderful when people have

546
00:25:50.670 --> 00:25:53.550
an idea like that and managed to muster

547
00:25:53.550 --> 00:25:56.230
the resources that um, he clearly did and

548
00:25:56.310 --> 00:25:59.190
get the results. And citizen science is a lot like that.

549
00:26:01.510 --> 00:26:03.670
Okay, we checked all four systems and.

550
00:26:03.670 --> 00:26:05.900
Heidi Campo: Team with a go space navigation. Yeah.

551
00:26:06.300 --> 00:26:09.220
So here's my bumpy segue to the last

552
00:26:09.220 --> 00:26:12.180
article. Um, I guess we can say if we're keeping it

553
00:26:12.180 --> 00:26:15.060
with the detective, uh, metaphor for this episode is this is

554
00:26:15.060 --> 00:26:18.060
a clue. So we had the first

555
00:26:18.060 --> 00:26:20.939
story was we've solved something. The second

556
00:26:20.939 --> 00:26:23.820
one is we have um. Well I

557
00:26:23.820 --> 00:26:26.460
guess the second one was the clue. And this last one is there is a

558
00:26:26.460 --> 00:26:29.380
mystery. This is a open case

559
00:26:29.380 --> 00:26:32.300
yet to be solved, which is a mysterious

560
00:26:32.300 --> 00:26:34.620
link between Earth's magnetism

561
00:26:35.360 --> 00:26:38.320
and oxygen. So this is

562
00:26:38.320 --> 00:26:40.480
an open mystery. We don't know the answers.

563
00:26:40.640 --> 00:26:43.400
Professor Fred Watson: We don't uh, um. And it

564
00:26:43.400 --> 00:26:45.840
is um, really quite a significant

565
00:26:46.480 --> 00:26:48.540
result Heidi, that um,

566
00:26:49.450 --> 00:26:52.080
uh, has come from scientists. Actually

567
00:26:52.240 --> 00:26:54.840
One of them is at my alma mater, the University of St.

568
00:26:54.840 --> 00:26:57.200
Andrews in Scotland, Scotland's oldest university,

569
00:26:58.000 --> 00:27:00.960
founded in 1413. I was there shortly afterwards,

570
00:27:00.960 --> 00:27:03.500
as I always tell people. Um, um.

571
00:27:03.760 --> 00:27:06.610
It's uh, the university uh, of um,

572
00:27:06.690 --> 00:27:09.530
of St. Andrews and also uh, scientists at the

573
00:27:09.530 --> 00:27:11.730
University of leed. So this is work in the uk.

574
00:27:12.670 --> 00:27:15.650
Um, the story is

575
00:27:16.330 --> 00:27:19.010
uh, basically uh,

576
00:27:19.010 --> 00:27:21.810
that we have this trend,

577
00:27:22.210 --> 00:27:24.440
uh, that is detectable um

578
00:27:25.650 --> 00:27:28.210
by techniques that

579
00:27:28.690 --> 00:27:31.400
are uh, quite um,

580
00:27:32.620 --> 00:27:34.940
remote from what we do in the world of astronomy.

581
00:27:35.330 --> 00:27:37.980
Uh, it's um, what was it?

582
00:27:39.420 --> 00:27:42.060
Biogeochemistry I think was one of them.

583
00:27:42.540 --> 00:27:44.860
So what scientists have looked at,

584
00:27:45.570 --> 00:27:48.540
uh, what you might call proxies,

585
00:27:48.850 --> 00:27:51.780
uh, um, things that tell you

586
00:27:51.780 --> 00:27:54.420
about something else. And uh, for

587
00:27:54.420 --> 00:27:57.300
example one of the examples is this, uh,

588
00:27:57.300 --> 00:28:00.120
if you look back through the geological

589
00:28:00.120 --> 00:28:02.480
record you can find evidence

590
00:28:03.040 --> 00:28:05.600
in the geological strata of

591
00:28:05.600 --> 00:28:08.600
periods where there were lots and lots of

592
00:28:08.600 --> 00:28:11.560
wildfires, um, what we call bushfires here in

593
00:28:11.560 --> 00:28:14.240
Australia, forest fires elsewhere.

594
00:28:14.560 --> 00:28:17.040
So you can find evidence of that. And

595
00:28:17.520 --> 00:28:20.000
the scientists are saying that is a proxy

596
00:28:20.400 --> 00:28:23.200
for the number of these wildfires, is a

597
00:28:23.200 --> 00:28:25.660
proxy for the amount of oxygen that was in the

598
00:28:25.660 --> 00:28:28.020
atmosphere at the time. Because

599
00:28:28.440 --> 00:28:31.300
uh, wildfires spread much more readily

600
00:28:31.300 --> 00:28:34.260
if you've got an oxygen rich atmosphere than they do

601
00:28:34.260 --> 00:28:35.220
if you've got less.

602
00:28:35.300 --> 00:28:36.340
Heidi Campo: Oh, interesting.

603
00:28:36.660 --> 00:28:39.620
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah. So it's that kind of work that's been

604
00:28:39.620 --> 00:28:42.370
done. Also, um,

605
00:28:42.370 --> 00:28:44.820
something that's a little bit more directly measurable,

606
00:28:45.330 --> 00:28:48.100
uh, is the history of the Earth's magnetic

607
00:28:48.100 --> 00:28:51.020
field. And that's one of the ways that we know that the

608
00:28:51.020 --> 00:28:53.780
Earth's magnetic poles reverse every,

609
00:28:54.180 --> 00:28:56.900
probably three or four times every million years, something like that.

610
00:28:57.550 --> 00:29:00.540
Uh, so the, the magnetic field of the Earth is something that we

611
00:29:00.540 --> 00:29:03.420
can get from the alignment of grains of

612
00:29:03.420 --> 00:29:06.340
crystals in rocks. Um, and

613
00:29:06.340 --> 00:29:09.340
that tells you, you know, how well these are aligned,

614
00:29:09.340 --> 00:29:12.020
tells you about the intensity of the magnetic field.

615
00:29:12.900 --> 00:29:15.740
Excuse me. So this group of scientists.

616
00:29:15.740 --> 00:29:18.660
Sorry, I've got, uh, an oxygen rich,

617
00:29:18.710 --> 00:29:21.440
uh, throat at the moment. It's wanting to come. So

618
00:29:21.520 --> 00:29:23.840
these groups of scientists have looked at something

619
00:29:24.560 --> 00:29:27.560
that nobody would have expected, uh, to

620
00:29:27.560 --> 00:29:30.240
correlate, but they find that

621
00:29:30.400 --> 00:29:32.880
there is a correlation between,

622
00:29:33.360 --> 00:29:36.320
and this is looking back over half a billion years.

623
00:29:36.320 --> 00:29:39.280
So they're looking back in time over 500 million years.

624
00:29:39.600 --> 00:29:42.440
When you plot the strength of the Earth's, uh,

625
00:29:42.600 --> 00:29:45.520
magnetic field over that period and compare

626
00:29:45.840 --> 00:29:48.480
it with the amount of oxygen in the Earth's

627
00:29:48.480 --> 00:29:51.080
atmosphere over that period, the two

628
00:29:51.080 --> 00:29:53.960
graphs match very, very closely.

629
00:29:54.380 --> 00:29:57.380
Um, there's clearly a link, uh,

630
00:29:57.400 --> 00:30:00.200
between the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere,

631
00:30:00.360 --> 00:30:02.600
the intensity of the magnetic field.

632
00:30:03.639 --> 00:30:05.400
The mystery is,

633
00:30:06.440 --> 00:30:09.240
is that link telling you that

634
00:30:09.240 --> 00:30:12.200
more magnetism means more oxygen and,

635
00:30:12.200 --> 00:30:14.510
or more oxygen means more magnetism?

636
00:30:14.980 --> 00:30:17.860
Or is it telling you that there is something else going on

637
00:30:18.180 --> 00:30:21.020
that affects both the magnetic field and the

638
00:30:21.020 --> 00:30:24.020
oxygen as well, and affects them both

639
00:30:24.020 --> 00:30:26.860
in the same way? So some other process that

640
00:30:26.860 --> 00:30:29.700
we don't really understand yet. So

641
00:30:29.700 --> 00:30:32.500
a really big mystery, but the reason why I'm

642
00:30:32.500 --> 00:30:35.420
mentioning this on, um, space knots is that

643
00:30:35.420 --> 00:30:38.180
it feeds into our understanding

644
00:30:38.180 --> 00:30:40.520
of what might, uh,

645
00:30:40.670 --> 00:30:43.670
constitute places where life evolves elsewhere in the

646
00:30:43.670 --> 00:30:46.590
universe. Because we know, ah, most of the oxygen in

647
00:30:46.590 --> 00:30:48.830
the Earth's atmosphere actually comes from

648
00:30:49.150 --> 00:30:51.670
biological processes. It's what we call a

649
00:30:51.670 --> 00:30:54.470
biomarker. Somebody looking at the Earth from outside and

650
00:30:54.470 --> 00:30:57.250
seeing that much oxygen, uh,

651
00:30:57.950 --> 00:31:00.870
if they have life of the same kind that we have,

652
00:31:00.870 --> 00:31:03.390
they could say, yes, that's a biomarker that is marking,

653
00:31:04.110 --> 00:31:04.410
uh.

654
00:31:04.590 --> 00:31:06.430
Heidi Campo: Similar to K2 18B, right?

655
00:31:06.910 --> 00:31:09.830
Professor Fred Watson: Exactly. That's right. Although

656
00:31:09.830 --> 00:31:12.180
it was, uh, what was it? Dimethyl

657
00:31:12.490 --> 00:31:15.130
sulfide was the biomarker that was

658
00:31:15.370 --> 00:31:17.450
caused for the exoplanet

659
00:31:17.450 --> 00:31:20.170
K2.18b, which is still of great

660
00:31:20.170 --> 00:31:22.970
interest to astrobiologists. We don't really know

661
00:31:23.610 --> 00:31:26.610
first of all whether that, uh, um, finding

662
00:31:26.610 --> 00:31:29.450
of dimethyl sulfide is real. Or whether

663
00:31:29.610 --> 00:31:32.410
it's being confused with some other molecule.

664
00:31:32.410 --> 00:31:35.090
The signature in the spectrum that the James Webb

665
00:31:35.090 --> 00:31:38.050
telescope took, um, and we don't actually know whether that

666
00:31:38.050 --> 00:31:40.270
is genuinely a biomarker

667
00:31:40.750 --> 00:31:43.510
in an environment different from the Earth's. So

668
00:31:43.510 --> 00:31:46.270
lots of questions attached to that too. But

669
00:31:47.150 --> 00:31:49.990
this new finding, the link between magnetism and

670
00:31:49.990 --> 00:31:52.970
oxygen, whatever causes it, uh,

671
00:31:53.070 --> 00:31:55.630
may be something that will feed into

672
00:31:56.030 --> 00:31:58.990
the understanding of the way life processes work,

673
00:31:59.410 --> 00:32:02.350
uh, by astrobiologists and perhaps will tell

674
00:32:02.350 --> 00:32:05.230
us more about the kinds of places that we might look for

675
00:32:05.310 --> 00:32:08.120
extraterrestrial life, uh, when we get the

676
00:32:08.120 --> 00:32:11.000
next generation of giant telescopes with big shiny

677
00:32:11.000 --> 00:32:13.880
mirrors. Uh, and the biggest shiny mirror of all is

678
00:32:13.880 --> 00:32:16.680
going to be the European Extremely Large Telescope.

679
00:32:16.680 --> 00:32:19.280
Should come online in 2028. Its mirror is

680
00:32:19.280 --> 00:32:21.920
39 meters in diameter.

681
00:32:22.160 --> 00:32:24.240
It's huge. Anyway.

682
00:32:24.640 --> 00:32:27.530
Heidi Campo: Yeah, well, I mean, uh,

683
00:32:27.600 --> 00:32:30.600
this is, uh, important to consider. This is one of the first things

684
00:32:30.600 --> 00:32:33.510
they teach you anytime you go to any kind of, of STEM

685
00:32:33.510 --> 00:32:35.710
related program is okay.

686
00:32:35.710 --> 00:32:37.950
Correlation does not mean causation.

687
00:32:38.190 --> 00:32:38.710
Professor Fred Watson: Exactly.

688
00:32:38.710 --> 00:32:41.630
Heidi Campo: And you said this. I mean, it's like we don't know if it's

689
00:32:41.630 --> 00:32:44.430
this, this, or this. And, and it's.

690
00:32:44.670 --> 00:32:47.470
I mean, I'm looking at the trend lines right now. I mean, they

691
00:32:47.470 --> 00:32:50.390
are right there. It's so

692
00:32:50.390 --> 00:32:53.390
easy to jump to the conclusion and say, yeah, these are

693
00:32:53.870 --> 00:32:56.590
so highly correlated. But then we just have to

694
00:32:56.590 --> 00:32:59.520
remind ourselves why. And we don't know. This one's a

695
00:32:59.520 --> 00:32:59.920
mystery.

696
00:33:00.640 --> 00:33:03.360
Professor Fred Watson: It's a mystery. And, um, well, I'm sure

697
00:33:03.360 --> 00:33:06.240
it will be the focus of a lot of really interesting research

698
00:33:06.400 --> 00:33:09.320
over the next year or two. Maybe Heidi,

699
00:33:09.320 --> 00:33:12.240
you and I'll talk about whatever they find in a Space

700
00:33:12.240 --> 00:33:15.000
Nuts down the track sometime. Uh, but

701
00:33:15.000 --> 00:33:17.840
yeah, we should, um, keep an eye on this one because it's a very

702
00:33:17.840 --> 00:33:18.640
exciting result.

703
00:33:20.000 --> 00:33:22.720
Heidi Campo: Well, I think that that is a good segue to

704
00:33:22.800 --> 00:33:25.720
kick it back to you, our listeners. We've talked about a

705
00:33:25.720 --> 00:33:28.580
lot of fun things, questions, answers,

706
00:33:28.580 --> 00:33:31.460
solutions, and more questions and citizen science in

707
00:33:31.460 --> 00:33:34.420
there. Um, I think we should just take this time to encourage

708
00:33:34.420 --> 00:33:37.180
you guys to stay involved because you can

709
00:33:37.180 --> 00:33:39.980
be a part of these breakthroughs. And

710
00:33:39.980 --> 00:33:42.820
then instead of writing in just simple questions here

711
00:33:42.820 --> 00:33:45.820
on SpaceNets, you can also say, hey, as a citizen

712
00:33:45.820 --> 00:33:48.820
scientist myself, I have discovered this. What do you

713
00:33:48.820 --> 00:33:51.620
think about these findings? And I think that would be really

714
00:33:51.620 --> 00:33:53.670
neat to hear those kinds of statements from you guys.

715
00:33:55.020 --> 00:33:57.900
Professor Fred Watson: Absolutely. We could then tell the world. Remember where you heard

716
00:33:57.900 --> 00:33:59.980
it first here on Space Nuts.

717
00:34:00.940 --> 00:34:03.820
Heidi Campo: What a perfect, perfect ending. Um, Fred,

718
00:34:03.820 --> 00:34:05.580
this has been such a fun conversation.

719
00:34:05.580 --> 00:34:08.500
Professor Fred Watson: Thank you so much My pleasure always, Heidi.

720
00:34:08.500 --> 00:34:10.380
And, uh, I look forward to talking to you next time.

721
00:34:11.500 --> 00:34:14.300
Voice Over Guy: You've been listening to the Space Nuts podcast,

722
00:34:15.900 --> 00:34:18.700
available at Apple Podcasts, Spotify,

723
00:34:18.860 --> 00:34:21.630
I Heart Radio, or your favorite podcast

724
00:34:21.630 --> 00:34:23.350
player. You can also stream on

725
00:34:23.350 --> 00:34:26.310
demand at bitesz.com This has been another

726
00:34:26.310 --> 00:34:28.390
quality podcast production from

727
00:34:28.390 --> 00:34:29.510
bitesz. com.