March 1, 2026

Uncharted Discoveries, Comet C/2026 A1 & Elon's Solar Pergola | SN604 Q&A

Unimagined Discoveries, Planet Nine Mysteries, and the Sungrazing Comet In this captivating Q&A episode of Space Nuts, hosts Andrew Dunkley and Professor Fred Watson tackle a range of thought-provoking listener questions that explore the unknowns...

Show Notes
Transcript

Unimagined Discoveries, Planet Nine Mysteries, and the Sungrazing Comet
In this captivating Q&A episode of Space Nuts, hosts Andrew Dunkley and Professor Fred Watson tackle a range of thought-provoking listener questions that explore the unknowns of our universe. From the potential for undiscovered celestial phenomena to the enigma of Planet Nine, this episode is filled with cosmic curiosities and insights.
Episode Highlights:
- Unimagined Existence: Bailey from Durban asks whether there are things in the universe that we have yet to imagine. Andrew and Fred discuss the surprises revealed by the James Webb Telescope and the potential for new discoveries that could challenge our current understanding of the cosmos.
- The Planet Nine Puzzle: Sarah from Townsville wonders why we can locate distant exoplanets but struggle to find Planet Nine in our own solar system. The hosts explain the challenges involved in observing faint objects close to home and the technology behind planet detection methods.
- Comet C2026A1: Eli from Anchorage brings attention to a newly discovered sungrazing comet set to be visible in April. Andrew and Fred delve into what makes this comet special and the uncertainty surrounding its visibility, drawing parallels to previous comet behavior.
- Rusty's Solar Pergola: Rusty from Donnybrook revisits his idea of a solar pergola and its environmental implications in light of Elon Musk’s satellite plans. The hosts discuss the feasibility and potential consequences of such a massive solar array in orbit.

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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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Hi there, Thanks for joining us. This is a Q

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and A edition of Space Nuts. It's where we take

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questions from the audience, we tear them up, throw them

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in the bin, and just make up something else. Today

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we are going to answer questions about things yet to

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be discovered.

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That'll be a short conversation.

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Finding planets closer to Earth versus distant discoveries. Somebody's a

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bit confused about that. We spoke about comets in the

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last episode. We're going to look at one specifically because

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we've got a question about comet twenty twenty six A one,

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a very very recent discovery.

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And remember when Rusty.

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From Donnie Brooks so long ago suggested that we could

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cool a planet with a solar pergola. Well, he thinks

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Elon Musk has the answer and he's going to ask

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us a question about it on this episode of Space Nuts.

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Fifteen second d in Channel ten nine ignition sequence Space

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Nuts NI or three two more red.

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On Space Nuts as when actually bought it.

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Neils Good joining us again to try and sort all

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of that out. Is Professor Fred Wat's an astronomer at large.

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I know he loses sleep over the audience questions because

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he just wants to get them all so right.

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Hello, Fred, An't true? Yeah, I do like to get

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them right. You know, it's why people are somebody.

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Sometimes we get challenged, or sometimes we have somebody look

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something up and say, I think he needed.

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To tell us a bit more. But you know, we

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do our homework. Sometimes we get back to people. Sometimes

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takes us a year or two, but we do. We

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do do it.

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We're always aiming for adequacy.

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Adequacy is key when we talk about space nuts.

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Shall we get into some questions for it?

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Let's do that. I'm just going to turn the lifetime

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just I'm doing here?

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All right, Well, I'll just sit here and peruse the question.

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There it is there, we are. Okay.

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I don't know whether that made any difference, but I

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can actually see what I'm doing now.

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It helps.

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Yes, let's start, Hi, Fred Andrew, do you think there

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are things in the universe that we haven't imagined existing?

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We didn't see exo planets until the nineteen nineties, but

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we assumed they were there and we were right. But

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what about things we haven't considered, like an undiscovered element

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or a planet bigger than its parents star? What else

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could be out there that comes from South Africa. Actually,

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Bailey in Durban. I visited Durban last year. It's it's

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a fascinating place, beautiful beaches.

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Lovely.

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On the on the western Indian Ocean. I think you'd say, yeah,

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the west coast of the Indian Ocean. Oh it is,

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that's right, or the east coast of Africa, whichever.

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Yeah, that's right. That's what I was with.

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Yeah, I was doing the rather than yeah, well that's

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because I live over here and I was thinking in

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terms of where it is that's on the western side

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of the Indian Ocean.

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That's that's correct.

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But sorry, Bailey, getting very confusing.

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But it's a great question, and I mean the answer

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is yes. Really, you know, even just within the last

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few months, we've got things that people have not considered before,

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little red dots galaxies in the early universe that look

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as though they're too massive for you know, for their age,

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their young age, because they're can't be more than a

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couple of hundred million years old, and yet they're they've

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got very high mass and very concentrated and that didn't

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really fit the theory. So these sorts of objects, especially

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as our telescopes get bigger, are going to take us

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by surprise, and I think you know, the James Web

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Telescope has certainly done that par excellence. We've come across

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so many things that were unexpected and had to almost

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rewrite the textbooks in many cases. And the next big

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thing in that regard, as I've said many many times

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before on space nuts, will be the ELT, the extremely

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large telescope with an aperture much bigger than the James

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Web telescope at thirty nine meters compared with the six

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and a half meters of the Web. So we're going

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to learn stuff from that that will, I think blow

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our minds. Could be exactly the kinds of things that

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you know that Bailey's mentioning exo planets bigger than their parents,

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styles and things like that. An undiscovered element is less

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likely because we know kind of what's going on in

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the elemental world from the periodic table, which doesn't all

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those The.

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Periodic table does purposely have gaps in it for future discovery,

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doesn't it.

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Well, yes, but they're all at the I think you're

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kind of beyond the elements that would exist in nature.

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Right after it's something we might accidentally invent in that kitchen. Yes,

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I'll try to aid kitchen sourer nuclear ocy.

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Somewhere if you're.

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If you're sour to produce these new elements.

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So I think you're probably burning it a bit, probably,

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and you might need to watch for the radiation that's

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coming from.

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It as well.

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Yes, Yes, indeed, I beg just sort of doing some

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AI searchers on things that may one day discover. Gravitons.

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We've talked about gravitons several times. We don't know if

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they exist, but they might. We've never found one, but

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it seems to be applausible way of you know, justifying

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the existence of gravity, new states of matter, just a

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generalization new states of matter.

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That's a good that's actually a good one because there

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are you know, there are subtilties in the states of

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matter that are still that are still being discovered. That

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might be physics that does that there rather than astronomy.

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Yeah it maybe maybe black hole stars. There's another one

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people have often asked us questions about. They haven't actually

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found one, but they're starting to find evidence that could

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lead to the possibility of one. Is that a fair point,

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That's that's right, yep. And the other one that comes

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up a lot white holes, wormholes, cosmic strings, other dimensions,

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multiple universes.

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In a sense that.

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Things that if there were discovered, they wouldn't surprise us

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because there's already a theoretical background for them. But the

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things that I guess that perhaps Bailey's thinking allow, things

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like the little red dots, which we now know very

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unusual aggregations of stars in the early universe, which we

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didn't think existed.

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It might have been what prompted the question, because it's

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been big in the news lately, and I actually saw

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another story about it the other day. It's continuing to

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that's right, Yes, yeah, we still don't really know what

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they are.

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Yes, you know, the the latest theory is slowly spinning

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dark matter halos. They are, I think the latest theory

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for what what actually makes these compact red galaxies that

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the Web telescope has been finding in the early universe.

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That's I think the current theory. That was October last

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year that I saw a paper on that. So, yes,

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it's still still still the working progress.

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There you go, Bay, There's still a lot yet to

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be discovered, and some of it will definitely surprise us

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down the track, like even In the last episode, we

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were talking about a comet that reversed its spin.

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No one's ever seen that before.

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Oh, that's right, that's sort of thing we're talking about.

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Great to hear from you. Hope all is well in Durban.

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We've got a great water park there too. By the way,

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to our next question, if we can find planets orbiting

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stars in other solar systems hundreds or thousands of light

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years away, why can't we find planet nine in our

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own solar system? I believe that we're not even sure

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about how many planets are in the Alpha Centauri system,

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which is our closest neighbor. I don't understand how we

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can't find things close by when we can find things

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eons away. Please enlighten me. That's from Sarah in Townsville

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in North Queensland.

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A great question too, Oh Sarah, thank you for asking

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that and sending it in.

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And it depends, Look, it depends.

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On the technology and the techniques that we're using to

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make these measurements. Planet nine is a peculiarly difficult thing

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to try and observe because it's going to be faint.

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It's going to be for all intents and purposes, just

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an ordinary star until you observe it over a fairly

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lengthy period of time, when you might detect its movement.

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It's so far away if it exists. Whereas, and turning

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to Alpha Centauri, that's another good point. We do know

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that there are planets in the Alpha Centauri system, but

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there might be more than we think there are.

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And so I think that that I've found.

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Guess giants at this point, but they they believe there

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are probably rocky planets, but we haven't found them.

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Yeah, that's right.

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And that's a couple of things going on here. One

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is that the smaller the planet going around the star,

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the harder it is to find it. And also it

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might take a lot longer to find it, because if

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you've got a planet like the Earth going around a

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star and you're looking for its signature on the either

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the light or the velocity of the star, it's got this,

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you know, three hundred and sixty five year period. So

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it's something you need to observe over a long period

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of time. But the other thing I was going to

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say is that the two main methods for finding planets

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around other stars are First of all, that what we

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call the Doppler wobble technique the fact that as a

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planet goes around a star, the planet pulls the star

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slightly out of place, and you can actually measure that

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displacement of the star's light because it turns out that

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you looking for velocities in the region of a meter

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per second.

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That's a very low velocity.

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For you know, trying to measure these things by the

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radiolosome method, spectroscopy the Doppler Doppler effect. So the Doppler

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wobble technique is really sensitive to massive planets that pull

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the star slightly off center more than a smaller planet would.

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And it's also sensitive to massive planets which are close

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to the star because that they have the biggest impact

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on the star. So you've got this combination that means

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that you really need a lot of light to make

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these measurements. So for the Doppler wobble technique, you've got

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to have stars that are relatively nearby, i either relatively

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bright in our skies. But then you might find that

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we know much more about some systems that are further

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away because you're measuring goes by what we call the

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transit technique, where the light of the star dims slightly

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when the planet passes in front of it, and that

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actually is more sensitive.

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First of all, it's more.

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Sensitive to things further out in a solar system, further

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away from their parent star. It's sensitive to smaller objects

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as well, because we can measure brightness much more accurately

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than we can these tiny radial velocities, these tiny speeds

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along the line of size.

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There is a downside to that process, though, isn't a

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transit method, because I think to confirm an exceit planet,

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you've got to see it twice.

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Is it all?

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Yes, it has to be.

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And if it's to be seen, if it's all being

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a star at like once in a thousand years.

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Next week, that's right.

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In fact, you really want to see it three times

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because that way you know that it's the same period

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of the planet going around the star. You'd really like

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to see it three times so that you can measure

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the distance between the first two transits and the second

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two transits, and they should be the same because you

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look at something in orbous around the star.

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But two is acceptable as well. And what what I

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was going to.

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Say was, you can you can look at that, you

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can make that measurement for objects much much further away. Now,

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the Alpha Centauri system doesn't lend itself to the transit technique,

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and so that's why we're not sure about how many

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planets are. Doesn't lend itself two very lightweight rocky planets either.

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So it's a great question, and it's got some fairly

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sensible answers, and really they depend on our abilities to

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discover different things under different classifications of observing.

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For example.

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Yeah, and it's an interesting quirk, isn't it that the

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closes something is that, let's like who we are to

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find it in certain circumstances.

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Under some circumstances, that's right.

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Yeah, that's mostly being near a Generally speaking, something that's

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nearer is easier to make discoveries from, just because you've

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got more light to blow with.

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Yeah, yeah, fair enough, Thank you, Sarah. Lovely to hear

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from you.

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I've actually never been to towns Phil, but I'm going

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to get there one day.

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I think furthest north I've ever made, it is, or if.

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You don't count being on a cruise ship is with

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some days as far north as I've ever been able

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to get. This is Space Nuts with Andrew Dunkley and

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Professor Fred Watson. I believe that this nation should commit

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itself we achieving the goal before this decade is out

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of landing a man on the moon and returning him

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safely to the europe MUDs. Last episode, Fred, we were

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talking about comic P forty one, which was doing that

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weird respinning thing thing it did. It stopped spinning one

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way and started spinning the other way and very confusing.

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What we're talking about now is a question from Anchorage, Alaska.

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Eli has messaged us. I've heard that there has been

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yet another once in a lifetime comet been discovered and

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will be visible in April. They're even saying we might

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be able to see this one in daylight. It's called

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C twenty twenty six A one and is referred to

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as a sungrazer. What makes this one so special?

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Where will it be visible? Thanks? Eli?

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Great question. I did read about this one. I meant

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to bring it up with you, but Eli's going before me.

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Yeah, that's nice when that happens.

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Well, it is a sungrazer, which means it, as its

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name implies, passes very close to the Sun. Often sungrazers

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fall to pieces because the gravitational forces that they feel

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as they pass the Sun that what we call the

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tidal effects tend to want to pull them up part

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and so sometimes they just disintegrate and you get lots

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of little comets that aren't really that interesting. But yes,

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comet see twenty six A one. It will pass something

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like one hundred and sixty thousand kilometers from the Sun's surface.

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And it may be that.

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The way the light is being released from the comet,

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what we call forward scattering, it could make the comet

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look quite a lot brighter, which is one reason why

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people are talking about it being a daylight comet. I

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am very, always, very skeptical when people talk about that,

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because there's that old story comets are like cats, they

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have tails and do anything they like. And yes, great,

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and it's perfectly true as well that you never quite

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know what a comet is going to do. But some

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of these, some grazers, have turned out to be to

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be quite bright. So it gets nearest the Sun in April,

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and it's probably going to be one that is not

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that that won't give us that much time to observe it.

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And I'm saying that because it's got a long, long

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period of probably something like six thousand years, sorry big band, No, No,

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not six thousand, about eight hundred years, something of that sort.

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And the fact I've got a figure here that is

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double that are probably looking at the wrong numbers there.

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Orbital period something like depends on what part of the

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orbit you look at. Sixteen hundred and eighty seven years inbound.

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So yes, it's it is an object that's pretty interesting.

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I think if it gets bright and actually starts showing

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signs of being a very very brightly visible planet, we'll

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talk about it again.

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But from the moment, I'm always, as.

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I said, I'm always skeptical because you never know what

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a comic is going to do, and usually they don't

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know what you want them to do, just like cats.

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Just like just like cats.

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Yes, remind us again how they name them, because I'm

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gathering from C twenty twenty.

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Six A one.

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This is the first one they've spotted this year.

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It's it's also got a temporary designation six AC four

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seven one, which I think is probably the designation for

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the object category when it was actually discovered.

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But you're right.

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Now.

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The P prefix on a comet is when it's periodic,

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and that usually mean it's got a period of less

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than two hundred years.

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This is not a P. This is a C.

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And it tells you that it's sort of classification. Is

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a what S stands for? Actually, I know, I know

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it means we're all cactus. Next time it turns.

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Up, that will be it. Yeah, that'll be it. I

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think you're right there.

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Yeah, it just takes a long long time to come

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back and say hello.

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Yeah, it may be.

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I mean it's it's sometimes called the Krouts group comet,

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but that will make it, okay, rather than the sea,

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So that can't be what it is.

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No, No, I could try and look it up.

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Why do you do that?

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Yeah, all right, why don't I what does the C

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stand for? Going to type fast, you give the naming

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of a comet?

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Yep, that's the right question. I will see cactus.

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No, it's you're not going to believe this C stands

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for non periodic.

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Yeah, that it was what I thought, But I couldn't

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work out where maybe you take.

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The last letter of the word non periodic.

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On the other hand, if you did that, a periodic

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comet would also be a C.

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So we're not.

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Getting they've got they've paanded themselves into a corner.

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Haven't they absolutely God so much for the International Astronomical Union.

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Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what happens when you put bureaucrats

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in charge. No, they're good people, so it may be

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up for it. Yeah, look out for it. It may

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be good to observe. Whether or not it's a visible

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comment in daylight debatable, but it's definitely on its way.

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And yeah, April is the month to keep an eye

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out for it. Where would be the best place to

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sit to have a look at it?

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Similar dark?

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Anywhere on the planet.

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I don't know.

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I don't know what it's what the exact details of

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its orbit are, so it may well be one that

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is best seen before dawn or after sunset.

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But it would depend a little bit on what your

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latitude multitude is.

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Okay, best places, best regions, mid southern latitudes, Chile, South Africa,

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Australia and New Zealand of the best opportunities.

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Thanks.

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Yeah, I think we should just stop space nuts and

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go to where.

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No, no, they've got funny voices, I think.

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So we've got funny voices as well, and the jokes

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are terrible.

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Oh hang on, that's the same.

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Oh dear, all right, Eli Thanks for the question and

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hope all is well. And Anchorage a very interesting, remote,

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cold place, but much visited. Lots of tourists go there

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for obvious reasons. It's just such a unique destination.

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Thanks Eli, I barlam Mount.

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If I'm promand piece notutes.

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Our final question comes from a regular.

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I don't like to give him too many bites of

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the cherry, but he's just come up with something that

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I could not avoid based on previous theories that he's

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come up with. Rusty from donny Brook, he says, Elon's

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one million satellite power station.

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Hi, Fred Andrew.

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Just looking at the environmental impacts of these power stations,

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about a quarter of these will shade the earth at

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any one time. Each will have about an acre four

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thousand square meters of solar collectors. I don't know what

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the next bit means. The iss is two and a

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half thousand square meter. He will use about twenty efficient

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cells and there will be about ten percent loss in

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