Latest / Space News Today / Gold From a Galactic Collision — Neutron Star Crash Stuns Astronomers | Astronomy Daily S05E60

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Gold From a Galactic Collision — Neutron Star Crash Stuns Astronomers | Astronomy Daily S05E60 · Space News Today

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to Astronomy Daily,
• 0:02
  your daily dose of what's happening in
• 0:05
  the cosmos. I'm Avery.
• 0:07
  >> And I'm Anna. It is Wednesday, the 11th
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  of March, 2026, and this is season 5,
• 0:13
  episode 60, which means 60 episodes of
• 0:16
  bringing you the universe, one day at a
• 0:19
  time.
• 0:20
  >> 60 episodes this year. That's a lot of
• 0:22
  space news. And today's lineup is not
• 0:25
  letting up. We've got neutron stars
• 0:27
  colliding in places nobody expected. A
• 0:30
  potential cosmic snowball fight between
• 0:33
  asteroids and a giant invisible sheet of
• 0:36
  dark matter that explains one of
• 0:38
  astronomy's longestr running mysteries.
• 0:40
  >> Plus, the latest on Artemis 2,
• 0:43
  Starship's next giant leap and a rocket
• 0:46
  that can't seem to get off the ground,
• 0:48
  but not for lack of trying.
• 0:50
  >> Stay with us. It's a big one. We start
• 0:52
  today with one of the most remarkable
• 0:55
  astronomy announcements in recent
• 0:57
  memory, and it literally involves gold.
• 1:00
  >> That's right. NASA has just published a
• 1:02
  major new finding. A fleet of its space
• 1:05
  telescopes has likely detected a
• 1:07
  collision between two neutron stars. And
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  the location where this happened has
• 1:12
  stunned researchers.
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  >> Though, let's back up for listeners who
• 1:15
  might not be familiar with neutron
• 1:17
  stars. These are the remnants left
• 1:19
  behind when a massive star burns out,
• 1:21
  collapses on itself, and explodes in a
• 1:24
  supernova. What's left is this tiny,
• 1:27
  unbelievably dense ball about the width
• 1:30
  of a city, but containing more mass than
• 1:32
  our entire sun.
• 1:34
  >> And when two of those collide, which is
• 1:36
  called a neutron star merger, it
• 1:38
  produces one of the most violent events
• 1:41
  in the universe. We're talking gamma ray
• 1:43
  bursts, gravitational waves rippling
• 1:46
  through spaceime, and something called a
• 1:48
  kilanova explosion. That's the process
• 1:51
  that forges heavy elements, things like
• 1:53
  gold, silver, and platinum through a
• 1:55
  chain of nuclear reactions that can't
• 1:58
  happen anywhere else in the cosmos.
• 2:00
  >> We've seen these mergers before, but
• 2:02
  always inside large or moderately sized
• 2:05
  galaxies. That's what makes this
• 2:07
  discovery so jaw-dropping. This one was
• 2:10
  found inside a tiny faint galaxy, barely
• 2:13
  there, tucked inside a vast stream of
• 2:16
  gas 4.7 billion lighty years away. A
• 2:19
  location nobody thought to look.
• 2:21
  >> The lead researcher, Simone Diara of
• 2:24
  Penn State University called it quote
• 2:26
  gamechanging, saying it may unlock not
• 2:29
  one but two important questions in
• 2:31
  astrophysics. One is why gamma ray
• 2:34
  bursts sometimes appear in the middle of
• 2:36
  nowhere, not near any galaxy at all. And
• 2:39
  the other is how precious metals ended
• 2:41
  up in stars at the very outer fringes of
• 2:44
  galaxies. The answer, it seems, is that
• 2:47
  small wandering galaxies like this one
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  can form from the debris of larger
• 2:51
  galactic collisions and eventually
• 2:53
  produce their own neutron stars, which
• 2:56
  then merge. Co-author Eleanor Troya of
• 2:59
  the University of Rome put it
• 3:01
  beautifully. We found a collision within
• 3:03
  a collision. The galaxy collision
• 3:05
  triggered star formation which over
• 3:08
  hundreds of millions of years led to the
• 3:10
  neutron star merger we just detected.
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  Four space telescopes were involved in
• 3:15
  making this discovery. Chandra, Fermy,
• 3:18
  the Neil Geral swift observatory and
• 3:20
  Hubble. It took all of them working
• 3:22
  together to pinpoint the location and
• 3:25
  confirm what they were seeing. The paper
• 3:27
  has just been published in the
• 3:28
  astrophysical journal letters. Though
• 3:31
  the gold in your jewelry, it may have
• 3:33
  come from a tiny galaxy in a gas stream
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  after a chain of collisions spanning
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  billions of years. I think that's one of
• 3:41
  the most extraordinary facts in all of
• 3:44
  science.
• 3:44
  >> Puts a new spin on where did this come
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  from, doesn't it? Okay, coming up next,
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  an update on Artemis 2. The mission that
• 3:52
  is almost almost ready to fly. So,
• 3:56
  Artemis 2, if you've been following the
• 3:59
  show, you know this mission has had
• 4:01
  quite a journey just to get to the
• 4:02
  launchpad. And today, there's a
• 4:04
  significant development.
• 4:06
  >> NASA has announced it will hold a flight
• 4:09
  readiness press conference tomorrow,
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  Thursday, March 12th, at Kennedy Space
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  Center in Florida. This is the formal
• 4:15
  milestone where engineers and mission
• 4:17
  leaders assess whether everything is
• 4:19
  technically ready to fly. It's a big
• 4:22
  deal. Just to bring everyone up to
• 4:24
  speed, Artemis 2 is the first crude
• 4:26
  mission of NASA's space launch system.
• 4:29
  Four astronauts, Reed Weisman, Victor
• 4:32
  Glover, Christina Coach, and Canadian
• 4:34
  Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen,
• 4:37
  will fly around the moon and back on a
• 4:39
  10-day journey. It will be the first
• 4:41
  time humans have reached the moon's
• 4:43
  vicinity since Apollo 17 in 1972.
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  >> The mission has had a series of delays.
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  Back in February, a hydrogen leak was
• 4:52
  found during a wet dress rehearsal.
• 4:55
  Then, after a second successful
• 4:57
  rehearsal, a helium flow issue was
• 4:59
  discovered in the upper stage, which
• 5:01
  caused the rocket to be rolled back into
• 5:03
  the vehicle assembly building for
• 5:04
  repairs. That pushed the launch out of
• 5:07
  March entirely. The current target is
• 5:10
  April 1st at the earliest with roll out
• 5:12
  back to launch complex 39B expected
• 5:15
  around March 19th. BASA has also
• 5:18
  announced a major restructuring of the
• 5:20
  broader Artemis program, adding a new
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  mission, increasing launch cadence, and
• 5:25
  targeting annual lunar missions with the
• 5:27
  first crude landing in 2028.
• 5:30
  >> So, tomorrow's press conference will be
• 5:32
  really telling. We'll know more about
• 5:34
  the state of the rocket, the official
• 5:36
  launch readiness verdict, and possibly
• 5:38
  more details on that April launch
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  window. We'll of course have full
• 5:41
  coverage as the story develops.
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  >> Fingers crossed for April. The crew has
• 5:46
  been in training for years. They deserve
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  their moonshot.
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  >> They absolutely do. Let's take a short
• 5:52
  break and come back with a story about a
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  rocket trying very hard to leave the
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  ground and a cosmic snowball fight
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  nobody saw coming.
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  >> All right, Firefly Aerospace. The small
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  launch company has been trying to get
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  its Alpha rocket back into the sky for
• 6:07
  weeks and once again the mission has
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  been delayed. The mission is called
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  Stairway to 7, which refers to this
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  being Alpha's seventh flight overall. It
• 6:16
  was originally scheduled for March 1st,
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  but high wind scrubbed that attempt.
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  Then on March 9th, a sensor reading
• 6:23
  outside the expected range caused
• 6:25
  another standown. And last night, March
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  10th, a third attempt was scrubbed
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  during fluid loading after off-normal
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  readings were detected.
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  >> No new launch date has been announced
• 6:35
  yet. Firefly says they're reviewing the
• 6:38
  data and will confirm a new window once
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  the investigation is complete.
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  >> Now, it's worth understanding why this
• 6:44
  mission matters. Alpha has had a rough
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  run. The sixth flight called message in
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  a booster ended when the first stage
• 6:52
  broke apart just after separation,
• 6:54
  destroying the payload. Then in
• 6:56
  September, a booster intended for flight
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  7 exploded during ground testing. The
• 7:01
  company has been working for nearly 10
• 7:03
  months to get back to the launchpad
• 7:06
  >> and stairway to 7 is carrying
• 7:08
  significant symbolic weight. It's the
• 7:10
  last flight of the alpha block one
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  configuration. After this, Firefly moves
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  to the upgraded block 2, which is 7 ft
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  taller, uses new in-house avionics and
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  batteries, improved thermal protection,
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  and stronger carbon composite
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  structures. Block two systems are
• 7:27
  actually flying on this mission in
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  shadow mode, testing quietly in the
• 7:31
  background without controlling the
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  flight. Firefly also had a big success
• 7:36
  recently. Their Blue Ghost lander
• 7:38
  completed the first ever private lunar
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  surface mission last March. So, the
• 7:42
  company's in an interesting position,
• 7:44
  proven on the moon, but still working
• 7:46
  through reliability challenges with
• 7:48
  their launch vehicle.
• 7:49
  >> Small launch is hard. We're reading for
• 7:52
  them. When Stairway to 7 eventually gets
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  off the ground, we'll give it the full
• 7:56
  coverage it deserves.
• 7:58
  >> Absolutely. Now, Cosmic Snowballs, you
• 8:01
  heard that, right?
• 8:03
  >> So, you might remember NASA's Dart
• 8:05
  mission, the spacecraft that
• 8:08
  intentionally smashed into an asteroid
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  in 2022 to test whether we could deflect
• 8:13
  one that might threaten Earth. It worked
• 8:17
  beautifully, as we reported last week.
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  But scientists are still finding new
• 8:22
  surprises in the data from that mission.
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  And this one is genuinely delightful. A
• 8:27
  team at the University of Maryland has
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  just published a study revealing that
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  asteroids can throw slowmoving chunks of
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  debris at each other in what they're
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  calling, and I love this, a cosmic
• 8:38
  snowball fight.
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  >> So, here's what happened. The Dart
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  spacecraft hit an asteroid moon called
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  Dimorphice, which orbits a larger
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  asteroid called Ditimos. In the images
• 8:50
  captured by the spacecraft in the
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  moments before impact, researchers
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  noticed something odd. Faint fan-shaped
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  streaks across Dorphice. Lead author
• 9:01
  Jessica Sunshine said, and this quote is
• 9:03
  great, "At first, we thought something
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  was wrong with the camera, and then we
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  thought it could have been something
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  wrong with our image processing. But
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  after months of painstaking work,
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  stripping away boulder shadows and
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  correcting for lighting, the streaks
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  became clearer, not fainter. They were
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  real. What the team discovered is that
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  these streaks are the imprint of debris
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  thrown off Ditimos by something called
• 9:29
  the Yorp effect, where sunlight
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  gradually spins a small asteroid faster
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  and faster until loose material flies
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  off the surface. Some of that material
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  then drifts across to Dorphice and lands
• 9:43
  on it, leaving these distinctive ray
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  patterns.
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  >> And the speed of this material transfer,
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  just 30.7 cm/s.
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  That's slower than a leisurely human
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  walk. These are the gentlest cosmic
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  snowballs imaginable. It's the first
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  direct visual proof that material can
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  travel naturally from one asteroid to
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  another, and it has real implications
• 10:08
  for planetary defense. If binary
• 10:11
  asteroids are constantly exchanging
• 10:13
  material and reshaping each other,
• 10:16
  scientists need to account for that when
• 10:18
  modeling how to deflect one. There's
• 10:20
  also a follow-up mission on the way.
• 10:23
  ESA's Hera spacecraft is set to arrive
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  at the Ditimos system in December this
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  year and may be able to see whether
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  those fan-shaped streaks survive the
• 10:32
  dart impact or whether new ones have
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  formed. More cosmic forensics to come.
• 10:38
  >> A snowball fight spanning millions of
• 10:40
  years between two rocks in the dark of
• 10:43
  space. I love this job. After this
• 10:46
  break, Starship is getting even bigger
• 10:48
  and we go looking for the giant
• 10:50
  invisible sheet of matter that may be
• 10:52
  holding our cosmic neighborhood
• 10:54
  together.
• 10:55
  >> SpaceX's Starship program is marching on
• 10:58
  and the next milestone is approaching
• 11:00
  fast. Elon Musk announced this week that
• 11:03
  SpaceX is approximately 4 weeks away
• 11:06
  from launching Starship Flight 12, which
• 11:09
  will be the first flight of the upgraded
• 11:11
  Starship V3 configuration, the most
• 11:14
  powerful version of the vehicle yet.
• 11:16
  SpaceX engineers have been working
• 11:18
  through propellant system tests on ship
• 11:21
  39. That's the newest vehicle, and some
• 11:24
  of those tests produced some spectacular
• 11:27
  imagery this week. The team is moving
• 11:29
  methodically through pre-flight
• 11:31
  preparations at Starbase in Texas. Now,
• 11:34
  Starship V3 is described as a
• 11:37
  significant step up. The rocket already
• 11:39
  holds the title of the most powerful
• 11:41
  launch vehicle ever built, and the V3
• 11:44
  configuration pushes that capability
• 11:46
  further, which is critical for the
• 11:48
  missions ahead, including NASA's Aremis
• 11:50
  lunar landings, where a Starship variant
• 11:53
  will be used as the human landing
• 11:55
  system. Flight 12 won't carry the Aremis
• 11:58
  lander, of course, that's further down
• 12:00
  the road, but each integrated flight
• 12:03
  test builds toward that goal,
• 12:05
  demonstrating reliability, reusability,
• 12:08
  and the ability to handle increasingly
• 12:10
  complex mission profiles.
• 12:12
  >> So, if all goes to plan, we're looking
• 12:14
  at mid to late April for Flight 12
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  liftoff. We'll keep a close eye on that
• 12:19
  timeline and give you the full launch
• 12:21
  preview when the date firms up. The pace
• 12:23
  of development at SpaceX is
• 12:25
  extraordinary. And now to cap off
• 12:28
  today's show, a cosmic mystery that's
• 12:30
  been puzzling astronomers for decades,
• 12:33
  and it might finally be solved.
• 12:35
  >> Here's a question that sounds simple. If
• 12:37
  our galaxy is so massive and has such a
• 12:40
  powerful gravitational pole, why are
• 12:42
  most nearby galaxies flying away from us
• 12:45
  rather than being pulled inward?
• 12:47
  >> It's something that's bugged astronomers
• 12:49
  for decades. Edwin Hubble established
• 12:52
  almost a century ago that the universe
• 12:54
  is expanding. Galaxies are receding from
• 12:57
  each other as space itself stretches.
• 13:00
  But the galaxies right next to us, just
• 13:02
  outside our local group, seem to be
• 13:05
  moving away faster than they should,
• 13:07
  even accounting for that expansion.
• 13:10
  Something wasn't adding up.
• 13:11
  >> A team from the University of Groigan in
• 13:13
  the Netherlands working with
• 13:15
  collaborators in Germany, France, and
• 13:17
  Sweden may have cracked it. They built
• 13:19
  what they call a virtual twin of our
• 13:21
  cosmic neighborhood, running advanced
• 13:23
  simulations starting from the early
• 13:25
  universe based on conditions measured in
• 13:28
  the cosmic microwave background all the
• 13:30
  way through to today. What they found is
• 13:33
  remarkable. The matter surrounding the
• 13:35
  local group, our cluster of galaxies,
• 13:38
  including the Milky Way and Andromeda,
• 13:40
  isn't spread out evenly in a sphere the
• 13:42
  way scientists had assumed. Instead,
• 13:45
  it's organized into a vast flat sheet of
• 13:48
  matter stretching tens of millions of
• 13:50
  light years across. Above and below this
• 13:53
  sheet lie enormous empty voids where
• 13:56
  there's essentially nothing. And when
• 13:58
  they included this flat structure in
• 14:00
  their models, the motion of 31 nearby
• 14:02
  galaxies matched almost perfectly with
• 14:04
  what astronomers actually observe. The
• 14:07
  sheets mass, which is mostly invisible
• 14:09
  dark matter, counterbalances the local
• 14:12
  group's gravitational pole. So galaxies
• 14:14
  within the plane drift outward in an
• 14:16
  orderly way while nothing falls in from
• 14:19
  the voids above and below.
• 14:21
  >> Bead researcher Ewad Wemp said this is
• 14:23
  the first detailed attempt to map the
• 14:26
  distribution and motion of dark matter
• 14:28
  in the region around the Milky Way and
• 14:31
  Andromeda. And co-ressearcher, Professor
• 14:33
  Amina Helme, who has worked on this
• 14:35
  problem for years, said she was thrilled
• 14:38
  to see that galaxy motions alone could
• 14:40
  reveal the mass distribution shaping our
• 14:43
  local cosmic neighborhood.
• 14:45
  >> What I find incredible about this is
• 14:46
  that we're essentially embedded in a
• 14:48
  cosmic structure we couldn't see. The
• 14:51
  Milky Way isn't floating freely in
• 14:53
  space. It's sitting on a vast flat sheet
• 14:56
  of dark matter surrounded by emptiness
• 14:58
  on either side in equilibrium. It's like
• 15:01
  being a grain of sand on a giant cosmic
• 15:04
  beach and only just realizing the beach
• 15:06
  exists. The paper is published in Nature
• 15:09
  Astronomy and we expect it to generate
• 15:12
  significant follow-up work as
• 15:13
  astronomers look to confirm the
• 15:15
  structure with additional observations.
• 15:18
  >> Amazing. What a lineup for episode 60.
• 15:21
  >> And that's our show for today. Let's do
• 15:23
  a quick recap of what we covered. NASA
• 15:25
  discovered a neutron star collision in a
• 15:27
  tiny galaxy buried in a gas stream. The
• 15:30
  first time this has been seen in such an
• 15:32
  unlikely location.
• 15:34
  >> The Aremis 2 flight readiness review is
• 15:37
  happening tomorrow. We're watching
• 15:38
  closely ahead of the April launch
• 15:40
  window.
• 15:41
  >> Firefly Alpha's Stairway to 7 mission is
• 15:44
  still on hold after a third scrub. A new
• 15:47
  launch date will be announced after
• 15:48
  engineering review. Dart mission data
• 15:51
  revealed the first ever direct visual
• 15:53
  proof of material transfer between two
• 15:56
  asteroids. The most gentle cosmic
• 15:59
  snowball fight you can imagine.
• 16:01
  >> SpaceX is about 4 weeks from launching
• 16:03
  Starship Flight 12, the first flight of
• 16:06
  the more powerful V3 configuration. and
• 16:09
  astronomers have discovered a vast flat
• 16:11
  sheet of dark matter surrounding our
• 16:14
  local group, finally explaining why
• 16:16
  nearby galaxies behave the way they do.
• 16:19
  >> As always, you can find us at
• 16:21
  astronomyaily.io
• 16:22
  and on all major podcast platforms, show
• 16:25
  notes, episode archive, and more are all
• 16:27
  there for you.
• 16:28
  >> If you're enjoying the show, please
• 16:30
  subscribe, leave us a review, and share
• 16:33
  us with a fellow space enthusiast. It
• 16:35
  means the world to us and genuinely
• 16:38
  helps the show grow.
• 16:39
  >> We'll be back tomorrow with more from
• 16:41
  the universe. Until then, keep looking
• 16:43
  up.
• 16:44
  >> Clear skies, everyone.
• 16:56
  Stories told.