Latest / Made of Stars / Artemis II Mission Now Has Its Boosters

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Artemis II Mission Now Has Its Boosters · Made of Stars

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Speaker 1: Warning.
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Speaker 2: The following podcast contains an entertaining look at astronomy, physics,
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Speaker 2: and space news throughout the known universe. Listeners have been
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Speaker 2: known to learn about astronomical phenomenon, the scientific method, and
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Speaker 2: expanded vocabulary to include terms like quasar asterism and uranus. Listen,
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Speaker 2: that's your own risk.
0:16
Speaker 1: Go ahead. We're made of stars.
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Speaker 3: Made them stars, madies. When made of stars, you could
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Speaker 3: be from high they would New Mexicomus.
0:39
Speaker 1: Where are.
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Speaker 3: Stars?
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Speaker 4: When we are made of stars? I'm West Carol, joined
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Speaker 4: by my good friend doctor Sean Cruising from Columbus State
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Speaker 4: University's Coca Cola Space Science Center.
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Speaker 1: Morning Sean, Good morning, Wes. Good to be here today.
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Speaker 1: Lots of fun stories on the docket for today, friends.
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Speaker 4: And you know, we talk a lot about how where
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Speaker 4: we don't fanboy SpaceX, we just tout accomplishments and things.
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Speaker 4: We've got some very significant accomplishments to talk about with
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Speaker 4: SpaceX coming up in a few But before we get
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Speaker 4: to that, we're gonna talk a little bit about NASA
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Speaker 4: Artemis two and a certain booster that you and I
1:30
Speaker 4: almost got to touch. I mean it felt like we
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Speaker 4: could almost touch it. It was just kind of right
1:36
Speaker 4: over there. You and I did the show at the
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Speaker 4: Kennedy Space Center last year as the booster for the
1:45
Speaker 4: Artemis two mission came to shore. We watched it come ashore,
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Speaker 4: we watched it make its way into the VAB and
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Speaker 4: it is in there, it is upright, and they are
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Speaker 4: getting this sucker ready to fly.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, so that was a great time. And we watched
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Speaker 1: that massive core stage. It had come by a water
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Speaker 1: vessel from from Stennis which is in the Gulf, and
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Speaker 1: it came around the Peninsula of Florida all the way
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Speaker 1: up to Titusville and then came in and we got
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Speaker 1: to see that thing coming shore, which is just awesome.
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Speaker 1: And by the way, as Wes mentioned, we're not going
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Speaker 1: to be SpaceX fanboys, we're also not going to be
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Speaker 1: total Boeing haters. Boeing's had a rough They've had a
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Speaker 1: rough time, and you know, there's a soft spot, soft
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Speaker 1: spot in my heart for Boeing because they're a very
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Speaker 1: important American company. And let's just remind everybody that the
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Speaker 1: core stage for the Space Launch System, the SLS rocket
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Speaker 1: is a Boeing built core stage. So it's now vertically
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Speaker 1: upright in the vehicle assembly building down at NASA's Kennedy
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Speaker 1: Space Center. It has been attached to two solid fueled
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Speaker 1: boots to rockets. They are now preparing the core stage
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Speaker 1: with a docking component. That is, it's the adapter stage
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Speaker 1: for the next stage to go on top of that,
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Speaker 1: they're getting it ready friends for a mission to the Moon.
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Speaker 1: That mission to the Moon currently scheduled for twenty twenty six.
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Speaker 1: The astronauts already picked out. They are right on my
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Speaker 1: wall Read Weisman, Victor Glover, Christina Cook, and Jeremy Hansen
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Speaker 1: all astronauts. It's already selected for the Artemis two mission,
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Speaker 1: ready to go to space. They're not physically on my wall.
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Speaker 1: By the way, I want you to get the idea
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Speaker 1: that these four human beings are just like hanging on
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Speaker 1: my wall. I have a poster. See, that's what it is.
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Speaker 4: And as you were talking about it and reading their names,
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Speaker 4: and I was trying to remember, was it one year
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Speaker 4: ago or two years ago during the NCAA tournament that
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Speaker 4: we got to see them like when they were announced,
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Speaker 4: because they were their court side.
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Speaker 1: I don't think it was.
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Speaker 4: Maybe it was the final four, but they were there
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Speaker 4: at some point during the tournament when they got announced.
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Speaker 1: Was that a year ago or two years ago? Yeah,
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Speaker 1: I can't remember now. I think it's been I think it's.
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Speaker 4: Been two feels like it's been too It does seem
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Speaker 4: like it was. But but anyway, I remember the announcement.
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Speaker 4: It's interesting that we're we've got this sort of news
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Speaker 4: story as the tournament is currently going on right now
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Speaker 4: for twenty twenty five. But obviously now that they have it,
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Speaker 4: they've got it in the building. It is it is upright.
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Speaker 4: It was not upright when it went in, which is
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Speaker 4: you know, I just think about the we We always
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Speaker 4: talk about James Webb being dropped, and we always think
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Speaker 4: about something like when you're trying to stand up something
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Speaker 4: that's that big inside a building. Obviously that's made to
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Speaker 4: house it.
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Speaker 1: It's got to be a very.
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Speaker 4: Very calculated, very systematic process for standing it up. And
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Speaker 4: then that it's just the beginning, because then they got
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Speaker 4: to start getting the boosters on and they've got to
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Speaker 4: get all of the other parts of it put together.
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Speaker 4: And that's where they are at this point, is working
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Speaker 4: on that.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, So just a sense of scale. The core stage
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Speaker 1: for the space launch system that NASA's new Moon Rocket
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Speaker 1: is as tall as a twenty story building. Right, So
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Speaker 1: when West says we watched it come in, it was
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Speaker 1: coming in horizontal because it's two hundred and twelve feet long.
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Speaker 1: And so when they stand it up inside the Vehicle
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Speaker 1: Assembly Building, the VAB down there at Kennedy Space Center,
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Speaker 1: it's twenty stories and that's if it's sitting on the ground.
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Speaker 1: It's suspended by cranes. Right. So this thing is it's massive.
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Speaker 1: It's a massive piece of equipment. Now, interestingly enough, it's
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Speaker 1: ninety four tons, but if you think about something that's
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Speaker 1: as tall as a twenty story building, ninety four tons
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Speaker 1: isn't all that much, right. Why is it so lightweight
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Speaker 1: for its giant size? And it's because it's basically a
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Speaker 1: giant Coca Cola can, Right, It's a giant aluminum shell.
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Speaker 1: It's not filled with fuel yet. They won't fuel it
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Speaker 1: up until it goes to the launch pad. So this
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Speaker 1: thing is, even though it's very very big and very heavy,
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Speaker 1: ninety four tons has nothing to play with When they
6:26
Speaker 1: fill it with seven hundred and thirty thousand gallons of
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Speaker 1: cryogenic propellant, as it will be right before liftoff, it's
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Speaker 1: substantially heavier right, So it's got a rigid structure so
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Speaker 1: it can stand vertically, and so they can mount these
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Speaker 1: solid rocket boosters to the outside. And hey, friends, quick detour.
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Speaker 1: Remember that tank and that those SRB systems, they're leftover
6:53
Speaker 1: modified components from the Space Shuttle era. Really, so this,
6:57
Speaker 1: this rocket space launched system has many ties to the
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Speaker 1: Space Shuttle program, including the four engines on board that
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Speaker 1: core stage, which are old Space Shuttle engines that are
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Speaker 1: the RS twenty five engines. Anyway, So this massive object
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Speaker 1: that's now mounted there is heavy now, but it's going
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Speaker 1: to be a whole lot heavier when they fuel that
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Speaker 1: thing up and get it ready to go to space.
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Speaker 1: So a truly amazing piece of equipment is now in
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Speaker 1: a vertical position. It's in the building where NASA assembled
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Speaker 1: the Space shuttles, the Saturn five rockets for the Apollo missions,
7:31
Speaker 1: and many many other missions that have flown out of
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Speaker 1: Kennedy Space Center over the year. So on Sunday, the
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Speaker 1: team's conducted course the core stage. I'm sorry, they connected
7:41
Speaker 1: the course stage to each of the boosters, and so
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Speaker 1: it's all connected via these load bearing attachment points. So
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Speaker 1: again it's like a big hollow can so they have
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Speaker 1: these rigid structures on there so they can attach these things,
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Speaker 1: and that's what makes the operation of doing this a
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Speaker 1: little bit tricky. So quick fun fact, which is one
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Speaker 1: of our former student assistants here at the Columba State
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Speaker 1: University's Coca Cola Space Science Center, mister Zach Coker, is
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Speaker 1: actually down at the CAPE because he's part of the
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Speaker 1: integration team. He's actually working on all of the adapters
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Speaker 1: and all the connecting points and all of the structural
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Speaker 1: engineering that's required to mount this giant rocket together. So
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Speaker 1: hat tip and shout out to Zach Coker. We're proud
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Speaker 1: of you, Zach, and we're really thankful that you're on
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Speaker 1: that team. And you know, godspeed for SLS. And he's
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Speaker 1: a critical part of the team too.
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Speaker 4: He's not just down there, you know, putting like smiley
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Speaker 4: face stickers on the side of things once it's done right.
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Speaker 1: I mean, he's involved. He's definitely involved. He's one of
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Speaker 1: the teams for all the mating points, all the connecting pieces.
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Speaker 1: But I don't know that he's not putting smiley stickers
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Speaker 1: on there because when he did things at the Space
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Speaker 1: Science Center here, he was often a prankster, So we
9:00
Speaker 1: got to watch him just to make sure. I hope
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Speaker 1: he's sticking little Easter eggs on the inside of the
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Speaker 1: SLS's mating ring.
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Speaker 4: I hope he's sticking a stick or two on just
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Speaker 4: for I look this up while you were talking, because
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Speaker 4: you're talking about the weight as far as this is
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Speaker 4: just being a giant empty can, and I was just
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Speaker 4: curious just taking the average tractor trailer that hauls fuel
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Speaker 4: around that you see on the roads, average weight about
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Speaker 4: thirty thousand pounds empty wind filled eighty thousand pounds.
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Speaker 1: So that's just we're just talking about one of those trucks.
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Speaker 4: That's obviously just a very small fraction of what we're
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Speaker 4: talking about.
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Speaker 1: When it comes to, you know, a giant rocket, Yeah,
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Speaker 1: it's those things are super heavy. So so and.
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Speaker 4: I realized we were talking about large numbers, and we
9:46
Speaker 4: talk about like when we try to do perspective on
9:48
Speaker 4: the size of the Earth compared to the size of
9:50
Speaker 4: Jupiter versus the size of the Sun, we can't fully
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Speaker 4: comprehend those kinds of numbers. And I'm just trying to
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Speaker 4: give some perspective on it. When it comes to one
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Speaker 4: of those fuel trucks. Because that's where my brain went
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Speaker 4: when you were talking about it being empty.
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Speaker 1: Well, and so so I apologize for not just remember
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Speaker 1: these numbers for SLS off the top of my head.
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Speaker 1: But Space Shuttle when it launched was roughly seven million pounds. Now,
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Speaker 1: Space shuttles engine systems with solo rocket boosters generated about
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Speaker 1: nine million pounds of thrust, which is why it just
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Speaker 1: hopped right off the old launchpad there. But seven million
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Speaker 1: pounds is a substantial amount of weight, and this rocket
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Speaker 1: system is bigger than Space Shuttle, so it's it's going
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Speaker 1: to be a lot heavier than ninety four tons when
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Speaker 1: it's all loaded up.
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Speaker 4: All right, let's not fanboy, but let's talk about some
10:40
Speaker 4: accomplishments for SpaceX. Because these accomplishments, again we started out
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Speaker 4: things you can't fully comprehend, and when you hear the
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Speaker 4: numbers for what SpaceX has done over the last few years,
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Speaker 4: really but you know, since they started launching, and we
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Speaker 4: know how frequently they're launching the number of times that
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Speaker 4: they're going up, but there's more to it than just boy,
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Speaker 4: they're launching a lot.
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Speaker 1: So friends, when we were last with you the last podcast,
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Speaker 1: since that time, SpaceX has launched two missions for the
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Speaker 1: National Reconnaissance Office. This is one of the one of
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Speaker 1: our US government's most secretive and important security agencies because
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Speaker 1: it helps us to keep track of what all of
11:33
Speaker 1: those other countries are doing, so we know how to
11:35
Speaker 1: react and we know how to prepare militarily and otherwise. Okay,
11:39
Speaker 1: so the National Reconnaissance Office is putting up a constellation
11:44
Speaker 1: of communications satellites that's similar to Starlink, except it's their
11:50
Speaker 1: own starlink, so they're not relying on Starlink and SpaceX.
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Speaker 1: They're going to have their own constellation of communication satellites
11:59
Speaker 1: as it makes sense they would want that. So those
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Speaker 1: satellites are called the NROL satellites, and two of two
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Speaker 1: different launches have sent NROL satellites to space by SpaceX
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Speaker 1: since the last time we did this podcast just a
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Speaker 1: week ago. Right. So the interesting thing about those missions
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Speaker 1: is that one of them happened from Vandenberg Space Force
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Speaker 1: Base in California, the other one from Cape Canaveral Space
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Speaker 1: Force Station. We would know that as the cape down
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Speaker 1: near the Kennedy Space Center near Titusville, Florida. All Right,
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Speaker 1: so here's the breakdown. When they launched from Vandenburg. They
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Speaker 1: used a booster and the serial number, the tail number
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Speaker 1: on the booster is B one zero eight eight. Why
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Speaker 1: is this an interesting or important Well because that very
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Speaker 1: same booster had just launched two really important NASA satellites
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Speaker 1: on March eleventh. So March eleventh booster, the Falcon it's
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Speaker 1: a Falcon nine rocket, SpaceX Falcon nine rocket. The main
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Speaker 1: stage booster, the B one zero eight eight booster launched
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Speaker 1: NASA's sphere X and Punch missions on March the eleventh. Now,
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Speaker 1: both of those are stories in themselves. You know what
13:27
Speaker 1: those satellites are going out there and doing. We may
13:29
Speaker 1: even do that on the next podcast. But okay, so
13:31
Speaker 1: two really important NASA space missions. One of those to
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Speaker 1: study the Sun. Okay, great, So they did that on
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Speaker 1: March eleventh. Just nine days later, they use the same
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Speaker 1: booster on a mission for the National Reconnaissance Office. Now,
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Speaker 1: I don't want to say that any satellites are throwaway missions,
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Speaker 1: but certainly if you're launching what Department of Defense or
13:57
Speaker 1: you know, for the security industry, for our un US government,
14:00
Speaker 1: you want to make sure that you're going to be
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Speaker 1: able to get things up there. They use the same
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Speaker 1: booster in nine days. They were able to reservice and
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Speaker 1: turn around the very same booster that landed safely from
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Speaker 1: the March eleventh mission at Vandenberg. They turned it around
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Speaker 1: and launched it again on March twentieth for a satellite
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Speaker 1: for the National Reconnaissance Office. That's record setting, by the way,
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Speaker 1: whose record do they break, of course their own? Right,
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Speaker 1: So this is breaking the record for the fastest turnaround
14:38
Speaker 1: time of a reusable rocket stage. Well, there's not too
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Speaker 1: many of those out there anyway, right, so Falcon nine
14:44
Speaker 1: is obviously one of the only reusable rockets that are
14:47
Speaker 1: actually taking payloads right now. So Falcon nine rockets first
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Speaker 1: stage booster B one zero eight zero had been turned
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Speaker 1: around in thirteen point five days, so basically two weeks, right,
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Speaker 1: So that was the former record held by SpaceX, but
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Speaker 1: now B one zero eight eight just nine days from
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Speaker 1: an important NASA mission back down, landing safely, reservicing that rocket,
15:17
Speaker 1: getting it fueled back up on the launch pad with
15:19
Speaker 1: a brand new payload in something just a little bit
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Speaker 1: more than a week.
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Speaker 4: When you realize the amount of time it would take
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Speaker 4: to produce the boosters, and the fact that obviously they're
15:32
Speaker 4: able to reuse them, and it allows them this ability
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Speaker 4: to do this. And you assume that once it goes
15:39
Speaker 4: through all of the checks it needs to go through
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Speaker 4: and get prepared for the next go round. They're just
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Speaker 4: getting faster at it, and they're only going to continue
15:45
Speaker 4: to get faster at it. I don't know what the maximum,
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Speaker 4: like how quickly they could get this down to, like
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Speaker 4: how short of a turnaround it could possibly be, but
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Speaker 4: you got to think it can't be much shorter than
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Speaker 4: nine days.
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Speaker 1: It's hard to imagine, right, I mean, nine day seems absurd. Remember, friends,
16:06
Speaker 1: before SpaceX, we were throwing the rockets in the bottom
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Speaker 1: of the ocean every time. Every time. Yeah, SpaceX now
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Speaker 1: turned around a stage in nine days.
16:21
Speaker 4: Now they just rinse it out and put it back
16:23
Speaker 4: up there and fire it up again. He just hose
16:26
Speaker 4: it down a little bit, you know, just run a
16:29
Speaker 4: little water in there. Maybe a guy goes in with
16:31
Speaker 4: a squeegee and gets some of the water out, and
16:33
Speaker 4: then it's ready to go.
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Speaker 1: And I it's not a rinse and repeat, right, you know.
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Speaker 1: And again not to say that all missions aren't important,
16:40
Speaker 1: but it's for a National Reconnaissance Office mission. Yeah, nine
16:44
Speaker 1: day turnaround.
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Speaker 4: That also just adds a little bit to the boldness
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Speaker 4: and the confidence. I guess, I don't know if it's
16:49
Speaker 4: boldness confidence a bit of both. But at a time
16:53
Speaker 4: when we know, let's be honest here, and I mean,
16:56
Speaker 4: we don't do politics here, but we're at a time
16:58
Speaker 4: where you know, Elon couldn't afford a mess with something
17:03
Speaker 4: to do with this National Reconnaissance Office. So you know,
17:07
Speaker 4: it is it's bold and it just says, hey, we
17:09
Speaker 4: know how this works, we know how to do it,
17:11
Speaker 4: and we know how to do it really well.
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Speaker 1: Let's just say that the chief engineer for SpaceX, who
17:19
Speaker 1: also happens to be the CEO, probably is in a
17:22
Speaker 1: position currently where he doesn't need any bad pr with
17:26
Speaker 1: a government mission. Yeah, especially and these, by the way,
17:30
Speaker 1: both of these were US government missions on either end
17:34
Speaker 1: of this nine day turnaround time. They were both missions
17:37
Speaker 1: for the United States government. And let's throw this in.
17:39
Speaker 4: This is a government mission for a communication system that
17:43
Speaker 4: would allow them to not use his communication system. So
17:47
Speaker 4: there's so many layers that there could have been with
17:50
Speaker 4: this worth something to go wrong.
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Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, and so so something else to note
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Speaker 1: the So there's there's there's another punchline to the story,
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Speaker 1: but all right. So the March twentieth flight also marked
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Speaker 1: the four hundred and fiftieth flight of a Falcon nine
18:06
Speaker 1: rocket and the four hundred and twenty first successful landing. So,
18:13
Speaker 1: in other words, this booster that they turned around to
18:16
Speaker 1: use it again in nine days. It also made another
18:19
Speaker 1: successful landing, which means it's there ready to go. However
18:24
Speaker 1: fast they want to turn it around the next time,
18:27
Speaker 1: it's ready to go again. And just four days later,
18:33
Speaker 1: on the other side of the country, SpaceX launched another
18:38
Speaker 1: NRO satellite, part of the same communication satellite system by
18:41
Speaker 1: the way, from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. They landed
18:47
Speaker 1: that one successfully. So that was the four hundred and
18:50
Speaker 1: twenty second time that SpaceX has successfully landed their boosters.
18:55
Speaker 1: This is not even a surprise anymore. Like people are like, yeah,
18:57
Speaker 1: so big deal, I guess SpaceX lands of rockets. Yeah, okay,
19:01
Speaker 1: but but wait, don't gloss past that too quickly. It
19:07
Speaker 1: is astounding. It is the fiftieth time that they've launched
19:15
Speaker 1: from Canaveral's landing zone. I'm sorry, landed at landing zone
19:18
Speaker 1: one from Canaveral Air Station, right so or space war station,
19:22
Speaker 1: which means okay, so it's it's routine, like it's routine
19:25
Speaker 1: at Kennedy Space Center. It's routine at Cape Canaveral Space
19:29
Speaker 1: war Station, which is across the road. It's routine out
19:31
Speaker 1: in Vanderberg. We're landing on barges. We're bringing them back
19:35
Speaker 1: to this friends. This rocket has enough thrust to knock
19:41
Speaker 1: a skyscraper off its foundation. So don't think we're launching,
19:46
Speaker 1: you know, a little model rockets here or whatever. These
19:51
Speaker 1: are massive heavy lift rocket systems that generate an enormous
19:58
Speaker 1: amount of thrust and pressure and are able to be
20:02
Speaker 1: turned around in nine days.
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Speaker 4: Astounding, absolutely remarkable. Coming up after a quick break, we're
20:09
Speaker 4: gonna go to Mars. Talk about an unprecedented discovery. We'll
20:13
Speaker 4: get to that next. When people say, why Mars? Why
20:35
Speaker 4: are we trying to get to Mars? Why don't we
20:37
Speaker 4: want to go to Mars? What's the fascination with Mars?
20:41
Speaker 4: There's a number of answers that you can give for that,
20:45
Speaker 4: and you hear a number of different answers depending on
20:47
Speaker 4: who you ask, But overall, the curiosity about a planet
20:52
Speaker 4: that's nearby in the Goldilock Zone that may have had
20:55
Speaker 4: life on it at some point, just the curiosity of
20:59
Speaker 4: was it there? Can we find any signs of it?
21:02
Speaker 1: You know what?
21:02
Speaker 4: The things that we want to look for. That's at
21:05
Speaker 4: the very least something that we have been able to
21:07
Speaker 4: make some progress with, slowly but over the years, and
21:11
Speaker 4: now we have another step forward in the search for that.
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Speaker 1: Friends, I won't try to argue that we couldn't successfully
21:22
Speaker 1: live our lives in a much less informed, dull and
21:26
Speaker 1: dim state. Of course we could. I wasn't going to
21:34
Speaker 1: go there, but I'll go there. Many do. Yeah, Okay,
21:38
Speaker 1: So we can all live like that, or we can
21:42
Speaker 1: indulge the natural sense of curiosity that seems to be
21:46
Speaker 1: innate in all human beings. All right, So let's go
21:51
Speaker 1: with choice B. So if you're leaning that direction. One
21:55
Speaker 1: of the biggest questions that we have about our existence
22:01
Speaker 1: is this, are we the only life in the universe?
22:07
Speaker 1: And I don't mean we humans. Obviously there's other life
22:09
Speaker 1: forms here on our own planet. But are the life
22:12
Speaker 1: forms on our own planet Earth the only life forms
22:16
Speaker 1: anywhere in our vast universe. That's a really important question
22:23
Speaker 1: from the innate curiosity side that makes us into the
22:28
Speaker 1: human beings that we are, and this curiosity drives us
22:33
Speaker 1: to improve conditions for all humanity. So I say that
22:38
Speaker 1: we indulge that curiosity side and we allow ourselves to
22:42
Speaker 1: investigate these things. In fact, curiosity is so important that
22:47
Speaker 1: we named a rover Curiosity, and we send it to Mars,
22:52
Speaker 1: and the Mars Curiosity Rover, for the first time, has
22:57
Speaker 1: detected something very interesting in a really interesting place on Mars,
23:03
Speaker 1: which is the Gale Crater. Why is Gale Crater interesting
23:08
Speaker 1: because it used to be a vast lakebed. In other words,
23:11
Speaker 1: it was a region where we know large bodies of
23:15
Speaker 1: liquid water were once contained on the surface of Mars. Okay,
23:19
Speaker 1: so what did curiosity find? Well, in a sample that
23:24
Speaker 1: researchers have nicknamed the Cumberland sample, it appears that the
23:29
Speaker 1: Mars Curiosity Rover has identified the largest organic compounds ever
23:36
Speaker 1: found on the surface of Mars. Now might be saying, well,
23:41
Speaker 1: are we talking about what are we talking about? Like zebras? No,
23:44
Speaker 1: it's not that big. These are large chain molecules, or
23:50
Speaker 1: as they're known in organic chemistry, long chain molecule.
23:53
Speaker 4: Let me just say this, if they discovered zebras on Mars,
23:57
Speaker 4: we're not waiting until Thursday to do a show. We'll
24:00
Speaker 4: to a show like it'll be a breaking news kind
24:02
Speaker 4: of So just understand that from us that we're not
24:06
Speaker 4: waiting like you know, a day, two days, a week,
24:09
Speaker 4: whatever it is. If they find zebras on Mars, well
24:13
Speaker 4: we'll go live. We'll take this show there. We can
24:16
Speaker 4: do this show live. We'll go live with the show.
24:19
Speaker 1: All right, make sure you subscribe, by the way, click
24:21
Speaker 1: that little bell so you know you're gonna get that.
24:24
Speaker 1: You're gonna be on Live with us when they find
24:26
Speaker 1: zebra's on Mars.
24:26
Speaker 4: That's our pledge to you. If they find zebras on Mars,
24:30
Speaker 4: we will and we may even come to your house,
24:33
Speaker 4: you know, door to door. If you send us your address,
24:35
Speaker 4: we may come door to door and tell you if
24:37
Speaker 4: they find zebras just running around on Mars, natural zebras. Anyway,
24:42
Speaker 4: back to the compounds, I'm sorry.
24:44
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying they haven't found zebras on Mars.
24:47
Speaker 1: By the way, I have no evidence one way or
24:48
Speaker 1: another whether they found zebras. But before you can find
24:52
Speaker 1: zebras on Mars, you have to find fatty acids. Because
24:57
Speaker 1: fatty acids are necessary for life, and before you can
25:00
Speaker 1: have fatty acids, you have to have long chain organic molecules.
25:06
Speaker 1: See where we're going. I might have skipped a few
25:09
Speaker 1: steps along the way in that chain, but what I'm
25:12
Speaker 1: saying is that long chain organic molecules make fatty acids possible,
25:16
Speaker 1: and fatty acids are necessary for zebras, So therefore one
25:21
Speaker 1: step closer to zebras on Mars, you know.
25:24
Speaker 4: And then I'm also just kind of thinking this is
25:26
Speaker 4: just on the fly. But you know, fatty acids I
25:28
Speaker 4: think would make a great name for a jazz band.
25:33
Speaker 1: I think I saw them, but they were naming themselves
25:36
Speaker 1: something else. Yeah, but I know those guys. Yeah, maybe
25:39
Speaker 1: just the name of an album. You know, this is
25:40
Speaker 1: our new album, fatty acids. Yeah, you know. So long
25:46
Speaker 1: chain molecules decane, undecayan, and do decane. That's C ten,
25:54
Speaker 1: C eleven, and C twelve. What does that mean? That
25:57
Speaker 1: means you can stick ten carbon atoms together to make
26:01
Speaker 1: this molecule called decane. See deck means ten, right, and
26:07
Speaker 1: then stick eleven of them together and you get undecane,
26:11
Speaker 1: which means one more than ten. I guess I don't know.
26:14
Speaker 1: I didn't take organic chemistry, and then stick twelve of
26:17
Speaker 1: them together you get do decane, not novacane, dodocaine, and
26:23
Speaker 1: so all of these actually really do lead to fatty
26:28
Speaker 1: acids on the chemical chain. And so you have underconic acid,
26:33
Speaker 1: dodaconic acid, and tritaconic acid, which are all fatty acids
26:38
Speaker 1: which can friends break down into C ten, CE eleven,
26:43
Speaker 1: and C twelve under the right temperature or ultraviolet bombardment conditions.
26:52
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, that means that the MARSK curiosity rover
26:56
Speaker 1: finding the long chain carbon molecule rules organic molecules on
27:01
Speaker 1: Mars could mean doesn't for sure mean by the way,
27:06
Speaker 1: but could mean that these fatty acids once existed on
27:10
Speaker 1: the surface of Mars. And if the fatty acids existed,
27:15
Speaker 1: were there zebras probably not. Were there any kind of
27:18
Speaker 1: life forms that may have once included fatty acids, And
27:23
Speaker 1: so so here's the thing. Fatty acids are fundamental to
27:29
Speaker 1: all life on Earth, and they form cell membranes and
27:33
Speaker 1: they insist assist in other biological functions. They can also
27:38
Speaker 1: potentially be created by non biological sources, but it requires
27:45
Speaker 1: some very specific chemistry in order to get that done.
27:49
Speaker 1: What kind of systems could create in a non biological process, well,
27:52
Speaker 1: maybe hydrothermal vents or maybe some kind of mineral interactions
27:56
Speaker 1: with water. So scientists are you know, they always have
27:59
Speaker 1: another hand. They have one hand, but then on the
28:01
Speaker 1: other hand, on one hand, these are really important to life,
28:05
Speaker 1: and life could have produced them. But on the other hand,
28:07
Speaker 1: there's a possibility that non biological processes could have formed them.
28:13
Speaker 1: But friends, it's an important discovery when what we're doing
28:16
Speaker 1: on Mars is trying to see if the soils of
28:19
Speaker 1: Mars harbor any evidence for past life. And lo and behold,
28:23
Speaker 1: we have the trace compounds that can form fatty acids.
28:28
Speaker 1: That's an important discovery, friend, because you and me were
28:32
Speaker 1: all full of fatty aids.
28:34
Speaker 4: Yeah, I can tell you right now there's a lot
28:36
Speaker 4: of fatty acids out there who have no curiosity about
28:39
Speaker 4: these things, and they're happy to just live oblivious to
28:42
Speaker 4: anything going on on Mars.
28:44
Speaker 1: And again, I think I went to school with some
28:46
Speaker 1: of those. Maybe, so I'm playing in a club one night. Hey,
28:49
Speaker 1: by the way, this story you can check it out
28:51
Speaker 1: on Daily Galaxy dot com. It's not one of the
28:53
Speaker 1: sources we quote often. But I'm happy to do it.
28:55
Speaker 1: They wrote a great story on it. You can also
28:57
Speaker 1: check it out on JPL dot gov, NASA dot JPL,
29:00
Speaker 1: JPL dot NASA dot gov. I think it's the actual order,
29:02
Speaker 1: but JPL's website you can also check it out. There
29:05
Speaker 1: really cool discoveries in Gale Crater by the Mars Curiosity
29:09
Speaker 1: Rover leading to the potential of possible life on Mars.
29:13
Speaker 4: Speaking of NASA dot gov, they got a great story
29:15
Speaker 4: about the cosmic tornado, which sounds like a superhero but
29:18
Speaker 4: it's not, but it should be.
29:21
Speaker 1: I mean, it's gonna be the B side of Fatty Acids.
29:24
Speaker 1: I think that that album we're gonna put out, the
29:27
Speaker 1: B side is going to be called Cosmic Tornado. All right,
29:30
Speaker 1: So what's a cosmic tornado? Well, astronomers loved nicknames, and
29:35
Speaker 1: the astronomers working with the Spitzer space telescope, which was
29:38
Speaker 1: an infrared telescope that flew a little bit more than
29:40
Speaker 1: a decade ago, gave us pictures seen approximately fifteen years
29:43
Speaker 1: ago something like that. It gave us a shot of
29:46
Speaker 1: a really cool and weird phenomenon that the astronomers at
29:50
Speaker 1: the time nicknamed the cosmic tornado. It looks kind of
29:54
Speaker 1: like a funnel shaped object. It looks like it has
29:57
Speaker 1: patterns that swirled. But we just could I see it
30:01
Speaker 1: nearly as well with Spitzer, because even though it was
30:04
Speaker 1: great tech at the time, it's not what we would
30:07
Speaker 1: call modern tech today. Well, what is modern tech today? Oh,
30:12
Speaker 1: you know it, friends, it's the James Webspace Telescope. JWST
30:17
Speaker 1: has gone back and reimaged the object that the Spitzer
30:21
Speaker 1: Space Telescope scientists nicknamed the cosmic Tornado. Now, there was
30:26
Speaker 1: a weird, kind of fuzzy like cherry on top of
30:30
Speaker 1: the ice cream cone feature in the Spitzer image that
30:34
Speaker 1: astronomers couldn't really they couldn't really understand what it was,
30:38
Speaker 1: and they didn't really say definitively we think it's this
30:41
Speaker 1: or that. Sometimes little faint, fuzzy smudges are just hard
30:45
Speaker 1: to determine. But now that we've gone back and reimaged
30:48
Speaker 1: the same object, the cosmic Tornado, which is really, by
30:51
Speaker 1: the way, a hair big horror object. I'll come back
30:54
Speaker 1: and tell you that in a second. A little bit
30:56
Speaker 1: more about HH objects in a moment. But the cherry
30:59
Speaker 1: on top of the cone was actually a distant galaxy
31:03
Speaker 1: that just happened to align with the base of the
31:07
Speaker 1: cosmic tornado, and it gave it a really strange appearance
31:11
Speaker 1: in the Spitzer images. But the JWST images show it
31:16
Speaker 1: very very well, very clearly. You can see the spiral alarms.
31:20
Speaker 1: So it's kind of like bugs on the windshield. When
31:22
Speaker 1: you're looking you're trying to look at the mountains off
31:24
Speaker 1: in the distance, and you have bugs on your windshield.
31:26
Speaker 1: It looks like you might have a giant bug sitting
31:28
Speaker 1: on a mountain. Well, that's not really what's happening. You
31:31
Speaker 1: don't really have a galaxy sitting on the tip of
31:33
Speaker 1: the cosmic tornado. The galaxy is like the distant mountain
31:36
Speaker 1: off in the distance. Cosmic tornadoes like the bug on
31:39
Speaker 1: the windshield nearby. You're looking through the cosmic tornado to
31:43
Speaker 1: see that more distant galaxy. Okay, so that's that part
31:46
Speaker 1: of the mystery. But here's the real mystery. What is
31:49
Speaker 1: the cosmic tornado and what does it tell astronomers about
31:53
Speaker 1: our universe? Well, the cosmic tornado is something called a
31:57
Speaker 1: hair big horro object. Big is not like you know,
32:01
Speaker 1: the band White Snake in the nineties, although they did
32:04
Speaker 1: have big hair. They had very large hair. And I'm
32:08
Speaker 1: not don't hear what I'm not saying. I'm not saying
32:10
Speaker 1: White Stinak didn't have large hair. They did, so did
32:13
Speaker 1: Poison and the Band Rat. Maybe not all of the
32:17
Speaker 1: Band Rat, but many of the members of the Band
32:19
Speaker 1: Rat had very large hair in the nights. Sure, this
32:24
Speaker 1: is a different spelling. This isn't h A I R.
32:27
Speaker 1: This is h R big. That's the difference, like a
32:31
Speaker 1: science y thing and not really anything to do with
32:33
Speaker 1: classic rock. Is nineties classic by now? I think it is.
32:38
Speaker 4: They say, what twenty years, which is strange enough, So yeah,
32:42
Speaker 4: technically early two thousands is, but that's just I can't
32:45
Speaker 4: even process that.
32:48
Speaker 1: So that means like the Googoo Dolls are like.
32:50
Speaker 4: You know, that's technically yes. I mean when you start
32:55
Speaker 4: going better than Ezra is classic rock, something's weird.
33:00
Speaker 1: I mean, I like, get Todd and the Monsters classic rock.
33:03
Speaker 4: When Hoodie and the Blowfish is classic rock, I'm going,
33:06
Speaker 4: what is happening right now?
33:07
Speaker 1: Anyway? Wow? All right? Well, so thank you listeners for
33:12
Speaker 1: going down that path with us. We know that's why
33:14
Speaker 1: you tune into this podcast, that's right, and at that
33:19
Speaker 1: and to find out what a hair big horr object
33:21
Speaker 1: is so hair big is spelled h g R big.
33:23
Speaker 1: That's the name of a scientist Horrow, another scientist. They
33:27
Speaker 1: together investigated a really weird phenomenon called wolf Reya Stars.
33:31
Speaker 1: Wolf Reya Stars are a couple of other scientists whose
33:36
Speaker 1: name got attached to brand new baby stars. Now, a
33:40
Speaker 1: brand new, newly formed baby star tends to have very
33:45
Speaker 1: strong and unstable processes going on in their magnetic fields.
33:51
Speaker 1: And it's unstable in the sense that those magnetic fields
33:53
Speaker 1: get filled with particles from the not quite settled down
33:56
Speaker 1: atmosphere and they jet out in the direction of the
33:59
Speaker 1: magagnetic poles, beams of particles into space like a particle accelerator.
34:06
Speaker 1: That's a hair big horror object, these giant jets coming
34:10
Speaker 1: out of brand new baby stars. That's what the cosmic
34:14
Speaker 1: tornado is. It's a hair big horror object. In fact,
34:17
Speaker 1: it's designated HH forty nine fifty two sides of the
34:22
Speaker 1: same AHH object. So so the cosmic tornado is an
34:26
Speaker 1: indicator of a brand new star information jetting out materials,
34:32
Speaker 1: and this object was very well imaged by James Webspace Telescope.
34:36
Speaker 1: You can check this story out on NASA dot Gov.
34:40
Speaker 1: All of this new imaging gives us really keen insights
34:43
Speaker 1: into what goes on when a star like the Sun
34:47
Speaker 1: is in its infancy and in the process of formation,
34:50
Speaker 1: generating hair, big horror objects coming up.
34:54
Speaker 4: After one more quick break, we're gonna make our way
34:57
Speaker 4: down to Duval County. You know, you know, we'll talk
35:01
Speaker 4: about that next. Electricity the home stadium for the Jacksonville
35:25
Speaker 4: Jaguars not so much, you know, last season. I mean,
35:28
Speaker 4: I'm not hating because my team did worse than them.
35:33
Speaker 4: It was iffy for a while, but the point is,
35:36
Speaker 4: and I actually lost to Jacksonville head to head, no
35:38
Speaker 4: that I think about it. But still, let's talk about
35:41
Speaker 4: Duval County because something cool happened with electricity at EverBank Stadium.
35:48
Speaker 1: So the last time that ever Bank Stadium was electrified
35:55
Speaker 1: was some night game. I guess they played her. I
35:57
Speaker 1: don't know, yeah, yeah, or Maurice Jones Drew is still
36:01
Speaker 1: in the house, or I don't know something, any of
36:03
Speaker 1: that that's true, any of those things. Tom Cowfloy was
36:06
Speaker 1: head coach. I don't know any of that. Yeah, that
36:09
Speaker 1: that could be. It's a real throwback, isn't it. And
36:13
Speaker 1: you know they could be good. They could be better
36:16
Speaker 1: this year. I don't know that's true. I'm gonna wait
36:20
Speaker 1: and see that's true. They're in a division that's certainly winnable,
36:25
Speaker 1: it could potentially win. I mean, how many wins would
36:27
Speaker 1: they have to have to win that division? I'm not sure.
36:29
Speaker 4: I guess the real question is is the contraption throwing
36:33
Speaker 4: electricity across the field gonna be taken away or is
36:36
Speaker 4: it still going to be functional whenever they start playing games.
36:39
Speaker 1: That's the question. Well, when the owners of an NFL
36:44
Speaker 1: franchise have to bring in a space company in order
36:47
Speaker 1: to generate electricity in their stadium, you might be in Jacksonville.
36:52
Speaker 1: There you go. So let's get down to the nitty
36:54
Speaker 1: gritty of this story. There's a space company called Starcatcher
36:58
Speaker 1: and Starcatcher. The main part of their business model is
37:04
Speaker 1: to generate space based solar power. What is space based
37:08
Speaker 1: solar power? Well, imagine we could put solar collectors in
37:12
Speaker 1: orbit around the Earth, where number one, they wouldn't be
37:16
Speaker 1: subject to the diminution of election of power due to
37:21
Speaker 1: the atmosphere of the Earth, and number two, the solar
37:23
Speaker 1: collectors wouldn't be taking up space on the ground. So
37:26
Speaker 1: if you had these clusters of satellites with giant collectors,
37:30
Speaker 1: they could gather the solar power and if they could
37:33
Speaker 1: somehow deliver it to the Earth, then we wouldn't have
37:35
Speaker 1: to put solar panels out in the deserts of Nevada anymore,
37:38
Speaker 1: or in your backyard or whatever. You could just beam
37:40
Speaker 1: down power from space and the atmosphere wouldn't get in
37:44
Speaker 1: the way, all right. So this company called Starcatcher has
37:50
Speaker 1: tested a very important component to all that is, when
37:54
Speaker 1: the satellite collects the solar power, how does it get
37:58
Speaker 1: it down to Earth. Well, the folks at Starcatchers say, hey,
38:02
Speaker 1: we've developed a system to be able to beam this
38:05
Speaker 1: electricity without wires from one location to another. Let us
38:10
Speaker 1: do a demonstration. So they called up the folks at
38:14
Speaker 1: the Jacksonville Jaguars and said, hey, we'd like to use
38:16
Speaker 1: your stadium to demonstrate how we can beam electricity from
38:20
Speaker 1: one side of a football field to another. Jacksonville said,
38:24
Speaker 1: we don't have anything going on right now, go for me.
38:28
Speaker 1: Free agencies wrapping up. They haven't got to the draft yet.
38:30
Speaker 1: You know, we're solid. We've got our quarterback for the season.
38:34
Speaker 1: So we know that's going to be so they said, yeah, sure,
38:38
Speaker 1: you can use it. So Starcatchers set up their systems
38:44
Speaker 1: for demonstrating their ability to beam without wires collected electricity
38:51
Speaker 1: across a great distance, in this case about one hundred
38:54
Speaker 1: yards from goal line to goal line. And so this
38:59
Speaker 1: electricity was actually beamed from the Starcatcher satellite to multiple
39:05
Speaker 1: receivers at the other end zone. I'm not sure who
39:10
Speaker 1: the receivers are for Jacksonville this year, but there were
39:13
Speaker 1: multiple of them on the Starcatcher equipment.
39:15
Speaker 4: That would have been nice if they had kind of,
39:17
Speaker 4: you know, put their jerseys.
39:18
Speaker 1: Maybe you know, some of the.
39:20
Speaker 4: Actual players, you know, put their jerseys on there, like
39:23
Speaker 4: they were the receivers.
39:24
Speaker 1: That would have been a nice touch. Would have been
39:26
Speaker 1: a good touch. And like, you know, Trevor's jersey could
39:28
Speaker 1: have been on the you know, the sending the transmitting device. Yeah,
39:32
Speaker 1: maybe they did that. It just wasn't in the story.
39:36
Speaker 1: Look out, Yeah, I was just looking it up. So anyway, well,
39:41
Speaker 1: the point of this somewhat protracted story that I'm telling
39:44
Speaker 1: is it worn't friends. It worked. So Starcatcher demonstrated the
39:49
Speaker 1: ability to beam solar generated electricity without wires from one
39:55
Speaker 1: side of a football field to another, and that is
39:58
Speaker 1: their first step in rest that not only can they
40:01
Speaker 1: collect solar energy in orbit convert it to electricity, but
40:05
Speaker 1: they can actually beam it down to the ground with
40:08
Speaker 1: the system with the kind of precision necessary for what
40:13
Speaker 1: it's going to take for a satellite to beam electricity
40:17
Speaker 1: from space to a specific collection point on the ground
40:21
Speaker 1: without throwing an interception. So they did that this week.
40:26
Speaker 1: Check out the story on space dot com. And this
40:29
Speaker 1: bodes well for a future where we can generate electricity
40:33
Speaker 1: from space based systems and not all the other things
40:37
Speaker 1: that we're trying down here on the Earth. And perhaps
40:39
Speaker 1: you could charge your Tesla from a satellite. Wouldn't that
40:43
Speaker 1: be interesting? More made of Stars.
40:45
Speaker 4: Right after this, let's talk about Columbus State University's COCOLA
41:09
Speaker 4: Space Science Center.
41:10
Speaker 1: Music under the Dome.
41:10
Speaker 4: We got another one coming up on April first, No
41:13
Speaker 4: really on April first.
41:15
Speaker 1: As it's not a joke. We do have a concert
41:17
Speaker 1: April first. It's our next installment of Music under the
41:20
Speaker 1: Dome and friends, if you've not been into a Music
41:22
Speaker 1: under the Dome concert, make sure and come down and
41:23
Speaker 1: check that one out. April the first. If you're anywhere
41:26
Speaker 1: in the area, or even if you're not, go ahead
41:28
Speaker 1: and travel in the students and faculty of our schwob
41:31
Speaker 1: School of Music, who are incredibly talented and bring in
41:35
Speaker 1: musicians from around the world literally for our program. They
41:39
Speaker 1: will be performing inside the Omnosphere Theater at Columbus State
41:42
Speaker 1: University's Coca Cola Space Science Center. That's our planetarium. They'll
41:46
Speaker 1: be performing inside the planetarium live with original graphics being
41:50
Speaker 1: presented on the dome. Come down and check out this
41:54
Speaker 1: site and sound extravaganza. If you want to know more
41:57
Speaker 1: about tickets, visit the website. Visit www dot cc SSC
42:02
Speaker 1: dot org. Charlie Charlie SamSam Charlie dot org. Find out
42:06
Speaker 1: about that concert and all of our programs, including our
42:09
Speaker 1: Summer Academy by visiting the website www dot cc s
42:14
Speaker 1: SC dot org.
42:15
Speaker 4: Sean and I thank you for listening, and we'll do
42:17
Speaker 4: this again next week. Overhead Door Company of Columbus has
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