Latest / Space News Today / Theia’s Fate, Galaxy Mergers & the Mysteries of Mars’ Atmosphere | Q&A | Space Nuts: Astronomy...

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Theia’s Fate, Galaxy Mergers & the Mysteries of Mars’ Atmosphere | Q&A | Space Nuts: Astronomy... · Space News Today

0:00
Hello again. Thanks for joining us on a
0:02
Q&A edition of Space Nuts. My name is
0:05
Andrew Dunley and today we will be I
0:08
won't Fred will be answering questions
0:10
about uh the former planet known as
0:14
Thea. Uh galaxy merges have come up. Um,
0:18
we go back to Mars uh with a theory
0:21
about Olympus Mons and why only
0:25
hydrogen? That is a question uh that
0:28
comes from, I believe, a 5-year-old.
0:30
We'll deal with all of that today on
0:32
this edition of Space Nuts.
0:35
>> 15 seconds. Guidance is internal. 10 9g
0:40
Ignition sequence start.
0:41
>> Space Nuts. 5 4 3 2
0:45
>> 1 2 3 4 5 5 4 3 2 1
0:47
>> Space Notes astronauts report at Bills
0:50
Good.
0:51
>> And to solve all of those little
0:53
riddles, we're joined again by Professor
0:54
Fred Watson, astronomer at large. Hello,
0:57
Fred.
0:58
>> Hello, Andrew. Very good to see you
1:00
again.
1:00
>> Good to see you, too. We've got a bit of
1:03
weird noise on your line. I I think it's
1:05
probably just the internet being the
1:07
internet, so hopefully that'll go away.
1:09
>> In fact, it just did. So, yeah. There
1:11
you go. solved itself. It must have
1:13
heard me winging.
1:15
>> All is well, I assume.
1:17
>> Uh yeah, we're doing fine. Thank you. Uh
1:19
it's good to join you on the questions
1:22
episode of uh what's this called again?
1:24
Oh, Space Nuts. That's right.
1:26
>> Space idiots. Uh Space Nuts. Yes. Yeah.
1:28
No, they're all good people. Uh we might
1:31
as well jump in straight away to our
1:33
first question, and it comes from one of
1:37
our regular contributors. It's Rusty.
1:39
Good day, Fred and Andrew. It's Rusty in
1:42
Donny Brook. I've been listening to your
1:45
latest episode
1:47
where you look at the relationship
1:51
between Sea and the Earth before the
1:55
collision. And I just want to make sure
1:59
I've got the story straight, so I'll put
2:02
it in my own words. The Earth had a
2:04
buddy named Thea who came a little too
2:08
near. She hit with a splash, then made
2:12
off with a dash. But there's no mooning
2:16
for Thea around here. So, what happened
2:19
to Thea after the collision? The
2:22
theories prior to this revelation said
2:26
Thea had enough kinetic energy to leave
2:29
the solar system altogether. But if the
2:31
orbits were so close, that doesn't seem
2:33
likely. So, it seems to me there's three
2:37
possibilities
2:38
that Thea fell into the sun, which would
2:42
be another amazing feat to get that uh
2:47
sort of precision after the collision.
2:49
Sea picked up a little slingshot energy
2:52
and moved out further and became Mars.
2:57
Now, Mars is a Mars size object after
3:01
all. And the third possibility I can
3:03
think of is that it picked up an
3:06
unlikely amount of kinetic energy and
3:10
became
3:11
planet 9. So, if it did become planet 9,
3:17
it would have a highly eccentric orbit
3:20
because it's too far away for us to
3:22
actually see at the moment. But would
3:26
this orbit then at some stage bring it
3:30
back uh to the inner solar system of its
3:34
origin?
3:35
>> That's it. Hope you guys are well.
3:38
Cheers.
3:39
>> Thanks, Rusty. Hope you're well, too. Uh
3:41
over there in WA. Um what happened to
3:44
Thea? He's come up with some interesting
3:45
theories. Uh quite a few ideas. I I'm
3:48
guessing they can't all be true.
3:52
Um, I think that's right. There's
3:54
there's actually a fourth possibility
3:57
>> uh added to the three that uh that Rusty
4:01
has
4:03
proposed. Uh, and I think that's the one
4:05
that's usually accepted and there's kind
4:07
of evidence for that. Uh, the fourth
4:10
possibility is that the basically was
4:14
absorbed into the earth. the remnants of
4:16
the air uh are actually in the earth's
4:21
mantle. And in fact uh there's something
4:26
called and there are two of these uh a
4:29
large low sheer velocity province in the
4:33
earth's lower mantle and the hypothesis
4:37
is that that is the remnants of the
4:40
year. uh so that we still see the
4:42
evidence of that collision by anomalies
4:45
basically in the earth's mantle which we
4:49
investigate seis you know with
4:51
seismology that's how we know about
4:53
what's going on in the mantle of the
4:55
earth it's how we know about large low
4:57
sheer velocity provinces um uh I'm kind
5:00
of just using the words here because I'm
5:03
not somebody who knows about the inside
5:05
of the planet uh other than the the the
5:07
you know the sketchiest outline uh of a
5:10
core, a mantle and uh and a crust. But
5:13
uh the mantle we know has significant
5:16
structure. Uh and in fact um Manny and I
5:18
have a a good friend um who Nick Pford
5:23
who is a volcanologist and he's somebody
5:26
who looks at these velocity structures
5:29
in the uh in the mantle of the earth uh
5:32
and you know the the upwelling of
5:35
material to form volcanoes and things
5:37
like that. Uh next time we see Nick I
5:39
will ask him about these large scale low
5:42
velocity shear areas uh and uh their
5:46
relationship to the but I think that's
5:48
the consensus uh Rusty that uh the
5:51
impact basically uh resulted in an
5:55
explosion uh which shed uh something
5:59
like um I think one of the suggestions
6:02
is about 70 70%
6:05
uh of the mass of the moon uh may have
6:10
come from thea. I'm actually um um I
6:14
think that might
6:17
let's let's put it this way. Thea is
6:19
responsible for 70 to 90% of the total
6:23
mass of the moon under the classic giant
6:25
impact scenario
6:28
where thea is considerably smaller than
6:30
a proto earth which it would have been.
6:32
Uh the earth was still kind of earthish
6:35
sized. Thea was Marsish sized. Uh but
6:39
the earth would have probably grown a
6:40
bit by absorbing uh the debris from the
6:44
uh remember that the the mass of the
6:46
moon is about 180th of the mass of the
6:48
earth.
6:49
>> Uh so it's a significantly large body
6:51
compared with the other moons in the
6:53
solar system. Uh but uh it's it's
6:56
clearly smaller than uh you know it's
6:58
not Mars sized. And so Rusty's right in
7:02
that that, you know, the remnants of the
7:05
had to do something, but the current
7:07
theory is that they were absorbed by the
7:09
proto Earth and we can still see
7:11
evidence for them.
7:12
>> Yeah. Um
7:15
Okay. So yeah, definitely not likely to
7:18
be P9. That would be a very
7:22
odd kind of occurrence, wouldn't it?
7:25
>> Yeah. Well, yes. Um I I think the
7:28
kinematics don't work. you you you know
7:31
you you you can't give it enough
7:33
velocity and you need you need a lot of
7:36
velocity for it to fall back into the
7:37
sun as well too too much energy that's
7:40
quite an energetic process is is getting
7:43
rid of the orbital velocity of a body to
7:45
make it fall into the sun it's you know
7:47
you need as much energy as you do to get
7:49
it pushed out uh to the outer planet so
7:52
>> yeah um didn't we talk about it once
7:55
before and suggest that remnants of it
7:57
just probably speared off into case
7:59
never to be seen again. I
8:00
>> I'm sure there would have been an
8:02
element of that. Yes. And you know that
8:04
that debris cloud that eventually formed
8:06
the moon probably lost some of its some
8:08
of its uh material content. Uh and it
8:12
there may even be stuff wandering around
8:14
uh in the form of nearear asteroids now
8:16
that are bits and pieces that are left
8:18
over from that. But remember this was
8:20
you know this was within the first
8:23
couple hundred million years of the
8:24
history of the solar system. So, you're
8:27
talking about things that happened a
8:28
very long time ago.
8:30
>> Yeah, indeed. Um, I'm I'm wondering,
8:33
Fred, why we've just got this sudden
8:36
influx of people asking questions in
8:39
poem. This is I'm blaming uh Martin for
8:44
that. Martin Burman Gorvine, you started
8:46
this and now it's taking
8:48
>> I actually think um I I I really liked
8:51
Russ Rusty's one there about the I
8:53
thought that was very nice.
8:54
>> Yeah. I don't know. I think he pushed it
8:55
a bit on one of those one of those
8:57
rhymes. Yeah. Um although there there
9:00
was a regular guest and I'm sure you
9:01
know who I'm talking about. Cole Wilson
9:03
who used to join us on the radio once a
9:04
week to do um bush poetry.
9:07
>> She blew the sheer and he often got
9:09
asked to do shearing demonstrations and
9:11
he had to tell them look I'm not a
9:12
sheer. I can't shear a sheep to save my
9:15
life. It's just my show name. But he he
9:18
used to actually invent words to create
9:22
rhymes.
9:24
It was one of his wonderful traits and
9:27
um yeah uh I used to spend a lot of time
9:29
with Cole. He's a terrific bloke. Um I
9:32
think we've dealt with Rusty's uh
9:35
theories and they were all wrong.
9:38
>> Thanks Rusty.
9:39
>> Thanks Rusty. Great to hear from you.
9:43
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11:11
>> Swift
11:13
base here. The angle has landed.
11:16
>> Space nets.
11:17
>> Let's move on to our next question and
11:19
this one I've lost. Uh here it is. Uh
11:22
this comes from Lena. I am a new
11:24
listener and not as hardcore a space nut
11:27
as most of your audience. Uh it's
11:30
probably a good thing. Uh but I saw an
11:32
article today talking about merging
11:34
spiral galaxies. If the universe is
11:36
expanding, how does something as large
11:38
as a galaxy move toward and merge with
11:42
another galaxy? It seems they should be
11:44
moving further away from each other. Uh
11:46
that comes from Molina in British
11:48
Columbia in Canada. Uh I think we've had
11:53
questions of this ilk before, but it's
11:55
always good to go over it again because
11:57
there's a lot more going on in the
11:59
universe than just, you know, spreading
12:01
out like school children playing what's
12:04
that game where you don't, you know, I
12:06
don't know what you call it. Um
12:08
something you throw a ball and try and
12:09
hit someone in the head. Anyway, go on.
12:12
That's cricket, isn't it?
12:14
>> No. No. Dodgeball. Dodgeball. And And
12:18
there's a whole bunch of games like
12:20
that. Like, uh, Red Rover Crossover. Did
12:22
you ever play that?
12:23
>> Uh, we Oh, no. We used to have a lot of
12:26
fun with that.
12:28
>> Um, anyway, uh, look, Lena's question is
12:31
a great one. And I I guess the the
12:34
simplest answer here is that yes,
12:36
galaxies are big, but they're tiny
12:39
compared with the universe. And so the
12:43
expansion of the universe is something
12:44
that we look at on very large scales.
12:48
You know, you're looking out billions of
12:50
light years uh and seeing this
12:53
expansion. It's actually with today's
12:56
technology, it's one of the easiest
12:57
observations that you can make uh that
13:00
the universe is expanding. Discovered um
13:02
back in 1929 by Edwin Hubble. Uh so uh
13:06
yes so if the universe is expanding, if
13:08
space is getting bigger and naturally
13:11
carrying things further and further
13:12
apart, why are some galaxies coming
13:14
towards each other? And it's because on
13:16
the scale of a galaxy, the expansion of
13:19
the universe is minuscule. Uh and the by
13:23
far the dominant um the dominant process
13:26
is gravity. Uh so um galaxies which yes
13:30
are being carried uh gradually apart by
13:34
the by the expansion of the universe
13:36
when you put them close together their
13:38
own gravity gives them a force that
13:40
pulls them together that's much greater
13:43
uh than the expansion. Um and we
13:46
actually give that a name. We call this
13:48
the peculiar velocities of galaxies
13:51
because it's a velocity peculiar to an
13:52
individual galaxy. And the usual way
13:55
that we describe it and I think we've
13:57
talked about this before on space nuts
13:59
is um if you imagine a river flowing uh
14:04
which represents the kind of expansion
14:06
of the universe and then somebody in a
14:08
boat is moving around on the river.
14:10
They're being carried downstream by the
14:12
river's movement but they've got their
14:14
own movement provided by the boat on the
14:16
water. Uh and it's a bit like that with
14:19
galaxies. They're being carried along by
14:21
the expansion of the universe. But a far
14:23
bigger effect is the way gravity pulls
14:25
them together. So that's what's pulling
14:28
our galaxy and the Andromeda galaxy
14:30
together. Uh it's the gravitational
14:32
force between them. Uh and on the scale
14:35
of the distance between uh Andromeda and
14:38
our own galaxy, which is about two and a
14:39
half million light years. Uh the
14:41
expansion of the universe makes
14:43
virtually no difference. Uh you only
14:45
start really noticing it when you get to
14:47
much bigger bigger scales. Yeah, but
14:49
there will come a point in time where
14:52
all these galaxy merges will finish.
14:55
They'll be done and dusted and the
14:57
universe will keep expanding and
14:59
eventually there'll just be darkness.
15:02
There'll be nothing.
15:04
>> Yeah. If that's assuming dark energy,
15:07
>> a big crunch. Oh, right.
15:08
>> Yeah. I mean, dark energy, we're now
15:10
just starting to see the first signs
15:12
that maybe over the last few billion
15:14
years it's decreased. uh and so the
15:17
acceleration of the universe it's still
15:19
accelerating the expansion is still
15:21
getting faster but it's getting faster
15:24
at a slower rate if I put it that way.
15:27
So the acceleration itself looks as
15:29
though it's declining and that's why
15:31
some people are still talking about the
15:33
big crunch or the gab gib again. Um it's
15:36
uh it's because if it if the
15:38
acceleration eventually goes away and
15:40
becomes a deceleration then yeah you're
15:42
going to get a big crunch.
15:44
>> Yeah. Yeah. It's, you know, could go
15:46
either way at this stage. The way that
15:48
they're talking, we we have witnessed um
15:52
some galaxy merges, haven't we? Doesn't
15:54
our own galaxy actually contain a couple
15:56
of other galaxies that have been sucked
15:59
into our void.
16:00
>> Yeah. Two quite big ones actually. What
16:02
the things we call the large and small
16:04
melanic clouds. Uh they are satellite
16:08
galaxies of our own and they're being
16:09
stripped of their stars by uh our own
16:12
galaxy. its gravitational pool uh and
16:15
will eventually be part of the halo of
16:17
our own galaxy. But we see we also see
16:21
examples in deep space of big galaxies
16:24
actually merging. The most famous is the
16:26
the antenna galaxies, two galaxies which
16:29
are merging and pulling off spiral arms
16:32
off each other quite a fashion.
16:35
>> Yeah, it all happens in slow motion
16:37
though, doesn't it? and um and and and
16:40
when people talk, you know, think about
16:41
galaxy merger merges, they're thinking
16:43
all this um drama and collisions and but
16:46
it it generally doesn't turn out that
16:48
way. Well, you're talking about
16:50
processes that take millions of years
16:52
and uh
16:54
>> yeah, and um you know, it's and and in
16:56
fact galaxies probably when they
16:59
collide, you don't get stars actually
17:01
colliding because there's so much space
17:02
between the stars, but what you get is
17:04
the effect of clouds of gas colliding
17:07
and that spawns new star formation. So,
17:10
uh you might get lots of hot young stars
17:12
being born in a in a galaxy collision.
17:14
>> All right, here's my horrible attempt at
17:17
poetry. It's more of a dance than a
17:18
glance. Boom.
17:20
>> Oh, I like that.
17:21
>> Yeah.
17:22
>> Yeah, it is actually. That's exactly
17:24
what it is. Yeah.
17:25
>> There. There we go. All right. Hope that
17:27
answered your question, Lena. Thanks for
17:29
sending it in and um thanks for
17:31
listening to Space Nuts, which is what
17:33
you're doing right now with Andrew
17:34
Dunley and Professor Fret Watson.
17:38
>> We choose to go to the moon in this
17:41
decade and do the other things, not
17:43
because they are easy, but because they
17:45
are hard. these nuts.
17:48
>> And now our next question comes from
17:52
Kevin and he said, "I've been listening
17:54
with much learning and enjoyment to all
17:57
the previous podcasts. I'm about halfway
17:59
through them." So he's at around 200
18:01
nearly 300, I imagine. So let's just
18:04
wait for him to catch up.
18:08
He says, "Uh, your your discussions of
18:10
Mars and its lack of atmosphere made me
18:13
wonder if perhaps what must have been an
18:16
enormous eruption of Olympus Olympus
18:18
Mons is what might have killed the
18:21
planet or at least its atmosphere." That
18:23
comes from Kevin. Uh so yeah, I I um I
18:28
I'm very impressed by Olympus Mons
18:30
because it is the biggest volcano in the
18:32
solar system and uh it it's staggeringly
18:37
huge. But uh could could a uh an Olympus
18:41
Mons eruption have have stripped the
18:43
atmosphere of Mars?
18:46
>> Um probably not. Uh the I mean the the
18:51
the eruptions of Olympus Mons would
18:53
certainly have sent a lot of gas into
18:57
the atmosphere. Um it it Olympus Mons
19:01
has probably taken a long long time to
19:03
grow. Uh it's you know it would have had
19:07
uh eruptions kind of like some of the
19:09
bigger volcanoes on Earth. Uh and they
19:12
took a long long time. So it's not like
19:15
one big explosion. Um, and that's why
19:18
Olympus Mons is so high. It's because
19:20
it's over a hot spot in Mars's mantle.
19:23
Uh, that just keeps on pushing out
19:26
material or did for a long period of
19:28
time. Uh, and without the plate
19:30
tectonics that carry this the surface
19:32
crust over the hot spot and results in a
19:34
chain of volcanoes like we see in
19:36
Hawaii, uh, it all built this one big
19:39
volcano. So, it's a process that took a
19:42
long time and maybe it did play a role
19:45
in the the changes in Mars's atmosphere.
19:49
But we think the main reason why Mars
19:52
lost its atmosphere is because it is a
19:55
world that is too small to sustain plate
19:58
tectonics. It doesn't have a magnetic
20:00
field. So, the subatomic particles from
20:03
the sun bombard the atmosphere
20:04
continuously. And we think that's one of
20:06
the main reasons why uh why it
20:09
eventually lost lost its atmosphere. I
20:11
mean it's not lost altogether. It's
20:12
still got 6 of a percent of the earth's
20:15
atmospheric pressure at the surface.
20:16
That's enough for winds to blow uh and
20:19
um you know to to sort of blow dust
20:21
clouds onto solar panels of spacecraft
20:23
and things of that sort. But it's
20:26
certainly not an atmosphere that we
20:28
would recognize as being similar to
20:30
Earth's. So um I think I think it's a
20:32
good question actually. Um, I think
20:34
Olympus Mons and the neighboring
20:37
volcanoes, there's there's more than one
20:39
big volcano there. Olympus Mons is the
20:41
biggest. They probably would have
20:43
affected the atmosphere of Mars, but
20:45
they're probably not the root cause
20:46
while why the atmosphere drifted into
20:48
space.
20:49
>> Yeah, it's more likely it was because
20:53
Mars just couldn't hold itself together,
20:55
basically. Um, it it didn't have the uh
20:59
the gravity. Um
21:01
>> it's yeah it it it doesn't have the
21:04
gravity uh to keep it hot enough to
21:08
sustain plate tectonics or a magnetic
21:11
dynamo basically which gives it a
21:13
magnetic field.
21:14
>> Yeah. But Olympus Mons is fascinating
21:17
for a few reasons. I correct me if I'm
21:19
wrong but I think right now as Mars is
21:22
uh Olympus Mons summit actually peaks
21:26
out of the atmosphere. Is that right?
21:28
It's sticking up that high. Uh yeah, no
21:30
it's certainly I mean the atmosphere is
21:33
like Earth's atmosphere. It gradually
21:35
disappears as you go higher. Uh but
21:38
yeah, I mean effectively the summit is
21:40
the pressure will be considerably lower
21:42
there than it is down at the what you
21:44
might call the surface of Mars.
21:46
>> This is one honking big shield volcano
21:49
though, isn't it? Like 21.287
21:52
kilometers in height. Uh 13.2 2 milesi
21:56
or 69,840
21:59
ft.
22:01
Uh, someone's going to climb that one
22:02
day and um, stick a flag in it. Uh, it's
22:05
2 and a half times the elevation of
22:07
Mount Everest. And and this is something
22:09
about Mars that astounds me. It's a
22:11
smaller planet, but all its features
22:14
geographically just make ours look like
22:16
tiddlywinks. Um, and it's its span is
22:20
600 kilometers.
22:22
>> 600 kilometers wide.
22:24
>> Yep. That's that's extra. I just can't
22:26
imagine it. I' I'd love to be able to
22:28
stand there and have a look in my last
22:30
five seconds of life because I didn't
22:32
take my breathing apparatus. But um it
22:35
it is it is an amazing world.
22:38
>> It's got um cliffs as well around its
22:40
base which are pretty spectacular. I
22:42
think they're kilometers high as well.
22:45
So, you know, it's Yes. Quite quite
22:48
quite a an extraordinary world.
22:51
>> Yeah. Well, the caldera itself is 50
22:54
miles across
22:55
>> and you compare that to Kilaweo which is
22:57
like a couple of miles across. It's it's
23:01
amazing. Um, no, I love that question
23:04
and um, yeah, good thinking, but uh,
23:06
probably not. And it it it sort of
23:07
brings back the same argument on Earth
23:10
that people say our global warming is
23:12
caused by volcanoes and cows. It's got
23:14
nothing to do with, you know, the
23:15
billions of cars that we're driving
23:17
around every day. But, uh, I think
23:19
they've proven that's just not the case
23:23
as far as I'm aware. Um, thanks for your
23:26
question, Kevin. Lovely to hear from
23:28
you. Our final question comes from Yuki.
23:32
Hi, I'm Yuki. I am 5 years old and I
23:35
live in Canra. Uh, we listen to your
23:38
podcast nearly every day. My question
23:39
is, why is hydrogen the only element
23:43
that isn't made in stars? Why was
23:46
hydrogen the only element around just
23:48
after the big bang and not others?
23:52
>> Yeah, that's a great question. Uh and uh
23:56
congratulations to Yuki on being able to
23:59
even think of a question like that at
24:01
the age of five because I certainly
24:02
wouldn't have been able.
24:03
>> No, I wouldn't either. I was still
24:05
trying to fix the wheel on my Tonka toy.
24:08
>> Yes, that's right. think I was at that
24:11
level. And the look the the bottom line
24:15
is that hydrogen
24:17
uh it was created in the aftermath of
24:20
the big bang. I think sort of 3 minutes
24:22
after the big bang, the temperature had
24:25
cooled enough that you could start to
24:27
form atoms.
24:29
>> Um and the the atom that was was
24:34
produced was the simplest. It's one
24:35
proton. uh it's the simplest atomic
24:38
nucleus. And so uh that was what
24:43
basically condensed out of the uh of the
24:47
of the aftermath of the big bang as as
24:50
energy became matter. You got protons
24:54
forming and hydrogen is protons. Uh in
24:58
fact in that same period uh you also got
25:03
the start of the process that does
25:05
produce other elements in stars what we
25:08
call nucleioynthesis where the nuclei of
25:12
atoms the centers of the atoms stick
25:14
together um and it did that process did
25:17
start so I think I can't remember the
25:19
percentage it's something like 20% I
25:21
think of the aftermath of the big bang
25:23
is helium which is the next most complex
25:27
at atomic nucleus um and formed by
25:31
hydrogen atoms coming together. But then
25:34
uh the temperature dropped far enough
25:36
that you didn't get the extension of
25:40
that process into the formation of other
25:44
atoms. Um, so it basically had to wait
25:49
until stars started to form because of
25:53
the gravitational pull of these clouds
25:55
of hydrogen together. Uh, that raised
25:58
the temperature again enough to start
26:01
forming other elements. Um, and so that
26:05
that's basically what it's all about.
26:07
It's just the simplest of atoms is the
26:09
hydrogen atom. That is why that was
26:11
created. uh and and you know we nearly
26:14
got more more uh elements being created
26:17
in the big bang uh but only uh helium
26:21
actually there's a bit of lithium and
26:23
other stuff as well tiny amounts uh of
26:27
of other nuclei but um it it it's true
26:31
to say that the star formation star
26:34
formation and the interiors of stars is
26:37
what led to the huge array of elements
26:40
that we see now all the elements of the
26:41
periodic table.
26:43
>> Thanks Ricky. That's a fantastic
26:44
question.
26:45
>> It is.
26:46
>> When when you look at the the the list
26:47
of the top 10 gases in the universe by
26:51
order of concentration,
26:53
hydrogen is far and away the most
26:55
dominant with um 74 to 75% of what they
27:00
describe as barionic mass.
27:02
>> Helium at 24 to 25%. Which leaves almost
27:06
no room for anything else. Oxygen is
27:08
less than 1%, carbon less than half a
27:10
percent, neon less than 0.1. Um, and
27:14
then it just dwindles away. At number
27:17
10, you got sulfur at 0.00 uh 044%
27:21
concentration.
27:23
Um,
27:24
it it it's staggering numbers when you
27:27
really
27:28
>> Yeah. So,
27:30
>> go down the list.
27:31
>> The bottom line is that the the big bang
27:33
hydrogen is still around. In fact, it it
27:36
makes up quite a large percentage of the
27:39
atoms in your body as well.
27:41
>> Yeah. Yeah. I um Well, it's everywhere,
27:44
isn't it? Um and
27:47
>> that that's the bottom line. And and the
27:49
the way the Big Bang happened and
27:51
everything that went on afterwards, um
27:54
you know, if one smidgy little thing
27:56
didn't happen, we probably wouldn't be
27:58
here.
27:58
>> Yeah,
27:59
>> that's right. H it's a scary thought but
28:02
then again uh there's so much we don't
28:04
know.
28:06
>> People believe in believe in multiverses
28:08
because um they say you know the
28:11
conditions are exactly right for life to
28:14
form in our universe and they might not
28:16
have be.
28:17
>> Yeah.
28:17
>> So maybe there are lots of other
28:18
universes where life didn't form.
28:22
>> Well yeah that the the mathematics
28:24
supports the theory, doesn't it?
28:26
>> Yeah.
28:28
>> Oh gosh. It's the brain hurting part of
28:31
the show just happened. So anyway, um
28:33
yeah,
28:34
it it just keeps us thinking and it
28:36
keeps us looking for answers and that's
28:38
what it's all about. Yuki, great to hear
28:40
from you and hope all is well in Canra.
28:43
And a reminder, if you would like to
28:45
send us questions, uh we welcome them
28:47
with open arms. You can send them
28:49
through our website spacenuts.io
28:52
and just click on the ask me anything
28:54
link at the top. it says AMA and we will
28:58
do our best. Don't forget to tell us who
29:00
you are and where you're from and we
29:03
will um put your question on if we
29:05
haven't had it before. And even if we
29:07
have, we might uh revisit them. We do
29:10
that from time to time. Uh keep them
29:12
coming. And if you haven't asked a
29:14
question before and you've always wanted
29:15
to, please send it in. We we'd love to
29:18
hear from you. And um we're just about
29:20
done. Fred, thank you very much.
29:23
>> Uh great pleasure, Andrew. always good
29:25
and uh hopefully we'll chat again soon.
29:28
>> I hope so. That'll be good. Professor
29:30
Fred Watson, astronomer at large and
29:32
thanks to Hugh in the studio who didn't
29:34
have a hydrogen problem, but he did have
29:36
a methane problem, but he'll be out of
29:38
emergency surgery very, very soon,
29:40
hopefully for next week's episode. And
29:41
for me, Andrew Dunley, thanks for your
29:42
company. Catch you on the next episode
29:44
of Space Nuts. Bye-bye.
29:47
>> Space Nuts. You'll be listening to the
29:49
Space Nuts podcast
29:52
>> available at Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
29:55
iHeart Radio, or your favorite podcast
29:58
player. You can also stream on demand at
30:00
byes.com. This has been another quality
30:03
podcast production from byes.com.